Note: This blog post is from 2008. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.

They have a great lineup of 7 terrific speakers, presenting on topics that many want to know or know more about: ColdSpring, OO, clustering, Subversion, dev practices, and Railo. And the topics are bring presented consecutively so you won't need to worry about missing a single one. That also makes for an easy read of the web site: it's just a single page, with popups for each talk. Take just a minute to check it out.

Put on by the same folks who run Scotch on the Rocks, I'm sure A Wee Dram will be as fun (and relaxed) as it will be informative. And since I spoke at this year's Scotch event, I say that from pleasurable experience. They've also got a nice lineup of sponsors, who I'm sure are helping make the low cost possible, and who should be thanked. Be sure to visit their booths while there.

(I only wish I could attend, but I've already got a commitment that week, volunteering at the PGA Tour Championship that's held yearly in Atlanta.)

It's being held 2 weeks from this coming Thursday, the 25th, in London. I realize that puts it out of reach for many, but hey, that low price gets you lunch, 2 free drinks, 10% off Scotch on the Rocks 09, and the great lineup of speakers. For folks in the greater London area, it's a no-brainer. And if you'd need to fly in to make it, and your training budget can cover that cost, it's a bargain, a good value, and sure to be a good time as well.

BTW, someone may want to ask, "is it being recorded?" The site doesn't say, so I'd assume not. It's in their interest (and that of the sponsors) to get people to come. Someone else may ask if I could get the speakers to present on the ColdFusion Meetup, and I'd surely like to, but none have offered yet, so do consider going to the event instead. :-)

Note: This blog post is from 2008. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.

Ray is at noon, Dan is at 6.

See the CF meetup site for details.

For more on the mistake, and an apology to those who may now have to miss out, as well as how to access the recording of the meetings, see my discussion of the mistake on the CF meetup discussion board.

Again, sincere apologies everyone.

Note: This blog post is from 2008. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.

Besides not having any speakers who've proposed to speak, I'm out of town traveling in the great (rainy, chilly) northwest (where I was invited to an intimate Microsoft tech summit). I just don't know if my schedule will permit me to speak myself if I wanted to, so it's best not to set any expectations. Ray, also, is already committed, so we'll pick things up next week.

I'm always looking for speakers. I also have some interesting new ideas I'll be trying in coming weeks.

Note: This blog post is from 2008. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.

"Testing with cfcUnit", with John Mason

The info in the message was write. The blog title was all that was wrong. Again, the URL for info is:

http://coldfusion.meetup.com/17/calendar/7356180/

Note: This blog post is from 2008. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.

Last week I praised and highlighted Kay Smoljak's week in ColdFusion blog entries. Then last night I was perusing FullAsAGoog and noticed for the first time one of Steve's entries. What a delight to find that.(It's funny to note that he started his about the same time Kay did hers--funny how that goes.)

I recommend you keep an eye on Steve's list, too. He strives to pick 5 key entries a week that he feels most developers will benefit learning from. (I'm delighted to see he picked one of my entries this week, but really it's totally coincidental that I tripped across it this week while perusing the 'goog.)

Do we really need yet another source? I say yes

Now, some may say, "why do we need these additional resources? Aren't aggregators like the 'goog, MXNA, FeedSquirrel, and ColdFusionBloggers, all one needs? And what about the dzone cf page?"

Sure, those are all great. But here's the thing: Steve's been doing his news for a few weeks, and this is the first I'd seen it (same with Kay's last week). I'm sure many of us miss things that come through the aggregators. Most of us don't have time to read EVERY message they show--and then, which aggregator do you pick? While they mostly show the same things, with different approaches, some blogs aren't in all.

Most of all, I have to admit that I don't even have time to keep an eye on even any one aggregator each day, or really even each week. There's just too much content being created for most of us to stay on top of it all.

That's why I LOVE these attempts to do that hard work for us. Like I said last week of Kay's, and earlier this week about the various CF podcasts past and present (and future?), any sort of manual effort to gather and present key news and info shared is really a tough job, and my hats off to all who try.

I have some approaches in mind myself. One of them is similar to the dzone approach, and feedquirrel's recent addition to let the community of readers vote on entries. Those are both steps in the direction I was headed, though my idea is still different. We'll see. But until then, I want to make sure people know about these various features.

Note: This blog post is from 2008. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.

If you were asked how many CF podcasts are there, and have there been, what would be your answer? I did a little digging myself and present here what I found. It's a fun trip down memory lane of the world of CF podcasting.

If I've missed any, please do let me know.

Current (still running)

The following podcasts are still being updated:

• ColdFusion Weekly, with Matt Woodward and Peter Farrell
• CFUnited, playing recordings of conference presentations, hosted by Christian Ready
• All Things Adobe has had one CF-related podcast, but has a category for them so may have more

Past

The following all appear no longer to be being updated:

• OutLoud, with Hal Helms and Jeff Peters, ran for 47 episodes from Oct 2005 through Sep 2007
• The ColdFusion Podcast, with Bryan Kaiser and Michael Haynie, ran for 38 episodes from Oct 2005 through Jan 2007
• ColdFusion Muse, with Mark Kruger, ran for 13 episodes from Nov 2005 through May 2006
• cfframeworks.com offered 8 interview podcasts hosted by Nick Tong and Kola Oyedeji, from Jan-Mar 2007
• Mark Drew offered a few CFEclipse Videos as a podcast in 2006 (note they videos were designed to be small enough to view in an iPod)
• the WebDU conference organizers (Geoff Bowers and Daemon), presented a couple of recordings of previous WebDU conferences in 2005
• the Scotch on the Rocks conference organizers (Stephen Moretti and Andy Allan) tried to do this also with one episode in 2007
• Aboutcast ran for a couple of episodes in 2006, hosted by Nic Tunney and AboutWeb
• Steven Erat made two attempts at podcasts in 2005, first with the CFMX 7 podcast, where he read selected Macromedia Devnet articles about CF7, and then the even shorter-lived CF NewsRadio
• I'm my own sql, hosted by C. Hatton Humphrey, ran out of HouseofFusion.com for just a couple of episodes in late 2006

Again, I welcome additions or corrections to this list. If you have any to offer, please do let me know.

Future?

Finally, what about that "and future?" tag in the subject? Well, I've been torn about saying anything before it's ready, but I've been contemplating entering the podcasting realm for a long time. I know others have considered it. Clearly, the list above shows that it's tough to make it.

That said, I've begun serious discussions with a colleague who some will know, John Mason, who runs FusionLink and FusionLink Labs (which has lots of neat stuff!). We've also worked together as board members of the Atlanta CF user group over the years.

I'll have more to say about what we plan. Naturally, I'd rather not just copycat what others have done. Indeed, I think there are a lot of areas that have not been covered, and we both are excited about the prospects. Look for more news in the near future. In the meantime, feel free to leave comments about what you might like to see in a podcast. Open your eyes beyond what you've heard before, and think beyond just what you may like. What do you think the CF Community, whether beginners or experts, could benefit hearing in a podcast form? We'll share out plans, and perhaps fold in some of yours, in the near future.

PS I know that others have also hinted at doing a podcast and then not gotten around to it. Again, I've been reluctant to say anything before being close, but since I had this history resource and wanted to share it, I figured I may as well "put my name into the race", to borrow a term from the current election season. :-)

Note: This blog post is from 2008. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.

http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/category/coldfusion/

The URL above is for all her CF entries on her blog, so you need to find each week's entry among her other entries for the week. But she's noted to me (in a comment in one of them there) that she won't have too many each week to make it hard to pick out the news items. (While someone could also setup a Yahoo Pipe to solve the problem, perhaps out of respect we should just get her entire feed and keep an eye out for those news entries.)

Kay's an Aussie (Perth) who's been doing CF for several years. She's done about 4 weeks of the news so far, and I wish her well. Keeping up with the week's news in the CF community is a noble effort. Many have tried and been unable to keep it up.

In the past, we had the guys on the ColdFusionWeekly offering news into the middle of last year, and CFReports until Sept, but since then it's been mostly interviews. I don't mean that as a slap. I know it's hard work!

Indeed, we also had the guys at the ColdFusion podcasts who would do news as well, but they went off the air completely in late 2006, so at least the weekly's still there. (I'll have more to share about the surprising history of CF podcasts in an upcoming entry.)

We also had Andy Allan also doing a roundup of the best of the blogs ("weekly blog roundup"), but he too petered out in late 2006.

It's a tough job, and we're all grateful for those who have, are, and will try to help us all out! :-)

Note: This blog post is from 2007. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.

It's like they say in baseball: "you can't tell the players without a program!" :-)

So with that, I'd like to present my observation of who's who, using primarily the list of publishers listed in the Adobe UG program. It generally just lists the parent publishers, so this will help you know who to go to for particular books. (Authorized UG managers can see the list in the "third party program resources" page.)

Who's owned by who?

Again, as mine is a blog focused on ColdFusion, this list is also focused only on the publishers (and their imprints) that would be of interest to CFers. The publishers below sometimes have (many) more subsidiary imprints than those I list. Beyond that, though, these lists may still be incomplete for publishers we may be interested in, and I welcome feedback and corrections.

I've tried to get the information from the actual publishers sites themselves, and have offered a link where available. Another useful resource for this is a blog entry by Tim O'Reilly on the state of the computer book publishing industry. It had a little more detail in some areas, yet also didn't list all the publishers mentioned below.

• Apress: Friends of Ed

• Manning: none

• McGraw Hill: Osborne and many others, but none in this space it seemed (from http://pubeasy.mcgraw-hill.com/pls/pubeasy/bepublist.publist_page)

• O'Reilly: Pogue Press (O'Reilly source-- as it states, others listed there are distribution partners, not subsidiaries)

• Packt: none

• Pearson: Addison-Wesley , Adobe Press, Exam Cram, IBM Press, Macromedia Press, MySQL Press, New Riders, Novell Press, Peachpit Press, Prentice Hall, Que, Sams, Sun Microsystems Press (Pearson source), additional info from O'Reilly blog)

• Wiley: Dummies, John Wiley, Sybex, Teach Yourself Visually, Wrox (Wiley source)

Hope that helps someone. And while it's accurate today (as far as I know), it could certainly become dated over time as transition in the industry continues, if you find this entry some months or years from now!

Note: This blog post is from 2007. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.

For more information on the group, which has offered (and will continue to offer) online presentations from speakers around the world, follow the link on this badge:

Once you join the group (it's entirely free), you can read more about the change in leadership, as I wrote a message of introduction at the group message board.

I also seek (in that message board entry) feedback from group members about the future of the group and in particular, prospective topics of interest for online presentations. (Please don't offer such here, if you're a member. Offer it on the message board for all members to see.)

Of course, any of the group's recorded presentations will be offered on my UGTV repository of recorded user group presentations, and indeed I hope that the Meetup may become a primary source for more and more varied recorded presentations.

Still, you'll want to consider joining the group (again, it's entirely free) to receive notification in advance of the online meetings. The group's message board itself can also be used for community interaction (though it's not been too active in recent months). Perhaps we'll see its use expand in the future.

Anyway, come check it out, and spread the word. We'll organize our first meeting within a few weeks, for sure.

As for the Atlanta CFUG, I have stepped down from the presidency of that group just this month. We coincidentally had elections just a few weeks ago and as I knew the change in the Meetup was coming, I stepped down (but didn't tell folks about the meetup as it wasn't finalized). Can't run two groups at once! :-) That wasn't the only reason I stepped down, but I won't deny that running the online meetup should be a lot less effort than running a real physical group.

I also knew that there were many capable prospective leaders in the Atlanta board of directors (numbering 14 strong, and of which I am remaining a member) who could step to take on that leadership role. The board selected Teddy Payne to replace me, and I'm sure the group will do great going forward.

The chance to lead the online meetup group is just a great challenge. With over 900 members, it has incredible reach, and both Ray and I are excited about the prospect of keeping it going as a great place to find online presentations, whether from ourselves or all the other fine speakers out there (and new ones who may want to give it a shot).

Again, if you're at all interested, click the badge above to join. We're happy to have you! :-)