CocoaHeads Belgium October Meeting – Notes
First of all, I would like to thank all attendees for showing up. We had about 35 people from all over the country joining us on this Meeting. For those who couldn’t make it, or didn’t know about this initiative, no worries, we will be putting all information online anyway, and this time we even video taped the session !
Status Update
Before the session started I gave a little Status Update on things we have already done since the last meeting.
As requested by the group, we have created a Google Group for CocoaHeadsBE. Some of you had indicated that it would be a lot easier to post things in a Google Group as opposed to posting it on the Website. Well, the Group is there, but apparently not everyone found it yet. Feel free to use the Google Group and post things in it if you want !
We also created a CocoaHeadsBE group on LinkedIn. We’re not quite sure what we will do with it, but for those of you who have an account on LinkedIn, make sure you join the group as well. It could be used in the future to post job openings and get in touch with each other on a professional level.
This month’s session : Stéphane Winnepenninckx : iPhone Bootcamp at The Big Nerd Ranch
This mont’s meeting was all about the iPhone Bootcamps at The Big Nerd Ranch (Europe). Stéphane Winnepenninckx from WiS & Co took the opportunity to share us his experiences with the iPhone Bootcamp at The Big Nerd Ranch. Thanks to Stephane we even had Stefanie Höfling from The Big Nerd Ranch joining in as well !
Stéphane covered everything you need to know in order to be prepared for the iPhone Bootcamp at BNR. It would be way too much to cover in an article, and since we video taped the session, I decided to put the video online for everyone to watch.
CocoaHeads Belgium October Meeting from Stefaan Lesage on Vimeo.
The Video
Well, the Session was video taped as a test. I’m not quite sure if we will keep doing that in the future. Personally I’m not 100% happy with the result. The video was shot in HD format, but in order to upload it to the interwebs I had to compress it a lot. It just wan’t affordable to upload the huge HD file since it would cost us way too much in bandwidth.
As I mentioned this was just a test, but if people are interested in those Video’s, we might continue video taping the sessions. If we can find the resources we might even add a second camera to the setup. Of course that would take us a bit longer to produce the final movie, but it would be a bit more dynamic to watch.
If you want us to keep video taping the sessions, please let me know. And if you have any suggestions on how to make the video even better, feel free to talk to me as well.
Next month’s meeting
After the session, I asked the attendees if it wouldn’t be better if we pick a fixed day in the month for the sessions. That would actually make everyone’s life a little easier and would allow us to plan things ahead. There was a consensus on having the meetings in the third of fourth week of the month, and on a monday or wednesday. I’ll be putting a new doodle online later this week in which everyone has the opportunity to vote for.
Additionally someone in the audience mentioned we could use their offices in Nijvel as well. Personally I don’t mind having the meetings take place once in Gent and once in Brussels as well. It would make it a bit easier for those who are located on the other side of the country to get there. If the person who suggested to use their offices is reading this, could you please get in touch with is so we can work something out ?
Ideas for Presentations :
It doesn’t matter where the next meeting will take place or on which day of the month it takes place, but one thing we will surely need is someone giving a presentation or a session on something related to Cocoa Development. If you have any ideas, or are willing to give a session at next month’s meeting, please get in touch with us so we can arrange everything.
Sessions could be anything, ranging from How to market / promote your application to how to design a good Mac / iPhone User Interface or even something technical like an in-depth look at Instruments. I had someone talk to me about presenting the ‘Bug of the Month’, in which he could give a short session about a typical problem he encountered while programming and how he solved it. All great topics for sessions !
So if you’re willing to give a presentation / session at the next CocoaHeads Belgium meeting, please let us know !
Final Note
I noticed we had less attendees this time, but I also noticed we had quite a few new faces joining in as well. This is great, since it a clear sign that there is interest in this initiative and that the word is getting around. If you know someone who is into Mac Development or iPhone Development, please do tell them about this initiative and website.
Oh, before I forget it. Stefanie Höfling from The Big Nerd Ranch Europe was kind enough to supply us with a Coupon Code which gives you an additional 50€ reduction on one of their courses. She even promised she would double that reduction for member of the CocoaHeads Belgium community. So, I’d like to thank here in the name of everyone involved in CocoaHeads Belgium.
For those of you who couldn’t make it to this month’s meeting, but would still like to get that discount, Stefanie provided me with a few additional cards / coupon codes. Make sure to ask me about the Coupon’s during next month’s meeting.
If anyone thinks he can help us out with one of the ideas mentioned in this topic, please do contact us. If you still have more ideas … well contact us as well. There is a real need for a CocoaHeads Belgium, and I’m sure that we can make it happen if we all work on it together.
Regards,
Stefaan
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Hi all,
I’ve got a few comments that I’d like to share here. I was one of the new faces at this event because I only found out about Cocoheads Belgium the day after the first event had taken place.
I came with high hopes but I left pretty disappointed and there were 2 major reasons for this.
First of all let me say that I have great respect for the people at BNR. At one point in time I considered their courses as I’m convinced they’re great value for money. However, I expect more from a Cocoaheads event than a one hour salestalk about BNR and how great their food is. Don’t get me wrong: it’s great to have an insight about the BNR course but this can be done in an article on the website.
Second I thought the infrastructure of this event was top notch: great parking space, great building. However, I felt we were being rushed out after the presentation. I was really hoping to talk to some people after the event. Apparently this wasn’t possible in the building so a pub was needed. This is not very ideal because of the nature of pubs you’re stuck on a chair and you can only talk to the people closest to you. Luckily I had 2 great people to talk to but I really felt it was a missed opportunity, especially considering how much space we had in the IBBT building to mix and talk.
I live in Wetteren so this event is only 15 minutes away for me. However, I can imagine that people who drive a long way for such an event felt pretty disappointed.
Am I the only one with this view ? Was no one else disappointed ? Or is it just me ?
Best regards,
Spencer
http://www.idevelop.be
Hi,
Let me respond with some feedback here.
First of all, this might have looked a bit like a salestalk, but actually a few people were interested in the topic we discussed. Of course we shouldn’t do these kind of sessions at each meeting. I hope someone will come forward and announce a more technical session for the next meeting. I guess we will always have this kind of sessions and more technical sessions. Personally I’m too new at Cocoa Development to give any kind of in depth technical sessions, but if you can, please feel free to tell us about the sessions you would like to give.
Concerning the infrastructure, the people at IBBT made it available to us, but they need to close everything down by 10 PM. The solution was to try and find a pub in the neighborhood. I know what you mean with getting separated in a pub, and that’s why I was asking to the people at the other table what they were talking about
It’s only the first real meeting we had, and since we didn’t really have that much volunteers willing to give a presentation / session we had to start with something. Personally I think the BNR session was very informative, but I can imagine a lot of people expecting more technical sessions.
So, if you’re up for it, and have suggestions on how we could improve everything, have any topics you would like to present at the next meeting, feel free to post them. The more feedback like this we get, the better we will be able to make CocoaHeads Belgium what you guys expect from it.
Thanks for the feedback, it’s really appreciated. This is the information we need, so we can learn from it.
Regards,
Stefaan Lesage
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Devia
Software Development & New Media Technologies
http://www.devia.be