Ruby/Rails Project Night is a Toronto-area gathering held at the TSOT developer office on the second Tuesday of every month. It’s an event that lets people developing projects in either Ruby or Ruby on Rails show them off in front of their peers in 20-30 minute presentations. Presenters are encouraged to go into as much technical detail as they like (even showing the code, if they’re so inclined) and cover all sorts of aspects of their projects, from programming issues to visual design and usability to the business of making a living off their software.
Whether you code in Ruby and Rails for a living like we do, dabble in it in your spare time or are just curious as to what the fuss is all about, we encourage you to come to our office next Tuesday for Ruby/Rails Project Night! It’s a chance for you to see software that’s being developed right here in town and to mingle with other developers interested in Ruby and Rails. We provide food and drink, so you can focus on the presentations and not your grumbling stomach.
Who’s Presenting
Yours Truly will start the night with an opening monologue to get things going, after which I’ll be followed the the evening’s main presentations:
How to Avoid Hanging Yourself in Rails, by Rowan Hick. This presentation is subtitled “or: Optimizing Your ActiveRecord Associations”.
EasyBrandingTools.com: Mike Bowler and Steve Vetzal will talk about their project that helps new businesses be memorable.
CRMS – Clinical Research Management System. Luke Galea will present this project, a Rails and Prolog/XSB application that manages drug and procedure trials at some of the biggest hospitals in the U.S..
What Happened at the Last Ruby/Rails Project Night?
I’ve been quite impressed by the “Addison-Wesley Professional Ruby” series of books (I’ve got The Ruby Way and RailsSpace) as well as the work of series editor Obie Fernandez, whom I had the pleasure of meeting at RailsConf 2006. That — along with glowing reviews for both books plus my serious immersion into Ruby and Rails at TSOT — is why I’ve got Design Patterns in Ruby and The Rails Way on order. I’m looking forward to getting my paws on these books, and I’ll post reviews shortly afterwards.
(I’m normally pretty conservative when it comes to spending on computer programming books for the past little while, but that’s because evangelism rather than programming has paid the rent. That situation has changed somewhat.)
Both Design Patterns in Ruby and The Rails Way are in Antonio Cangiano’s set of recommended Ruby and Rails books. If you’re looking to get into either Ruby or Rails (or if you’re already into either and just looking for related reading material), check out his list.
It’s been exactly one week since we moved from TSOT’stemporary office to the permanent one on the 11th floor at 151 Bloor Street West. The new digs are pretty sweet, and I thought I’d post some photos showing the evolution of the space.
Here’s what the place looked like on December 7th. You can click the photo below to see the whole photoset on Flickr:
Click this photo to see the “TSOT December 7″ photoset.
Here’s how things looked on December 20th and 21st. Once again, click the photo to see the whole photoset on Flickr:
Click this photo to see the “TSOT December 20 – 21″ photoset.
And finally, here’s how things looked on “Moving-In Day”, January 3rd. Click the photo to see the whole photoset:
Click this photo to see the “TSOT January 3″ photoset.
Tonight is TSOT’s first monthly Ruby/Rails Project Night, where we invite the local developer community into our offices to see presentations on Ruby and Rails development and socialize. We’ve got a great lineup of speakers:
Yours Truly, on the lessons and challenges of Zed Shaw’s rant
Andrew Burke on the business and technical aspects of his current Rails project
Hampton Catlin on Ziplocal.com
Mike Ferrier on The Score’s iPhone application
The event will take place at TSOT’s office — 151 Bloor Street West (on the south side, just east of Avenue Road), suite 1130. The doors open at 5:30 p.m., during which time we’ll serve food. Presentations start at 6-ish, with breaks in between and some time for socializing afterwards. Admission is free, but space is limited — to register, please email joey.devilla@tsotinc.com.
The resemblance is uncanny, isn’t it? Zed Shaw photo by Adewale Oshineye — click the photo to see it on its Flickr page.
By now, most Rails developers — and even a number of people who couldn’t care less about Rails — have read Zed Shaw’s infamous rant titled Rails is a Ghetto. It’s given me a lot to think about, and as a result, I’m changing my presentation topic at Tuesday’s TSOT Ruby/Rails Project Night to Rant Said Zed: I’m Too Sexy for my Rails (or: Lessons and Challenges from Zed Shaw’s Rant). I promise that it’ll be both informing and entertaining.
Want to know more about Tuesday’s TSOT Ruby/Rails Project Night, which takes place this Tuesday, January 8th? See this entry.
Here’s a quick reminder about TSOT’s upcoming Ruby/Rails night, which takes place on Tuesday, January 8th, 2008:
TSOT Ruby/Rails Night
Tuesday, January 8th, 2008 (and the second Tuesday of every month)
@ TSOT’s office — 151 Bloor Street West (on the south side, just east of Avenue Road)
11th floor
Door open and food at 5:30 p.m.
Presentations start at 6-ish
FREE [...]
Gear-wise, life is pretty sweet at TSOT. The standard-issue computer is a 15″ MacBook Pro (the 2.2 Ghz model), which is a great Ruby on Rails development machine. The standard issue keyboard is the ultra-skinny Apple Wired Keyboard and Apple Mighty Mouse, but I don’t like the feel of either. I prefer the feel of [...]
The Quick Version
TSOT Ruby/Rails Night
Tuesday, January 8th, 2008 (and the second Tuesday of every month)
@ TSOT’s office — 151 Bloor Street West (on the south side, just east of Avenue Road)
11th floor
Door open and food at 5:30 p.m.
Presentations start at 6-ish
FREE ADMISSION (but limited space)
To register, please email joey.devilla@tsotinc.com
About TSOT
TSOT is a Toronto-based start-up that [...]
Ever since I got my first digital camera back in 1998, I’ve made it a point to snap pictures of my workspace on a regular basis. The nature of my work has meant that I’ve rearranged or changed desks about every six months since I joined the workforce full-time back in ‘95, so I’m glad [...]
The New Company
The “mascots” from the SororityLive and FraternityLive home pages. Party! Whoo!
My new company is TSOT, a little start-up specializing in social software. The company’s first products are SororityLive and FraternityLive, social software with special features for people in — you guessed it — sororities and fraternities. It’s pretty interesting software, and it doesn’t [...]
