May – Iron Python & Iron Ruby

Python has been around for a while now and Ruby on Rails has certainly brought the Ruby language to the fore in recent years.  So what is it with all this dynamic language stuff that’s been going on in the industry lately, and why should you care?  More importantly, why is Microsoft bothering to release projects that allow Ruby and Python to run on the .NET stack?  And what tools would you need to use to do your own development work using one of these languages?

The answers to all these questions and more can be asked of none other than Nick Hodge (@nickhodge) at this months meeting as we get a run down on the DLR, the languages themselves and the tools you need to develop with them.

If you’re coming, let us know via the poll on the site so we can make sure there’s enough Pizza to go around :-)

We look forward to seeing you there!

April – It’s DDD Time

This month we’ll have Jak Charlton (@JakCharlton) of Devlicio.us, the JetBrains academy fame doing an informal, interactive DDD talk.

Plenty of opportunity for you to ask questions and get a better grasp on how this DDD stuff might apply for you.

Here’s the basic outline of the session:

 

Practical Domain Driven Design, Message Based Architectures and CQRS

The original book on Domain Driven Design was subtitled "Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software", and even where a system does not merit "full on" DDD, many of the practices and principles can massively reduce the complexity of software, especially when combined with messaging and events.

This informal talk and Q&A will cover concepts including the Ubiquitous Language, Domain Experts, Aggregate Roots, and touch on more esoteric ideas including Message Based Architecture and Command Query Responsibility Separation

Here’s Jak’s bio for those who are interested:

 

 

Jak Charlton, is now based in Sydney, Australia, and working as a Senior Consultant for Readify (http://readify.net/). Jak is a well known community figure in the Microsoft and .NET worlds with a reputation for a passionate view of development.

With primary interests around Domain Driven Design, software architecture, and putting the world to rights one debate at a time, he is a strong believer in principles and practices, allowing developers to concentrate on delivering business value.

 

If you’re coming, let us know via the poll on the right hand side of the site and don’t forget to invite your friends.

We’ll have some JetBrains and TekPub giveaways for those who are there on the night. All the more reason for you to come along!

March Coding Dojo Summary

Last night was our groups first Coding Dojo and it went really well and I think everyone got something out of it.

For the curious people were given a choice of one of the following Katas to do:

http://codingdojo.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?KataPotter

http://codingdojo.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?KataMinesweeper

http://codingdojo.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?KataBankOCR

We then grouped everyone into kata clusters based on their choices so that people working on the same kata were in the same room and could talk about design and implementation issues together.

The clusters then tackled their katas via two 40 minute sessions with a pizza break in between and time at the end to talk about what they learned.

What was great to see was that almost everyone elected to work in a pair (or a trio) and that people were trying to use techniques and approaches that they hadn’t tried before.  We even had one pair attempt the Minesweeper kata using F# (with tests in C#) even though they had never written a line of F# code before! Sweet!

The camaraderie on display was excellent, as was the joking and fun, and the when the kata clusters talked with each other about how they went it was great seeing such openness from people about what they screwed up and what they learned.

For everyone who came – thank you for making it such a great and enjoyable night!!

JetBrains Support

Many thanks go to Thoughtworks for supporting our group by allowing us to use their premises and drink their beer on Tuesday nights.  It's very appreciated.
And now we can start saying thank you to JetBrains as well, since they are providing copies of ReSharper or DotTrace as give aways for meetings.  We need to have around 30 people along to be able to do the giveaway, so bring some friends to the code dojo this month and see if you can land yourself a free license :-)

See you there!

March Meeting – Coding Dojo

This month we’re going to be running a coding dojo.  For those who don’t know what one of these are here’s a definition from the CodingDojo wiki:

A Coding Dojo is a meeting where a bunch of coders get together to work on a programming challenge. They are there have fun and to engage in DeliberatePractice in order to improve their skills.

We’re going to pick something simple for the challenge so that you don’t have to think about the subject domain too much letting you focus more on the techniques you use.  So if you’re still learning TDD, or you want to try MSpec, or you want to practice pairing with someone and see how that works, or you want to try solving a problem using F#, or you just want to come and geek out with some code then this is for you.

And when you come, remember to bring not only a willingness to learn and try something new, but also a willingness to help others out.  These things work best when everyone is willing to help everyone else.

Oh, don’t forget, bring your laptop if you have one, and if you don’t have one, then don’t worry! We’ll get you paired up with someone else on the night. :-)

Finally, don’t forget to RSVP (on the right) so we can sort out catering as well.  See you there!

Automated Build and Deploy slides & links

Following on from last Tuesday's meeting, here are some links and slides for those wanting to look further into Rake builds and PowerShell deployments.

nRake on GitHub
nRake slides from last meeting

psDeploy on GitHub
psDeploy slides from last meeting

February Meeting – Automated Build and Deploy

Sure, many people do automated builds, but how many do automated deployments?  And if they do, how do they actually do it?

This month Romain Prieto and James Crisp will be talking about various automated build and deployment options with a number of tools being talked about, including nRake (Rake builds for .NET), TFS Deployer and PowerShell.  If you’ve got something of your own you’d like to show off then come along prepared to talk about it :-)

We’ll also chat about the latest happenings and toss around some ideas for coding dojos so come along and be a part of the community.  We’d love to see you there!