OpenSourcery

The spring conference season is fully upon us, and various OpenSourcerers have hit the circuit to spread the good word on open source technologies. Michael Schwern has been particularly active.

Schwern begins close to home, presenting "Is the Web Down: A Practical Look at How the Web Works" at the Open Source Bridge conference. In this session, Schwern and Joshua Keroes will lift the veil that keeps many users from understanding "how the Web and its plumbing works." This talk is part of the Chemistry track at Open Source Bridge, which is dedicated to "Understanding how our systems work, in order to improve and extend."

On Thursday, July 23rd, Schwern will share "How to Lie Like a Geek" at OSCON. In short, the talk will cover how geeks, while relentlessly pursuing the Truth, sometimes find themselves accidentally perpetrating lies: Lies by Omission, Lies by Precision, Lies by Irrelevancy, and, perhaps most painfully, Lies rooted in the word "should." As in, "The user /should/ have realized."

Stay tuned to learn what Schwern will deliver at the upcoming YAPC (Yet Another Perl Conference).

Wednesday, March 25th marks the second monthly meeting of Portland's OS Geospatial users group at OpenSourcery. The first meeting focused primarily on logistical and scope issues, but now it's time to dig into and explore emerging technologies.

To learn more about the group and to follow their discussions, please visit the user group page. There you will find a thread about upcoming presentations. You can also help to shape the conversation.

The event is free and open to the public. Please visit the Upcoming event page and register so we know how many people to expect. Find our office here.

PLEASE NOTE: OpenSourcery's developers will be working right up to event time, so please plan to arrive no more than five minutes prior to the start. We tend to recommend this place for thirsty early-comers.

Thank you for reading.

On April 22nd and 23rd, InnoTech will hold its sixth annual technology conference here in Portland, Oregon. OpenSourcery is proud to present at the 2009 conference for a number of reasons: InnoTech is local, it's run by good, smart people, and it provides an opportunity for us to demonstrate the value of open source software to a wider technology community.

To that end, OpenSourcery is teaming with partner Acquia to bring a truly professional approach to open source web publishing frameworks. As we've said here a few times, OpenSourcery is proud to be an original Acquia Drupal Gold Partner: together we provide world-class discovery, development, design, and support to our clients. In a space that has traditionally leaned toward proprietary solutions, this coordination between two of the country's premier open source development shops aims to disrupt old standards.

Attendees will find OpenSourcery and Acquia in the exhibit hall, but they can also find us speaking about the business case for open source software. The panel brings together four executive- and management-level professional who have successfully implemented open source software while improving their business' bottom line. We're very pleased to have Deborah Bryant, director of GOSCON and Public Sector Communities Director of Oregon State University's Open Source Lab (OSL), to moderate the panel.

Registration for the event is now open. If you are interested in being a guest of OpenSourcery, please contact thomas@opensourcery.com to enquire about complimentary registration passes.

Thank you for reading. We hope to see you at InnoTech.

The Open Source Bridge is an all-volunteer, all-awesome conference that will take place in Portland, Oregon this summer, June 17-19 at the Convention Center. When OSCON fled south, did Portland cry itself to sleep? No. It organized across languages, across disciplines, and on both sides of the mighty Willamette to stage an even more impressive event.

But the success of the conference relies on real people presenting real content. That's where OpenSourcery and other development shops come in. That's right, it's time to submit proposals. We're encouraging our developers, project managers, systems administrators, and business developers to do so.

A few words about why the Open Source Bridge exists, taken from their website:

"Our primary objective will be to explore what it means to be a responsible Open Source citizen.

"Our conference structure is language-agnostic by design, in hopes of facilitating broader community growth by focusing on Open Source development as a discipline–divorcing the techniques of development from the language used for that development. In so doing, the conference will encourage and foster cross-pollination and widespread knowledge sharing, regardless of each developer’s chosen programming language."

That sounds like the kind of activity Drupal developers should participate in. Please feel free to contact thomas@opensourcery.com if you have further questions about the event or if you would like to volunteer your time as an OSB advocate. We're looking for developers across the country (world?) to visit our fair city during the most beautiful time of year. Come June you'll see why they call us the Rose City.

Thank you for reading.

Jonathan, Amye, Dylan, and Stacy are en route to DC as I write this, speeding toward the goodness that is DrupalCon DC. Immediately upon their return, OpenSourcery will host the March Drupal Meetup in order to squeeze every bit of smarts from the collective, exhausted, Drupal brains of PDX.

The Meetup begins with Tony Rasmussen, who will continue a discussion from the January meeting re. when to use Contemplate module vs. the Theme Layer.

We'll follow Tony's discussion with DrupalCon roundup, contemplation, and embellishment. AND IF YOU HAVE NOT HEARD, March is drewish's last Portland Drupal Meetup. That is, until he realizes that Portland is the greatest city on earth and that NYC, while it never sleeps, just doesn't stack up. So please join us and bid drewish a hearty adieu. Travel well, sir!

As always, we'll save plenty of time for questions and concerns. Bring your ideas and your thirst, because immediately following questions and answers we'll head to the Bridgeport Brew Pub for thoughtful libations. The Meetup is free and open to the public. OpenSourcery is located at 1636 NW Lovejoy between 16th and 17th streets. Contact thomas@opensourcery.com with questions.

Date: Wednesday, March 11
Time: 6pm - 8pm

Please note that OpenSourcery's developers work right up to meeting time, so please take care to arrive as close to 6pm as possible (5:55, perhaps?). We recommend public transportation and self propulsion; if you arrive a few minutes early, we can recommend a solid local bar where 30 minutes are easily passed.

Thank you for reading. We'll see you on March 11.

OpenSourcery is pleased to host the very first PDX Open Source Geospatial Users Group here in the Lovejoy office. The group has been looking for a good place to meet and begin pursuing their goals, and we're happy to be that place.

We encourage you to contact David Percy, the Geospatial Data Manager in the Geology Department of PSU, if you have further questions about the group. He can be found through his website. Because space is limited, we ask that interested parties let him know they'd like to attend.

Find us here:

The first meeting's agenda is fairly straightforward. This description comes from PDX OS Geo member Sarah Beecroft:

We'll have a demo by one of the founders, then some discussion about group structure and preferences, and then adjourn to a local boozery around 8pm for more co-conspiring.

Welcome to the new digs. We look forward to an exciting presentation.

Thank you for reading.

It's no secret that OpenSourcery supports transparent and easily accessible public data. We're working to help all levels of government make public data available so that developers can create useful applications and citizens can better inform themselves. The technology is available, and we're seeing increased energy behind the project.

Which brings us to "Trust the Vote! Program," a "public digital works project" of the Open Source Digital Voting Foundation. The OSDV Foundation is a Silicon Valley-based public benefits corporation whose mission is to work to restore trust in how America votes through the design, development, and demonstration of open source digital voting technology.

Yeah, that's right. Join us for this introduction and learn a few important things, like:

* The project's development work so far
* Opportunities for systems architects, software developers, SDQA/test specialists, and user experience designers
* Development philosophies and approaches, including experience-driven design and test-driven agile development

And more. The event is free and open to the public. So bring a friend, make a friend, learn how to make a difference.

Join us on Wednesday, February 18th from 6pm until 7:30pm at CubeSpace

Website
http://osdv.org

Register
Upcoming
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The January Drupal Meetup was, once again, the largest on record. To give you an idea of the turnout, we put every chair, couch, desk, and other horizontal surface to work and we /still/ ran out of seating. It's a testament to the amazing Portland Drupal community and to the quality of Todd's presentation that we were able to bring so many developers together under one roof (without free beer, mind you). Special thanks to everyone who attended for being incredibly respectful of the developers who were wrapping up their work until just a few minutes before Meetup start time.

Drewish has posted the outline for February's Meetup, and it looks like fun. In short, February is for lightning talks, giving each speaker about seven minutes to present a topic, show off a module, or demonstrate a trick. Sign-ups are open now in the comment field of Drewish's post.

I have a feeling this will be a great session. As always, the Meetup is free and open to the public, so please bring people who are interested in joining the community. NOTE: Please be aware that the developers at OpenSourcery will be working right up to event time. We ask that you arrive between 5:50pm and 6:00pm. Thank you!

OpenSourcery is located at 1636 NW Lovejoy St. between 16th and 17th Streets. We encourage the use of public transportation and there's plenty of space for your bike. We'll walk to Bridgeport Brew Pub for libations afterward.

Thank you for reading, and we hope to see you here. Contact thomas@opensourcery.com or Drewish with questions.

What better way to invite our friends and cohorts in the Portland tech community to see the new offices than to throw a Lunch 2.0 bash? No way, is what.

So we're doing it. And just to get the obligatory construction out of the way: Lunch 2.0 at OpenSourcery is free (as in lunch) and free (and in freedom). Done.

We're so happy with the new digs that we feel sort of selfish being the only ones to enjoy it. We want to share our two-piece arcade, comprised of Spy Hunter and the Theatre of Magic (and since we never actually get to /play/ the things during the day, it'll be a welcome change to see them brought to life). We want to nosh. And of course we'll be quite happy to talk about what we've been up to.

So let us know in advance that you're coming by visiting Upcoming to register and apprise us of your food preferences. You can also read a similar version of this same information (largely because I stole the details) at SiliconFlorist.

Our offices are located at 1636 NW Lovejoy, cuddled up to the Radio Cab company and under the broad shoulders of venerable I-405. It's easy to reach us by Streetcar, bike, foot, and, er, cab; it's not easy to find parking, however. We encourage public/self-transport.

Please email thomas@opensourcery.com if you'd like more details. Otherwise, we'll just see you here.

This post is a double-reminder: first, please be advised that OpenSourcery's offices have moved. We are now meeting at the Lovejoy Building at 1636 NW Lovejoy (between 16th and 17th). Time: Wednesday, December 10th from 6pm-8pm. Who: Drupal developers, from beginners to power users. As always, the Meetup is open to the public and absolutely free.

Second, due to the somewhat frenetic pace of our move, there was some question as to a topic. But confusion leads to unpredictable gifts: in this case, two (informative if informal) topics.

1. Jonathan Hedstrom will give an introduction to Drupal's Testing Framework. Drupal's own testing framework is modeled on (and originates from) SimpleTest. Jonathan will discuss how test-driven development results in tighter and more solid code, the results of which benefit not only module development but entire sites/applications as well. Without appropriate testing, complicated sites can begin to feel loose and somewhat cobbled together. In addition, Jonathan will discuss the opportunities for developers to write much-needed tests for Drupal 7.

2. Melissa Anderson will give an informal presentation on her ideas for Website in a Weekend (a much-discussed thread on the Portland User Group site). The project in question is the Rose City Resource, a quarterly publication that "is Portland's most comprehensive, updated list of services for people experiencing homelessness and poverty."

We hope you'll be able to attend our first Meetup at the new office. As always, Spy Hunter and Theatre of Magic are in full working order.

See you there (here).

Thanks to all in the Portland community that helped make tonight's Ignite Portland 4 a great experience. For an event that everyone donated their time to, it's a great reminder of how good Portland's community is at creating valuable events.

Looking forward to the next Ignite Portland on February 19th, 2009, so it's time to start getting some slides together.