This post was written by a fellow developer and friend, Drew Crawford. I’d like to thank him for taking time out of his busy schedule to write this post. I was out of town at Barcamp Chattanooga that weekend. Thanks man!
Enter Drew…
Last weekend, July 24th-25th, the Birmingham Software Developers Association hosted an event called LINQ Bootcamp. The event was held at the Birmingham, AL location of New Horizons and drew a crowd of nearly 30 people from the local tech community. The idea behind this event was to take a tech book and spend a weekend going through it in depth. Each chapter was presented by the participants in the weekend (similar to how participants deliver presentations at a barcamp event). The schedule was from 9-5 on both days, until we ran out of time, content, or presenters.
The book that we decided to go through was the Programming Microsoft LINQ book published by APress. We were lucky enough to get the books for free, courtesy of Microsoft. The book covered all different aspects of LINQ with chapters ranging from “LINQ to Objects” to “LINQ to XML” all the way to “Extending LINQ”, which discussed how to write your own LINQ provider.
One thing that made this event special was the presence of a very big name in the LINQ community, Jim Wooley (@linqkinq). He was one of the authors of the book entitled LINQ in Action and came all the way from Atlanta despite the fact we were going through a different book. Based on his wealth of experience with LINQ he was able to take the presentations and discussions to the next level. He was able to point out nuances that someone relatively new to LINQ would not have considered. It takes a true sense of selflessness to take so much time out of one’s schedule for the sole purpose of sharing knowledge.
What really made this event stick out in my mind was the sense of community that it brought with it. Some people were meeting for the first time, while others were gaining a better understanding of the acquaintances that they otherwise only see at the monthly meetings. While the topic of the event was LINQ, I think the best takeaway of an event like this is how it cultivates the local community.
Perhaps my favorite part of the event was watching a few bootcampers discussing expression trees in between sessions on Sunday. One of the campers was sharing her understanding of expression trees with a few others that did not quite have a firm grasp on it. This resulted in a light bulb moment for a few of those involved in the conversation, which is always such an exciting moment. The fact that it took place during an impromptu discussion on the whiteboard in between presentations made it extra special… very cool stuff.
In closing, this event was a great example of what the Birmingham Software Developers Association is all about. While they have monthly meetings to discuss the latest and greatest technologies and practices, the true value lies in how it grows the local tech community. It brings people together based simply on their passion for developing software. It is for this reason that I consider the LINQ Bootcamp, as well as the Birmingham Software Developers Association, a wonderful success.
Drew Crawford is a software engineer at Jack Henry and Associates. His personal blog can be found at atcrawford.com and you can stalk him on twitter by following @atcrawford.
The Birmingham Software Developers Association (BSDA) meets the second Thursday of every month at New Horizons in Birmingham, AL. The meeting times are from 6:30-8:00 and topics tend to gravitate towards Microsoft technologies. That said, there have been presentations covering general software development practices, and I’m sure other technologies could be discussed as long as there is a demand for it.
I’m glad I was able to attend and help shed lite on some of the more nuanced areas of LINQ. Regardless fo the book selected, there are many areas that you will only discover once you start working with LINQ.
Due to a noobs I am always exploring on the net regarding this kind of details .Thank you:P