Speaker Series
Dennis Stevens - Video
Yesterday we had Dennis Stevens speak here at Software GR. Check out Carl Erickson's write up here. Video here.
Dennis Stevens: The Agile Program Manager - Organizational Leadership in the Value Driven Enterprise
Who: Dennis Stevens
When: December 14, 2010
For over 25 years, Dennis has been passionate about helping organizations deliver technology that makes a difference for their business. For 15+ years, he has served in enterprise project management and leadership roles. He advocates blending responsible Lean and Agile Software Project Management with traditional project management practices in the Enterprise. He was a significant contributor to Microsoft’s business architecture offering, has earned certification as a Project Management Professional, in Lean Value Stream mapping, as an OPM3 Professional, as a Certified Scrum Master, and as a Kanban Coach.
Dennis frequently speaks at local events and international conferences about Enterprise Agile Project Management and writes extensively, including publication in Harvard Business Review (“The Next Revolution in Productivity,” Harvard Business Review, June 2008) and The Cutter Consortium ( “Re-thinking the Agile Enterprise,” Cutter Consortium Executive Report, July 2009). Dennis is supporting the advancement of Agile Project Management as a leader in PMI's Agile Community of Practice and on the working group exploring how PMI can best support Agile.
Dennis served in the USMC, attended FSU on a violin scholarship, helped coach the 2008 12U Girl's AAU National Champions, and has a degree in Organizational Psychology and Development.
Chris McMahon: The Audience Experience and Other Frontiers
Who: Chris McMahon
When: October 26, 2010
Last month we had a great start with Steve Smith! If you missed it, check the video, and be sure not to miss our October meeting:
About the presentation
The current state of User Experience work in software development is missing critical knowledge and critical conceptual tools necessary for understanding how large numbers of users interact with applications in the public arena. In this talk, Chris will point out exactly what is missing, and will suggest some approaches for improving that understanding. Along the way, he will mention some other unusual and unexpected areas of work that will be influencing software development in the very near future.
About the speaker
Chris McMahon is a software tester and a former professional musician. His work has appeared in Better Software magazine, stickyminds.com, SearchSoftwareQuality.com, Software Test and Performance magazine, and in the book Beautiful Testing, among other places. He founded the Writing About Testing peer conference where he lives in Durango, Colorado. He can be eccentric.
Steve Smith, Ordered List: Stop Being an Idiot
Video of this talk is available on Screencast.
Who: Steve Smith, Ordered List
When: September 28, 2010
We're back! This September marks the beginning of Software GR's eighth year, and we're off to a great start. We're starting off with a bit of a change: we'll be recording all of our talks this season and posting them here. You can see the "Meeting Recordings" widget to the right. We'd love to have you at our meetings, but if you can't make it in person, be sure to check out the video.
And don't forget: our sponsors give us the support we need to do all this!
About the presentation
Your visitors aren't stupid. Sure, they may be inexperienced with technology. They may be frustrated with their lack of experience. They may even be embarrassed by it. But they're not stupid. We'll discuss engaging your visitors through design and workflow, and how your software can be respectful, attentive, and even helpful.
About the speaker
Steve architects user interfaces and web designs. But it’s about more than just design, as he brings a passion for simplicity and usability.
He is a recognized authority on front-end development and interface design. He is an entrepreneur, founding Ordered List, and co-founding Sidebar Creative, both of which are outlets for his professional work. And as an author, public speaker, and University of Notre Dame professor, he is passionate about sharing his knowledge with others.
He lives in South Bend, Indiana with his wife and two children. In the rare times he’s not working, he’s either on the golf course, making home-brewed beer, or spending time with the family.
The Fall 2010 Software GR season is almost here!
Thanks for waiting patiently over this hot, hot summer, everyone! Things may have seemed quiet but I assure you that we haven't been taking a break. We've been working hard to make the next season of Software GR a success. As always, we'll continue to bring in the best speakers from around the world to share their experience with Grand Rapids. Below are just a few of the events from the upcoming season, and remember: Software GR events are always free to attend, thanks to our sponsors.
Steve Smith: is a recognized authority on front-end development and interface design. He is an entrepreneur, founding Ordered List, and co-founding Sidebar Creative, both of which are outlets for his professional work. And as an author, public speaker, and University of Notre Dame professor, he is passionate about sharing his knowledge with others.
Chris McMahon: When I'm not testing software he's gone to the canyons or the mountains. Chris recently helped organize the Writing About Testing conference and will be sharing some of the great observations that came out of it for those of us who couldn't make it.
Joe Stump: CTO and co-founder of SimpleGeo. Before that Joe was Lead Architect for Digg. In his spare time he likes to run, bike, swim, play disc golf, go hiking, and snowboard. He appreciates Oxford commas.
Walter Bright: Engineer, Digital Mars. Creator of the D programming language. Walter Bright graduated from Caltech in 1979 with a degree in mechanical engineering. He worked for Boeing for 3 years on the development of the 757 stabilizer trim system. He then switched to writing software, in particular compilers, and has been writing them ever since.
That's just a few of upcoming events - keep an eye on our web site as we post the complete schedule! And in addition to that, we're also very proud to be presenting these other fantastic west Michigan tech events:
BarCampGR: This is the fifth BarCamp gathering in Grand Rapids, and it is free. It is an intense event with discussions, demos, and interaction from attendees, usually centered around design & technology topics. If you're not familiar with what BarCamp is, we recommend reading the rules. BarCamp GR is on Saturday August 20th at the Devos Communications Center, Calvin College.
GLSEC: Stay tuned for details on the next Great Lakes Software Excellence Conference. We'll be gathering on April 16th, 2011 at the Prince Center, Calvin College. We've got a really great show lined up. Keep an eye on the GLSEC web site for details as their finalized.
Thanks to all of you for your support this far, and we're looking forward to the upcoming year. Hopefully you are too!
Ryan Montgomery: Google AppEngine::DataStore
Who: Ryan Montgomery
When: May 25, 2010
Google's AppEngine can enable developers to build awesome apps quickly. However, building on AppEngine means you have to work with the Datastore, and you can get into trouble quickly if you don't understand how it works. The rewards are great, but so is the learning curve. This is especially true if you've never worked with a NoSQL database before. AppEngine forces you to consider scaling from the beginning and the API's can range in available functionality. There are important differences between both the Python and Java implementations and the imposed limitations can seem arbitrary at first. All of this can be daunting, so join me as we dive deep into the AppEngine::Datastore and discover all the power it has to offer.
Have an AppEngine topic you're curious about? Submit questions online with Google Moderator here.
About the speaker
Ryan Montgomery is a local Grand Rapids web developer who has years of experience building web based applications in .NET for the Material Handling industry. In more recent years Ryan has migrated his attention to building apps with Python and JRuby on Google's AppEngine. You can discover the Meaning of it all on his blog or learn more about Interwebteknology on his technical blog. Catch him in person at the GR Python Users Group.
Bob Walsh: "Becoming a IT Linchpin"
Who: Bob Walsh, 47 Hats
When: April 27, 2010
The bad news is being a commodity IT person means your job or skills are ever closer to being outsourced or automated. The good news is social media and the web as it's own economy, society and culture have reached the point where you can define, focus and build your web-wide reputation as an indispensable IT person beyond any single service, beyond your current job or next contract gig.
In this talk, I'll be focusing on beyond why you should be on Twitter or Facebook, beyond the ten best tips on blogging, etc., to look at the road ahead for online professionals of all stripes. What online/social media core strategies work to make you indispensable? How do you build levels of interaction with your social network to be a valued part of that network and still get work done?
Whether you've been a sysadmin for the same company for a decade or in the midst of launching your own startup, becoming indispensable, being a linchpin, is a key component to developing an option-rich future for yourself.
About the speaker
Bob Walsh is the author of The Web Startup Success Guide, co-hosts the Startup Success Podcast and founded http://startuptodo.com (a training/productivity community for startups and microISVs).
Over the years Bob has written 4 other books for microISVs and startups including Micro-ISV: From Vision to Reality, presented at both European Software Conference and the Software Industry Conference, and a moderator at both Answers.Onstartups.com and Joel On Software Business of Software forum.
His blog, 47hats, covers topics interesting to microISVs and startups. Bob provides consulting services to startups and microISVs including web site copywriting, market positioning, social media and product strategies.
Charles Nutter: JRuby in 2010: Where We've Been, Where We're Going
Who: Charles Nutter, Engineyard
When: March 23, 2010
JRuby has changed a lot in the past year. With a new focus on Java integration, the entire world of Java libraries has opened up to Rubyists. The night will include a presentation by Charles Nutter followed by discussion about all things JRuby, such as:
- invokedynamic and method combinators
- JRuby on the desktop
- challenges of implementing a dynamic language on the JVM
- what JRuby can do to help enterprise IT and existing J2EE applications
- JRuby on Android
- whatever else the audience wants to hear about
About the speaker
Charles Oliver Nutter has spent the past 4 years making JRuby into an oustanding Ruby implementation. Now he's working to make JRuby a first-class JVM language, with all the Java integration features users expect. Charles blogs at blog.headius.com.
Dr. Richard Enbody: "Secure-bit: Hardware buffer-overflow prevention"
Who: Dr. Richard Enbody, MSU
When: February 23, 2010
Buffer-overflow attacks persist and there have been many solutions proposed -- all with weaknesses. We mark all external data as 'tainted' and refuse to jump to any 'tainted' addresses. By using hardware to support this approach we are able to prevent all buffer-overflow attacks that culminate in jumping to a user-supplied address, i.e. the nasty ones. In addition, our approach is backward compatible for user code at the machine-code level, i.e. no recompile or change in user software is needed. Furthermore, there is no way to 'untaint' data once it has been marked 'tainted.'
About the speaker
Dr. Enbody received his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in 1987 and has been in the Computer Science and Engineering Department at Michigan State University since then. He has published research in a variety of areas including design automation, parallel processing, computer architecture and security. He is currently co-authoring an introductory computer science text using Python -- due in February. When not teaching he enjoys wilderness camping, hockey, and squash.
Eric Sink: Version Control
Who: Eric Sink, Source Gear
When: January 26, 2010
In his day job he is a software developer at SourceGear, a company which sells source control (aka “version control,” “SCM”) tools for small and midsize software teams.
In October 2002, SourceGear was named one of the fastest growing companies in the nation by Inc magazine.
By original training, he is a software programmer. He has a B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He founded the AbiWord project and was responsible for much of the original design and implementation. The title on his business card says “Software Craftsman.”
Prior to founding SourceGear, Eric was at Spyglass (now part of OpenTV) for around five years, where he served as Project Lead for the browser team. They built the original versions of the browser you now know as “Internet Explorer.”