Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: The .NET Framework continues to evolve with new options for building web applications that incorporate the latest development practices. In this session we'll go over the current and upcoming .NET technologies to develop applications using modern patterns and architectures. In this code-focused session, we'll cover MVC, REST, TDD and other techniques to cover the breadth of whats available.

Presented By: Drew Robbins

About the Speaker: Drew Robbins is a Technical Evangelist for Microsoft, focused on Visual Studio and the .NET Framework. Drew moved from the midwest to Redmond, Washington in 2008 to join the Developer & Platform Evangelism group. Before moving, Drew was a field evangelist for Michigan, Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee where he helped with user groups and events run by the developer community like CodeMash. Orginally, from Columbus, Ohio, Drew is passionate about developer community and helped create the Central Ohio .NET Developers Group.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: A complete description of creating control templates and managing state and state transitions and understanding the Silverlight Visual State Manager. This presentation offers a practical, developer-centric approach focusing on the integration of managed Code (C#), Xaml and the use of both Visual Studio and Expression Blend to facilitate skinning standard controls.

Presented By: Jesse Liberty

About the Speaker: Jesse Liberty, (Silverlight Geek), is one of the most sought after speakers on Silverlight, and has presented at numerous high-profile events internationally. Liberty has been interviewed extensively about Silverlight, including most recently in InformationWeek and Sparkling Client.   Liberty works for Scott Guthrie, in the Silverlight Development Division where he is a Senior Program Manager responsible for the creation of tutorials, videos WebCasts, and other content to facilitate the learning and use of Silverlight and where he has a tremendously loyal following and a highly regarded blog.   Even before joining Microsoft, Jesse was well known in the industry in part because of his many bestselling books, including O'Reilly Media's Programming .NET 3.5, Programming C# 3.0, Learning ASP.NET with AJAX and the soon to be published Programming Silverlight He has over two decades experience writing software, consulting and training, with stints at AT&T as a Distinguished Software Engineer and at Citibank as a Vice President in the Information Division. He can be reached at jliberty@microsoft.com or at http://silverlight.net/blogs/jesseliberty

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: This presentation develops the idea of having 2 or more sets of injectable markers for a video (say an HR training video) and building having a Silverlight video player that responds to the markers by indicating “more info is available.” – The video creator (or client) can inject different markers (e.g.,) for line personnel than for specialists or for management. Clicking on the screen when more info is available might pause the film and bring you to a different film, or a web page, or other additional information - but key is that different people would see a different set of additional information.

Presented By: Jesse Liberty

About the Speaker: Jesse Liberty, (Silverlight Geek), is one of the most sought after speakers on Silverlight, and has presented at numerous high-profile events internationally. Liberty has been interviewed extensively about Silverlight, including most recently in InformationWeek and Sparkling Client. Liberty works for Scott Guthrie, in the Silverlight Development Division where he is a Senior Program Manager responsible for the creation of tutorials, videos WebCasts, and other content to facilitate the learning and use of Silverlight and where he has a tremendously loyal following and a highly regarded blog. Even before joining Microsoft, Jesse was well known in the industry in part because of his many bestselling books, including O'Reilly Media's Programming .NET 3.5, Programming C# 3.0, Learning ASP.NET with AJAX and the soon to be published Programming Silverlight He has over two decades experience writing software, consulting and training, with stints at AT&T as a Distinguished Software Engineer and at Citibank as a Vice President in the Information Division. He can be reached at jliberty@microsoft.com or at http://silverlight.net/blogs/jesseliberty

Technology/Platform: Other Languages
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: Building Rich Swing applications seems to be a more difficult task that building a web counterpart, but in reality it is not so thanks to SwingBuilder, Groovy's answer to building swing apps with ease. SwingBuilder leverages the builder pattern, letting you concentrate in the business at hand, the builder will take care of assembling the UI's hierarchy, thus rendering the code easily understandable for both developer and machine.

Presented By: Andres Almiray

About the Speaker: Andres is a Sun Certified Programmer, Sun Certified Web Component Developer with more than 8 years of experience in software design and development, currently working for Oracle as a Principal Software Engineer. He has been involved in web and desktop application development since the early days of Java. He has also been teacher of computer science courses in the most prestigious education institute in Mexico. His current interests include software architecture, developer testing, Groovy, Spring and swing hacks. He is a true believer in open source and has participated in popular projects like Groovy, JMatter and DbUnit, as well as starting his own projects (Json-lib and EZMorph among others). Andres maintains a blog at http://jroller.com/aalmiray

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: The Managed Extensibility Framework (MEF) is a set of building blocks for developing extensible and dynamic applications. In this session, we will discuss the four basic concepts of MEF and build a simple application that can be extended at runtime.

Presented By: Drew Robbins

About the Speaker: Drew Robbins is a Technical Evangelist for Microsoft focused on Visual Studio and the .NET Framework. He recently moved to Redmond from Columbus, Ohio where he was a field evangelist supporting user groups and community events as well as helping customers understand the business value of Microsoft technology. Drew has been involved in the developer community for 10 years, presenting at events around the world on Visual Studio, .NET and PHP.

Technology/Platform: Java
Difficulty Level: Advanced

Abstract: As the number of cores in our servers increase, concurrent programming continues to rise in importance. Most concurrent programming today focuses on shared memory and concurrency control via locking. However, an alternative paradigm called *actor-based concurrency* has been rising in visibility with languages like Erlang and Scala. We'll look at how actor-based concurrency differs from shared memory programming and how it can be utilized in languages like Erlang, Scala, and Java (using the Kilim library).

Presented By: Alex Miller

About the Speaker: Alex Miller is a Tech Lead and Engineer with Terracotta, the makers of the open-source Java clustering product Terracotta. Prior to Terracotta, Alex worked at BEA Systems on the AquaLogic product line and was Chief Architect at MetaMatrix. His interests include Java, concurrency, distributed systems, query languages, and software design. Alex enjoys writing his blog at http://tech.puredanger.com and has spoken at JavaOne and as part of the No Fluff Just Stuff tour.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: It doesn’t matter if you’re doing Agile or if you’re working in an environment like RUP or CMMI, there are several things you can do to improve your development process. This highly interactive session will show you three specific tips: improve your estimation, use a daily standup to keep a close focus on your progress, and work in retrospectives to empower your team’s ability to drastically improve your entire software development process, regardless of what that process is, even if it’s no process! You’ll leave this session with a handle on ways to smooth out your project’s environment.

Presented By: Jim Holmes

About the Speaker: Father. Husband. Certified Geek. Veteran. Co-author of “Windows Developer Power Tools.” Coffee Roaster. MVP for C#. Founder of the CodeMash Conference and the Dayton .NET Developers Group. One-time setter, middle blocker, and weakside hitter. Blogger (http://FrazzledDad.com). Practice Lead of the Information Worker Studio at Quick Solutions in Columbus, Ohio. Big fan of naps.

Technology/Platform: Other Languages
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: Functional languages have been getting a lot of attention because multi-core machines are the future... but what are functional programming languages all about? What advantages do they offer over Object Oriented languages and just as importantly, what shortcomings do they have? What is the difference between a "pure" functional language and an "impure" functional language? This talk should answer these questions and it will cover concepts common to many functional programming languages: lack of shared state, recursion, higher order functions, pattern matching, actors, and monads. Most of the code samples will come from Erlang.

Presented By: Bryan Weber

About the Speaker: Bryan Weber is a Senior Software Developer at Near Infinity Corporation, an enterprise software development, training, and consulting services company based in Reston, Virginia. He has consulted to numerous federal agencies and more recently has been working on a commercial media product. He has experience in developing and securing enterprise and web applications. Bryan attempts to practice the fundamental principles of simplicity and clarity in the design and implementation of software. Bryan dabbles in too many areas of software to count in an attempt to quench his personal curiosity and to round out his professional experience. Bryan holds a B.S. in Economics from Virginia Tech. In his spare time he enjoys spending time with his family, traveling, playing soccer and of course writing software.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: Brian transitions into his new role at Microsoft, he looks back at 15 years of being a developer, consultant, and business leader. He will talk about the skills and wisdom that you need to be happy and successful.

Presented By: Brian Prince

About the Speaker: Brian H. Prince is an Architect Evangelist with Microsoft focused on building and educating the architect community in his district. Prior to joining Microsoft in March 2008, he was a Senior Director, Technology Strategy for a major mid-west partner. Further, he is a co-founder of the non-profit organization CodeMash (www.codemash.org). He speaks at various regional and national technology events including TechEd. Brian holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Computer Science and Physics from Capital University, Columbus, Ohio. He is also an avid gamer.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Advanced

Abstract: For the past several years Domain-Driven Design has given the object oriented developer a proven set of practices and patterns for coping with business complexity through coherent, expressive domain models. In the coming years new techniques, such as Domain-Specific Language design, will carry forward the core tenants of DDD: ubiquitous language, bounded contexts, and model-driven development. In this session, we'll look at some language-oriented programming techniques for getting the most out of your domain models. We'll discuss the use of internal DSLs as a means of developing clean, intention revealing APIs and creating encapsulating languages that protect mature models. We'll examine practical scenarios where external DSLs and domain models play nice and we'll look at domain expert friendly techniques for specifying, testing, and documenting your high-value model code.

Presented By: David Laribee

About the Speaker: David Laribee is President of Xclaim Software, an ISV offering a platform for building document management applications. He has 12 years experience designing, developing, and architecting enterprise applications with Microsoft technologies. David has worked with the .NET Framework since the zero-day in internal IT, product development, consulting, and rapid prototyping contexts across a wide variety of industries. David is a frequent speaker at local and national developer events, a Microsoft MVP, and a certified ScrumMaster. He writes about agile practices, software architecture, and the business of software on the CodeBetter blog network (http://thebeelog.com).

Technology/Platform: Other Languages
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: The Apple iPhone has brought mobile web browsing to the masses. Using the right tools, libraries, and techniques, you can provide your users with a user friendly experience customized for their iPhone. This session will gently introduce you to iPhone web development and teach you how to extend your Grails application to reach those millions of iPhone users and other mobile phone users.

Presented By: Christopher M. Judd

About the Speaker: Christopher Judd is the president and primary consultant for Judd Solutions, LLC, an international speaker, an open source evangelist, the Central Ohio Java Users Group leader, and the coauthor of Beginning Groovy and Grails (Apress 2008), Enterprise Java Development on a Budget (Apress, 2003). He has spent 12 years architecting and developing software for Fortune 500 companies in various industries, including insurance, retail, government, manufacturing, and transportation. His current focus is consulting, mentoring, and training with Java, Java EE, Java Platform, Micro Edition (Java ME), mobile technologies, and related technologies.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract:

Learn about the Live Framework, Microsoft's latest offering for developers programming against Live Services from any device, platform, runtime, or programming language. See new and future services (such as Mesh Services), protocols, APIs, and tools which enable your web, service, or client applications to access, store, and synchronize user data with Live Services, obtain audience analytics data, and more.

Presented By: Jeff Blankenburg

About the Speaker: Jeff Blankenburg is a Developer Evangelist for the Microsoft Corporation. Over the past 10 years, Jeff has successfully implemented his technology expertise in numerous industries including retail, education, and healthcare. Jeff has exceptional proficiency in user-interface design, Web Standards, and web application development. He is a contributor to the O'Reilly title Windows Developer Power Tools on the subject of code validation services. Jeff is also an organizer of the CodeMash conference. Jeff holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Psychology from Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, Ohio.

Technology/Platform: Other Languages
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: Introduces developers new to functional programming and Erlang to the wild, wonderful world of Erlang. The session will: * Cover the basics of Erlang syntax * Provide an overview of "sequential" Erlang * Illustrate the ease and elegance of distributed Erlang

Presented By: Kevin Smith

About the Speaker: Kevin Smith has, at various times, been a network administrator, DBA, developer, and team lead. In 2006 he discovered Erlang and immediately wondered why more people weren’t using it. Since his discovery Kevin has been writing and blogging about Erlang. He has produced a series of screencasts, "Erlang In Practice", for the Pragmatic Programmers. Currently, Kevin is a developer at Engine Yard where he uses his Erlang skills only for good.

Technology/Platform: Ruby
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract:

By borrowing the ideas and knowledge accumulated from the Rails and Merb frameworks, we can utilize Ruby to build desktop applications with ease, speed and beautiful code. In this talk I’d like to discuss some of my plans for the future of Ruby Anvil and bring attendees up-to-date in regards to what is currently being developed. For the presentation I plan on walking everyone through creating their own Anvil application. Using the application we generated, I will show the features I’ve discussed in action as well as the current state of the implementation.

Presented By: Lance Carlson

About the Speaker: I’ve been a ruby and a rails developer for over 3 years ever since I watched David’s screencast on how to make a blog in 15 minutes. I am the owner of a rails/merb/ruby consultancy called Ruby Skills. I am the creator of Ruby Anvil, a GUI framework in Ruby and am currently working with Bruce Tate to release the second edition of the book Ruby on Rails: Up and Running. (which should be released by the time this conference starts)

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: Thanks to the pervasiveness of GPS data, developers today are being asked to incorporate geospatial information into their data-driven applications. Working with spatial data, though, involves using complex geometric formulas that are difficult to implement in SQL queries. What developers need is a common abstraction layer running on the database itself that softens the complexity of working with geospatial data, yet is straightforward enough to incorporate directly into queries to provide spatial-based filtering and distance calculations. Microsoft introduced two new spatial data types (Geometry and Geography) in SQL Server 2008 that provide an implementation of Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standards.

Presented By: Jason Follas

About the Speaker: Jason Follas, President of the Northwest Ohio .NET User Group, has over 13 years of professional experience developing for the Microsoft platform using Visual Basic and C#. He is a Technical Architect for Perficient, Inc. proudly serving the Toledo and Detroit markets, and is a Microsoft MVP - SQL and a Microsoft Certified Professional. Over the course of his career, Jason has worked on a wide assortment of projects for various industries, including an Aircraft Weight and Balance system, several e-Commerce websites, Risk Management systems, and blend optimization software. Hobbies and interests include Coin-Op Video Game restoration, prime numbers and factoring, astronomy, and annihilating songs by attempting to play them on his guitar.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: What would happen if programmers gave up their duty of designing the user experience and delegated it to the the people who actually use the application? Why do we automatically assume that the people who engineered the software are the ones who should dictate how it is used? People who design fantastic user interfaces are those who are passionate about the experience people have using the software. Good programmers typically do not design great user experiences. Great programmers realize that someone else should be doing this job. In this talk I discuss the fundamental concepts behind great user experiences. Since programmers are often given this responsibility, we explore what can we do to step away from technology and learn about the feelings and emotion that drive great user experiences. Everyday we use applications which are plagued by bad design. Through the process of redesigning these interfaces we will learn a few fundamental concepts: 1. How to decide what the single point of the screen is. 2. Emphasizing priority by using greyscale and blurring the design. 3. Removing elements which aren't necessary (most of what you think is important actually isn't) 4. How to make features prove themselves to be important by telling simple stories. Perspicuous writers make their point with 5 words instead of 10. Theatrical writers learn to use visual cues to portray information. Edward Tufte evangelizes data visualizations which present as much data as possible with as little ink as possible. These are the same principals we should be adhering to when designing user interfaces.

Presented By: Josh Walsh

About the Speaker: Josh Walsh is a partner as Designing Interactive, a hosted application development firm in Cleveland, OH. He regularly blogs on the topic of entrepreneurship and his unique approach to user experience design. When not behind the desk he is usually found giving piano lessons to church kids or playing trombone with small performing groups.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: As our ASP.NET Web applications become more and more successful we switch our focus from adding features to performance, scale, and management. Richard has been in the lab studying the scaling habits of the average domestic ASP.NET solution and has emerged to discuss his findings. (No applications were actually harmed during the capture of this data.) Come and learn where ASP.NET stumbles and how to get it back on its feet. In this session we will learn about the web acceleration equation, identify common ASP.NET bottlenecks, explore solution alternatives, uncover the secret sauce, and determine a reasonable strategy for scaling ASP.NET applications.

Presented By: Richard Campbell

About the Speaker: Richard Campbell is one of the co-founders of Strangeloop Networks and today serves as product evangelist, introducing the company's unique story to advisors, investors, patent attorneys, beta-customer candidates, potential employees, etc. Richard has more than 30 years of high-tech experience and is both a Microsoft Regional Director and Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP). He has consulted with a number of leading North American organizations; Barnes&Noble.com, Dow Chemical, Johnson & Johnson Health Care Services, Reuters, Subaru/Isuzu and the U.S. Air Force. In addition to speaking at conferences around the world, Richard is co-host of the ".NET Rocks!, the Internet Audio Talk Show for .NET Developers" ( www.dotnetrocks.com ) podcast and the host of "RunAs Radio, the Internet Audio Talk Show for IT Professionals" ( www.runasradio.com ) podcast.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: Some companies are better than others at software development. The really good companies, the ones that have tackled most of the easy problems, all seem to have one problem left: they are trying to do more work than they have the capacity to deliver. Anyone who understands queuing theory realizes that trying to work beyond capacity will slow things down, not speed things up. Everyone who works with computers understands thrashing – an overloaded computer spends all of its time moving data around in its limited remaining storage area. This happens when disk usage reaches about 80 or 85% capacity, and the only solution is to do less or get more storage. This session will discuss what causes software development thrashing and how to stop doing it.

Presented By: Mary Poppendieck

About the Speaker: Mary Poppendieck started her career as a process control programmer, moved on to manage the IT department of a manufacturing plant, and then ended up in product development, where she was both a product champion and a department manager. Mary tried to retire in 1998, but instead found herself managing a government software project where she first encountered the word “waterfall”. She wrote the award-winning book “Lean Software Development” to explain how the lean principles from manufacturing could be applied to software development. Mary found retirement elusive as she lectured and taught classes with her husband Tom. Based on their on-going learning, they wrote a second book, “Implementing Lean Software Development.” Mary continues to be a popular writer and speaker as she brings thought-provoking insights to the world of software development.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Advanced

Abstract:

This session takes a deep dive into world of LINQ and the C# query expression pattern.  You will learn how LINQ is built on two key concepts: a query language and a translation from that query language into a set of methods. You will see demonstrations on how the C# compiler converts query expressions written in that query language into method calls and that every query expression has a mapping to a method call or calls that are critical from two perspectives.  Other topics covered include creating better implementations, translation from query expressions to method calls, the importance of correctly handling method signatures, and much more.  You will come away from this session with a complete understanding of the query expression pattern and when it makes the most sense to apply it in your code.

Presented By: Bill Wagner

About the Speaker: With more than 20 years experience in software design and engineering, Bill Wagner has led the design on many successful engineering and enterprise Microsoft Windows products and adapted legacy systems for Windows. In addition to his role at SRT Solutions, Bill serves as Michigan’s Regional Director for Microsoft. In 2005, Microsoft awarded him “C# Most Valuable Professional (MVP)” status. These honorary positions allow Bill previews of upcoming technologies and help ensure SRT clients the most advanced and cutting-edge solutions for their technology projects. An internationally recognized author on the C# language evolution, Smart Clients and enterprise design, Bill has been a contributing editor, editorial board member and regular columnist for over a decade with his tutorials and advanced essays published in MSDN Magazine, MSDN Online, .NET Insight, and .NET DJ. He also writes a monthly column for Visual Studio Magazine, and a monthly column on the MSDN C# team developer center. Bill’s book, Effective C#, was published in 2004. His next book, More Effective C#, was pulished in 2008.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: WPF provides developers and designers unheard of UX power with relative ease. It's time to wake up and start using WPF in the way that it was intended. DataTemplates can be used to define how data is to be represented in a UI, but did you know that they can be swapped out on the fly or have different templates applied to different items in a list depending on a condition? This session will review the concepts above and demonstrate more of the goodness that WPF DataTemplates has to offer.

Presented By: Carey Payette

About the Speaker: Carey Payette is a Senior Software Developer at American Electric Power. She is a graduate of Laurentian University in Computer Science. She has been a developer on the Microsoft .NET Platform since 2002 and is president of the Central Ohio .Net Developers Group (CONDG.org). Her skillsets include the .NET framework (mainly C#), Java (JEE), PHP and more recently has been dabbling in Dynamic languages like (Iron)Ruby. While not reading twitter messages, Carey enjoys spending time with her husband and 3 young boys.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: Developing software is only half the battle- the methodology that you use is just as important. If you’ve ever struggled to deliver solutions for business problems that are constantly changing, you are not alone. In this session we will cover the general tenants of agile development, how it can be implemented in the real world, and recount "war stories" on varying software projects of size and scope. Developers will walk away with a better understanding of agile practices and what really happens when the proverbial rubber meets the road.

Presented By: Greg Huber

About the Speaker: Greg Huber is the Business Applications Manager for First Solar. He has over a decade of experience developing, architecting, and managing software projects in consulting and large corporations. Greg is active in the .NET community and speaks at regional user groups and conferences, including regional Days of .NET and Code Mash, and was recognized as a Microsoft .NET MVP for several years. He also founded the Northwest Ohio .NET User Group and currently serves as the chairman.

Technology/Platform: Other Languages
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: With all the attention being paid to Ruby and it's hip cousin Rails, many in the Java camp may be feeling like their party invitation is "lost in the mail". Fear not loyal Java lovers, the dynamic language meme is alive and well in your space! Between numerous JSRs and various languages, the JVM is becoming quite the dynamic disco. After an overview of what it means to be dynamic, this talk will look at JRuby, Groovy, and Rhino."

Presented By: Nathaniel Schutta

About the Speaker: Nathaniel T. Schutta is a senior software engineer focussed on making usable applications. A proponent of polyglot programming, Nate has written two books on Ajax and speaks regularly at various No Fluff Just Stuff symposia, universities, and Java user groups. In addition to his day job, Nate is an adjunct professor at the University of Minnesota where he teaches students to embrace dynamic languages.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: When starting a new project, most developers make sure that testing is a priority. However, only the lucky few live in the idyllic world of greenfield development; the vast majority of us must contend with code written when "test" was a four letter word and testing was the sole responsibility of that "other" organization. We'll examine some techniques for introducing testing - not just to your code but to the rest of your development organization."

Presented By: Nathaniel Schutta

About the Speaker: Nathaniel T. Schutta is a senior software engineer focussed on making usable applications. A proponent of polyglot programming, Nate has written two books on Ajax and speaks regularly at various No Fluff Just Stuff symposia, universities, and Java user groups. In addition to his day job, Nate is an adjunct professor at the University of Minnesota where he teaches students to embrace dynamic languages.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: Learn the various techniques bad guys can use to extract information from your .NET or Java applications or at least how you can recover the source code that your predecessor deleted before he quit. A demo filled session on how easy it is to extract information from any .NET application (yes, including Silverlight).

Presented By: Joe Kuemerle

About the Speaker: Joe Kuemerle is a Sr. .NET Developer at PreEmptive Solutions, LLC ( www.preemptive.com ) and has over 14 years of experience in development.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: Does your team spend days integrating code at the end of a project? Continuous Integration can help. Using Continuous Integration will eliminate that end-of-project integration stress, and at the same time will make your development process easier. But Continuous Integration is more than just a tool like CruiseControl.Net; it is a full development process designed to bring you closer to your mainline, increase visibility of project status throughout your team, and to streamline deployments to QA or to your client. Find out what Continuous Integration is all about, and what it can do for you.

Presented By: Jay Harris

About the Speaker: Jay Harris is developer with 5 years of experience in the .Net Framework, and a developer at SRT Solutions in Ann Arbor, MI. With a career focus on user experience, he is a strong advocate of practices and processes that improve quality through code, such as automated testing, continuous integration, and performance analysis. Jay is also active in the developer community, serving on the executive board of Greater Lansing Users Group for .Net (GLUG.net), and organizing local study groups to help area developers pursue Microsoft .Net certifications. When not coding, he is usually blogging or playing games on his Xbox 360.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract:

This session explains many practical uses for Extension Methods. You will learn how to use extension methods to provide implementations on interfaces. You will see how to use extension methods to define a public interface for closed generic types. You will learn how to define new functionality on enums and create new behavior for structs. You'll see how using extension methods properly will enable you to extend closed systems with less disruption to other components. Other topics will include common mis-uses of extension methods, and why they should be avoided. You'll walk away from this session with a clear knowledge of the versatile, lightweight solutions that you can achieve using extension methods, and when to apply them in your development efforts.

Presented By: Bill Wagner

About the Speaker: see other session

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: This session introduces the newly available Surface SDK that forms the basis of the Windows 7 multi-touch programming model. In addition, learn about the unique attributes of Surface computing and then dive into the core controls like ScatterView and vision-system tagging. Learn how you can become a part of the expanding partner ecosystem for Surface computing and leverage your existing investments in Windows Presentation Foundation and Microsoft Visual Studio.

Presented By: Jennifer Marsman

About the Speaker: Jennifer Marsman is a Developer Evangelist in Microsoft’s Developer and Platform Evangelism group, where she educates developers on Microsoft’s new technologies. Prior to becoming a Developer Evangelist, Jennifer was a software developer in Microsoft’s Natural Interactive Services division. In this role, she filed two patents for her work in search and data mining algorithms. Jennifer has also held positions with Ford Motor Company, National Instruments, and Soar Technology. Jennifer earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Engineering and Master’s Degree in Computer Science and Engineering from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Her graduate work specialized in artificial intelligence and computational theory.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: Javascript is hard. It's not javascript's fault and it's certainly not your fault. It's the first causality of the browser wars. Javascript is often the bain of developer's experiences when building comprehensive user experiences for as many browsers as possible. We'll take an introductory look at the open source Prototype Javascript library and how it provides a fast, simple, Ruby-inspired abstraction to the javascript language. We'll look at how Prototype and its sister library script.aculo.us make building responsive, rich internet applications a joy again and in this talk you'll learn what they are, what they can provide for you and how they can help you fall in love with javascript programming once again. Topics covered: intro to prototype, event binding, Dom manipulations,Ajax, intro to script.aculo.us, using script.aculo.us to show flash/silverlight a thing or two about RIA!

Presented By: Leon Gersing

About the Speaker: Leon Gersing aka fallenrogue is a Software Development Engineer on the Community Server Product Team at Telligent Systems. He wears a plaid hat and sports a manly beard. Many attribute the invention of indoor laser gun sporting arenas to a dream that he had in a field during a 3 day open air music festival in Ithaca, NY. While he refuses to take credit for that he has confirmed that he is, indeed, funding an aggressive humanitarian aid program to feed the world's hungry called: "bytes of bacon... for the kids." He was rejected to work for the good people of Twitter in 2006 but holds no grudge and continues to support their product at Twitter.com/fallenrogue

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: We have been living in the shadow of Moore's law for many years. Transistor sizes keep shrinking and processor speeds keep increasing. But technology seems to have hit a brick wall. Clock cycles have not been able to keep up with the shrinking transistor. As a result, manufacturers have increased performance by putting more CPUs on a chip. But is today's software really able to deal with the concurrency demands of today's hardware? How will tomorrow's enterprise software have to change to take real advantage of this new push toward multi-core machines. This talk will take a look at current and future trends in software concurrency with respect to Ruby and other Languages.

Presented By: Jim Weirich

About the Speaker: Jim Weirich is the Chief Scientist for EdgeCase LLC, a Rails development firm located in Columbus Ohio. Jim has over twenty-five years of experience in software development. He has worked with real-time data systems for testing jet engines, networking software for information systems, and image processing software for the financial industry. Jim is active in the Ruby community and has contributed to several Ruby projects, including the Rake build system and the RubyGems package software.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: The Manifesto for Agile Software Development essentially focuses on meeting customer needs through reducing wasteful activities. For example, Agile developmental practices push for reducing repetitive documentation and for a rapid acceptance of change; yet, achieving these goals is by no means easy. While a process can enable increased collaboration, for instance, there are various tools that can effectively implement Agile principles. Once such tool is easyb (www.easyb.org), which is a Groovy based domain specific language, which facilitates collaboration by bridging those that define requirements (i.e. customers) and those who turn requirements into code (i.e. development). With easyb, collaborative teams can develop stories in a specific format which are then implemented as tests through a framework which marries the underlying application. This test suite enables change and produces accordance among Agile teams in short order. At its heart, easyb is story verification framework built in the spirit of behavior driven development. It's written with mostly Groovy and made to work with Groovy and Java. With easyb, you can write stories that help validate applications; using easyb, you can craft stories, which are essentially a series of scenarios, which read as given some context when something happens then something else should happen In this talk, we’ll learn how to embrace collaboration and change rapidly by defining easyb stories that exercise a Java application end to end. You’ll learn how to define specific easyb structures, how to plug them into real code, and how to run them in an automated fashion. You’ll see first hand how non-coders can define tests easily and how the collaboration this brings yields working software faster.

Presented By: Andrew Glover

About the Speaker: Andrew Glover is a developer who writes for multiple online publications including IBM's DeveloperWorks, Oreilly's ONJava and ONLamp portals, Dev2Dev, and InfoQ; additionally, he is the co-author of Java Testing Patterns (Wiley, 2004), Groovy in Action (Manning, 2007), and Continuous Integration: Improving Software Quality and Reducing Risk (Addison-Wesley, June 2007). He is a frequent speaker at various conferences around the country as well as internationally (and he spoke at CodeMash last year!!). You can keep up with him at thediscoblog.com.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: The Virtual Earth platform is Microsoft's next generation mapping and location service. It combines the MapPoint Web Service with exciting new innovations around bird's eye, satellite and aerial imagery, map styles and usability as well as enhanced local search. The Virtual Earth platform has become the best solution available on the market for businesses and government customers. The Virtual Earth platform enables you to deliver innovative solutions and breakthrough customer experiences. Add bird's eye imagery for real estate applications to show prospective clients, enhance your store locator with the dynamic, drag-n-drop maps, or provide your fleet drivers with highly-visual driving directions. The possibilities are endless. With version 4.0 of the map control, you can now display 3D maps on your Web site. Existing 2D maps will continue to work as they do in version 3 of the control, but now users can switch to 3D mode and view maps in an all-new way.

Presented By: Aydin Akcasu

About the Speaker: Aydin Akcasu is a Vice President of Software Development at a small software company. He is also the founder of A Vision, Inc ( www.A-V-I.com). He has over 20 years of experience, and provides innovative solutions using technologies such as Java, JavaScript, ASP, Visual Basic, VB.Net, C#.Net, ASP.Net, Flash, XML, XSL. He is a part time 'C#.Net' instructor at Washtenaw Community College (www.wccnet.edu), teaching both "Introduction to C#.Net", as well as "Advanced C#.Net". He has given many presentations and classes to local area groups (as well as a few in Bangalore, India) in topics such as: 'Help, I need to learn Javascript', 'Cover you ASP', 'VB- What is it good for?', 'FLASH-in-the-Pants?', 'C#, ASP.Net on a Budget', 'Introduction to 'C#.Net', 'AJAX - A What', 'Google Maps API-Wheres'Waldo?', 'Wii Will Wii Will Rock You! !! !!!'. He is a frequent speaker at Day Of Dot Net ( www.dayofdotnet.org ) ('Kids Programming Language', 'Introduction to Object Oriented Programming Using C#', ''Microsoft Virtual Earth, Now in 3D', 'Wii Will Wii Will Rock You! !! !!!').

Technology/Platform: Other Languages
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: The iPhone may be the most disruptive consumer electronic product released in decades, and with the release of a public SDK for third-party programmers, is one of the most important new platforms. For many developers, the iPhone SDK is completely alien, forsaking widely used languages and libraries in favor of Objective-C and Cocoa. However, these technologies were honed for years on the Mac and for those willing to invest the time to learn them, they offer a surprisingly powerful programming environment. This talk will offer an introduction to the contents of the iPhone SDK: developing with XCode and building GUIs with Interface Builder. It will introduce the Objective-C language and the core ideas and design patterns of the Cocoa Touch framework. Along with an overview of the major APIs of the iPhone platform, the talk will also discuss the processes by which you can get your application onto end-user devices, either via ad hoc distribution within the enterprise or via the Apple App Store to the general public.

Presented By: Chris Adamson

About the Speaker: Chris Adamson is a writer, editor, developer and consultant specializing in media software development. He is the co-author of the upcoming "iPhone SDK Development" (Pragmatic Programmers), as well as the author of “QuickTime for Java: A Developer’s Notebook” (O’Reilly) and co-author of “Swing Hacks” (O’Reilly) and has served as Editor for the developer websites ONJava and java.net. He maintains a corporate identity as Subsequently & Furthermore, Inc. (http://www.subfurther.com/) and writes the [Time code]; blog at http://www.subfurther.com/blog .

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: You have worked on software projects with varying degree of success. What were the reasons for the success of your last project? What were the reasons for those that failed? A number of issues contribute to project success - some non-technical in nature. In this presentation we will visit practices in a number of areas including coding, developer attitude, debugging, and feedback. These practices have an impact on our ability to succeed on software projects. The discussions are based on the 2007 Jolt Productivity award winning book with the same title.

Presented By: Venkat Subramaniam

About the Speaker: Dr. Venkat Subramaniam, founder of Agile Developer, Inc. has trained and mentored thousands of software developers in US, Canada, Europe, and Asia. He helps his clients succeed with Agile Development and various software technologies. He is a frequent invited speaker at various international software conferences. He authored .NET Gotchas (O'Reilly), and co-authored the 2007 Jolt Productivity Award winning book Practices of an Agile Developer (Pragmatic Bookshelf). His most recent book is Programming Groovy (Pragmatic Bookshelf).

Technology/Platform: Other Languages
Difficulty Level: Advanced

Abstract: In this presentation, the speaker will present a case for "Why functional programming" and present features of Scala that promote this paradigm. He will also show how you can take advantage of mixing Scala with Java features, and hence take advantage of this powerful language on your Java applications.

Presented By: Venkat Subramaniam

About the Speaker: Dr. Venkat Subramaniam, founder of Agile Developer, Inc. has trained and mentored thousands of software developers in US, Canada, Europe, and Asia. He helps his clients succeed with Agile Development and various software technologies. He is a frequent invited speaker at various international software conferences. He authored .NET Gotchas (O'Reilly), and co-authored the 2007 Jolt Productivity Award winning book Practices of an Agile Developer (Pragmatic Bookshelf). His most recent book is Programming Groovy (Pragmatic Bookshelf).

Technology/Platform: Ruby
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: Breaking Apart the Stack: Ruby Isn't Just About Rails Ruby is best known for Rails, which offers an extremely full stack of tools for building web apps. But Rails is a relatively monolithic block of tools; for many purposes, you need more customization. The Ruby underground is now afire with a battery of app frameworks, ORMs, http clients, test and spec frameworks, webservers, and javascript libraries - all the stuff that comes with Rails, but with more choice, more flexibility, and more opportunities for the alpha geek to tinker inside the box. Adam Wiggins, cofounder of Heroku (deployment platform for Ruby web apps) and author of many Ruby open source projects, will take you on a tour of all the new hotness in the Ruby world: frameworks (Sinatra, Merb), ORMs (DataMapper, Sequel), webservers (Thin, Ebb), and more. We'll compare the choice of opinionated, turnkey components (such as Rails) compared against flexible, DIY components. Both have their place; when is the right time for each?

Presented By: Adam Wiggins

About the Speaker: Adam Wiggins is a hacker, entrepreneur, and bad-ass Ruby coder from San Francisco. He's a cofounder of Heroku, the instant deployment platform for Ruby/Rails web apps; the author of many open source gems, plugins, and apps; and a contributor to the Advanced Rails Recipes Book by the Pragmatic Studio. He's spoke at events such as RailsConf and RubyConf, and he blogs about technology, business, methodology, and other high-faltuin' topcs at: http://adam.blog.heroku.com/

Technology/Platform: Java
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: Groovy and Grails have given us the ability to leverage the strength of the Java Platform (and Eco System) and the productivity of "Convention over Configuration" to construct websites.  But what if the User Interface requirements of your new application is best solved with the type of interaction a desktop application provides? Griffon, a Groovy based framework, brings the same productivity gain to desktop applications that Grails brings to web applications.  This session will use the Griffon and popular open source libraries to build a desktop application to interact with a Grails backend.

Presented By: Jim Shingler

About the Speaker: Jim Shingler is Lead Technical Architect for Big Lots, co-founder of open source project FallME, and co-author of "Beginning Groovy and Grails". The focus of his career has been using leading-edge technology to develop IT solutions for the insurance, financial services, and manufacturing industries. He has 11 years of large-scale Java experience and significant experience in distributed and relational technologies.

Technology/Platform: Other Languages
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: Looking for a better Java? Do the proposed Java 7 features fall short (or seem too far off)? Are you wondering if there's a way to use Scala as a better Java, putting aside its functional features at least for a while? This talk will focus on the improvements that the Scala language offers over Java. Far from "writing Java code using a Scala compiler", there are real efficiencies to be gained by Scala today, such as type inference, improved generics, and traits. Oh, but maybe you're a Swing programmer? Let's do that too!

Presented By: Dianne Marsh

About the Speaker: Dianne Marsh is a specialist in providing coaching and project support in a variety of programming languages. Dianne’s expertise is scientific and technical programming, including manufacturing, genomics, decision support, and real-time processing on both Windows and UNIX operating systems.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: What is Cloud Computing? How is it like and dislike clusters and grids? How should applications be architected to take advantage of the cloud? How can our current tools and skills be leveraged to get our projects off the ground and into the cloud? Join us for a look at real world .Net code running on a cloud, with all of its hurdles and glories.

Presented By: Wesley Faler

About the Speaker: Wes Faler has 20 years (ack!) of professional programming experience and is a veteran of several commercial grid-computing applications and many more projects just crying for intensive parallel computation. Wes is currently doing grid simulations for the US EPA and working with cloud-enabled genetic programming.

Technology/Platform: Ruby
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: In this talk we will examine how IronRuby can be utilized to breath new life into preexisting .NET code. The words "Silverlight" nor "Rails" will be uttered. This talk is not about glitz and glam, this is about how IronRuby can help your existing .NET enterprise. Programmers don't know every inch of the Business Domain and Domain experts can't program. IronRuby can create an intuitive interface between these two worlds, even with legacy code. A preexisting application will be scripted and automated utilizing IronRuby in order to create a Domain-Specific Language leading to a more dynamic and easier to use interface. The goal is to allow Business Domain experts to understand, in a natural manner, how the application is being used. Possibly even be able to write their own small bits of functionality!

Presented By: Michael Letterle

About the Speaker: An active contributor to IronRuby, Michael Letterle is an avid technologist and passionate about programming. When not hacking on Ruby, he is a developer at PreEmptive Solutions, and gets paid to work on the Dotfuscator and Runtime Intelligence Platforms. He has been an active member of the .NET community for the past 2.5 years, and most recently was on the planning committee of Cleveland Day of .NET. Michael also likes to try and play the guitar and his Xbox when he's not enjoying time with his wife and two year old daughter.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Advanced

Abstract: Concurrency is hard. You know it, and I know it. Fortunately, the F# team seems to have ignored this fact and delivered a host of language features and libraries that attack the problem of concurrency head on. In this session, we'll explore various parallel computing patterns, asynchronous workflows, and Erlang-style message passing, to help untangle the multi-threading mess. DISCLAIMER: The problem of concurrency will NOT be fully solved by the end of this session, but that won't be for lack of trying.

Presented By: Dustin Campbell

About the Speaker: Dustin Campbell is a program manager in the Visual Studio Managed Languages group at Microsoft where he works primarily on the Visual Basic IDE experience. Before joining Microsoft, he developed much of the low-level plumbing of the award-winning CodeRush and Refactor! products at Developer Express. A regular speaker, Dustin is a noted authority in many advanced areas of the Microsoft .NET Framework and dives deep “under the hood” of any technology that he works with. Dustin is a language nut.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: As python grows in popularity, IronPython has started making more waves. What is IronPython and why should regular python programmers be familiar with it? This session will introduce the open source .NET implementation of python known as IronPython without using Windows. Come see FePy (IronPython community edition) in action via Mono -- a cross-platform open source implementation of the .NET framework.

Presented By: Sarah Dutkiewicz

About the Speaker: Sarah Dutkiewicz has worn many hats in the past decade - including technical support tech, technical support manager, database administrator, system administrator, programmer, report writer, editor, and now developer. She graduated in 2002 with her Bachelor of Science in Computer Science and Engineering Technology from the University of Toledo, Toledo, Ohio. When she isn't working on database-driven websites, she's reading up on the latest technologies and networking with other developers.

Technology/Platform: Other Languages
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: If you've ever considered getting in to Java, but thought it was too complicated, then Groovy is for you! Groovy and Grails have proven to be a powerful combination for development (web and otherwise) in the Java world, but Java people shouldn't have all the fun. This session will demonstrate how non Java developers can quickly leverage some of the dynamic power of the Groovy language (and the Grails web framework) with language and examples which are friendly and understandable to developers coming from other backgrounds, such as PHP, Perl, Python or Ruby.

Presented By: Michael Kimsal

About the Speaker: Michael Kimsal is an independant software consultant based, host of the WebDevRadio podcast series, and author of "The PHP Job Hunter's Handbook". Michael brings 13 years of commercial web development experience, ranging from small custom projects to billion dollar ecommerce websites and everything in between. He currently lives in Raleigh, NC with his wife and two cats.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Advanced

Abstract: The Unix command line and the array of small software tools built for it are old enough to be forgotten by the new crop of hipster programmers. In this talk I present an overview of an architecture, called "grease", for designing and implementing powerful, short programs that handle a variety of common back end data processing tasks. Grease is notable for its brevity - most code is less than a screen full of text - and its simple expressive power. By using modern parallel processing tools a short grease program can exploit CPU resources all around the globe. Finally, grease allows for (and depends on) iterative development, with heavy code reuse. We'll trace the history of this programming technique through several eras of parallelism - multiprocessor systems, shared memory systems, and cloud computing - and illustrate with the consequent development of programming languages and tools that exploit parallel pipelined processing.

Presented By: Edward Vielmetti

About the Speaker: Edward Vielmetti is based in Ann Arbor, MI. He has been involved with Internet development since 1985 and with commercial use of the Internet since 1989. Edward has worked for a series of pioneering and industry-leading organizations that have build systems for Internet-based securities trading, the first commercial Internet service provider in Michigan, and network-based credit card processing. He was a co-author with Nathaniel Borenstein of the 1996 Communications of the ACM paper "Perils and Pitfalls of Practical Cybercommerce". He has a B.A. in Economics from the University of Michigan and is a member of the International Network of Social Network Analysts and the Internet Engineering Task Force.

Technology/Platform: Java
Difficulty Level: Advanced

Abstract: Spring 2.5 induces a new way of development, I refer to as ADD, Annotation Driven Development. This session dives deep into the new ADD approach of building web applications with Java. Be an ADD programmer!

Presented By: Ken Sipe

About the Speaker: Ken Sipe is a Technology Director with Perficient, Inc. (PRFT), IBM's largest service partner, where he leads multiple teams in the development of solutions in the SOA, Web 2.0 and portal domains, on both the Java and .Net platforms. Ken was the founder of CodeMentor, where he was the Chief Architect and Mentor, leading clients in the execution of RUP and Agile methodologies in the delivery of software solutions. He is a former trainer for Rational in OOAD and RUP, and a CORBA Visibroker trainer for Borland. He continues to enjoy providing training and mentoring in all aspects of software development.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: It's a meeting of titans! The latest .net meets the oldest 8-bit! We will do a brief overview of services in Microsoft Robotics Studio, then write a simple MSRS service to support a HeathKit HERO-1 robot from 1983. Code will be in C# and M6800 assembly language (don’t worry, we won’t need too much assembly code.)

Presented By: Andrew Craze

About the Speaker: Andrew Craze has been designing and writing software professionally for more than 25 years. After graduating from Stanford University, he worked as a developer and team lead at Microsoft for 6 years, before returning home to Cleveland. He has worked for companies ranging from 2 to 17,000 employees, on projects from coding 8-bit device drivers to designing enterprise client-server workflow systems.

Technology/Platform: Java
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: Do Rich Internet Applications need a Model View Controller (MVC) framework for the client side? If so, which MVC framework is best? This session will cover some fundamentals of developing Rich Clients using Adobe Flex 3.0 and the benefits of good program structure, including the use of MVC frameworks. It will demonstrate the use of Cairngorm, the leading MVC framework for Flex, and contrast it briefly with PureMVC and other leading frameworks. We’ll also look at the FlexUnit framework for testing Flex applications and put it all together through examples.

Presented By: Robert A. O'Malley

About the Speaker: Robert O’Malley has over 20 years experience in software development, architecture and product management. He has taught on J2EE, Software Engineering concepts and UML. He has implemented Rich Client solutions using Adobe Flex, and many forms of JavaScript / Ajax techniques including the JavaScript libraries. He also has significant experience implementing eCommerce web sites and implementing Web Services and Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) technologies.

Technology/Platform: Python
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: Django offers compelling performance advantages over Rails on Jython (because of "native" threading support. And Jython is one of the oldest languages on the JVM -- other than java of course -- so it's a great language to learn and use for scripting java libraries. Python programmers can learn how to use Java tools like Terracotta, and hibernate, to improve performance and scalability, while Java people can learn how Python Django and SQLAlchemy can increase developer productivity, and provide production ready rapid prototypes that can be deployed in standard java ways (as war files, etc).

Presented By: Mark Ramm

About the Speaker: Mark Ramm is a web developer famous for his Python work, but who's a 100% sold out language and tool pragmatist. He believes choosing the right tool for the job is the right way to develop software, and Mark has a history with Java, Python, Perl, and even Visual Basic.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: Windows Communication Foundation was released with the .Net 3.0 framework and is the future of the platform for distributed computing. With .Net 3.5 and Visual Studio 2008, Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) became a first class citizen with additional tooling and add ons for Windows Workflow Foundation. In this session we are going to look at WCF from the standpoint of how to transition from ASMX web services and some of the important things you should know about WCF. If you have been hesitant in adopting WCF and still writing ASMX web services, this session will hopefully put you over the edge to giving WCF a try. I assure you, once you do, you will never look back.

Presented By: Keith Elder

About the Speaker: Keith Elder is a Team Leader / Sr. Software Engineer for Quicken Loans, the nation's largest online mortgage lender based in Livonia, MI and is a host of the popular online technology podcast Deep Fried Bytes. He is also the founder of the Hattiesburg, MS .Net User Group called Hub City NUG. Keith is an experienced technologist, systems administrator, software engineer, and all around geek. As a Microsoft MVP he speaks throughout the South and Midwestern parts of the United States at various Code Camps, .Net User Groups, technical conferences and schools. You can read more about Keith's interests, hobbies, rants and raves on his blog at http://keithelder.net/blog/.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: If you ever wondered how computer vision worked, this is the session for you. The session will provide real-time examples of object recognition, object tracking, vision based user interfaces and applications in robotics. Yes, this will be the session with robots, smarter faster, and more intelligent than last year.

Presented By: Scott Preston

About the Speaker: Scott is a member of the Java Community Process, Central Ohio Java Users Group, Columbus Ruby Brigade and founder of The Columbus Robotics Society. He wrote his first book The Definitive Guide to Building Java Robots, by Apress in 2005, and Co-Authored, Real-World-Ajax by SYS-CON Media in 2006. Scott has given talks about robotics all over Ohio including CodeMash 2008.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Intermediate

Abstract: This talk goes over the fundamentals of Guerilla SOA (a concept conceived in ThoughtWorks and championed by Dr Jim Webber) and how they are applied to WCF in both a SOAP and REST context. Using principles from agile software development into an emergent architecture, particularly for services, the talk looks at an alternative approach to the usual usage of the WCF programming model which provides a true message-oriented approach (rather than the RPC hole almost every WS-* stack drives us into). Drawing on real large-scale projects, we'll touch on consumer-driven contracts, sensible XSD, alternate validation techniques, LINQ to XML, XPath, and an MVC approach to web service implementation.

Presented By: Joshua Graham

About the Speaker: JoshG has over 19 years experience in the software industry and is the Chief Dispenser of Pleasantries at ThoughtWorks. Originally from the TW Sydney office, he's now based in Chicago and serves ThoughtWorks clients as a modern Enterprise Architect (in that he actively works on implementing architectures to gain feedback and adapt to change). Josh has spoken at and chaired conferences on SOA, enterprise architecture, and agile software delivery. He's currently learning Scala and thinks F# is the next big thing on .NET (IronRuby notwithstanding). You may have met Josh already at a bar.

Technology/Platform: Python
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: Python is a great tool for collecting and analyzing data. Frequently, that analysis ends in outputting data to a file or a database, but it doesn't have to; Python has rich imaging libraries for interacting with digital images and visualizing data graphically. In the first part of the talk we'll look at interacting with digital images in Python, including image creation, color manipulation, and edge detection. In the second part we'll look at ways of visualizing different data, including geographic data on maps and various types of graphs. Both parts will use the Python module matplotlib.

Presented By: Zach Steindler

About the Speaker: Zach frequently needs to visualize data at Zattoo, where he works to spot potential problems and trends in TV viewing before they are reported by millions of users. He also enjoys hacking in his free time and is an avid Coffee House Coder (irc.freenode.net/#coffeehousecoders).

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Advanced

Abstract:

Now that most people know that Silverlight can do fancy animations and play videos, lets look at how to make it do some real work. In this presentation we will demonstrate connecting to web services, using returned data, binding data to controls and discuss some limitations Silverlight currently has. And of course, since it's Silverlight, we'll try to make it look good in the process.

Presented By: John Stockton

About the Speaker:

Technology/Platform: Ruby
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract:

Presented By: Joe O'Brien

About the Speaker:

Technology/Platform: Ruby
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: Ruby on Rails was one of the first platforms to ship with a full testing harness.  There are, however, some critical problems that can arise from doing straight out-of-the-box testing.  This talk will walk through some of those areas helping you avoid the pitfalls that many fall into.  What do you change, what do you keep, how do you write maintainable tests that last the test of time?  We will walk through all of these while test-driving an application.

Presented By: Joe O'Brien

About the Speaker:

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: Microsoft Developer Evangelist Jeff Blankenburg provides a captivating oversight of some of the amazing things that Microsoft is busy working on behind the scenes. You may have played around with some of these technologies already in their beta form, but in the end, you'll be guaranteed to see something that you've never seen before! Join us for a peek into these exciting future products and technologies, including Photosynth, Deep Zoom, Live Mesh, and more.

Presented By: Jeff Blankenburg

About the Speaker:

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: In this session, you will learn the basics of measuring and tuning web application performance and scalability, using a variety of toolsets. The session starts out with the basics, including the difference between what is meant by performance vs. scalability, and how to ensure that a customer provides enough information that the development team knows when “good enough” performance has been achieved. Once the basics are established, several best practices and tips and tricks are described which can dramatically improve application performance or scalability (and sometimes both), as well as improving perceived responsiveness through asynchronous processing techniques. Most of these techniques apply equally well to applications regardless of their underlying platform, and several rely only on HTTP and/or JavaScript.

Presented By: Steve Smith

About the Speaker:

Steve Smith is co-owner of Lake Quincy Media, the Microsoft Developer Ad Network, and ASPAlliance.com, a popular software professional web site.  He is a Microsoft Regional Director, an ASP.NET MVP (profile), an INETA Speaker, and an ASPInsider.  He's written or contributed to several books on ASP.NET and related topics and is a frequent speaker at industry conventions such as DevConnections and Tech Ed.

Steve is a US Army veteran who served in Iraq as a combat engineer platoon leader tasked with destroying unexploded ordnance and clearing IEDs.  He received his honorable discharge as a CPT in 2005 and is now happy to be 100% a civilian.

Steve lives in Ohio with his wife and business partner Michelle, their daughter Ilyana, and son Nikita.  When he's not trying to keep up with his business or technology, Steve enjoys games, bicycling, and karate.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract:

Presented By: Mike Woelmer and Jay Wren

About the Speaker:

Mike Woelmer is a senior software consultant for SRT Solutions, Ann Arbor. His perspective on version control systems stems from more than a decade in the field working for both small companies (video game development) and global businesses (ultrasound image analysis applications). His current career focus is in developing .Net desktop applications and improving the user experience. Mike holds degrees from both Michigan State University and the University of Michigan.

Jay Wren has been writing custom software solutions for integrating Windows and Unix since 1998. His blend of traditional system administration and custom software solutions has allowed numerous enterprises to transcend platform dependence. Some of Jay's software is still in use at a state university in Michigan. In 2004, Jay started learning .NET via C# when trying to learn J2EE proved too difficult. In 2008 he was awarded the MVP award from Microsoft.

Technology/Platform: Java
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: Java developers want to use what they already know to build great software.  Rich Internet Applications allow us to build better software but with many of the options out there developers have to replace what they know with a new software stack.  This session will help you learn how to use what you already know to begin building RIAs.  For those new to Flex the session it will cover the basics of connecting a Flex application to a Java back-end powered by Spring and Hibernate.  There will be tons of code aimed at those looking to make the move to RIA.

Presented By: James Ward

About the Speaker: James Ward is a Technical Evangelist for Flex at Adobe and Adobe’s JCP representative to JSR 286, 299, and 301. Much like his love for climbing mountains he enjoys programming because it provides endless new discoveries, elegant workarounds, summits and valleys. His adventures in climbing have taken him many places. Likewise, technology has brought him many adventures, including: Pascal and Assembly back in the early 90’s; Perl, HTML, and JavaScript in the mid 90’s; then Java and many of it’s frameworks beginning in the late 90’s. Today he primarily uses Flex to build beautiful front-ends for Java based back-ends. Prior to Adobe, James built a rich marketing and customer service portal for Pillar Data Systems.

Technology/Platform: Other
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract: In November 2008, Adobe previewed “Gumbo,”a  code name for the next version of Adobe Flex Builder, and is the next generation IDE for building Flash applications with Flex. The company also introduced Adobe Flash Catalyst, a new interaction design tool, based on Eclipse, for creating rich Internet applications in a Creative Suite-like environment. In this session we will share some of the upcoming features in “Gumbo” including the network monitor, improved refactoring and documentation support, as well as updated code generation tools to help make developers more effective. We will also look at how “Gumbo” and Flash Catalyst work together to make it easy for teams to collaborate. Because“Gumbo”and Flash Catalyst are based on Eclipse, designers and developers can stay synchronized throughout a project, enabling a streamlined two-way design and development workflow, resulting in faster time to market through agile design and development.

Presented By: James Ward

About the Speaker: James Ward is a Technical Evangelist for Flex at Adobe and Adobe’s JCP representative to JSR 286, 299, and 301. Much like his love for climbing mountains he enjoys programming because it provides endless new discoveries, elegant workarounds, summits and valleys. His adventures in climbing have taken him many places. Likewise, technology has brought him many adventures, including: Pascal and Assembly back in the early 90’s; Perl, HTML, and JavaScript in the mid 90’s; then Java and many of it’s frameworks beginning in the late 90’s. Today he primarily uses Flex to build beautiful front-ends for Java based back-ends. Prior to Adobe, James built a rich marketing and customer service portal for Pillar Data Systems.

Technology/Platform: .NET
Difficulty Level: Beginner

Abstract:

Presented By: Carl Franklin

About the Speaker: Carl Franklin has been a figurehead in the VB community since the very early days when he wrote for Visual Basic Programmers Journal. He authored the Q&A column of that magazine as well as many feature articles for VBPJ and other magazines. He has authored two books for John Wiley & Sons on sockets programming in VB, and in 1994 he helped create the very first web site for VB developers, Carl & Garys VB Home Page. Carl is also the MSDN Regional Director for Connecticut(www.microsoftregionaldirectors.com), an MVP for Visual Basic, host of .NET Rocks! and Mondays, and CEO of Pwop Productions, which provides podcasting services.