dotSwift 2016
I really enjoyed dotSwift’s first edition, so no way for me to miss 2016 edition, especially because this time, I’ll be on stage as well, for a lightning talk about Protocol Oriented Programming.
I take a seat in the gorgeous Théatre des Variétés and the conference starts. The first big change compared to last year is Daniel Steinberg (@dimsumthinking) as the MC. A job he’ll do perfectly by doing transitions with humour and by interviewing the main speakers after their talks.
The first talk set directly the tone, Protocol Oriented Programming, by Rob Napier (@cocoaphony). Obviously, I was at the right conference. The talk was very interesting because it proposed tools to overcome problems I’ll be talking about that we can meet in POP. I can’t wait though to see his talk in video so I can pause it and watch it again as Daniel will joke about later that day. In the meantime, here is a blog post from Rob on type erasers : http://robnapier.net/erasure
Thomas Visser (@thomvis88) told us about Future. I already read articles about this idea to ‘break’ asynchronism and which looks extremly prometting but for the moment I put it in the same box as FRP in the way that it (seems to) requires to big of a mindset change for me to test it on my current projects.
Daniel Haight (@Daniel1of1) proposed us an xcodeless approach, a growing need with the open sourcing and the fact that Swift is no longer reserved to Apple computers.
After this 3rd talk, it was the first break. I spent most of it backstage, lightning speakers were required to adjust schedules and slides. I’ll be the 7th, so the 3rd lightning talk after the second break.
The second session started with the first 4 lightnings :
- Daniel Tomlinson (@dantoml) : building APIs in Swift
- Victor Wang (@wangshengjia) : play with views as with Legos
- Alessandro Ludovici (@AleLudovici) : CAReplicatorLayer tips
- Maxim Zaks (@iceX33) : FlatBuffers, a binary exchange format to replace json
Then back to the regular talks with Roy Marmelstein (@marmelroy). I didn’t thought it could be possible to dedicate a whole talk on internationalization, but Roy did it very well and we learned a lot. It was pretty funny too.
I also liked very much Ayaka Nonaka (@ayanonagon) talk, which had 2 parts, a tech one and a more organisational one. On the tech part, we were in the middle of topics I am currently working on, which is fighting the immemorial problem of Massive View Controllers thanks to protocols. On the organisational part, using the same process as the one used by Apple for Swift evolution proposals is really great, even though I think it requires a very high level of discipline.
It is now the second break, I now have time to chat with people. It’s also time to eat a banana and drink a coke, I will need some energy.
Here are the 4 lightning talks to start the last session :
- Paul Ardeleanu (@pardel) : The Forgotten Cloud
- Michael May (@CoderMay) : How to be an empathetic developer
- Me (@greg3z) : Protocol Oriented Programming
- Boris Bügling (@neonacho) : Swift Packet Manager
Sadly, I won’t be watching very carefully the others lightnings because we don’t see pretty well from the backstages and mostly because I am freaking out ^^
I can’t wait for the videos to catch up!
I arrive a bit early in the backstages and chat a bit with Boris, Paul and Daniel. Then the last session starts. Pressure’s level goes up. I practice a last time my talk with my slides on my iPhone. The sound engineer installs my mic. Only a couple of minutes left. By chance, there is water, I drink a bit and Daniel goes on stage to announce me and… I go.
I come in the light, and I’ve heared many times that in these situations, we don’t see the audience because we’re a bit dazzled. So it didn’t surprise me and as I have bad eyes, I wasn’t expecting to see a lot of people. In fact, I was hopping it also, it’s less frightening in a way.
I received a warming welcome, especially from my friends from the meetups CococaHeads Paris & Swift Paris, in the front rows. It is very comforting but also a bit frightning, so it took me a couple of seconds to start. The begining was in auto-pilot mode. I had practiced so much that every sentances were already made, as well as the moves or the facial expression. But with time and laughters from the audience, confidence came back and I was able to cut the auto-pilot and take back the control. And from there, it has been only pure joy, I was hearing Daniel laughing backstage, it was amazing!
After that, I left the stage, my mic was removed and I left the backstages. I spent a couple of minutes wandering in the hallways before returning in the theater for TJ Usiyan (@griotspeak) talk. But to be honnest, it was hard to focus, so that’s one more talk I’ll have to watch once the video will be released.
To conclude dotSwift ’16, Chris Eidhof (@chriseidhof)! I asked him few days before if he was intending to do some livecoding and he replied a mysterious ‘we’ll see’. So, yes there was some livecoding. In fact it was only livecoding! But really clean and really clear. I never tried doing some livecoding but I’ve seen many confs where it was pretty confusing. So to not loose yourself and the audience, a high level of skills is required! It was question of protocols here as well, so it was perfect!
The interview with Daniel afterwards was awesome, Chris came back on his pure functionnal past and how it may have been in excess, to enlight the fact that there is good ideas in every paradigm, which is, for me, the message of Swift, a language equipped for functionnal, written with protocols and used with objects!
I came back on stage for the group picture and that’s it, dotSwift was already over! I stayed a bit talking with Rob, Sylvain and Ayaka, then heading to the bar for the after party.
Above the personnal impact of this new edition, I also enjoyed the evolutions, the b4 party was great and Daniel as a MC was perfect!
To conclude, a huge thank you to the dotSwift team, I know they work hard and it’s not easy, but keep up the good work, it was awesome! 🎉
See u next year :)
