{ |one, step, back| } http://onestepback.org/index.cgi Jim Weirich's Blog en-us { |one, step, back| } http://onestepback.org http://onestepback.org/images/jwface.gif Rails Conf 2008 Summary http://onestepback.org/index.cgi/Tech/Conferences/RailsConf2008/RailsConf2008Summary.red <h2>Conference Summary Video</h2> <p>Wow, what a great conference! There was a lot of energy flowing at RailsConf this year. Overall I&#8217;d rate this year as head and shoulders above last year. I&#8217;m not going cover much here, but will direct you attention to a <a href="http://www.railsenvy.com/2008/6/2/Railsconf-videos">Rails Envy VideoCase</a> that Greg Pollack put together. The video is a series of very short interviews with a number of presenters giving summaries of their own talks. The only downside with the video is that I wish it was available <em>before</em> the conference. I see there were a number of interesting talks that I missed.</p> <h2>Followup on the &#8220;Modelling Dialogue&#8221;</h2> <p>Joe O&#8217;Brien, Chris Nelson and myself did a dialogue style presentation on the difference between object modelling and data modelling. The most common question I got after the talk was requests for book titles to learn more about object oriented modelling. Here are the books that Joe, Chris and I have recommended:</p> <ul> <li><em><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Domain-Driven-Design-Tackling-Complexity-Software/dp/0321125215/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&#38;s=books&#38;qid=1212463473&#38;sr=1-1">Domain Driven Design</a></em>&#8212;Eric Evans</li> <li><em><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Software-Development-Principles-Patterns-Practices/dp/0135974445/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&#38;s=books&#38;qid=1212502027&#38;sr=1-1">AgileSoftware Development, Principles, Patterns, and Practices</a></em>&#8212;Bob Martin</li> <li><em><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Refactoring-Improving-Existing-Addison-Wesley-Technology/dp/0201485672/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&#38;s=books&#38;qid=1212465268&#38;sr=1-1">Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code</a></em>&#8212;Martin Fowler</li> </ul> Artichoke Music Rocks http://onestepback.org/index.cgi/Tech/Conferences/RailsConf2008/ArtichokeMusic.red <p style="float: right; padding: 0.5em;"><a href="http://www.artichokemusic.com/index2.htm"><img border="0" src="http://www.artichokemusic.com/LogocommUnity-sm.jpg"/></a></p> <p>The Musician&#8217;s Birds of a Feather gathering at RailsConf was great. We had a room full people, two guitars, a ukulele, a flute, several harmonicas and an improvised drum set. Unfortunately, one of the guitars was an electric travel guitar which had a dead battery, therefore no way to really hear it.</p> <p>However, the other guitar was a nice Epiphone accoustic which was passed from player to player. It became the quickly became the basis for most of the music performed that night.</p> <p>I want to thank <a href="http://www.artichokemusic.com/index2.htm">Artichoke Community Music</a> for supplying the guitar. Travelling with a guitar by plane is a big pain, so I arrived with nothing to bring to the music <span class="caps">BOF</span>. I called several local music stores looking for a guitar that I could rent for an evening. Artichoke music said they had a &#8220;not-for-profit&#8221; guitar that they would let me borrow for a day. Not many stores would do that for an out-of-town stranger.</p> <p>So, if you&#8217;re in Portland looking for a good guitar store, check out the great people at <a href="http://www.artichokemusic.com/index2.htm">Artichoke Community Music</a>.</p>