4 ms·

Clojure/West conference has launched

91 points by puredanger 15y ago

tbatchelli 15y ago
I find clojure/conj to be a tad too theoretical (at least from paper). Not that I don't like that since I am a language geek anyway, but I think it will be great for Clojure the language to have a more of a "get things done" conference to complement the conj.
- fogus 15y ago
  Do you mind explaining "theoretical"? For example, of the talks listed this year are there any that you would say are theoretical?
  - tbatchelli 15y ago
    I guess theoretical is a subjective term. What I meant to say was that Clojure/conj seems geared towards advanced clojure users, and I think Clojure would benefit of a conference that focuses more on bringing new developers to the fold. From this perspective, more talks about build tools, web development frameworks, useful libraries, etc would be great. I personally think that clojure could use some more evangelization here in the Bay Area, and I believe Clojure/west can do just that. But I myself attended to the Emerging Languages Conference, so I will definitely enjoy the conj very much, don't get me wrong. EDIT: I guess I didn't answer part of your question, which is what talks I consider theoretical. Here are some (judging from title and abstract): "Extreme Cleverness: Functional Data Structures in Scala", "Predicate Dispatch", "Concurrent Stream Processing" . Hoping this will help with clarification, this is what I would like to see too at some point: "From concept to production in 40 min: how to create a webapp in clojure", "A survey of Clojure tooling", "Debugging made easy", "Clojure and Hadoop", etc.
    - fogus 15y ago
      I do see what you mean. I was afraid that you were getting into the "academic" phrasing, but suspected that I only misunderstood. I too like case-studies and prefer a mix of them and the "theoretical" topics.[1] I would hate to see one excluded in favor of the other, so I am hopeful that Alex and team will put together a great mix. [1]: Although I think the vast majority of topics that we as programmers talk about are theories.
      - puredanger 15y ago
        We will brew up a tasty mix.
puredanger 15y ago
Track Clojure/West on Lanyrd here: http://lanyrd.com/2012/clojurewest/ http://lanyrd.com/2012/clojurewest/
marcolz 15y ago
Cannot wait. I especially like the fact that there will also be training days: being still a "new" language I believe it's nice to make it more appealing for new people.
- puredanger 15y ago
  We have several things in the works but would love to hear any ideas you have for more specific training than just "learning the language".
  - marcolz 15y ago
    Still. For a couple of days of "just learning the language" I'm ready to come all the way from Italy. ; ) Anyway, a few suggestions: - Clojure for Processing large amount of data (MapReduce); - Clojure for Web Development; - Clojure for When Other Languages Are Simply Not Enough(tm).
    - puredanger 15y ago
      Thanks - we already talking to people about most of those. :) Also, we will have training for learning the language as well, done by Clojure/core.
michaelschade 15y ago
It says it on the website, but of particular note is that Alex also runs the Strange Loop conference (https://thestrangeloop.com/ https://thestrangeloop.com/). Of its three years, I've attended two consecutively, and have had a blast both times, learned many new things, and made great connections. He also runs groups here in St. Louis that I attend, so that paired with my experiences at his conference lead me to say with confidence that a conference run by him is certainly worth considering.
puredanger 15y ago
I'd love to have Paul Graham talk at Clojure/West. Seeing as this is HN, if anyone reading this wants to convince him, please do. :)
- puredanger 15y ago
  Unfortunately pg can't make it. :(
sbochins 15y ago
Can anyone give me a justification for attending a tech conference. I never have attended one in the past an d $450 seems like a lot of money out of my own pocket. I'm interested in writing clojure web apps, but I am not convinced I would benefit enough from this conference to justify the cost. Can someone tell me where I'm wrong?
- puredanger 15y ago
  As someone that puts on conferences (including this one), this is something I've spent unhealthy amounts of time thinking about and it's a question any sane person should ask. There are really two (well 3) things you should hope to get out of a conference. 1) Information. The most visible reason to go to a conference is to extract information from speakers in a direct form. Whether this actually "works" depends largely on whether you (the attendee) have the right prior knowledge and expectations and whether the speaker has the ability to teach you something. If either of those is wildly off, the session will be a miss. My goal as an organizer is to find great speakers and make expectations as clear as possible to both attendees and speakers so that this connection is maximized. That said, there are many books, videos, tutorials, blogs, etc on Clojure (or any other topic). Will you learn better from a teacher than a book? Maybe. Hard to say. Sometimes seeing a talk live forces a focus and clarity that you would not otherwise have. In short, I can't answer this for you. :) But I will work hard to create the environment for it. 2) Relationships. AKA the "hallway track". This is something that is much harder to get through online learning - meeting and creating relationships with the people creating and using the technology. For many people it is hard to quantify this value (unless you're trying to get a job or something very concrete). But I'd say this is every bit as important as #1. 3) Inspiration. This one is even more elusive, but a conference with the right speakers and audience can be electric and inspire you to learn and create. Clojure is a young and exciting community right now with a ton of crazy smart people. I find it quite energizing to be talking to people in the context of that. You may find that taking a training course (which we will be offering prior to the conference), gets the really hard focus on #1 which is what you want. However, that training will certainly be more than $450. :)
  - tomfaulhaber 15y ago
AlexBaranosky 15y ago
Very cool stuff. I'm very interested in hearing more about how this conference (which I have every confidence will be really great) will complement the Conj.

91 points by puredanger 15y ago

I find clojure/conj to be a tad too theoretical (at least from paper). Not that I don't like that since I am a language geek anyway, but I think it will be great for Clojure the language to have a more of a "get things done" conference to complement the conj.

fogus 15y ago
Do you mind explaining "theoretical"? For example, of the talks listed this year are there any that you would say are theoretical?
- tbatchelli 15y ago
  I guess theoretical is a subjective term. What I meant to say was that Clojure/conj seems geared towards advanced clojure users, and I think Clojure would benefit of a conference that focuses more on bringing new developers to the fold. From this perspective, more talks about build tools, web development frameworks, useful libraries, etc would be great. I personally think that clojure could use some more evangelization here in the Bay Area, and I believe Clojure/west can do just that. But I myself attended to the Emerging Languages Conference, so I will definitely enjoy the conj very much, don't get me wrong. EDIT: I guess I didn't answer part of your question, which is what talks I consider theoretical. Here are some (judging from title and abstract): "Extreme Cleverness: Functional Data Structures in Scala", "Predicate Dispatch", "Concurrent Stream Processing" . Hoping this will help with clarification, this is what I would like to see too at some point: "From concept to production in 40 min: how to create a webapp in clojure", "A survey of Clojure tooling", "Debugging made easy", "Clojure and Hadoop", etc.
  - fogus 15y ago
    I do see what you mean. I was afraid that you were getting into the "academic" phrasing, but suspected that I only misunderstood. I too like case-studies and prefer a mix of them and the "theoretical" topics.[1] I would hate to see one excluded in favor of the other, so I am hopeful that Alex and team will put together a great mix. [1]: Although I think the vast majority of topics that we as programmers talk about are theories.
    - puredanger 15y ago
      We will brew up a tasty mix.

puredanger 15y ago

Track Clojure/West on Lanyrd here: http://lanyrd.com/2012/clojurewest/ http://lanyrd.com/2012/clojurewest/

marcolz 15y ago

Cannot wait. I especially like the fact that there will also be training days: being still a "new" language I believe it's nice to make it more appealing for new people.

puredanger 15y ago
We have several things in the works but would love to hear any ideas you have for more specific training than just "learning the language".
- marcolz 15y ago
  Still. For a couple of days of "just learning the language" I'm ready to come all the way from Italy. ; ) Anyway, a few suggestions: - Clojure for Processing large amount of data (MapReduce); - Clojure for Web Development; - Clojure for When Other Languages Are Simply Not Enough(tm).
  - puredanger 15y ago
    Thanks - we already talking to people about most of those. :) Also, we will have training for learning the language as well, done by Clojure/core.

michaelschade 15y ago

It says it on the website, but of particular note is that Alex also runs the Strange Loop conference (https://thestrangeloop.com/ https://thestrangeloop.com/). Of its three years, I've attended two consecutively, and have had a blast both times, learned many new things, and made great connections. He also runs groups here in St. Louis that I attend, so that paired with my experiences at his conference lead me to say with confidence that a conference run by him is certainly worth considering.

puredanger 15y ago

I'd love to have Paul Graham talk at Clojure/West. Seeing as this is HN, if anyone reading this wants to convince him, please do. :)

puredanger 15y ago
Unfortunately pg can't make it. :(

sbochins 15y ago

Can anyone give me a justification for attending a tech conference. I never have attended one in the past an d $450 seems like a lot of money out of my own pocket. I'm interested in writing clojure web apps, but I am not convinced I would benefit enough from this conference to justify the cost. Can someone tell me where I'm wrong?

puredanger 15y ago
As someone that puts on conferences (including this one), this is something I've spent unhealthy amounts of time thinking about and it's a question any sane person should ask. There are really two (well 3) things you should hope to get out of a conference. 1) Information. The most visible reason to go to a conference is to extract information from speakers in a direct form. Whether this actually "works" depends largely on whether you (the attendee) have the right prior knowledge and expectations and whether the speaker has the ability to teach you something. If either of those is wildly off, the session will be a miss. My goal as an organizer is to find great speakers and make expectations as clear as possible to both attendees and speakers so that this connection is maximized. That said, there are many books, videos, tutorials, blogs, etc on Clojure (or any other topic). Will you learn better from a teacher than a book? Maybe. Hard to say. Sometimes seeing a talk live forces a focus and clarity that you would not otherwise have. In short, I can't answer this for you. :) But I will work hard to create the environment for it. 2) Relationships. AKA the "hallway track". This is something that is much harder to get through online learning - meeting and creating relationships with the people creating and using the technology. For many people it is hard to quantify this value (unless you're trying to get a job or something very concrete). But I'd say this is every bit as important as #1. 3) Inspiration. This one is even more elusive, but a conference with the right speakers and audience can be electric and inspire you to learn and create. Clojure is a young and exciting community right now with a ton of crazy smart people. I find it quite energizing to be talking to people in the context of that. You may find that taking a training course (which we will be offering prior to the conference), gets the really hard focus on #1 which is what you want. However, that training will certainly be more than $450. :)
- tomfaulhaber 15y ago

AlexBaranosky 15y ago

Very cool stuff. I'm very interested in hearing more about how this conference (which I have every confidence will be really great) will complement the Conj.