It’s been a while since we ran our last Devs4Devs event, but it’s coming back!

Devs4Devs is - to turn a cliché - an event by the community for the community. Anyone can participate and presenters can volunteer to present a session on any developer topic. Attendees get to hear from their fellow developers about something new and cool in a short, 20 minute presentation by one of their peers. Presenters get to experience what it’s like to prepare for and deliver a technical presentation for an audience.

Devs4Devs will run on 4 September 2010 from 9:00 AM to 12:00 PM 12:30 PM at the Microsoft offices in Johannesburg. What better way to spend your Saturday morning than in the company of your fellow developers, listening to some great technical presentations and networking with your community peers?

This is a free event and we’ll be providing breakfast and tea and coffee during the break and may even have some cool giveaways… Smile

For Attendees

Register now to let us know you’re coming so that we can arrange catering.

For Presenters

We have timeslots for up to 12 14 presentations and we’ll update this post as people submit new sessions. If you’re interested in presenting on a topic (any development related topic will do) we’d love to have you! Remember, this is a relaxed environment and you’re in front of your peers. This is a great way to build up your confidence if you’re new to presenting, or, for experienced presenters to practice and polish up their skills.

If you’d like to present contact us and let us know what topic you’d like to talk about, provide a description and get preparing! If you’d like to present at Devs4Devs keep your eye on our blog for the next event – we’ll try and ensure you get an opportunity to show your stuff!

Agenda

We’ve had an overwhelming response and our mailbox has been full of great topic suggestions. We’ve decided to include extend the day by an extra 20 minutes and now we’ll be accommodating 14 sessions! Thanks to everyone who’s submitted a presentation and, for those who missed out, try again next time we run Devs4Devs!

For everyone attending: we’ve got some excellent content for you to choose from, so be sure to register your place before you miss out.

Title Description Presenter

Windows Phone 7 - Getting Started

A high level introduction to getting started with Windows Phone 7 development including: where to begin, options for developers, thinking about design and a demonstration application.

Johannes van Schalkwyk

Making MVVM easy

 Starting with WPF, Silverlight or WP7? Heard of MVVM but think it’s WAY too complex for your simple application? Join me for a crash course using the easiest MVVM framework available… Caliburn.Micro! Rudi Grobler

Why you should care about Google Closure

Closure is a modularised set of JavaScript libraries that can assist you in building rich internet applications.

It's been battle-tested by Google on sites like: Gmail, Google Docs and Google Maps.

Attend this short intro to get an understanding of how important these libraries are and why you should consider using them in your next big internet app.

 Simon Stewart

Introducing NHibernate 3

 The daddy of .NET ORM is back with a new release, in this session you'll see a few of the newest features - such as a full IQueryable LINQ provider - that makes NHibernate 3 the best release yet! Kevin McKelvin

Branding SharePoint 2010 with MasterPages, Layouts and CSS

 One of the largest limitations of WSS3.0 and MOSS2007 is the ability to brand SharePoint without intricate knowledge of the platform and in some cases breaking a few rules and modifying out of the box system files to get the desired look and feel. Come and see how the theming engine in SharePoint 2010 together with CSS, Master Pages and Layouts can be used to brand your SharePoint site using the amazing new SharePoint Designer 2010. Brent Samodien

Unit Testing - Code Coverage & Mocking

 In this presentation William will demonstrate how code coverage tools help measure the effectiveness of your unit tests.  He will also show how Mocking tools can help to add value to your unit tests and ensure that all edge-case logic is properly checked. William Brander

Getting ready for Windows Azure development

 Heard about the cloud? Excited about the possibilities? In this session we have a 1000-mile introduction to Microsoft’s operating system for the cloud, Windows Azure, how it compares to the other cloud offerings that are out there and how to get your hands dirty with the skill-up process. Endless possibilities + new tech = fun stuff. Ryno Rijnsburger

An introduction to Mercurial Source Control

 Want a quick introduction into a Distributed Version Control System (DVCS)? Meet Mercurial it is a cross-platform, fast, lightweight source control management system designed for easy and efficient handling of distributed projects. Zayd Kara

Making money with Coded UI

 Coded UI is a brand new feature of Visual Studio 2010 which enables you to quickly build automated user interface tests for your application and run them as if they were unit tests. In the talk we will look at how Coded UI can change your life, one UI at a time! Robert MacLean

Hack .Net in 10 Seconds - Why obfuscation is critical

 Hacking 101 – I demonstrate how to bypass basic copy protection in an unobfusctaed .Net application through reverse engineering and show how obfuscation adds a layer of protection. I also demonstrate additional techniques for protecting your applications from hacking once they are released in the wild. Mark Pearl

Composite Applications with PRISM

 In this session Stephan will demonstrate how to leverage the Composite Application Libraries to create modularized applications for WPF and Silverlight. He will also show you how to do multi-targeted development by sharing lots of code between the web and desktop applications. Stephan Johnson

An Introduction to Pex and Moles

 An introduction into Pex and Moles, covering the basics of Mole Types and Mole Stubs and Parameterised Testing. Dave Russell

ASP.NET Dynamic Data

I will briefly introduce ASP.NET Dynamic Data by showing how to build a complete data maintenance web application with almost zero code.

Moving on, I will demonstrate some standard ways of customising a Dynamic Data application, and some more advanced non-standard customisation techniques. I will finish off by illustrating how Dynamic Data libraries and controls can be leveraged in other applications that don't normally use dynamic data.

 Brady Kelly

ASP.NET MVC 3

 As you probably already surmised, ASP.NET MVC 3 is the next major release of ASP.NET MVC. Join us as we highlight the upcoming features and modifications to this popular framework. Jaco Pretorius and Kobus Brummer

We’re looking forward to seeing all of you there!

- Dario