[TriZPUG] Triangle Python User Group

[Chris Calloway]

On 3/23/2012 2:13 AM, Kurt Grandis wrote:
> Chris reminded us last night that we're coming up on our ten year
> anniversary.

I've been looking for a way to commemorate our tenth anniversary, which 
occurs in October this year. And this re-identification seems like the 
perfect way to do that, especially if it means more do-ers doing things 
in the do-acracy (HACK! NIGHT! PLEASE!). Ten years on, we're still as 
relevant as ever and still growing.

I promised to post some things. And the first one of these things fits 
really nicely into this sudden energy thing. It's a talk from CUSEC 2012 
by Bret Victor, the guy who invented the iPad interface, the Alesis 
Micron, and a bunch of other stuff I bet most of you have used and 
thought were really really well done. It's a talk somewhat about 
immediate feedback, which our host Mark Corzine was touching upon at the 
after-meeting last night. And it's also a talk about having guiding 
principles and knowing what your motivations are:

http://flowingdata.com/2012/02/20/live-coding-and-inventing-on-principle/

I don't agree one hundred percent with everything is he says (the guy 
has way too madd skillz to be slagging on skillz). And I'm not much for 
navel-gazing meta-hacking. But it is an amazing talk I think all 
TriZPUGers should see, if only for the super cool programming apps in 
it. It's good to know one's motivations. So that you can evaluate your 
guiding principles. To see if they are really going to get you what you 
want.

Also, for Joseph (and Jim, too!), this is d3.js:

http://mbostock.github.com/d3/

And this is the crazy d3 designer app inspired by Bret's talk:

http://gabrielflor.it/water

Finally, as long as we are doing some user group self-reflection, here 
are two relevant PyCon 2012 videos:

http://pyvideo.org/video/691/1-psf-sprints-supporting-the-community-one-spr

http://pyvideo.org/video/719/diversity-in-practice-how-the-boston-python-user

I don't subscribe to every idea within those videos. But I think they 
are food for thought. About our principles and motivations. Stir the pot 
every once in awhile.

-- 
Sincerely,

Chris Calloway http://nccoos.org/Members/cbc
office: 3313 Venable Hall   phone: (919) 599-3530
mail: Campus Box #3300, UNC-CH, Chapel Hill, NC 27599