Blog
March 12th, 2008
Today, at SXSW, I hosted a panel discussion on the "Secrets of JavaScript Libraries." We set out to discuss the behind-the-scenes nitty-gritty code that powers the universal features of the most popular JavaScript libraries.
I think the presentation went quite well. I think we could've, easily, done a 2 hour talk with all the content that we had (we had to chop off, at least, two sections at the end in order to take questions). Here are the slides:
Some of the slides will be a little bit tricky considering that they rely on someone talking about them - I'll be sure to do an audio-to-slide synchronization once the presentation podcast is released.
I want to thank all the panelists for participating: Sam Stephenson, Alex Russell, Thomas Fuchs, and Andrew Dupont. Together it helped make for a stand-out panel. Here's hoping that SXSW decides to do more technical panels next year - if this panel was any indicator developers are hungry for more code talks.
Tags: sxsw, javascript, libraries, panel, dojo, jquery, prototype
33 Comments on 'Secrets of JavaScript Libraries (SXSW)'
March 11th, 2008
Today was the Mozilla Birds-of-a-Feather here at SXSW. It was a lot of fun and was a great opportunity to catch up with a bunch of the community. Everyone from users, to web developers, to extension developers were in attendance.
We ran a mini contest, giving away some prizes for the best, original, Firefox extension ideas. The three winners were as follows:
- John Refano: "I served you an ad but I eated it." - An spin-off of Adblock which replaces all ads with cute lolcat pictures.
- Jon Steffens: "Stumble Fake or Not." - Display two panes, one with a real web site, one with a fake one - can you tell the difference? Useful for teaching users to spot possible in phishing attempts.
- Steve Levithan: "A Firefox 3+ only add-on to leak memory, to remind you of the old days."
Definitely want to thank all the participants, and everyone that attended, I think a lot of fun was had by all. Also want to thank Mary, Melissa, Brendan, Chris, and Aza for helping to make this happen. I hope we'll be able to do something like this, again, next year - and maybe even on a day when it isn't raining!
Tags: sxsw, mozilla
4 Comments on 'Mozilla BoF'
February 22nd, 2008
It's that time of year again - the annual South by Southwest conference is nearly upon us! This year I submitted two panel topics and had one accepted: Secrets of JavaScript Libraries.
Secrets of JavaScript Libraries
This is going to be a stand-out panel, I can feel it in my bones:
This talk will delve into the secret techniques used by JavaScript library authors to create comprehensive libraries that work seamlessly across browser environments. We'll look at everything from fixes for strange browser quirks, tricks for gaining speed, to tips for writing smooth animations. This panel will be held by experienced JavaScript Library developers who have, cumulatively, many decades of JavaScript development experience under their belts. Everything discussed will be backed up with publicly available, rock-solid, code.
And check out who will be joining me on the panel:
- Sam Stephenson (Creator of Prototype)
- Alex Russell (Co-Creator of Dojo)
- Thomas Fuchs (Creator of Scriptaculous)
- Andrew Dupont (Contributor to Prototype)
This is going to be an advanced panel, tons of code, deep-and-dirty into the code and why we do what we do. So be sure to check us out - we're going to be competing against the keynote talk on the final day: Room 9 - Tuesday, March 11th 2 to 3:00pm.
Browser Wars: Deja Vu All Over Again?
One of the top panels from last year, back again. Three of the major browser vendors will be up and discussing various aspects of browser development, standards, and all sorts of interesting topics. Be sure to stop by to get your dose browser craziness in: Room 10 Monday, March 10th, 2 to 3:00pm.
On the panel:
- Chris Wilson (Platform Architect, Microsoft)
- Brendan Eich (CTO, Mozilla)
- Charles McCathieNevile (Chief of Standards, Opera)
Birds of a Mozilla Feather
There's also going to be a Birds of a Feather, held by Mozilla, on Monday, March 10th from 3:30 to 5:30pm (soon after the Browser Wars panel) at the Moonshine Bar and Grill. This is going to be a ton of fun, it'll be a good time for chatting and talking about the future of Firefox and the web. You can expect to see the following people there:
- Brendan Eich (Creator of JavaScript)
- Christopher Beard (Head of Mozilla Labs)
- Aza Raskin (Mozilla Labs)
If you wanna catch up with me, be sure to do it before Tuesday as my flight is right after the panel. I'll be spending plenty of time checking out the various parties, panels, etc. so you're bound to see me around.
If you're not already doing so you should follow me on Twitter as that'll probably be the best source of determining where I am (and for pinging me if you want to meet up).
I'm so looking forward to being in Austin. Boston is expecting 3-5in of snow tonight. Sunny, warm, Texas can't come soon enough.
Tags: javascript, browsers, sxsw, conferences
13 Comments on 'JavaScript and Browsers at SXSW'
August 20th, 2007
It's that time of year again - voting for the 2008 SXSW Interactive panels has opened up. This year I played it smart and actually got my panel submissions in on time. I've got two new talks planned, so if you're interested in seeing me present (or are interested in reading the slides, and hearing the audio, if you can't make it) please feel free to vote up my two talks:
This talk will delve into the secret techniques used by JavaScript library authors to create comprehensive libraries that work seamlessly across browser environments. We'll look at fixes for strange browser quirks, tricks for gaining speed, and tips for writing smooth animations. Everything discussed will be backed up with publicly available, rock-solid, code.
This will be a panel and I'm hoping to bring along some other devs from Prototype and Dojo (depending on who's planning on attending).
This talk is going to take you through the new JavaScript features that browsers are introducing and show you how you can begin using them in your applications, today. We'll look at how you can use the new features of JavaScript 2 to create robust, deployable, code -- and even how to bring JavaScript out of the browser and onto the server.
Also, be sure to check out the many Mozilla talks that are being proposed.
Looking through the presentation list it seems as if people didn't really learn anything from last year's conference. You have to remember that this is 7 months away at this point. That's like, what, 3 Internet years?
So to all 11 of you who proposed iPhone-related talks - don't be surprised if your talk isn't nearly as interesting come March of next year.
Tags: mozilla, javascript, sxsw, conferences
10 Comments on 'SXSW 2008 Voting'
March 5th, 2007
This Friday I'll be flying down to Austin to attend SXSW. I'm really excited to be going, it looks like its going to be a lot of fun. There's going to be a ton of people that I know, there, and I'm looking forward to meeting them.
I won't be presenting this time around, I'm looking forward to just soaking in the area and talking with people. You'll most likely be able to find me at the Mozilla booth (in case, my cell # is 585-615-5287) and making at least one stop to the Apress booth. (I hear they'll have a bunch of my books on hand - let me know if you want one signed, ha!)
Side Events
Three events that I'm looking forward to (in addition to the main conference) are:
BarCamp Austin: I'll confess, I love BarCamps. Ever since attending the first BarCamp NYC, during January of last year, I've gone to all the camps that I've been able to make. This one is no exception. (I'm also looking forward to going to BarCamp Boston 2 later this month.)
Avalonstar Bowling: I'm part of Team JavaScript Ninjas, which includes: Andrew Dupont (Prototype Core), Aaron Gustafson (Co-Author of Web Design in a Nutshell, Speaker, A List Apart), and Dan Webb (Prototype Core, author of UJS for Rails). And no, we're not better at bowling than we are at JavaScript.
Breakfast with Dustin: Dustin Diaz is having a late night breakfast for all of those who've opted to fly out on the 14th (as opposed to taking a red-eye).
Games + Work = ?
One thing that you might notice from my itinerary: I'm currently planning on attending very few JavaScript-centric or Entrepreneurship-centric talks. I could say that I'm burnt out, but in reality I'm just much more interested in the number of game-centric talks. For example, these all sound very interesting to me:
I love the topic of integration of games and reality. Mixing user interfaces and games, work with games; treating real-life like a game. It fascinates me, I can't get enough. It definitely looks like SXSW will satiate that desire.
I'm sure I'll talk about it more at some point, but there's a fundamental core buried inside gaming. Work becomes enjoyable, interfaces and input become simple - I'm very interested in how those concepts can be extracted and applied to real-life applications and user interfaces.
Rough Itinerary
Note: If you're reading this in a feed reader, then you'll probably see no agenda below this line - please visit the blog post to view the full thing.
So yeah, if you're going to be at SXSW, let me know - I'd love to talk with you!
Update: I just signed up for Conferenceer, you can look at my full schedule (and connect with me) on my profile there.
Tags: games, conferences, mozilla, sxsw, sxsw2007
2 Comments on 'SXSW'
·
« Previous entries
