| Kyle ShankApril 13, 01:00pm - 01:30pm |
Kyle Shank is a 4th year Software Engineering major at the Rochester Institute of Technology. He is the lead developer on both the RadRails and Rubish projects. Kyle has been developing on the web since 1996 and has a background in Java, Perl and PHP. In addition to Rails related open source projects he has been an active developer within the Drupal and Scoop CMS communities. |
| Tooling Rails |
The topic of integrated development tools for Rails has sparked a
great deal of controversy between console aficionados and IDE types. RadRails is an open source, cross platform Rails IDE that seeks
to enhance productivity while allowing the developer to maintain control. Rails is simple, but there are still aspects of the
development experience where tooling can help. This talk will focus on the tools integrated into RadRails and engage the audience in
a discussion about the future of Rails tooling. |
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| Dave AstelsApril 13, 01:45pm - 03:15pm |
Dave Astels (co-author of "A Practical Guide to eXtreme Programming" and author of Jolt Award winning "Test-driven Development: A Practical Guide") has over 2 decades of experience in the software field, most of that involved with object-oriented technologies and techniques. Dave has been studying, practicing, teaching, evangelising, and coaching XP and Agile Processes since 1998. Dave\'s experience ranges from embedded process control systems to consumer products (both consumer electronics and shrinkwrapped software) to energy trading systems. Dave is an independant software consultant specializing in the areas of agile process, programming practices, and object design/architecture. Dave attends, and speaks at, a variety of conferences including the XP conference in Europe, JAOO, SD West, SD Best Practices, XPAU, Smalltalk Solutions, and OOPSLA. Dave is one of the thought leaders in the area of TDD, and now BDD. |
| Behaviour Driven Development.. the step after TDD |
Test Driven Development (TDD) has made it to prime time. Big companies are paying big money to have their programmers trained in how to do TDD. It's a popular topic at conferences... agile and otherwise. TDD books are winning Jolt awards. So everything's rosy, huh? Fat Chance! What's wrong?
Well... one thing is that people think it's about testing. That's just not the case. Then what's it about? It's about figuring out what you are trying to do before you run off half-cocked to try to do it. This session will introduce Behaviour Driven Development.. the step after TDD. |
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| Jeremy VoorhisApril 14, 01:45pm - 02:30pm |
As a programmer and lead architect for PLANET ARGON, Jeremy Voorhis understands the importance of keeping an eye on the big picture. Whether designing an application from scratch or turning around an existing project that just needs a little extra love, Jeremy works hard to balance his unique sense of aesthetics with the practical needs of the project. |
| Internationalizing Rails |
One common criticism of the Rails web application
framework is its lack of internationalization support, but much has been done in recent months to improve this! In this talk, I will
discuss Globalize - the ActiveRecord-backed internationalization framework for Rails, Globalize's success in PLANET ARGON projects,
as well as other solutions that have proven effective in the real world. |
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| David BlackApril 13, 04:30pm - 05:30pm |
David A. Black, Ph.D., has been writing in and about Ruby for over five years, and developing Rails applications since 2004. He is a founding director of the non-profit organization Ruby Central, Inc., which produces both the annual International Ruby Conference ("RubyConf") , now heading into its sixth year, and the International Rails Conference, scheduled to debut in June, 2006. David's book "Ruby for Rails: Ruby techniques for Rails developers" is due out from Manning Publications this Spring.
David is the chief author of Ruby's standard scanf library, the creator and maintainer of the Rails-based Ruby Change Request Archive ("RCRchive"), and the chief developer of the Rails applications behind the Ruby FAQ. He contributed three chapters ("days") to "Teach Yourself Ruby in 21 Days" (Sams, 2001). He is a frequent participant on the ruby-talk mailing list and the #ruby-lang IRC channel (freenode.net). |
| Ruby and the Rails Developer: Breaking Through the Programming Glass Ceiling |
The
question often comes up: do you need to master Ruby in order to use Rails? The short answer is: yes. The longer answer, which will
be elaborated in this talk, is: you can get Rails applications up and running with a fairly minimal grasp of Ruby; but mastering Ruby
is greatly to your benefit as a Rails developer.
Learning Ruby thoroughly offers at least three major benefits:
1. knowing the actual meaning of what you're doing (as opposed to wondering what the "has_one" in "has_one :engine" actually is,
or why you have to stick an at-sign in front of some variable names and not others)
2. knowing how to do more: extending your models programmatically, taking advantage of the ways that Rails is engineered for the
enrichment of applications through custom Ruby code (for example, the very existence of a whole directory for "helper" files, in
which you're supposed to put your own code)
3. gaining the ability to understand the Rails framework source code, which in turn means that you can participate more
meaningfully in discussions, and perhaps even submit patches
This talk will expand on each of these points, using specific examples to illustrate and support the general case that Rails
developers can, indeed, benefit from a thorough understanding of Ruby techniques and idioms -- even those that are not usually
thought of as directly pertaining to Rails programming conventions. |
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| Amy HoyApril 13, 05:45pm - 06:15pm |
In short, she's a PHP developer-turned-Ruby addict. She has approximately six years' experience in developing for the web, and eight years' experience designing for it. Amy got into Ruby on Rails after reading that it was behind Basecamp, which she loved, and haven't really looked back. Amy is also in the process of writing a book for Pragmatic Programmers -- a "Right-Brained Guide" to Ruby on Rails. |
| Getting started with AJAX on Rails |
Ruby on Rails is, in fact, the premiere web
development framework when it comes to creating Ajax-enhanced web sites and applications. Even though Rails takes most of the muss
and almost all of the fuss out of simple (and some not-so-simple) Ajax interaction, you still have to devote some time to learning
how it all works.
If you're having trouble getting started with Ajax on Rails, or you haven't had a chance to dig in yet, this introductory course
will get you going -- with Ajax basics, helpful info about the built-in Rails Ajax and Javascript helpers, and troubleshooting tips.
And it'll be just the crash course you need to prepare yourself for Thomas Fuchs' " Advanced Rails AJAX Techniques" the next
day. |
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| Alex BunardzicApril 13, 06:30pm - 07:00pm |
After completing the Bachelor of Science degree in numerical analysis, Alex Bunardzic worked on the Masters degree in the field of computational simulation of complex natural systems. He then moved on to developing software-based solutions for various businesses, utilizing wide gamut of technologies, from mainframe and midrange monolithic systems, to complex distributed systems using Java and .Net platforms.
Last year Alex made a transition from the mainstream IT platforms to the new and promising world of Ruby and Ruby on Rails. Alex helped instigate Vancouver-based Ruby users group by delivering the inaugural presentation on the role of Rails in today's world of software development. |
| Less Technology -- Reclaiming the Software Development Craft, One Scaffold at a Time |
Information technology, and the accompanying software code, had gradually shifted from being regarded as an asset to being
regarded as a liability. Each line of source code, regardless of how we arrived at it, incurs a very high and undesirable cost.
Prudent software development practices dictate that the cost of maintaining source code should be minimized.
Ruby on Rails is currently the most suitable solution for minimizing the technological impact of the proliferating source code.
Based on the DRY (Don't Repeat Yourself) principle, as well as on the Law of the Least Surprise, this platform brings the promise of
reducing liabilities of the mounting costs of high technology projects.
The presentation will offer a demonstration of the reduction of the amount of source code necessary to supply the solution to
typical business problems. The attendees will be able to witness the dramatic impact that Rails can bring into the IT fold. |
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| Thomas FuchsApril 14, 08:00am - 09:30am |
Thomas Fuchs is a software architect from Vienna, Austria. He\'s been building web applications since 1996. Thomas is the author of script.aculo.us, a cross-browser JavaScript framework featuring advanced Ajax UI controls, visual effects and other niceties, and a core development team member of the Ruby on Rails web development framework. He\'s also a contributor to Prototype, an object-oriented Ajax/JavaScript framework. |
| Advanced Rails AJAX techniques |
AJAX is a driving technological factor behind the
current trend in convergence of web and desktop applications, and Ruby on Rails is the premier framework for implementing
AJAX-powered web applications. Go beyond the basics and learn how to use the Rails Prototype and Script.aculo.us helpers to full
potential. Implement effective multiple-element updates, drag & drop and other UI controls and make use of plug-ins to achieve a
desktop application-like intuitive user experience while adhering to web standards. |
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| James AdamApril 14, 09:45am - 10:45am |
James Adam is a Rails programmer working as part of a five-man team developing applications for a major media buyer with high-profile blue-chip clients. He developed Rails Engines to assist in the rapid development of client-oriented software whilst supporting team-based development of common application infrastructure.
After graduating with a First-Class Honours degree in Artificial Intelligence in 2000, he spent 4 years researching Emergent Behaviour in Multiagent System for his PhD in computer science. He has been using Ruby for development full-time since 2002, and following Rails since it's first public release. |
| Engines: Team Development with Rails |
Rails Engines provide a means to share common
functionality across many projects, in a package that's easy to both update *and* override.
This presentation will explain the concepts behind Engines and demonstrate how they work within a Rails application. I will also
discuss how Engines has dramatically enhanced collaboration within our own development team, and how such collaboration can be
extended into the Rails community as a whole. |
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| Geoffrey GrosenbachApril 14, 11:00am - 11:30am |
After earning a degree in Philosophy, Geoffrey Grosenbach went on to develop customized web-spider engine technology for Project Guildes, Inc. which was later bought by Onvia Corp.
Geoffrey is currently the host of the Ruby on Rails Podcast and an active member of the Seattle Ruby Brigade. His Ruby Sparklines and Gruff Graphs projects have received much attention and are being used on a number of Rails-based websites. He is a full-time Rails consultant with the Topfunky Corporation. |
| Generating Great Graphs with Ruby on Rails |
One of the consistent questions on the
Rails mailing lists and the IRC channel is "How do I make graphs with Rails?" Sparklines (simple graphs) and Gruff (full-featured,
beautiful graphs) were written to address this need.
This presentation will provide an overview of the graphing options available for Rails (Sparklines, Gruff, MRPlot, GNUPlot) and
the features of each.
The speech will then go into detail concerning the real-world use of Gruff in the Rails environment. It will highlight the use of
inheritance to easily extend and enhance Gruff to show additional types of graphs.
In addition, it will address the issues of performance with RMagick and Rails, and how to use Rails' built-in caching to solve
performance problems and scale productively.
Finally, the presentation will show easy ways to place graphs into dynamically generated PDF documents. |
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| Robby RussellApril 14, 12:30pm - 01:30pm |
Robby Russell founded PLANET ARGON in 2002. His experience includes six years as a professional programmer, and (soon) as a published technical writer. Robby’s current project is a Ruby on Rails book, titled Programming Rails, to be published by the leading technical book publisher, O’Reilly Media. This project, in part, stemmed from his Rails related blog, robbyonrails.com. He is also working on another project, titled Refactoring Rails with Jeremy Voorhis. |
| Sneaking Rails Into The (Legacy) System |
Learn how to sneak Ruby on Rails into an
existing infrastructure. In this session, you will watch Robby take a legacy database structure and build a Rails interface without
modifying the existing schema or data. This session will also demonstrate using Unit Tests, Console, and stored procedures and
functions in PostgreSQL. You will learn how Ruby on Rails can quickly enhance your legacy systems capabilities which might help you
convince your boss or client that Rails is an excellent choice for their next project. |
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