Hard to believe that my 4 years of student life at the University of Dundee are coming to an end today. In some respects this has been an uphill struggle, in others it has been a wonderful, enjoyable and rewarding experience. I have made mistakes a long the way, I have learned important lessons and I have worked hard to better myself not only as a software engineer, but as a person throughout this experience.

I was planning on collating a number of resources and tit-bits of information and then posting them to the internal mailing list at university, however I changed my mind and decided to write this post making what I have to say open to all. I hope it is of use to someone as the advice I provide here comes from real, solid, “Been there, done that, got the t-shirt” experience.

Not all of it may be relevant to you but it has helped me. Use the links below to view each page (I apologise as it is rather long).

I have been quite busy over the last little while between moving flat, finishing university, looking for a job and other things and as such I have not had the time I would have liked (as well as the energy) to write a couple of the posts I have in mind although there are some drafts now kicking around I am working on.

In the mean time I have been invited to join the Scottish Developers committee and as of yesterday I have taken over the role of convener for the Dundee (well, soon to be Tayside) branch of the user group. I am very happy to be asked to fill this position and I look forward to getting started.

Thanks again to Colin and the rest of the committee for the opportunity.

Haven’t updated in a while so I figured 2 birds with 1 post.

jQuery Talks

I would like to say thank you to all of the people who voted for my jQuery Deep Dive session at both Developer Day Scotland and Developer Day Belfast, I will now be speaking at both events. I am still very surprised at how popular the sessions have been so far and I just hope that what I deliver on the days lives up to the expectations.

Developer Days

Ok, a bit of an update on these.

DDD Belfast 4th April 2009 in Belfast
Web: http://developerdeveloperdeveloper.com/belfast/
Status: Registration Open

WebDD ‘09 18th April 2009 in Reading
Web: http://developerdeveloperdeveloper.com/webdd09/Default.aspx
Status: Registration Opens on Monday 30th March

DDD Scotland 2nd May 2009 in Glasgow
Web: http://developerdayscotland.com/main/Default.aspx
Status: Registration Open

DDD South West 23rd May 2009 in Somerset
Web: http://www.dddsouthwest.com/Home/tabid/36/Default.aspx
Status: Registration Open

The events are getting pretty close now, Belfast is in less than a month so if you plan on attending any of the above, get your registrations in! If you are attending then I hope to see you there

In addition, if you are on Twitter you may wish to follow

• scottishdevs
• developerday
• dddsouthwest

In other news…

My blog is bothering me. I like WordPress, it has some nifty features that make blogging easier (although I probably should use Live Writer more often) however I still want to roll my own. Why?

There are a number of reasons:

1. Because I can (not a good one, but still top of the list)
2. Because I want to use ASP.NET MVC to build a blog engine
3. Because I want to demonstrate various technologies all working together
4. Because I said I would build one

The problem is time, I still maintain there are never enough hours in the day. Anyway, I have a couple more things to look into and then I will most likely start work. I want it to be an exercise in blogging because I don’t really blog as much as I should on some of my discoveries. Just something else to keep an eye out for.

And finally

Graduation is getting ever closer and the date is now set. On 25th of June 2009 I will graduate with a BSc (Hons) in Applied Computing. On June 26th, the first day of the rest of my life will begin (Actually, no, that is a lie, June 26th will most likely be a recovery day from the alcohol consumption of June 25th). I think I should go spin the job wheel and see what I can find

Ok, so I am a little late to the party for announcing it but just in case you don’t already know, DeveloperDeveloperDeveloper! (DDD) Day Belfast is now accepting session submissions.

The event will be held on Saturday, 4th April 2009 however a venue is yet to be announced.

• http://developerdeveloperdeveloper.com/belfast/

If Northern Ireland is a bit too far afield for you, DDD Scotland will be held in Glasgow at Glasgow Caledonian University on Saturday, 2nd May 2009. Call for speakers is still open until the end of January.

• http://developerdayscotland.com/main/Default.aspx

Well, although it is half way though January, Happy New Year. I have not been posting as much as I would like but that should get turned around soon.

Today saw my first game of Warhammer 40k in 2009 and it very painfully showed me that some of the changes in 5th edition have made Tyranids even harder to play (automatically passing morale checks in a lost combat now kills hormaganuts very effectively, more so than 4th edition), still was a good game and I have some new tricks up my sleeve for next time. For the record: I hate Tau!

Geekery out of the way, time for some more, er, geekery. I will be giving two talks on jQuery in the coming months which may be of interest to those either in the Tayside area of Scotland or those willing to travel to Edinburgh. These will be my first public talks outside of university and I am excited to see how they turn out since interest thus far has been quite good.

Abstract

A new client-side framework has been taking the internet by storm, many have already been mesmerised by the power of such a small javascript library. And “what is the name of this fantastic framework?” I hear you ask, “jQuery” is my reply.

jQuery is a robust javascript framework with a very small footprint (15kb minified and GZipped) which makes the complicated aspects of javascript very simple. From traversing the Document Object Model to complex AJAX functionality, jQuery can do it all.

In this session I will introduce you to the basics of jQuery, showing you, through code, how to select and manipulate elements on the page, attach functions to events, implement ajax and more! This is the perfect opportunity to learn about jQuery and how it can make the life of web developer so much easier, allowing you to focus more on building your application!

Both talks are the same, An Introduction To jQuery, however there are two different venues and dates.

• Queen Mother Building at the University of Dundee on Wednesday 4th February 2009
• Microsoft Offices in Edinburgh on Wednesday 8th April 2009
  

As with other Scottish Developers events, both sessions are completely free and all are encouraged to come along. If interested, it you be greatly appreciated if you could register for the events using the links above to give us an idea of number.

For those of you who do not already know, Developer Day Scotland 2 is now in planning (has been since last week, I have just been slow to post) and is now looking for speakers. As you can probably see from the banner on the right, the date for the event is the 2nd of May 2009.

What is Developer Day Scotland?

Developer Day Scotland (DDS) is a community event, run by community for community, which is based upon the highly successful Developer! Developer! Developer! (DDD) community conference events. – Developer Day Scotland website (http://www.developerdayscotland.com/)

Industry professionals (and students) come from all over scotland to attend sessions presented by members of the Scottish development community. These sessions span numerous areas including C#, Visual Studio, ASP.NET, Web Development and Internationalisation.

What happens next?

At present a call for speakers has gone out so if you have a talk you think you would like to submit then now is the time. For details on how to submit a session, visit the Developer Day Scotland website.

After sessions have been submitted voting will open to the public allowing the community to decide what they would like to see most at the event, this will dictate the agenda for the day and will narrow down the number of sessions.

Finally, the only thing left to do is attend the event. If your session is selected then you should be preparing your talk, presentation slides and code demos. If you are simply planning on attending then the only thing you need to worry about is writing the date down in your diary

These events are made a success by community participation and the fantasic support of the sponsors who make all of this possible at a price everyone can afford: FREE. So what do you have to lose?