Sawyer X

I wanted to write up on the February TA.pm meeting we had two weeks ago but kept delaying it. I think it's about time!

As with every TA.pm meeting, we try to mix both beginner and advanced talks, in order to have something for everyone. It's proven very effective so far. We've also started doing lightning talks, which I really wanted to do for a while.

The beginner talk was done by Gabor Szabo, giving an introduction on how to get started contributing to an open source project. There were a lot of laughs and a lot of fun. We also got to see new faces, and that's always great.

Then we had a round of lightning talks, one by Shlomi Fish on how to solve a very specific problem in a ton of different ways, and one by no speaker at all, on how to write a nifty website in under a minute using Dancer.

Shlomi's talk was a hell of a lot of fun. Considering how difficult it is for Shlomi to do a talk, I think he was very brave at attempting a lightning talk and I think it really paid off. People were really enjoying themselves and having a blast. I would attribute it to a good-spirited crowd and an amused - yet humble - speaker.

After the lightning talk, I gave a talk on the differences in Perl variable definitions, mainly explaining each of (and the difference between) "my", "our", "local" and "state".

When the talks ended, we went to a local restaurant to enjoy a dinner and have some more fun.

I want to thank the speakers and everyone who came. I hope to see you all (and those who didn't come last time) in the next meeting!!

Slides:

• There are too many ways to do it


• Your first website in under a minute with Dancer


• Our local state, my, my

If you fancy doing a talk, whether beginner or advanced or a lightning talk, hit me up.

Here's to more fun!