Rails Underground

Vladimir Tarasov

Vlad Tarasov has today had some serious health issues, and, of course, can no longer attend. We send him and his family our best wishes, and hope for a speedy recovery.

Change in line-up

I got an e-mail last night suggesting that Jason Hoffman won't be able to attend the conference. It seems that this is indeed the case. These things happen, I suppose!
However, as a motivational speaker might tell you, these sort of things are not problems, but opportunities, and in fact, its all turning out rather well!

Instead ofJason, we can now hear from Fred George - a former ThoughtWorks Vice President, Agile Guru and someone with 40 years experience in IT - who has written code not just in Ruby, but 60 other languages!

"Fred George is a consultant with over 40 years experience in the industry including over twenty years doing object programming and a decade doing Agile/XP. He counts at least 60 languages with which he has written code. A veteran of the IBM-Microsoft wars, Fred did early work in computer networking, LAN's, GUI's and objects for IBM. He gave the first Agile/XP experience report at OOPSLA about an embedded system done in Java, and has mentored many clients in use of objects in Java under an XP process. He has shared the stage at JavaOne with Martin Fowler, acting as his foil, and assisted in XP Immersion sessions with Kent Beck, Ron Jeffries, and Robert Martin. IN 2007, he joined an Internet advertising firm, TrafficBroker. He believes in objects, lean processes, fun in programming, and the client's successes. He holds a bachelors degree from N. C. State University in Computer Science, and a masters degree from MIT in the Management of Technology. Oh, and he still writes code!"

More on Fred, by Jay Fields: http://java.dzone.com/news/lean-software-development

Sponsor News, book discounts

Manning, publisher of books such as The Well Grounded Rubyist and Ruby in Practice (and many others) are offering a 35% discount to everyone attending the conference. You could even pre-order Rails 3 in Action (due in February 2010, but available via early access)

You can also browse the O'Reilly book catalogue - Josette from O'Reilly will be at the conference, selling a host of books at special rates!

I'm very happy that rails hosting providers, Brightbox are supporting us too! Brightbox provide UK hosting services tailored specifically for Rails. Visit their web site for more details.

Free BDD Workshop, 23rd July

Chris Parsons from Eden Development is putting together a half-day workshop on Cucumber & BDD techniques for the day before the conference. These topics have been very popular on the forums and in the feedback I've received, so I hope you will find the workshop useful!

If you have any ideas or suggestions, or want to chat about the workshop, let us know on the mailing list.
We still have the opportunity for another half-day's worth of stuff - possibly a basic course in rails for beginners - what do you think? Let us know if you are interested, or have other suggestions!

It's going to cost a bit for the room and equipment, but we're going to make it free - but if you would like to come, perhaps you'd like to make a voluntary donation to the Red Cross? Our donation page is here.

More details to come, but the number of spaces is going to start off small, and we'll see now it goes... So, please register your interest by reserving a space here. If spaces run out, we will look into getting a larger room. In the mean time, you can use the same link to put your name down on the waiting list.

Last day for Early Bird tickets!

There is just three weeks to go before the conference, and things are geting even more hectic around here.. Today is the last day to get your early bird discount tickets, so get them quick!

List of speakers

The full list of speakers for Rails Underground is now available, and its fantastic!
It's very exciting to have such an excellent line-up of awesome talks! The full details on each talk and the schedule will be coming out over the next 2 or 3 days, as soon as I can type them up, but I couldn't wait any longer to get the line-up out there...

It has taken quite a while to get everything sorted out - we needed to sort out some extra time at the venue and jiggle things around a bit in order to fit in as many of the brilliant talk submissions as possible. Thank you to all the people who made the job so much harder by submitting far too many great talks to fit them all in! Also, the masses of people on the forum who provided ideas and suggestions and gave feedback on the talks they would most like to see. Many thanks!

As well as the scheduled talks, we're planning a session of lightning talks in the evening, where anyone can put their name down to give an impromptu, short (say, 10 minute) talk on any subject they like... We'll also have an 'open mic' at lunch times for people to make short announcements or introductions. For example, job opportunities, a quick introduction for a company or new product, or just to say 'Hi' and show your face.

We also have a slot available for a workshop for the day before the conference, details are TBC, so if you have any ideas, shout out!

Our New Silver Sponsor: New Relic

I'm very pleased that New Relic have been kind enough to sponsor our conference! New Relic have been busy doing some great things recently: RailsLab, an educational resource focused on Rails performance and scaling has recently produced an excellent series of screencasts by Gregg Pollack, and they also recently launched a new version of their RPM product.
New Relic is the leading provider of Rails application performance solutions. New Relic's RPM is used by more than 1500 Rails organizations to monitor, tune and troubleshoot their applications. Try RPM Lite for free at http://www.newrelic.com/RPMlite.html

Our Gold Sponsors: Engine Yard

Our latest sponsor is Engine Yard, we are delighted to have their support. Our sponsors have already been fantastically supportive, andwe really appreciate their involvement.

Engine Yard provides expert Ruby and Rails application deployment for businesses of all sizes. Through its managed service and cluster computing platform, the company takes the pain out of deploying and maintaining Ruby and Rails applications. Without the need to shoulder the pitfalls of deploying and managing Ruby and Rails applications on their own, businesses can now take advantage of Rails' superior agility and ease of development to build robust, Ruby applications.

Engine Yard's deep roots in the Ruby and Rails community and its commitment to driving the next generation of Ruby technologies—as evidenced by its leadership in the Rails, Merb and Rubinius projects—give customers the added peace of mind that their applications are managed by a team of true technical experts.

To learn more, visit engineyard.com.

Our First Sponsor: ELC Technologies

We're very pleased to be supported by ELC Technologies. Here is a little bit of information about them:

Founded in 1991, ELC Technologies is powering the hottest Ruby on Rails web applications. From Cisco to ESPN to Live Nation, ELC Technologies is bringing Ruby on Rails to business-critical applications. Our work and speed of implementation has received praise from the Rails core team.

To learn more, visit elctech.com.

Registration is Open!

We will be providing more details for speakers, session and other events as they become available, but yes, you can already register!

As an extra special offer, we have a Very Early Bird Registration option available for this two-day event, for just £160. There are just 30 of these tickets available, and this is for a limited time only!

• Very Early Bird Tickets: £160 - strictly first come, first served, and for a limited time only!
• Early Bird Tickets: £180 - book before 25th June. 140 tickets will be made avaiable.
• Standard Tickets: £240.

All delegates will receive a conference pack, t-shirt, plus snacks and lunch will be provided during the conference sessions. We will also be negotiating discounts with local hotels.   

Thanks!

Announcing Rails Underground '09

Rails Underground '09 takes place 24-25th July in London at the Royal National Hotel.

We'll be talking about cutting-edge subjects, the latest developments and the considerable benefits of the Rails platform

The full list of speakers is now available, and has so many great names, there are too many to mention here! Check it out! David Heinemeier Hansson, creator of Ruby on Rails, will also be available for a videoconference Q&A session!

New to Rails?

Ruby and Rails are both fantastic tools for producing better quality code: faster, cheaper, more readable and more maintainable. The community is growing and new technologies (like Maglev, IronRuby & JRuby and the upcoming features in Rails 3) are enriching the Ruby world every day. If you don't know about Ruby and Rails yet, now is the time to find out more.

A Rails Pro?

I'm sure you agree that 2009 has already been a great year for Rails. There have been lots of exciting news and developments in the last few weeks, the community is vibrant and enthusiastic and, with more eagerly anticipated updates on the way, there's never been a better time to get more involved or hone your techniques. Come along and find out more; or come along and tell us what you know.

Get Involved

We hope this will be also be a great opportunity to meet other Rails developers, IT professionals and enthusiasts, do a bit of networking, pitch your ideas and meet more members of the community. We are also looking for sponsors: see the links at the side for more information.

If you have any suggestions, or ideas for talks, please contact us or leave a comment or join the google group. Otherwise, please subscribe to our news feed, and keep in touch!

Tickets would cost £240, but early bird tickets are £180 until 25th June. We may well sell out before then, and no-one will need to pay the full price! There were some very early bird tickets, but they've all sold out now!