Monthly Archives: June 2012

Books and Conferences and Blogging, oh my!

Long time, no blog. I’ve been putting all of my writing energy into the book that I’m writing with Bruce Eckel. We’re working on Atomic Scala, a book targeted at a gentle introduction to Scala, for programmers and not-yet-programmers alike. If you like the language, we expect that the book will prepare you for a more comprehensive book.

If you want to experience what we’re working on, Bruce and I will be holding a 4-day workshop, “A Gentle Introduction to Scala” in Crested Butte, CO from July 18-21. We’re limiting attendance to 8 people for now, and holding it in Bruce’s living room.  The goal is to gently introduce the workshop attendees to the language through a series of discussion-y type interactions based on the book and exercises that we’ve developed. We will gain valuable feedback about the book and we hope that the attendees will become comfortable enough with the language that they can decide if they want to pursue its study or not.

We decided to do a social experiment on pricing the Atomic Scala workshop. Inspired by the Humble Bundle folks, we’re letting the attendees decide how much they want to pay. We set a minimum ($75) and show how other open spaces conferences have been priced for comparison sake. Unlike the Humble Bundle folks, we didn’t write any cool code to show how much above or below the average people are paying, or separate it out by platform, and we didn’t throw in any bonuses for paying above average. Frankly, the numbers are just to small for that to be meaningful in this case. But we are looking forward to seeing how people respond to “pay-by-worth”.

Immediately before the Scala workshop, I will be presenting the Scala Koans with Daniel Hinojosa at OSCON, in Portland, OR. I’m really looking forward to the conference. I haven’t been to Portland in quite a while, and I’ve never been to OSCON. The koans will be presented on Monday afternoon. Daniel and I have presented them together several times now, and it’s been an interesting experience each time. The participants really make it fun!

I’m looking forward to my own little Geek Week this summer!