After reading Bill Burke’s article, Dynamic Languages: Rationalizations and Myths, you might also want to look at Patrick Logan’s articles, Dynamic Languages: Should the Tools Suck? and Deeper Dynamics.
It’s a new month, which means a new Ruby/Rails Project Night at TSOT on Tuesday, February 12th!
The last one was a success — we had over 50 attend (you can see photos and a quick writeup here) and this one looks like it’s going to be as big a hit. Better still, based on feedback from the attendees, we’re going to delve even deeper into technical matters, because that’s what you asked for!
Several eager Rails developers have asked us about presenting their projects at our Project Nights, and next Tuesday, we’re proud to feature these presentations:
- How to Avoid Hanging Yourself in Rails (or: Optimizing Your ActiveRecord Associations) by Rowan Hick
- Helping New Businesses be Memorable with EasyBrandingTools.com by Mike Bowler and Steve Vetzal
- Clinical Research Management System (CRMS) by Luke Galea. CRMS is a Rails and Prolog/XSB application used to manage drug and procedure trials at the some of the biggest hospitals in the US.
TSOT’s Ruby/Rails Project Night takes place next Tuesday, February 12th at our development office at 151 Bloor Street West (just east of Avenue Road), Suite 1130. Doors will open at 5:30pm with presentations beginning some time between 6 and 6:30. This event is free but space is limited; reserve your spot today by emailing corina.newby@tsotinc.com or joey.devilla@tsotinc.com.
The third Toronto edition of Facebook Developer Garage/FacebookCamp (it goes by both names) takes place tonight at MaRS Discovery District (101 College Street, just east of University Avenue).
Here’s the agenda as of the time of this writing:
| Time | Event / Presentation |
|---|---|
| 6:00 – 6:30 | Social / Mingling / Registration |
| 6:30 – 6:35 | introduction and update from the last Facebook Toronto Gathering (Roy Pereira, Colin Smillie and Andrew Cherwenka) |
| 6:40 – 7:15 | Keynote by Dave Morin, Senior Platform Manager, Facebook |
| 7:15 – 7:30 | Website Marketing in Facebook case study (Tim Shore, BlogTO) |
| 7:30 – 7:40 | Facebook Pages case study (Andrew Cherwenka) |
| 7:40 – 7:50 | Bebo Facebook Application (Roy Pereira and Colin Smillie, Refresh Partners) |
| 7:50 – 8:00 | Facebook vs. OpenSocial (Jawad Shuaib) |
| 8:00 – 8:15 | Facebook Beacon (Jay Goldman, Radiant Core) |
| 8:15 – 8:40 | 5-minute Demos:
|
| 8:40 and on | Wrap-up and Social |
If you were wondering what happened at the last Facebook Garage/FacebookCamp, you can see my notes at:
Categories
Microsoft’s Bid for Yahoo!
On the very off chance that you hadn’t yet heard: Microsoft has proposed to buy Yahoo! at $31 per share, which translates to just under $45 billion. My fellow Canuck tech news bloggers Mark Evans and Mathew Ingram have weighed in, and — as Mark has astutely observed, the major snowstorm covering the northeast should have the blogosphere’s tongues a-waggin’. Keep an eye on Techmeme for the latest news.
Here’s a sign displayed in the window of A&D Computer in Milford, New Hampshire:
Here’s the relevant excerpt from Todd Bishop’s Microsoft Blog:
Shop manager Aaron Kaplan said they were prompted to put it up because so many people were having problems with Windows Vista, including compatibility issues with older software and trouble adjusting to the interface.
“A lot of people didn’t like using Vista, and a lot of the manufacturers forced people to go up to Vista,” he said.
What was the demand for the service? “We had a lot of people coming in and asking about it,” Kaplan said. “Of all the signs we put up there the last two years, at least, we probably got the most response out of that one. A lot of people coming in.”
Kaplan said they’ve since replaced it with a different message, but they’re thinking about putting the Vista removal message back up.
Phil Factor’s blog entry, Microsoft Boy Announces His School Homework, is a pretty good allegory for how Microsoft’s marketing department communicates.
Categories
Ten Worst PC Keyboards of All Time
PC World takes a look at the 10 Worst PC Keyboards of All Time:
- Commodore 64 — I don’t recall this one being so bad.
- Timex Sinclair 2068
- Commodore PET 2001-32-N – my high school had a room full of these, and as with the Commodore 64, I don’t recall this one being so bad.
- Texas Instruments TI 99/4
- Tandy TRS-80 Micro Color Computer MC-10
- Atari 400
- Timex Sinclair 1000
- Mattel Aquarius
- Commodore Pet 2001
- IBM PCjr