Tuesday, July 17, 2007

The Harry Potter Mania Fossil

3 days to go. I can't wait to lay my hands on the last book. I have so many theories - as would anyone who's read the series so far - whether Sirius Black is really dead, Harry is a horcrux, what Aunt Petunia got to do with all this. It doesn't matter whether I am going to be proven right or wrong, its so much fun thinking about all the pieces of the story. Kids who will grow up to read Harry Potter would miss out on this fun. For instance, when my son (who's just over 1 yr) is old enough to read the book, he'll probably have a hard-bound boxed set, but the overall story will be well known. Readers like us have the pleasure (or otherwise, if you think) of ruminating over each part (i mean, each book), spewing out our own theories and reasoning, asking irrelevant questions with enthusiasm. In short, my son will probably read the Harry Potter series like I read the Lord of the Rings or the Hitchhikers Guide - where the intervals of suspense are shorter.
Reading the first 6 books after this one's out, knowing what is going to happen in the end is likely to be a completely different experience. Just try reading the Prisoner of Azkaban now that we know Peter Pettigrew helps Voldemort regain his powers. I'm going to miss the feeling of having so many unanswered questions.

Note to Self: Hyperlink all the terminology to the appropriate wikipedia pages.

Note to Reader: If you don't see a hyperlink, please look up the word on wikipedia.

Monday, July 02, 2007

At Code Camp, San Diego

Got bitten by the BarCamp bug again. I spent the last weekend at the Rock and Roll Code Camp at San Diego. This was one unconference that covered a lot of MS technologies. I got my fill of Silverlight, CardSpace, and some refresher/updates on WCF and WPF. I also saw an good demo of TeamCity. This is a build management tool (quite comprehensive) from Jetbrains, the same guys who make Idea, my favorite Java IDE.

My presentation on "The Ten Commandments for an Agile Developer", was based on a post I wrote earlier. My slides:





This was one unconference that made the speakers feel extra special. A speakers' room, bags and t-shirts as audience giveways, and even a speakers badge! I'm saving mine :), I've never seen it in an unconference before.