5 ms·

Ask HN: What is the best developer conference talk you saw in 2011?

73 points by puredanger 15y ago

What is the best developer conference talk you saw (in person or on video) in 2011? What taught you or inspired you the most?

j45 15y ago
Microconf 2011 by a few hundred country miles. I have never had my head crushed by so much actionable info in 1-2 days. The entire conference was worth it by the time the first speaker had done his session and it kept getting better.
- mmcconnell1618 15y ago
  I'll second you on Microconf. Rob and Mike have announced they will be having a 2012 conference to. This conference focuses on individuals who want to create and run software companies without outside funding.
- jamessun 15y ago
  I third Microconf 2011. Great formal presentations and invaluable networking opportunities, too. I'm looking forward to Microconf 2012.
fbru02 15y ago
That's easy : Simple made easy by Rich Hickey
- puredanger 15y ago
  Video for "Simple Made Easy" from Strange Loop: http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Simple-Made-Easy http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Simple-Made-Easy
  - erichocean 15y ago
    Thanks for the link, and to the others, for the recommendation. What a great talk!
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tednaleid 15y ago
Strangeloop - great speakers (including my favorite keynote in years by Rich Hickey http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Simple-Made-Easy http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Simple-Made-Easy) and great variety (https://thestrangeloop.com/sessions https://thestrangeloop.com/sessions). I'm also happy that all of the presentations will (eventually) be available on the web (https://thestrangeloop.com/news/strange-loop-2011-video-schedule https://thestrangeloop.com/news/strange-loop-2011-video-sche...). I'll definitely be attending in 2012.
puredanger 15y ago
One of the most inspiring talks I saw this year was Sarah Allen's talk about teaching programming to kids: "Easy as Pie" (http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Easy-as-Pie-Teaching-Code-Literacy http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Easy-as-Pie-Teaching-Code...). A month later I found myself teaching my first programming class to kids and I'm hoping to do some more early next year.
conikeec 15y ago
Of course. Strange Loop 2011.
cemerick 15y ago
Strange Loop 2011, "We really don't know how to compute", Gerald Sussman (http://www.infoq.com/presentations/We-Really-Dont-Know-How-To-Compute http://www.infoq.com/presentations/We-Really-Dont-Know-How-T...). That's not entirely fair though, insofar as I'm a sucker for a Sussman talk. Beyond that, I'd have to say Sam Aaron's Overtone presentation @ Clojure Conj 2011. At the moment, it strikes me that the obvious common element of both talks and speakers are their absolutely infectious enthusiasm for their respective specialties.
- bldurling 15y ago
  Sam is a complete rock star. One of the few people I know who can get showstopper applause in the middle of a talk.
- jozeph78 15y ago
  Sam crushed it. It felt like a TED talk. Hickey and Sussman at STLoop were both awesome, but Sam takes the cake. I hope the video goes up soon.
simonw 15y ago
Coincidentally I was asked I put together one of those "top 15 of 2011" lists for .NET magazine on more or less this topic, you might find these of interest: http://www.netmagazine.com/features/2011-review-15-web-conference-talks-you-need-watch http://www.netmagazine.com/features/2011-review-15-web-confe...
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_yash 15y ago
Hibernate should be to programmers what cake mixes are to bakers: beneath their dignity. http://vimeo.com/28885655 http://vimeo.com/28885655
rdouble 15y ago
I liked the WWDC talks and Chris Liscio's talk at Çingleton.
- simonw 15y ago
  Chris' talk is available as a video http://lanyrd.com/2011/cingleton-symposium/smfww/ http://lanyrd.com/2011/cingleton-symposium/smfww/
kgutteridge 15y ago
Two of the lunchtime sessions at WWDC really inspired me as did much of the entire conference. Morten Lunds talk at the Power of 1 conference in Battersea powerstation
piotrSikora 15y ago
Theo Schlossnagle's "Career Development" (Velocity 2011 Keynote): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0mHo7SMCQk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0mHo7SMCQk
gmcabrita 15y ago
"Extreme Cleverness: Functional Data Structures in Scala" at Strange Loop. http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Functional-Data-Structures-in-Scala http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Functional-Data-Structure...
jMyles 15y ago
Glyph's keynote at Djangocon was hilarious and accurate. It also immediately sparked some wonderful and deep discussions about the future of Django. http://blip.tv/djangocon/keynote-glyph-lefkowitz-5573264 http://blip.tv/djangocon/keynote-glyph-lefkowitz-5573264
pardner 15y ago
Design in the Land of Sharp Pointy Technologies, at Twiliocon
bitops 15y ago
Simple made Easy by Rich Hickey by several miles. Also "Hammock Driven Development" by the same gentleman.
mmcconnell1618 15y ago
Business of Software 2011 in Boston was great as usual. 300+ people that actually run software companies getting together to learn from each other. The most targeted conference for software entrepreneurs that I've seen.
3pt14159 15y ago
There was a Ruby talk the guys at Nulayer did in Toronto that showed that Ruby can be nearly as fast as NodeJS. I wasn't fully convinced but I learned a ton of useful things.
amjith 15y ago
Strangeloop 2011 - Bryan O'Sullivan Running a Startup On Haskell: http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Running-a-Startup-on-Haskell http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Running-a-Startup-on-Hask...
- gtani 15y ago
  transcribed https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1eQiXRyStqCVVlp6cMucQZ6K3nX4eeaPOkzzgOJRSc7w&pli=1 https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1eQiXRyStqCVVlp6cMuc...
jedws 15y ago
Being in Aus we don't get to see many live and rely on the videos being made available. Of those I particularly liked Daniel Spiewak's "Extreme Cleverness: Functional Data Structures" and Rich Hickey's "Simple Made Easy". We were fortunate enough though to have the excellent YOW conference with many excellent talks, particular stand-outs coming from Simon Peyton-Jones and Mike Lee, but the absolute best talk (not necessarily the best tech, it is Perl after all) was Damian Conway's flabbergasting "Temporally Quaquaversal Virtual Nanomachine Programming In Multiple Topologically Connected Quantum-Relativistic Parallel Timespaces...Made Easy!"[1] [1] http://www.yowconference.com.au/YOW2011/general/workshopDetails.html?eventId=3496 http://www.yowconference.com.au/YOW2011/general/workshopDeta...
farnetto 15y ago
Josh Bloch's talks at Devoxx alone were worth the trip.
gkoberger 15y ago
Sounds cliche and possibly like I'm pandering to the HN crowd, but Startup School. I quote it constantly - almost on a daily basis. It wasnt way more about soft skills than actual code, of course, but I find that to be more important. Also, my best advice at any conference is to take notes. I took comprehensive Startup School notes, and reviewed them later. I never would have gotten so much out of it if I hadn't.
davidchua 15y ago
I like Mike Lee's talk 'Product Engineering' at SL2011 http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Product-Engineering http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Product-Engineering as well as DHH's Railsconf 2011 Keynote speech on Asset Pipeline. Learnt quite a bit from these two talks.
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73 points by puredanger 15y ago

What is the best developer conference talk you saw (in person or on video) in 2011? What taught you or inspired you the most?

j45 15y ago

Microconf 2011 by a few hundred country miles. I have never had my head crushed by so much actionable info in 1-2 days. The entire conference was worth it by the time the first speaker had done his session and it kept getting better.

mmcconnell1618 15y ago
I'll second you on Microconf. Rob and Mike have announced they will be having a 2012 conference to. This conference focuses on individuals who want to create and run software companies without outside funding.
jamessun 15y ago
I third Microconf 2011. Great formal presentations and invaluable networking opportunities, too. I'm looking forward to Microconf 2012.

fbru02 15y ago

That's easy : Simple made easy by Rich Hickey

puredanger 15y ago
Video for "Simple Made Easy" from Strange Loop: http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Simple-Made-Easy http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Simple-Made-Easy
- erichocean 15y ago
  Thanks for the link, and to the others, for the recommendation. What a great talk!

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

tednaleid 15y ago

Strangeloop - great speakers (including my favorite keynote in years by Rich Hickey http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Simple-Made-Easy http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Simple-Made-Easy) and great variety (https://thestrangeloop.com/sessions https://thestrangeloop.com/sessions). I'm also happy that all of the presentations will (eventually) be available on the web (https://thestrangeloop.com/news/strange-loop-2011-video-schedule https://thestrangeloop.com/news/strange-loop-2011-video-sche...). I'll definitely be attending in 2012.

puredanger 15y ago

One of the most inspiring talks I saw this year was Sarah Allen's talk about teaching programming to kids: "Easy as Pie" (http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Easy-as-Pie-Teaching-Code-Literacy http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Easy-as-Pie-Teaching-Code...). A month later I found myself teaching my first programming class to kids and I'm hoping to do some more early next year.

conikeec 15y ago

Of course. Strange Loop 2011.

cemerick 15y ago

Strange Loop 2011, "We really don't know how to compute", Gerald Sussman (http://www.infoq.com/presentations/We-Really-Dont-Know-How-To-Compute http://www.infoq.com/presentations/We-Really-Dont-Know-How-T...). That's not entirely fair though, insofar as I'm a sucker for a Sussman talk. Beyond that, I'd have to say Sam Aaron's Overtone presentation @ Clojure Conj 2011. At the moment, it strikes me that the obvious common element of both talks and speakers are their absolutely infectious enthusiasm for their respective specialties.

bldurling 15y ago
Sam is a complete rock star. One of the few people I know who can get showstopper applause in the middle of a talk.
jozeph78 15y ago
Sam crushed it. It felt like a TED talk. Hickey and Sussman at STLoop were both awesome, but Sam takes the cake. I hope the video goes up soon.

simonw 15y ago

Coincidentally I was asked I put together one of those "top 15 of 2011" lists for .NET magazine on more or less this topic, you might find these of interest: http://www.netmagazine.com/features/2011-review-15-web-conference-talks-you-need-watch http://www.netmagazine.com/features/2011-review-15-web-confe...

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

_yash 15y ago

Hibernate should be to programmers what cake mixes are to bakers: beneath their dignity. http://vimeo.com/28885655 http://vimeo.com/28885655

rdouble 15y ago

I liked the WWDC talks and Chris Liscio's talk at Çingleton.

simonw 15y ago
Chris' talk is available as a video http://lanyrd.com/2011/cingleton-symposium/smfww/ http://lanyrd.com/2011/cingleton-symposium/smfww/

kgutteridge 15y ago

Two of the lunchtime sessions at WWDC really inspired me as did much of the entire conference. Morten Lunds talk at the Power of 1 conference in Battersea powerstation

piotrSikora 15y ago

Theo Schlossnagle's "Career Development" (Velocity 2011 Keynote): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0mHo7SMCQk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0mHo7SMCQk

gmcabrita 15y ago

"Extreme Cleverness: Functional Data Structures in Scala" at Strange Loop. http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Functional-Data-Structures-in-Scala http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Functional-Data-Structure...

jMyles 15y ago

Glyph's keynote at Djangocon was hilarious and accurate. It also immediately sparked some wonderful and deep discussions about the future of Django. http://blip.tv/djangocon/keynote-glyph-lefkowitz-5573264 http://blip.tv/djangocon/keynote-glyph-lefkowitz-5573264

pardner 15y ago

Design in the Land of Sharp Pointy Technologies, at Twiliocon

bitops 15y ago

Simple made Easy by Rich Hickey by several miles. Also "Hammock Driven Development" by the same gentleman.

mmcconnell1618 15y ago

Business of Software 2011 in Boston was great as usual. 300+ people that actually run software companies getting together to learn from each other. The most targeted conference for software entrepreneurs that I've seen.

3pt14159 15y ago

There was a Ruby talk the guys at Nulayer did in Toronto that showed that Ruby can be nearly as fast as NodeJS. I wasn't fully convinced but I learned a ton of useful things.

amjith 15y ago

Strangeloop 2011 - Bryan O'Sullivan Running a Startup On Haskell: http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Running-a-Startup-on-Haskell http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Running-a-Startup-on-Hask...

gtani 15y ago
transcribed https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1eQiXRyStqCVVlp6cMucQZ6K3nX4eeaPOkzzgOJRSc7w&pli=1 https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1eQiXRyStqCVVlp6cMuc...

jedws 15y ago

Being in Aus we don't get to see many live and rely on the videos being made available. Of those I particularly liked Daniel Spiewak's "Extreme Cleverness: Functional Data Structures" and Rich Hickey's "Simple Made Easy". We were fortunate enough though to have the excellent YOW conference with many excellent talks, particular stand-outs coming from Simon Peyton-Jones and Mike Lee, but the absolute best talk (not necessarily the best tech, it is Perl after all) was Damian Conway's flabbergasting "Temporally Quaquaversal Virtual Nanomachine Programming In Multiple Topologically Connected Quantum-Relativistic Parallel Timespaces...Made Easy!"[1] [1] http://www.yowconference.com.au/YOW2011/general/workshopDetails.html?eventId=3496 http://www.yowconference.com.au/YOW2011/general/workshopDeta...

farnetto 15y ago

Josh Bloch's talks at Devoxx alone were worth the trip.

gkoberger 15y ago

Sounds cliche and possibly like I'm pandering to the HN crowd, but Startup School. I quote it constantly - almost on a daily basis. It wasnt way more about soft skills than actual code, of course, but I find that to be more important. Also, my best advice at any conference is to take notes. I took comprehensive Startup School notes, and reviewed them later. I never would have gotten so much out of it if I hadn't.

davidchua 15y ago

I like Mike Lee's talk 'Product Engineering' at SL2011 http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Product-Engineering http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Product-Engineering as well as DHH's Railsconf 2011 Keynote speech on Asset Pipeline. Learnt quite a bit from these two talks.

deleted 15y ago

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