CodeMash v.2.0.0.8 (January 10-11, 2008)
CodeMash
is a conference held in Sandusky, OH. It attracts developers mainly
from Ohio and Michigan, but also some from surrounding states. This
year, at least one person came from each of the states of Nebraska,
South Dakota, Georgia, California, Virginia, and Washington. The talks
were great and the conference experienced about a 40% growth over last
year's inaugural event.
Sponsors and great speakers are the key
to the success of CodeMash, and the conference has been fortunate
enough to attract both. This year's sponsors included big companies
like Amazon,IBM, Sun, and Microsoft, regional companies like Pillar,
TechSmith, HMB, Quick Solutions, and Stout Systems. And, we at SRT
Solutions sponsored as well as helping to organize the conference.
The
conference, organized completely by volunteers (all of whom are
developers) attracted industry luminaries such as Brian Goetz, Neal
Ford, Scott Hanselman, and Bruce Eckel. Some speakers traveled to the
conference, including Dick Wall (Google, Java Posse), James Ward
(Flex), and Andrew Glover (Groovy). Well known local speakers included
Bill Wagner (C#), Brian Sam-Bodden (Java) and Kevin Dangoor (DoJo) ..
and many others. It was truly a great conference, and we're already
looking forward to next year's event.
CodeMash Families was
introduced this year. This was organized by the spouse of one of the
attendees, as a result of recognizing that many families attended last
year but didn't discover one another until well into the conference.
Organized activities for families included group dinners and story time.
KidzMash
took on a life of its own. Just before the conference started,
discussions centered around who was bringing kids. A few people
volunteered to lead some "kid geek" activities, to show our kids what
it is that we do, as computer scientists. One demonstration (thank you
Arnulfo Wing!) included showing kids how to program in the Kids
Programming Language (KPL). It was truly amazing to see young kids
(ages 4-8 or so) intently listening and participating! The other
demonstration was a Lego Robotics demo by Duane Collicott (thanks
Duane!). The parents seemed to enjoy it as much as the kids!
And yes, the conference was held at a water park: the Kalahari Resort.
It's a great venue for a conference and lends itself well to the
family-friendly atmosphere that the CodeMash conference organizers are
promoting, by including CodeMash Families and KidzMash.