The 2009 Toronto Code Camp was held on Saturday, April 25, 2009 and what a huge success it was. The keynote was standing room only and many of the sessions were also at capacity. This was the fourth Toronto Code Camp and each year it gets better.  Chris Dufour has organized each and every Code Camp and has done an outstanding job. Thanks to Chris for all his hard work!

With some 25 sessions in all with diverse topics such as Silverlight, AJAX 4.0, SQL Reporting Services, WIX, Data Architecture, XNA, the day had something to offer each and every .NET developer. I personally enjoyed the Silverlight and AJAX talks as my current focus is on web development. Nonetheless, there was something for everyone.

I had the pleasure of interviewing some of the attendees and the overwhelming consensus was the sessions were great and much appreciated.

As for surprises, this year had a visit by Joey DeVilla aka Assless Chaps. Joey made a surprise entrance to Bruce Johnson’s Data *Bondage* with WPF presentation. He arrived wearing assless chaps and sang Britney Spears while playing an accordion. The whole thing was capture on video and can be viewed below. 

Another first, at this Code Camp, was the After Party at the Ground Hug Pub. To unwind from the days events and sit back and relax, many of the attendees went to the pub and put back a beer, or two, or …

What a day! A .NET developer’s dream realized; great presentations, networking, great prizes (the grand prize was 2 MSDN premium subscriptions and one admission to DevTeach Vancouver), free lunch and a great party at the pub.

Thanks to everyone that made the fourth Toronto Code Camp a huge success; the speakers, the volunteers, the sponsors, the attendees and especially to Chris Dufour.

Please visit the Toronto Code Camp Site for additional information of the days events and many more videos.

I had one of two options, drink green beer on St. Patrick's Day or give a JQuery presentation a TVBUG. Silly me I chose to give the presentation. All kidding aside, today, I had the privilege to speak at the Toronto Visual Basic User's Group. I decided to give the talk a St. Patrick’s theme and provided green food colouring for the water. I also gave the talk while wearing a St. Patrick’s hat.

The topic was on jQuery a technology that I have embraced for the last few months. As ASP.NET developers we need to upgrade our skill sets and be able to provide rich internet applications. jQuery is one such technology that delivers Web 2.0 type functionality. The audience was quite engaged and at the end of the presentation I got some very positive feedback and interest in jQuery. If you want to see the presentation online then visit the site. 

Here are some photos from the meeting.

Back in May 2008, I had the privilege of representing TVBUG at the Canadian User Group Summit held at DevTeach, Toronto. It was great meeting with .NET user group representatives and discussing relevant issues.

The User Group TV (UGTV) was also in attendance and interviewed us for an future episode of UGTV. The latest episode of the show features interviews with the user group representatives. Check me out!

Guess the movie

Remember, George: no man is a failure who has friends.

It's getting colder. The flowers are no longer blooming. The leaves on the trees are beginning to change colour. Heck my garden on the balcony is beginning to die. No more basil, no more tomatoes which means no more fresh tomato basil salads. All these are indicators of the demise summer and the arrival of fall. Or are they?

.NET developers have there own ways of doing things and determining changes in the season are not necessarily determined by the means described above. The last user group meeting of the year tells us that summer is here. Likewise the first meeting tells use that fall has arrived and winter is just around the corner.

I just went to the first TVBUG meeting. A great beginning to a what is sure to be a great set of presentations in the up and coming user group sessions.

Here is a list of user groups in and around the Greater Toronto Area. Please visit their sites and check to see if there are any presentations that interest you. They are all free!

• Toronto Visual Basic User Group 
• Metro Toronto .NET User Group
• Toronto .NET User Group
• East of Toronto .NET User Group
• Toronto Silverlight User Group
• Toronto Biztalk User Group
• Toronto Sharepoint User Group
• Toronto SQL Server User Group

June 4th, 2008 was the first meeting of the Toronto Silverlight User Group and yours truly was in attendance. The meeting was held at 222 Bay Street and was standing room only. This meeting was primarily focused on introducing Silverlight 2.0. A Silverlight application was created using Blend 2.5.

As an ASP.NET developer I need to be up to date on web technologies. Web 2.0 is fast becoming a norm and users are expecting Rich Internet Applications (RIA). Silverlight and Blend allow designers and developers to create compelling Web 2.0 application.

I enjoyed the first Toronto Silverlight User Group meeting and look forward to many more.

Great job!

Photos from the meeting:

Guess the movie

I see dead people.