Alan Dean

CTO, Developer, Agile Practitioner

Photograph of Alan Dean

Monday, November 24, 2008

DDD7

I thought that Developer Day 7 was another resounding success. As usual, the organisers deserve kudos for arranging what has to be the premier UK Community event.

If you were an attendee, please take the time to fill in the feedback - the speakers all appreciate this a great deal.

I was in the first tranche of presentations in Memphis at 09:30 and all the seats were taken (typically a good sign). It was the first time I have given the "Separating REST Facts from Fallacies" talk to an audience and was pleased that I timed it right, completing it with a little under 5 minutes for questions. It is a bugbear of mine when speakers overrun their timeslot so I take this very seriously in my own presentations.

There were surprisingly few questions at the end but those that were asked were good. I had prepped for a number of questions that I had expected to be faced with, but wasn't. One of my friends who was in the audience reported overhearing a conversation where the comment was made that the presentation was 'religious'. If that meant that they could tell that I believe in REST where appropriate, then that is good. If that meant that they felt that the presentation was unbalanced, that is not so good and would be surprising as I made a particular effort in the talk to avoid setting up the typical dogma of "REST Good, WS-* Bad".

In any event, the Channel 9 folk were there to video all the sessions this time so you will be able to judge for yourself. Historically, only a limited number of sessions were recorded. I don't yet know where the videos will be hosted but I will announce when I find out. It is going to be interesting, to say the least, to see myself giving a presentation as I haven't previously done so. I imagine that I will be squirming in my seat and will be my own worst critic.

The Geek Dinner in the evening was great fun. Thanks to Zi Makki for organising that. The conversation is always stimulating and I had a couple of very interesting discussions about REST and other subjects. I really do enjoy the networking aspects of these conferences - a chance to meet and talk with others who are as passionate about technology and self-improvement as I am.

Phil Winstanley and Craig Murphy have both pushed up their photos to Flickr (I didn't take any).

1 comment:

chrishayuk said...

Heya Alan,

I really enjoyed your session, I thought I new about REST, turned out I really didn't :)

I didn't think it was religous but I really liked the point that REST is what roy says it is. I guess if it is religous, does that make Roy God?

Anyways, I learned loads and a REST book is now on my purchase list. Looking forward to having you in Cambridge