CFUnited Blog

Golf Contest

Hello everyone,

As I have mentioned before, we weren't able to snag the free golf for everybody; however, the Lansdowne Resort was kind enough to let us raffle off a free round of golf! So here's the deal:

Send us a picture, video, or really anything of you related to golf to: newsletter(at)cfunited(dot) com, in addition to your registered name (so we know who you are!), with a subject line of: Golf Contest Submission.

Yes, it's that easy.

Only one (1) entry allowed per person. Those who would like to participate must be registered; this may be as an attendee, speaker or sponsor. Either way, the winner has to be registered for CFUnited. Please only submit if you plan to use the free round of golf! The coolest/most creative/most awesome/best submission decided by me will be chosen as the winner! All entries must be submitted by June 30, 2010 to be eligible.

The winner will receive a round of golf for a total of 4 players. The winner will be responsible for selecting the other 3 players. This prize is transferable, so if the winner changes his/her mind, they can pass it on to whomever they choose.

If you would like to be eligible for this prize, but have yet to register, please do so now!

Also, take advantage of Lansdowne Resort's very own Spa Minérale, where attendees get a 10 percent discount.

Good luck to all!

BOF on Mach II

Hello everyone,

We have another BOF posted on the schedule!

BOF: Mach II - We are Community Driven

Whether or not you are a user of Mach II consider attending this discussion about Mach II and building object-orientated applications. We will chat about the news on the latest features in 1.8 and 1.9 releases, how to get started learning the framework and OO programming, and where Mach II is headed in the future. We will also share tips, tricks and resources for using Mach II to build powerful CF applications. We would love to hear how you have used the framework to build cool applications. We value the community's feedback about Mach II and look forward to seeing you there.

This BOF will be hosted by Kurt Wiersma on Thursday, July 29th at 6:30 pm. Make sure to add this in to your schedule!

Kurt will also be presenting on Real World ColdSpring and Setting up a Solid Local Development Environment.

Happy scheduling!

Speaker Spotlight - Jim Priest

Jim Priest is a husband, father of two, developer, and avid motorcyclist. He currently works for SRA International as a Configuration Manager and Senior Software Development Analyst. He works primarily with ColdFusion, JIRA and Ant, but also dabbles with Powerbuilder, as well as creating handheld applications in Visual CE. Jim is an active participant in the ColdFusion community; co-managing the Triangle Area ColdFusion User Group (TACFUG) in the Raleigh/Durham, North Carolina area. In 2009 he helped organize CFinNC, the first ColdFusion conference in North Carolina. He posts regularly to his blog: The Crumb

CFUnited session: Digging into the Developer Toolbox

1. Have you spoken at CFUnited in the past?

No. This is my first time and I am very excited to have been selected to speak (and slightly terrified!) :)

2. Why should people attend your sessions?

I watch a lot of developers code and it always frustrates me that people do things 'the hard way'. Computers are supposed to make our lives easier, yet people fail to leverage available tools and techniques that can save them time and effort.

3. Do you have any projects in the works that you will be revealing at CFUnited?

Hopefully I will have a new CFEclipse site up and running. We are trying to improve our communication with the CFML community and remind people of our free alternative to other CFML IDE's. :)

4. Besides your topic, what other sessions are you looking forward to?

All of them? :)

5. What are some of the hot topics you'd like to see at RoundTable discussions?

I'd like to see continuing discussions of CFML, how the three CFML vendors can work together to strengthen the core language and how we in the community can better spread the word about CFML. We need to end the "ColdFusion is dead" rumors but do it in a positive way - not by bashing other languages on Twitter and mailing lists.

6. Where can people find you at CFUnited?

Before my presentation: Hunkered down in my room practicing my presentation. After my presentation: At the bar.

7. What's the latest news with you? Has anything changed since last CFUnited?

No news is good news?

8. What is unique about CFUnited?

I think it's the perfect mix between the big conferences like Max and the more technical events like cf.Objective. Last year was my first conference and I had a great time. It was great meeting so many people I've known online for years but never met in person.

9. What do you like to do in your free time?

I'm a father of two so that keeps me rather busy! In my spare time I can usually be found on my motorcycle heading west to the mountains for some camping and relaxation. My other hobbies are building and flying remote control airplanes and dabbling in music.

Speaker Spotlight - Sandy Clark

Sandra Clark has been developing ColdFusion applications since 1997 and speaking about ColdFusion, CSS and Accessibility since 2001. She is a passionate advocate on applying accepted and proven web standards to development as a way of creating websites that are usable by all people. Sandra currently works with AboutWeb as a contractor to the National Institutes of Standards and Technology in Gaithersburg, MD.

CFUnited session: Accessible Javascript

1. Have you spoken at CFUnited in the past?

I've spoken at CFUNITED since it was CFUN. I think my first speaking engagement there was 2002. I've spoken at every CFUNITED with the exception of 2009.

2. Why should people attend your sessions?

There are a lot of exciting updates in the world of Accessibility. The Section 508 refresh is out for public comment at this time and when that becomes law (hopefully by the end of this year), then RIA's will be able to meet the 508 criteria for the first time.

3. Do you have any projects in the works that you will be revealing at CFUnited?

None at the moment.

4. Besides your topic, what other sessions are you looking forward to?

I'm looking forward to Christian Ready's HTML 5 talk. I haven't done much with it yet and I'm eager to learn more. Bob Silverberg's ORM talks are always great. There are so many great talks, I can't possibly list them all. Hopefully I won't be talking at the same time as the ones I really want to see!

6. Where can people find you at CFUnited?

I'm all over the place. Its hard to miss me, since I'm one of the few female speakers. Come over, introduce yourself and lets talk!

7. What's the latest news with you? Has anything changed since last CFUnited?

After 7 years, I switched companies. I am now employed by About Web, which is a great company. I get to work and hang out with some really smart Programmers, which I really enjoy. I'm also back at the National Institutes of Standards and Technology which I love as well.

8. What is unique about CFUnited?

The people. I think the best thing about CFUNITED is the people it attracts, both as conference goers and speakers. I always come out of the conference with new ideas and more things I want to learn.

9. What do you like to do in your free time?

Anyone on my Facebook account can tell you that. I've really gotten into local and seasonal eating this past year. I've started preserving my own food (control issues, this way I know what is going into my food). I'm also trying to exercise more and spend less time on the computer.

SciFi BOF

Hello everyone,

For all those who want to spend your post-session time in an un-CFUnited related BOF, I've got the perfect solution!

Ray Camden would like to host a SciFi BOF! Yay!

SciFi BOF: Join Ray and other SciFi fans for a get together about your favorite Shows, Movies, Games and more.

And yes, to those who are wondering, we had the same BOF last year, and it was a great hit! The SciFi BOF will be on Wednesday, July 28th at 9:30 P.M.

Make sure you schedule BOFs as you see them come in!

And we, of course, have more on the way!

Happy scheduling!

Great Adobe Event for Government tomorrow 5/20!

We just wanted to let everyone know about Adobe Government Summit! We would like to help Adobe to extend an invitation to you for the Adobe Government Summit for government customers. This complimentary event will feature Overviews and Solution Discussions on Creative Suites 5, Adobe Connect, LiveCycle, ColdFusion 9 & ColdFusion Builder; Opportunities to meet with Adobe's technology experts at the "Collaboration Station"; Complimentary instructor-led training classes in the technology lab (space for these sessions is limited); and networking with fellow Adobe users from various government agencies We hope you can join Adobe to learn how you can Create, Connect, and Collaborate with Adobe products.

Also, CFUnited is offering a 15% off discount for CFUnited 2010 registration to those who attend this event and any other Government employees. The code is GOVTDS01 click here to register for CFUnited 2010

Speaker Spotlight - John Paul Ashenfelter

John Paul Ashenfelter - With over 15 years experience in web application development, John Paul provides broad ranging analysis and development skills focusing on the rapid development of web-based business applications. His particular technical expertise lies in Ruby, Rails, ColdFusion, and database design and development with a strong focus on open-source software. John Paul is a frequent speaker at conferences and a contributor to online resources such as the O'Reilly Network and the (now defunct) WebReview site. He has written three books on web databases and ColdFusion and has contributed or been a technical editor on a number of other books on the web, databases, and development.
CFUnited session: ColdFusion with noSQL

1. Have you spoken at CFUnited in the past?

Every one except 2001.

2. Why should people attend your sessions?

A conference should expand your mind and challenge your assumptions. I'm talking about building CF applications that don't use a relational database. This is some *seriously* cool stuff.

3. Do you have any projects in the works that you will be revealing at CFUnited?

Probably -- the NoSQL community is growing quickly and there's a lot of work to do on the CF side to make it easier to integrate with these new tools.

4. Besides your topic, what other sessions are you looking forward to?

I really like FW/1 and look forward to seeing what open source projects are working their way into the ColdFusion world. I'm also always interested in seeing what folks are doing as far as testing and agile development.

5. What are some of the hot topics you'd like to see at RoundTable discussions?

Growing the open source community with ColdFusion. We've started to get pretty good about having projects run by a single person, but we're still not there as far as larger collaborative projects that involve many different people. This probably relates to 4CFF.

6. Where can people find you at CFUnited?

In the bar, coding.

7. What's the latest news with you? Has anything changed since last CFUnited?

I've started another company. Oh, and I'll be flying into the conference straight from two months of living in Mexico.

8. What is unique about CFUnited?

There's not a lot of places large numbers of CF folks gather -- CFUnited is unique in both the breadth of experience in attendees (n00b to guru). CFUnited also has some of the best-looking conference staff of any major conference I've ever attended.

9. What do you like to do in your free time?

Be outside, do thing with my boys. Travel.

BOF on Mango Blog

Hello everyone,

We have another BOF posted on the schedule!

BOF: Mango Blog Tips and Tricks

Mango Blog is a popular ColdFusion blog engine. If you are using Mango Blog or curious about it, this is your opportunity to get together with other users to share experiences, tips and tricks. Laura Arguello, the creator of Mango Blog, will moderate this session and you'll be able to ask any beginner or advanced question.

This BOF will be on Wednesday, July 28th at 9:30 pm. Make sure to add this in to your schedule!

Laura Arguello will also be presenting on Mate Flex Framework: What's in it for me?

Happy scheduling!

Adobe releases some sessions for CFUnited

Hi everyone,

I'm here to inform you of some of our much-anticipated TBA topics!!

Adobe has let us in on a few of their topics!!

Check them out...

Building multi-player games on the Flash Platform with ColdFusion, Flex and Data Services - Greg Wilson: Learn how to build scalable, interactive, multiplayer games using the Flex, AIR, ColdFusion and BlazeDS/LCDS. Employ publish/subscribe messaging, CF remoting and other tricks to build something far cooler than just another multi-user chat application. Synchronize graphics across players, learn how to handle player disconnect, reconnects, tolerate poor networking conditions, latency, etc.

Adding Real-Time Data Visualization to your Application or Website - Greg Wilson: Every time your application accesses the server, data is available to do many more things than simple logging. Learn how to take this data and create valuable visualizations to show usage trends in real-time. Then with some simple IP to Geo techniques, the data can be visualized with maps to show visitor locations. Learn to use ColdFusion's event gateway to publish the data and use Flex to consume the data and visualize it with various mapping APIs from Google, ESRI, Mapquest and others to build compelling, animated application dashboards.

Check back in with us, as there will be more to come from Adobe!

Enjoy!

Speaker Spotlight - Chaz Chumley

Chaz Chumley - Consultant, Instructor, Author, Husband and Father. Chaz has been specializing in web development and database design since 1995. He currently resides as a Web Developer for the Smithsonian. Chaz is also CIO for w3Consultants, an Internet Application Development & Hosting company. Consultant services include XHTML, CSS, JavaScript, Fireworks, Photoshop, Drupal and ColdFusion. Chaz is also a contributing author and partner at CommunityMX and a guest speaker at such conferences as Todcon and CFUnited.

CFUnited session: ColdFusion Report Builder

1. Have you spoken at CFUnited in the past?

I have spoken at CFUnited for the past 4 years, including CFUnited Europe, and every year is better than the last.

2. Why should people attend your sessions?

Often people overlook the importance of good report writing tools that ColdFusion provide you. They lean toward building queries and outputting the data in a table and that's their idea of reporting. A lot of the work is done for you in ColdFusion Report Builder. Stop by and find out just how easy.

3. Do you have any projects in the works that you will be revealing at CFUnited?

Actually. I have 2 projects that we will be showcasing at CFUnited this year - one for the Smithsonian and one for CommunityMX. Both utilize the CFWheels framework and will be awesome. Stop by and check them out.

4. Besides your topic, what other sessions are you looking forward to?

Being a Government employee I just blogged about the Top 10 topics you don't want to miss out on. Make sure to check it out, as there are too many great topics and too little time for one person.

5. What are some of the hot topics you'd like to see at RoundTable discussions? Frameworks - There are so many to choose from that it's often a hard decision for people to make. Mike Henke, Chris Peters and myself will actually be doing a Birds of a Feather on CFWheels so stop by to hear more.

6. Where can people find you at CFUnited?

When I am not taking in a presentation, chatting with attendees in the hallway then you can find me in the bar socializing.

7. What's the latest news with you? Has anything changed since last CFUnited?

I actually went over to the darkside. I am now a Government employee and work for the Smithsonian. Moved from the desert of Las Vegas to the Capital City of D.C. and participated in my first 10K. Does that count?

8. What is unique about CFUnited?

Where else could you sit and talk to such great people with such great backgrounds and never mention the word - ColdFusion.

9. What do you like to do in your free time?

Free time - is that what they call it?

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