CFML: Into the Box 2023

Howdy partner:

Well here's something interesting (well: to me, anyhow). I will be attending the Into the Box conference in Houston, TX in May (17th - 19th). This has come about due to a very kind gesture from Luis / Ortus Solutions. Thank-you so much for this!

I know nothing about Houston - I have been through the airport on the way to somewhere else a coupla times, and that's it - so am getting there a coupla days early to have a look around and make sure the local craft beer bars are patronised.

The schedule of Into the Box itself looks pretty good too, and cover a lot of bases other than just the CFML / Boxiverse side of things. I see "testing" and "TDD" mentioned a coupla times in the schedule, so will be in my element.

The best thing about conferences though is to get to put faces to names, and meet people properly. I might be a surly anti-social type, but I really value the friendships I have built from meeting people at industry conferences, and having an agendaless chat with them over a beer or a watercooler, and got to know them better. I do hope to catch up with a bunch of people from the community who I know only as words appearing in a chat app / forum / etc. And hopefully re-meet some familiar faces too.

And the proof is in the pudding on this "conference socialising" thing: after saying farewell to Houston on the Sunday after the conference, I'm heading over to North Carolina for a few days to hang out with Dan & Jennette Skaggs (and family). I first met D & J @ CF.Obective() (or maybe Dev.Objective()?) many years ago, and we've become really good friends since then. And having had them come visit me on my side of the pond a coupla times; it's my turn to come see their part of the world. I can't wait.

So come and say "G'day" if you see me around the conference, and let's talk about... whatevs. And maybe let's go for a beer :-D

Y'all come back now, hear? (*)

--
Adam

---

(*) yeah, all right, enough of that.

Come on Adobe: bring Anit to CFSummit

G'day:
OK ColdFusion community: time to voice your will again.

Brad started this conversation off:

Hey @anitkumar85, will you be at CF Summit this year? You're one of the most visible on the CF team, so I'd love to meet you cc/ @ColdFusion
— Brad Wood (@bdw429s) September 12, 2014

And the notion needs support: currently Anit is not attending CFSummit, and that's not really on.

Better(?) late than never: CF.Objective() recap

G'day:
I'd kinda decided it was too late in the piece to write this article now, given CF.Objective() was a month ago. Sorry for not writing it up in a timely fashion, but I had a motivation block for a coupla weeks after returning from it. The timing of this blockage was coincidental, and nothing to do with CFO itself.

However I am going to offer some feedback now due to a comment from Jason Dean y/day:

90 ppl in my session at #cfobjective. 14 filled out a session survey. Overall, surveys weren't completed. What does it take? #disappointed
— Jason Dean(12Robots) (@JasonPDean) June 11, 2014

What I took away from Scotch on the Rocks

G'day:
I'll just run through the presentations I attended, and offer some uninspired commentary on them. Sorry but I'm pants at reviewing things... I only ever remember concepts rather than details in these things.

CF.Objective(): what I will/might go see

G'day:
Bloody hell... this is proving to be a bit of a mission. There are so many good presentations and presentations I feel I should go to and a lot of overlap & different twists on similar content. What I do know is my brain is going to be busy. Note to self: no hangovers. Do not put yourself in a situation in which you end up with a hangover (there, that's out of the way, I can ignore that idea now).

Well that was unexpected

G'day:
Well... once again I am gobsmacked by the community, and in a good way.

SotR14: my schedule

G'day:
A while ago I did an article on what I would like to go see, based on the likely sessions, but giving no thought to the schedule (which was not out at the time): Scotch on the Rocks: which sessions am I going to? (2014 version).

Now the schedule is up, so I'm able to revisit my initial thoughts and formulate a plan of attack.

Shamelessful plug

G'day:
I'm not quite sure what I think about this one, and not sure how to word things. But one thing I do know how to articulate: Gavin's a nice bloke.

Scotch on the Rocks: which sessions am I going to? (2014 version)

G'day:
The SotR crew have got the first pass of the Scotch on the Rocks 2014 schedule posted, so I'm gonna go through what I think I might go have a look at. Obviously the schedule is still subject to change, as is my whim. Right... from top to bottom...

Vote for CF.Objective() presentations... even if you're not attending

G'day:
There was chatter doing the rounds on Twitter a few days back that there's perhaps not as much community uptake as far as voting for what presentations will be given at CF.Objective() 2014.

I've voted for a few presentations, even though I'm unlikely to be attending the conference. I think it's important and useful information for the conference organisers to know what sort of thing the broader community is interested in as far as technology topics go.

Go have a look at the cf.Objective() Call For Speakers 2014 page, and vote for stuff you find interesting. Unfortunately the UI is a bit obstructive, and not a great UX, but stick with it. Also worthy of note is that a lot of people seem to be missing that there is a horizontal scroll bar... most of the presentations are listed off the right-hand side of the screen. So vote 'n' scroll.

As a taster / tempter, here's the list of presentations I'd attend if I was going (in order of left to right ;-)

CFML: CFCamp seems real now

G'day:
This is a bit of a time filler because the Central Line is screwed so I can't get home in time for my Skype with my boy, so need to stick around the office and do it from here. Damn you, TFL! Not to worry.

CFCamp is all of a sudden seeming very real. Mike touched base with me a coupla days ago and has organised my hotel, and EasyJet reminded me today (third time) I had to actually check-in if I wanted to fly with them on Sat. I'm still really really flattered that the CFCamp peeps are comping me to the thing.


There's been a couple of programme changes since I last mentioned what I was gonna look at.

Scotch on the Rocks 2014: tickets now on sale

G'day:
I've got no connection to Scotch on the Rocks other than having attended a few times in the past. But it's a great web tech conference, and I'll be going to it again next year.

They've just put tickets on sale.

CFCamp: what am I seeing on Day 2?

G'day:
I'm sitting in the pub in Portumna, having completely my paternal input for the day, and just killing time until it occurs to me what else to do. And drinking Guinness (end of pint one). It will distress my mate Brian - with whom I was discussing this at the pub in London on Thurs - that I truly cannot detect a difference in a pint of Guinness served in London, and one served in Ireland. That said, they're both good.

I've not been doing any interesting coding in the last couple of days, and I am still digesting my last Ruby tutorial, and don't even have anything to complain about (well, OK, I could come up with something, I'm sure, but I'm in a happy mood so will leave that for next week ;-).  What I am is jealous of all the chatter from people reporting on the first day of NCDevCon, and the ongoing chatter about StrangeLoop over in the States. But of course we (in Europe) have our own conference coming up: CFCamp. As I wrote earlier I'm off to it, and I've given you my thoughts on which sessions I'll be attending (probably) on Sunday/Monday.

And now for Day Two...

CFCamp: what am I gonna go check out (on Sunday/Monday)

G'day:
So I'm off to CFCamp, thanks to Mike Hnat and the other sponsors who pitched in to get me over there (I've said it already, but I'll say it again, and I'm gonna keep saying it: you guys rock). But what am I gonna go see whilst I'm there?

CFCamp 2013

G'day:
Yesterday Michael Hnat, organiser of CFCamp dropped me a line, and made me an offer I could not refuse...

Scotch on the Rocks: recap

G'day:
I didn't do a daily update of SotR like I did at cf.Objective(), instead sending Twitter updates in "real time" as things occurred to me. So if you want to know my general thoughts of the sessions I attended, have a look through my Twitter history. I was a bit haphazard as to whether I had space to include a #sotr13 tag, but they should be easy to spot amongst the rugby / cricket / environmentalism (Rob Glover, I'm looking at you ;-) chatter. In summary of those later three: NZ lost the cricket (although won the series), won the rugby, and I withdrew (mostly in despair) from the environmentalism discussion.

What thoughts was I left with for Scotch on the Rocks? In no particular order:

Scotch on the Rocks: which sessions am I going to?

G'day:
Meself and a bunch of the bods from work are off up to Edinburgh for Scotch on the Rocks 2013 next Weds. I should be lurking about from about 2pm, I guess.

I've not even looked at the schedule yet, but "what are you going to see?" came up over cheap-steak-lunch-at-'Spoons just now, so I figured I'd better find out.

So in a similar vein to my cf.Objective() article on the subject... here's my thoughts on which sessions I might go it.

cf.Objective() day 2&3 - brain dump

G'day:
My health faded a bit on Fri & Sat (some of this was self-induced - especially Saturday - but my man flu was getting the better of me), so I'll roll the latter two days into one article.

cf.baseball()

G'day:
Apropos of not much, here's a badly exposed photo of the cf.objective() bods who have come along to the Twins v Red Sox game:

What a very very shady bunch they are. Update: I've changed to a much better photo... one in which one can actually tell who the people are!

We're currently sitting at the bar at the game. Great fun, great new friends, great conference.

Time for another pint...

--
Adam

OK, another handy new Railo feature

G'day:
I have some downtime @ cf.Objective() at the mo', so looking at some of the stuff Gert showed us in his presentation. It's that or have a beer... but it's perhaps slightly too early for that. Maybe... hmmm. Anyway, whilst I mull over having a beer, I have this article in my head, so I'll type it in.