Rachel Hawley's DevExpress Community Blog

July 2010 - Posts

• CodeStock 2010: Dane Morgridge on the Community Megaphone Podcast

  Community Megaphone is a one-stop-shop for community events in the USA. A valuable resource set up by Microsoft Developer Evangelist, Andrew Duthie, it has been added to by the recent inclusion of the Community Megaphone Podcast – pretty neat. The podcasts aim to highlight community talent that you might not find at the likes of TechEd or PDC, but who are active in the developer community. The hosts hope that by introducing developers to their local community speakers it will encourage more techies to participate in their local user groups and code camps. Recent guests on the Community Megaphone Podcast have included Stephen Bohlen, who many of you will know from the DevExpress forums, and Kevin Griffin, who runs the Hampton Roads .NET User Group. Check out how Dane’s embryonic idea for a podcast ended up on one of the developer community’s most powerful resources, and don’t forget make time to listen to the shows on www.communitymegaphone.com.   Posted Jul 27 2010, 12:47 PM by Rachel Hawley (DevExpress) with no comments Filed under: Community, Conferences, CodeStock 2010

• CodeStock 2010: The Women in Technology Debate

  Last month Gary and I were excited to get the opportunity to travel to CodeStock in Knoxville, TN. We experienced some serious Southern hospitality en route and even made time for some trekking in the Smoky Mountains. I wish I could spend some time telling you about the fantastic Jamaican brunch I had one afternoon, but this post instead is about a topic that cropped up a couple of times at the event – the role of women in the technology field. The notion of women in tech was subtly demonstrated throughout the conference thanks to the official CodeStock t-shirt. Inspired by Rosie the Riveter, it prompted Rachel Appel to make reference in her keynote to her aunt, who was a real-life Rosie. Rachel’s aunt was an example of the strong, self-motivated women who paved the way for their daughter’s and granddaughter’s to excel in all fields – including science and technology. I know that this is a contentious topic, and many people have the opinion that if you’re good at your job it doesn’t matter if you’re male or female. However, not everyone is as advanced in their way of thinking as those people are. I urge you all to listen to Jennifer Marsman and Rachel Appel’s tales from the field. And for those of you who can stomach a bit of heated discussion, check out this blog post from Nicole Sullivan. If you pay particular attention to the comments you’ll see some eye-opening responses from female and male developers alike.    Jennifer is one of the Heartland’s busiest Microsoft Developer Evangelists. After working as a developer in Redmond, WA she moved back home to Michigan and is now committed to her local community. Everyone I speak to holds both her and her technical skills in very high regard. I have long admired Rachel Appel as a vibrant, independent and vastly intelligent community spokesperson. We’ve known each other for over 4 years and I was grateful to finally get a chance to meet her at CodeStock. You can find out more about Jennifer and Rachel on their blogs: Jennifer Marsman: http://blogs.msdn.com/jennifer/ Rachel Appel: http://rachelappel.com/ Take a look at the video we recorded and remember to leave your comments on the Women in Technology debate. We talked about: What it means to be a woman in technology in 2010 Experiences in the field What skills women bring to the technology sector Why the idea of women in technology causes such volatile debates Enjoy! Posted Jul 27 2010, 11:38 AM by Rachel Hawley (DevExpress) with 1 comment(s) Filed under: Community, Conferences, CodeStock 2010, Women In Technology

• CodeStock 2010: Mike Neel says CodeStock is his Red Rock

  CodeStock is a conference that successfully mixes great content, open spaces discussions and top speakers with an intangible, yet obvious, sense of hospitality and genuine friendliness. You arrive knowing only a few people, and you leave having met a bunch of great people that you know you’ll stay in touch with. At an early bird cost of $55 a ticket, CodeStock is great value for money, giving you access to some fantastic speakers like Seth Juarez who gave a mind-bending session on machine learning.  For those of you who follow me on Twitter you’ll know that I had a great time with Seth and touted him as “The Next Big Thing” after I returned from Tennessee. It appears that Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell agree. Seth recorded a show for DotNetRocks on the same topic. Mike Neel did a great job of putting together this year’s CodeStock, and major kudos to him for doing all of this while both planning and having his wedding to the beautiful Cicelie. I sat down with Mike to chat about the event and how it feels to be at the helm of this community event for a third year. Take a look and see what Mike thinks gives CodeStock its unique flavour, and get information on how to find out about CodeStock 2011. Posted Jul 27 2010, 11:16 AM by Rachel Hawley (DevExpress) with no comments Filed under: Community, Conferences, CodeStock 2010