SUMMER OF TECH 2011 » Seminars

Announcing Xero Summer Seminar Series 2011/12

John — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 08:21:11 +0000

Welcome to the launch of the Xero Summer Seminar Series 2011/12.

Xero presents the Summer of Tech summer series of IT seminars. Running every Friday from November to the end of February. We have selected some of the best local and international speakers to provide a variety of talks including inspirational, career, technical and design topics. All of the seminars are free and open to the public. RSVP’s are essential to help us provide food .

We’re in the process of finalising this summer’s line-up of talks. (We’ll be announcing soon.) Here is the first seminar.

#1 Owen Evans

Owen Evans (Chief Architect at Xero) will provide the Summer of Tech 2011 commencement speech. He will talk about life in IT and offer some career advice for Wellington IT professionals. This is the first in a series of Tech Talks for the Summer of Tech community, it’s open to the public, and a light lunch will be provided.

Owen Evan’s Bio:

Owen Evans is a software developer currently employed by Xero to be a Chief Architect, according to his wife and 19month old daughter that means he goes ‘type type type’.
Hailing from the UK or more specifically a small place called Wales, he’s always had a passion for technology and believes we can change the world, together.
Recently Owen lead a team, including a Summer of Tech Alumni, to victory at Wellington’s first Startup Weekend, and is investigating how to take business further.

When… 11:30pm-1:00pm, Friday 18 November 2011

Where… Kiwbank Level 3 , NZ Post House, 7 Waterloo Quay, Wellington (here’s a map) (Thanks to Kiwibank for providing a venue)

Rsvp… is essential!! please do this over here on the groovy lil’ regie platform.

What… are you waiting for? inspiring & informative speakers! lunch! awesome networking with the Wellington IT community!

Lightning Talk: Adam And Brendan

ruth — Sun, 01 May 2011 07:58:14 +0000

On the 4th of February 2011, we asked some of our SoT2010 interns to tell us what they’d been up to this summer.

Adam Bramley and Brendan Vercoelen spent Summer of 2010/11 working on a wide range of Open Source projects at Catalyst IT.

Here’s the video of their talk:

Intern Lightning Talk: Catalyst IT from SummerOfTech on Vimeo.

Unleashing Apis

ruth — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 01:40:13 +0000

At our Xero Summer Seminar on Friday 28 January we heard from 3 local Wellington tech gurus talking on the topic of “unleashing APIs”: Richard Rowley from Trademe, Dan Lee from YouDo, and Owen Evans from Xero.

Here’s a video of the seminar. Part 1 is Richard & Dan:

Unleashing APIs – Part 1 from SummerOfTech on Vimeo.

Part 2 is Owen plus QandAs with our live studio audience:

Unleashing APIs – Part 2 from SummerOfTech on Vimeo.

Lightning Talk: Cameron Fowler At Abletech

ruth — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 03:48:08 +0000

On the 4th of February 2011, we asked some of our SoT2010 interns to tell us what they’d been up to this summer.

First up: Cameron Fowler spent Summer of 2010 working as a code intern for Able Technology. His projects included streetsalive.org.nz and a customisable store locator tool.

Here’s the video of Cameron’s talk:

Intern Lightning Talk – Able Technology from SummerOfTech on Vimeo.

Your Authentic Brand With Paul Soong

ruth — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 20:15:30 +0000

On 14 January 2011, Paul Soong (founder of socially responsible design agency The Church, and mover & shaker behind Semi-Permanent) talked about authenticity in a socially networked, transformational world can come to define who you work for, how far you can go and if you actually enjoy the journey.

Here’s the video of his talk:

Your Authentic Brand with Paul Soong from SummerOfTech on Vimeo.

Tech Entrepreneurship With Melissa Clark-reynolds

ruth — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 02:33:43 +0000

On 11 January 2011, successful Wellington tech entrepreneurs Melissa Clark-Reynolds and Dave Moskovitz shared wisdom and learning about how to execute a great idea, how to get it from the garage to the market, and what the key ingredients are to building a successful enterprise in Wellington, NZ.

(our notes from the talk are available here)

Here’s Part 2 of the session for your viewing pleasure:

Tech Entrepreneurship with Melissa Clark-Reynolds from SummerOfTech on Vimeo.

Tech Entrepreneurship With Dave Moskovitz

ruth — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 03:22:48 +0000

(our notes from the talk are available here)

Here’s Part 1 of the session for your viewing pleasure:

Tech Entrepreneurship with Dave Moskovitz from SummerOfTech on Vimeo.

Startup Lessons With Rowan Simpson

ruth — Sun, 13 Feb 2011 20:09:02 +0000

On Friday 3 December, Rowan Simpson explained why many of the things that you think you know about what it takes to start and grow a technology company are wrong, why most of the successful companies and entrepreneurs that you read about in the media can’t teach you much about your startup, and some of the counterintuitive lessons that you should be paying attention to as you try and get a new idea off the ground.

There’s this mythical startup model that involves a lone hero having a “eureka moment” in a shed. Next thing, they’re inundated with customers, the business grows, is sold to an investor for a gazillion $, and the inventor retires happily to the beach (with a boat & beemer parked nearby). Time for some mythbusting:

Startup Lessons with Rowan Simpson from SummerOfTech on Vimeo.

What Do You Want To Do When You Grow Up?

ruth — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 19:26:19 +0000

On Friday 17 December, Nat Torkington talked about how to get a job, how to keep a job, when to get the next job, what a career path looks like, and what your choices are. And who said you *have* to grow up anyway?

WARNING: this is the uncut and unbleeped version. Nat’s speaking style is direct and sweary. We like it that way, but if you have sensitive ears… consider yourself warned!

No matter what stage of your IT professional development you’re at, for some straight talking insight & advice on career paths, watch this:

What do you want to do when you grow up? with Nat Torkington from SummerOfTech on Vimeo.

What Makes A Great Game Developer?

ruth — Tue, 08 Feb 2011 20:00:58 +0000

On Friday 10 December, Stu Sharpe, Technical Director at Sidhe Interactive wowed us with some demos, gave an update on the games industry in 2010 and set out a step-by-step pathway to becoming a great game developer.

No matter what stage of your career you’re at, if you want to know what makes a great game developer, watch this:

What Makes a Great Game Developer with Stu Sharpe from SummerOfTech on Vimeo.

Xsss-7 Writeup

John — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 03:31:38 +0000

On 21 January 2011, Francois Marier tackled the topic

Open Source – What? Why? How??

…as part of our Xero Summer Seminar Series.

Francois has kindly made his slides available for download, which is highly recommended for anyone wanting to get started on Open Source projects. Here ya go:

Francois PDF (it’s approx 16MB of pdf)

In the meantime, here are some highlights and key learnings from his presentation:

First, a definition of Open Source, including the 4 Freedoms

Why should open source be of interest to new software developers? It helps you build a professional portfolio. Contribution to open source projects gives potential employers tangible evidence that you can code, that you can work with others. The stuff that’s really hard to tell from a CV/job interview.

You can build a public portfolio on a site like Ohloh, that tracks the quality and quantity of your contributions.

Participating in open source projects gives you a chance to work with (and learn from, and connect to) some of the worlds best software developers. You’ll develop technical and social skills, and, if you start up your own project, you’ll get to create a solution to a problem.

How to get started? One of the most common pathways is to transition from “user” of a piece of software to “developer” via the sweet spot that is “super-user”.

Use it (familiarise yourself with the software). Blog about it. Download the source code. Find a bug. Reproduce the problem. Fix it. Put a patch on the bug-tracker. Key thing here: fix a problem or add a feature that you care about.

So, you want to start a new project? Here’s some things to think about:

a good idea + a good name
a licence (pro tip: don’t write your own one, pick one that people already know about, like Apache/BSD/*GPL)
think about your user, what questions they’ll have (write simple installation instructions, a Readme, your contact details…)
build community (be responsive)

Francois shared some tips on useful tools for managing projects, like using a mailing list/forum (not just email), a bug-tracker (like Launchpad, which is a good roadmap & project management tool, too), and using a wiki for managing documentation.

Highly recommend you check out the full slideshow: Francois PDF (it’s approx 16MB of pdf)

And for more information/to learn more, check out:

http://www.ubuntu.com/community/participate

http://wiki.debian.org/GetInvolved-Beta

http://tinyurl.com/startingproject

Cloudcamp Kickoff

ruth — Sat, 29 Jan 2011 02:03:03 +0000

Hope to see you at our final Xero Summer Seminar for SoT2010, lunch at Macs on 11 February! Please RSVP over here!

YOU are invited, yes, that means YOU! SoT2010 Interns, Mentors, Colleagues, members of UP, the wider Wellington Tech community & CloudCamp Wellington Attendees!

The final seminar in the series, and this one’s a little bit different – we’re partnering up with CloudCamp and the Summer of Tech Seminar doubles as the warm-up act for the main event! CloudCamp Wellington is an “unconference” for all things Cloud Computing. If you want to stay on for CloudCamp proper (1pm-5pm+), please make sure you register over here.

Thanks to everyone who’s attended our seminars this year, it’s been a great opportunity to develop & connect the top talent of and the top employers of Wellington.

Here’s the details for our 11 February #xsss:

CloudCamp Kickoff
2011 is set to be a landmark year for cloud computing, and a local Wellington company (with customers in 70 countries) is delivering game-changing productivity: the kind of performance that can potentially match traditional grid computing, all at the push of a button.

Intergrid’s Chris Teeling (COO) and Dave Fellows (Head of Development) will reveal how their company is leveraging cloud computing, in a way that allows the common software user to easily access super-computing power whenever they need it. InterGrids’ GreenButton is the user-friendly front end for high performance Cloud Computing. The GreenButton, simply allows your system to access massive computer processing power, large storage and high speed network infrastructure that would normally be outside the budget of all but the wealthiest institutions. This is what the internet and on-demand computing is all about!

When… 12pm-1pm, Friday 11 February 2011

Where… Upstairs, Macs Brewbar, 4 Taranaki Street, Wellington (here’s a map)
Rsvp… is essential!! please do this over here on the groovy lil’ regie platform.
What… are you waiting for? inspiring & informative speakers! lunch! awesome networking with the Wellington IT community!

HUGE thank-yous to Xero for being our fantastic sponsor of the seminar series.

Thanks for making these events possible.