Slammin' with Hamin

So this post is about a month overdue, but hey, Ramadan just ended. Thirty days of fasting and not enought sleep will definitely be cause for a bit of procrastination.

Cascadia Ruby Conf 2011 was definitely FANTASTIC! It was my first ever talk/presentation as a professional programmer at a conference. I’ve done several impromptu and informal unconference/barcamp/meetup talks but not a prepared talk with slides for a while. The last presentation I remember giving with slides was way back in college for my math research… Simulation of Viscoelastic Fluids…fun stuff :)

One thing I’ve gathered from attending Cascadia Ruby Conf and other local conferences (GoRuCo, GothamJS), I really love local conferences. I especially love small single track conferences. I always feel like I never missed a session that I would’ve liked to attend, and the discussions/Q&A are always more riveting.

I can say loads about all the different talks but really, just check out confreaks coverage of all the talks.

I think my talk went fairly well. For those of you who were unaware, my talk was titled The Enumerable Module or How I Fell in Love with Ruby. I essentially wanted just to share how I love the Enumerable module and why it makes me enjoy Ruby programming so much. My goal was that both experienced and inexperienced members of the audience would get something out of it. And judging from the feedback I got, I think I was fairly successful. One of the presentations after mine, mentioned how he loves that there was a whole presentation on the Enumerable module, he never seemed to recall seeing a whole presentation on Lists at any Java conference he’d been to :) .

I had a blast in Seattle, its a gorgeous city and of course it hosts an excellent Ruby community. I also had the chance to jam with a Ian Dees and Ivan Oats. Here is us jamming on Hey Joe by Jimi Hendrix.

You guys can check out my talk on confreaks. By the way… CONFREAKS ROCK!!! You can also grab my slides on both slideshare and scribd. I do plan on giving this talk (revised and perhaps extended) at other conferences if I get a chance, so do let me know if you’re interested.

I will end this post with something I said in my talk that seemed to resonate with the audience:

Are you in love with ruby yet? You don’t have to be monogamous…. go make some love!

Resources

Scribd

The Enumerable Module or How I Fell in Love with Ruby

Slideshare

Confreaks : http://confreaks.net/videos/607-cascadiaruby2011-the-enumerable-module-or-how-i-fell-in-love-with-ruby