MidsouthMakers: CodeMonkeys

[Joe Ferguson]

As a lot of you know, I'm a full time web dev / code monkey. Some of you are as well. Some of you are aspiring web devs or just are simply interested in development. I saw an awesome list of stuff a "senior" level dev should have exposure to and or be very familiar with. As I went down this list I realized even though I've been doing this for a few years now there's a lot on the list I don't know as well as I should. I bet there are members out there in the same boat. 

I want to start a group similar to the Artists Ghetto that has the focus to teach, learn, and hack at various web development technologies. I would lead this group and provide a curriculum of learning a good bit of the technologies involved. Since I'm no expert on everything, I'd love it to have those that are more familiar contribute to the group as well. I envision our meetings going something to the effect of "Introducing a topic, discussing a topic, hands on demo, hands on assignment" Then the next meeting would be showing off what you did with the hands on assignment from the previous meeting then starting a new topic. The ultimate goal would be to create a regularly meeting group of people interested in learning more (or just better) various web development technologies with a hands on approach.

Meeting Times: It's been suggested that we meet on a Weds or Thurs. night. I would think 7 to 9 or 10pm maybe? For those interested how does the 1st and 3rd Thursdays of the month sound? That would make tonight the first meeting. With it being really short notice I think if anyone that is interested can make it tonight we start planning out the first meeting / what we'd want to get out of the group. If you can't make it tonight, don't worry.

--
- Joe Ferguson
http://www.midsouthmakers.org

[Danny Chamberlin]

I definitely want to be involved, but I am already committed for tonight (and pretty much all Thursdays) - Wednesdays now that Artists' Ghetto is moving days would be much better for me

Danny

[Joe Ferguson]

What day is the Artist ghetto moving to? I specifically went with 1st and 3rd Thursdays to avoid AG. Haven't seen any talk of them moving days.

[Danny Chamberlin]

I think Roy was talking about Saturdays.
Danny

[Thomas Pledge]

I'm interested, Wednesday or Thursday are both fine for me.  I'm don't have any plans for tonight and can show up.

[erik]

I'm down for Thursday's, I would not be available tonight unfortunately, already promised the wife dinner. But I will be available just about every other Thursday, weds would be iffy for me, as I have to work late some of those days.


Sent from my iPhone

[Danny Chamberlin]

I was just looking at things, and after tonight, Thursdays would be cool - this whole weekend from tonight on is packed - I'll actually be glad when Monday gets here :)

Danny

[Chad Miller]

I'm down like a fat kid in dodgeball.

[Kevin Nuckolls]

I'm not officially part of the makers group, just lurking. I think I would have a lot to offer a group like this as I currently lead a software team and manage an infrastructure of 40ish servers in the ec2 cloud that get more than 1.5 billion http requests a year and growing. Previous co-workers from this team now lead projects at Amazon and Instagram. I think it may be worth your while to link up with the python user's group as it's kind of unofficially a "local web devs using emerging technologies" meetup. Check out mempy.org, Brad Montgomery is always looking for a place to host the monthly meetups.

Regardless, I'm willing to just drop by the house for questions/answers any night I happen to be free. Even better if there's a white board I can use. My schedule with the nights I have the kids is pretty variable this next month but if you guys settle on a day I'll let you know if I can make it.

-Kevin

[Nick]

This has the makings of a trap; you're trying to flush us out to farm web labor to us, aren't ya? :o

I keed, this sounds pretty great, Joe! I could definitely stand to polish and expand my skills, and learning as a group sounds like a lot of beer..er.. fun~

-Nick

[Mark Turnage]

RE: Brad

Contact's already been made. In fact, the plan's for the next MemPy
meeting to be at the space, last I knew.
--
Mark Turnage

[Joe Ferguson]

We're in contact with Brad and a couple of the other user group leaders. We will be reaching out to people to help us a good bit. The short term goal is to figure out who's interested, what the current skill set is, and where to go from there. 

[Daniel Soskel]

I'd be interested in something like this.  Thursdays are probably going to be busy for me in the future, and god only knows what my schedule's going to be like once the baby gets here.  I guess mark me down as interested and probably never going to make it out XD

[Mark Turnage]

I'm going to try to make it out; not sure how long I'd be able to stay, though.

[MemphisArtGuy]

the First thursday is the Word Press meeting. Current I know of no meets on the thrid Thursday. Count me in, my poor website are so neglected.

 

-Dru

[brian...@gmail.com]

Like a couple of others I've been lurking for a while but would be very interested in this. I can't make it tonight, but please keep us updated and I will try to be at the next meeting. 

Brian Lawson

[Ed Stafford]

I could actually make something like this once a month.  Maybe I have a few things to contribute.. not sure.

--
Ed Stafford

[Joe Ferguson]

Well it looks like this got a pretty great response. I'll be at the space tonight around 7ish for anyone who wants to come throw some ideas around. If you can't make it, no big deal.

[Joe Ferguson]

We had 6 people come out for our first CodeMonkey Meetings. Tonight we decided to start meeting on the 1st and 3rd Thursdays of each month at 7pm. This puts our next meeting on August 2nd. The next meeting we'll be going over Linux Administration for installing / configuring a LAMP stack and getting started with Github. Bring your laptops with VirtualBox and Ubuntu 12.04 already installed as a VM and we'll take it from there. More info will be coming as well as a recording of our meeting from tonight.

[Danny Chamberlin]

any chance of recording or having notes made available if we're not able to attend?
Danny

[Mark Turnage]

That's the plan. One of the things we're actively planning for is members missing meetings but still being able to keep up and contribute.

Mark Turnage

[Thomas Pledge]

Hey Joe,

Can you link the reddit post you reference in the meeting last night?

[Joe Ferguson]

I didn't save the link, but I saved the content from the post:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Asbe0OwLFhQLdHJnT25QRVhadXJ1YjBOX0VwTFMwNlE

Doc probably needs to be cleaned up a bit, it's a straight copy & paste.

On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 10:17 AM, Thomas Pledge <tomp...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hey Joe,

Can you link the reddit post you reference in the meeting last night?

[Daniel Kohn]

I would also be interested.

Dan Kohn

[Mark Turnage]

Is it this?

http://gist.github.com/3114425
--
Mark Turnage

[Joe Ferguson]

Yep!

[Chella Norvell]

Code monkey? Hah! I can't believe I missed those emails! I would love to participate! I have so much to learn! When are the meetings? :P

~Chella 

Sent from my iPhone

[Brad Dunagan]

Looking forward to, and preparing for, the next monkey meeting!

 

Two questions -

Rough, basic outline before the meeting?

 

Github for a website? 

Linux is not my main OS and I don't do websites.  So, to not fall to far behind at the meeting, I am going through stuff before hand - VM, installing Apache, MySQL, PHP, configuring, and some kind of website (I have a book).  That is what I imagine will be covered at the meeting.  In other words, the simple outline might be -

(Have VM going before the meeting.)

 

Install Apache

Configure

Install MySQL

Configure

Install PHP

...

Some kind of simple website.

Is this what you have in mind?  Maybe Perl or Python too?

 

I can, I suppose, set up something up at Github.  Why?  That is, what do I put in it?  Do people put their website files in the hub?  Or are we just covering it as something separate from the website subject?

 

[Joe Ferguson]

Lots of good questions. I'll have a bunch of info shortly. 

[Danny Chamberlin]

One thing I've been thinking of is that with as many people interested as there are, I had this crazy idea that we could develop a viable startup, document the process - from a bunch of people that literally know almost nothing about putting together a website to a successful launch - and put that out as a webseries...

or am I just insane?

Danny

[Mark Turnage]

On Thu, Jul 26, 2012 at 1:02 PM, Danny Chamberlin <crit...@gmail.com> wrote:
> One thing I've been thinking of is that with as many people interested as
> there are, I had this crazy idea that we could develop a viable startup,
> document the process - from a bunch of people that literally know almost
> nothing about putting together a website to a successful launch - and put
> that out as a webseries...
>
> or am I just insane?
>
> Danny

Ignoring that 'viable startup' is close to an oxymoron...you know the
part in the horror movies where the mad scientist begins recording all
his work religiously as he descends into madness?

...yeah, it'd be something like that. <g>

Also, people that start off not knowing anything don't _have_
successful launches; they just have blind luck that saves them from
themselves, usually by getting someone involved that _does_ know what
they're doing.

Not that the idea's _bad_ per se...but you're going to have a _very_
different outcome if that's your goal than you would playing around
with various techniques and approaches. Granted, it's for a nominally
real-world project, but still a far different process.

[It's also worth noting that this isn't really a beginner's
project...there's going to be people involved who are newcomers to
various aspects, but it's not really intended as a <FOO> 101
project...at least not the way I've understood it]



--
Mark Turnage

[Joe Ferguson]

Sorry I've been slacking on getting this info sent out. This should be a good starting point.

Our Purpose: MidsouthMakers: CodeMonkeys is a subgroup dedicated to the study and practical use of various web / programming technologies. It is a very open ended purpose by design so that we don't pigeon hole ourselves into any specific technology. We may not even strictly stay in the realm of the web. Just like MidsouthMakers, CodeMonkeys will be largely user driven. I'm here to provide leadership and mangerial duties. I have a vague idea of what the next few months will hold for us, but it is nothing set in stone. We're not going to be a users group. There are already various user groups in Memphis and the ones I have participated in are great. CodeMonkeys is about real world use and practical application of various technologies. We won't be writing "Hello World" applications. We'll be writing applications that are based on real world needs and solutions.

Our Target: Anyone with programming experience or the drive to learn from an advanced type setting. We do have a couple of people interested that are completely new. These people I believe are going to be able to pick up and run with the rest of us. This isn't a Programming 101 course. It's likely not even a Programming 201 level. That's not to say we won't cover some basic stuff. What is basic to you may not be basic to me or someone else. I don't want to purposefully exclude anyone, however I do want to be clear in our goals.

Our Goals: Monthly meetings demonstrating practical application of a web technology or continued study in its use. I want to be able to throw a problem at the group, and a method to solve that problem. I want the group to work together (or individually if they wish) to solve the problem using the method provided (or another method along the same lines). The idea is to get you outside of your comfort zone. There will be some topics that won't take an entire month, there will be some that may take multiple months. Another goal is to be well documented enough that anyone of just about any skill level can jump in and join at any time. At the same time regular members won't feel behind if they have to miss a meeting.

Next Meeting: August 2nd Meeting: Linux Administration for installing / configuring a LAMP stack and getting started with Github. Bring your laptops with VirtualBox and Ubuntu 12.04 already installed as a VM and we'll take it from there. If you want extra credit go ahead and install Virtualmin and configure a test host. 

Meeting after Next: August 16th: Basic HTML / CSS. We'll be creating our first website with the fundamental tools and going over various related topics.

Now, to answer some questions that have been brought up:

Brad: What you're doing is great. Don't feel bad about being where you are now. I'd say come to the meeting and let's see how comfortable you are with the setup we're going to be using. It's a nice frontend that makes 95% of the administration quite easy. If you're still having issues it's something we can work on during a meeting or at some other time. 

Github: I created an organization: https://github.com/organizations/MidsouthMakers/ for us to group up and share repositories with. I'm not sure if you can request ot join or if I need to invite you. The reason we're using github is for version control and centralized code storage. You'll want to set up a github account before the meeting. With github we can easily work with each other's code to show different methods of acheiveing a result. It will also be a nice display to show off what we're doing as a group/subgroup.

Danny: It's a good idea, and I do plan on documenting meetings / progress quite well. However the skill level would probably not be for beginners. We have a few beginners among us, and I'm willing to work extra with them and outside of meetings if needed provided they have the initiative to learn. If you take what we're doing outside of the group, I don't know how well that would stand up without as much context. I would never do anything to question your sanity. Me questioning your sanity while Dan is so blatantly questioning your height. I just couldn't do that to you. :_)

Mark makes a lot of good points. I think if we're successful in this maybe before we get too far along if some kind of series of sorts is what we want to do, we can go back and revist what we've done so far.

[MemphisArtGuy]

Can some one record the 16th meeting, I'll be at the Los Vegas Dealer Market from the 13th - 19th.