web directions
web directions
Melbourne, May 1 & 2 2014
Featuring the world's leading experts in web and mobile development, JavaScript, HTML5, advanced CSS, Nodejs and more, it's the funnest way to help you and your team stay on top of the web development game.
Web Directions Code is a two day, single track conference on May 1 and 2. We mix more traditional, long–form presentations with short, sharp, highly focussed ones to create a unique blend of inspiration and education. The conference runs from 9am to 5.30pm, with parties afterwards, on both days
There's also an optional, all day, hands-on workshop on developing smarter, faster "offline first" web sites and apps with John Allsopp on April 30th, 9am - 5pm.
Raquel Vélez
I know, math is scary. Most of us didn't pay as much attention to it back in school as we should have. But here you are, at one of the best conferences in the world, hoping you'll learn something that will help you step up your web dev game.
I present you with: Math.
Yes, math. Math, like programming, requires some context and a lot of practice. But once you master the basics, well then, the world is your oyster!
We're going to talk about matrices. And then we're going to talk about how to use them to do something awesome on the web. And THEN we're going to make them do something even more awesome in the physical world.
Don't blame me if there are robots; blame the demo gods if they do something crazy.
Raquel Vélez is a Senior Software Developer at npm, Inc. in Oakland, CA. She has previously worked at institutions such as Caltech, NASA JPL, the MIT Lincoln Laboratory, and various universities in Europe. In her off time, you can find her baking, teaching NodeBots not to fall off of tables, and speaking. Also, hanging out with her hilarious husband and two cats dressed in dog suits.
Treat yourself to pear and blueberry tea cake, mini danish pastries and chocolate and raspberry brownies. You deserve it!
Ryan Seddon
For years Web developers have hacked up their own controls, using divs and classes and CSS. The results have often been amazing, but the costs have been high. Often poor code quality, a tendency for every developer to roll their own controls.
But there's a light on the horizon, Web components. This inter-related, but also independently useful set of technologies, like HTML templates and the Shadow DOM enable Web application authors to, in the words the specification, "define widgets with a level of visual richness and interactivity not possible with CSS alone, and ease of composition and reuse not possible with script libraries today."
In this session, Ryan Seddon gets you up to speed with components, and how you can start using them today.
Ryan Seddon is a Senior Software Engineer at Zendesk. Hailing from Melbourne Australia, he has an unnatural obsession with JavaScript and the many places it runs. In his spare time he’s either playing basketball, writing for his blog thecssninja.com or committing code to github.
Fiona Chan
CSS is at times something of the red headed step-shild of Web technologies, seen as fine for adding a bit of style to Web sites, but not "real programming". Well think again. Beneath its stylish surface beats a powerhours of sophistication, Selectors, which you can use not only with CSS, but to manipulate the DOM as well using querySelector.
In this session, CSS wunderkind Fiona Chan takes us into the little explored world of sophisticated CSS selectors. Your development will never be the same again.
Fiona is a fun size front-end developer who is passionate about web standards and making the web an accessible place for all. Her love for CSS and the web community has led her to co-found SydCSS and being one of the organisers for CSSConf Australia. Previously she's worked at Stubbornella, Bigcommerce, Fairfax Media and a few other digital agencies.
Ben Schwarz
A head first dive into the past, present and future of all things variable in CSS. Theres waaay more going on than you might first think — Maybe you didn't know that you can access your variables by JavaScript? Or perhaps you'd just like to know WHY the variables spec ended up where it did? These questions will be answered in this 15 minute power session.
Ben Schwarz is an independent web dude from Melbourne. He's an invited expert to the W3C CSS working group, 1/5 of CSSConf, a percentage of JSConf (We all know how good JavaScript is at numbers), a bower team member and a swag of other stupid projects.
Rob Manson
For a long time Augmented Reality has been imprisoned in the land of the Native Application. But now Web Standards, Browsers, Devices and javascript libraries have matured enough to set AR free, making it possible to create AR that runs using "nothing but a Web Browser". In fact it's not only "possible", it's downright easy and loads of fun too! I'll show you how today, you can easily add AR as an alternative interaction model to any web application you are building and how this will totally change the way you and your users will see and use the web over the next few years.
Rob Manson is CEO and co-founder of buildAR.com, the world's leading Augmented Reality Content Management System. Rob is the Chair of the W3C Augmented Web CG and an Invited Expert with the ISO, W3C and the Khronos Group. He is an active evangelist within the global AR and standards communities and he is regularly invited to speak on the topics of the Augmented Web, Augmented Reality, WebRTC and multi-device platforms. Rob's latest book "Getting started with WebRTC" is now a 5 star hit on Amazon.
Head to the buffet for Indian vegetable curry with chick peas, potato and cauliflower, along with butter chicken and basmati rice; marinated and slow cooked pork sliders; roasted pumpkin, rocket, beetroot and goat's curd salad; cauliflower salad with peas and turmeric dressing; assorted lavoche wraps and finger sandwiches and then finishing with a selection of fresh seasonal fruits and Australian and European cheeses.
Barbara Bermes
A publisher's take on controlling 3rd party scripts
It's almost impossible to find a website anymore that doesn't utilize any kind of embedded widgets such as ads, social plugins or analytics: All of these add-ons are considered 3rd party scripts and promise to increase and benefit publisher's revenue. Publishers don't have much control over the provider's code and inevitable just have to trust their integrity, content security policy, code quality and performance.
Imagine a high-traffic website hosting a Twitter widget: Are publishers aware that a sudden Twitter server outage could potentially bring down their site if the widget is not properly included?
The performance and availability of 3rd party scripts don't have to become a worry for publishers. Barbara's talk will not only outline best practices, tools and tricks on how to sandbox 3rd party scripts but also help the audience understand bottlenecks, determine potential risks, and elaborate on how to measure their performance.
Barbara has been captivated by the web since the millennium and has always been passionate about its capabilities. After working for web agencies in Germany and Canada, and most recently working as a Senior Architect and Performance Advocate for Canada’s national public radio and television broadcaster (CBC), she joined OANDA as the Product Manager for their Developer Program and API. Barbara is an international speaker and organizer of the Toronto Web Performance Meetup Group.
Jared Wyles
Developers have a bunch of well established “axioms" of readable code. Yet, how much time have you wasted arguing about whitespace or semicolons, which some may say is a personal choice? Is readability even the right thing to strive for? I think it’s time we had a chat about some of these “established” axioms of readability.
As a senior computer scientist at Adobe, Jared is putting his money where his mouth is in order to improve the web. Previously, he’s worked with Atlassian, Bigcommerce, and the usual digital agencies.
Andrew Fisher
The Device API is what enables web browsers to appear more "native", giving the browser access to new hardware components that are being created primarily in phones and tablets but on some desktops too. Motion and Orientation are well known features of the API, however there are a plethora of others to play with too. Let's take a tour through the jungle that is the Device API spec and go looking for some new, interesting features of the API. We'll focus on the ones that will be landing in mainstream browsers soon and that you can play with now in order to explore new interaction methods.
Andrew Fisher plays at the intersection of the web, mobile tech, ubicomp and data.He does some real work too and has been involved with organisations globally since the dawn of the web creating digital solutions for brands including Nintendo, peoplesound, Sony, Cotton On, the Melbourne Cup and Optus. Andrew is the CTO for JBA, a data agency in Melbourne, Australia.
Give yourself an afternoon pickup with mini fruit tartlets, orange and poppy seed slice and european style cookies
Allen Wirfs-Brock
ECMAScript 6: A Better JavaScript for the Ambient Web Era
We've entered the Ambient Computing Era and JavaScript is its dominant programing language, But a new computing era needs a new and better JavaScript. It's called ECMAScript 6 and it's about to become the new JavaScript standard. Why do we need it? Why did it take so long? What's in it? When can you use it? Answers will be given.
Allen Wirfs-Brock is a Mozilla Research Fellow and the technical editor of ECMA-262, the international standard that defines the JavaScript programming language. He is an expert in dynamic, object-oriented programming languages and their implementation but is also an entrepreneur who founded two successful companies. When he's not working on the evolution of JavaScript, he is thinking and writing about the technical and societal implications of the rapidly emerging Ambient Computing Era.
Dmitry Baranovskiy
The animated Web has come a long way since JavaScript based animations just a few years ago. Increasingly, developers are taking advantage of CSS transforms, transitions, and animation to bring their interfaces to life. But these sophisticated visualizations and experiences users expect at times need more than JavaScript and this is where SVG comes in.
In this session Dmitry Baranovskiy shows us how to resurrect our content using Scalable Vector Graphics.
Dmitry started his journey back in 2000 as a back-end developer, then a designer and has now finally settled and accepted his fate as a front-end develoepr. Despite his deep knowledge of CSS and HTML, he mainly specializes in JavaScript and is well known as the creator of Raphaël, Snap.SVG as well as other JavaScript libraries. These days he is a Senior Computer Scientist with Adobe.
After we wrap up on Thursday evening, pop round the corner for a drink and a chance to share some of your thoughts on what you’ve seen today with other conference attendees, and speakers. Why not round up a group and head out to dinner after?
Alex Feyerke
Offline First: faster, more robust and more fun (web) apps
Just assume for a minute that the technical side of building offline-capable (web) apps was really simple. Because it's getting easier every day, and it's obviously desirable: having a robust, reliable app instead of one that turns into a wonky disappointment when it's disconnected for a moment. But what does building apps offline first mean in terms of interfaces and experiences, in terms of your application's structure? What new things can you do? What problems can you solve? What problems does it cause? Is it too much trouble, or is it the future? A talk about patterns for offline UX, persistent local data, confident wording, pre-empting user needs, conflict resolution and ordering things in lists.
Alex works as a freelance frontend developer and consultant in Berlin and is one of the founding members of Hoodie. He also helps organise Berlin's frontend usergroup & frontend meetup berlin">up.front.
Treat yourself to pear and blueberry tea cake, mini danish pastries and chocolate and raspberry brownies. You deserve it!
Rod Vagg
Embrace the asynchronous
Embrace the asynchronous: for most of its history, programming has been primarily concerned with serial flows of execution. Only since the ascent of the web have millions of programmers been exposed to, and embraced, event-driven, asynchronous programming.
Programming for the web is reactionary. We respond to events from the user, the network and the browser itself. We're regularly receiving new new asynchronous APIs in our browsers, like Geolocation and IndexedDB.
Node.js takes asynchronous programming to a new level and has tracked the rise of new approaches to managing complex program flows. Callbacks, event emitters and streams form the basis of the Node.js tool-set. JavaScript control-flow libraries are a dime a dozen. More recently we've seen wide adoption of Promises and we are now on the verge of new language primitives in JavaScript itself: generators.
Join Rod Vagg for a deep-dive into event-driven programming with JavaScript and learn to embrace the asynchronous.
Rod Vagg describes himself as a recovering Java programmer with a passion for JavaScript. Rod has been building software for the web for nearly 15 years and is excited about the modularity and productivity afforded by Node.js for constructing complex and performant web applications.
Ben Birch
When all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail
JavaScript has come a long way with just two tools: the Object and the Array. This talk introduces some of the new native data structures that are available in modern javascript, with unique and powerful capabilities that allow you to write fast, elegant and expressive code.
Ben is a Tech Lead and Beer Baron at Aconex. He’s spent the first 10 years writing JavaScript frameworks, and is now trying to undo all the damage he's done. By day he builds enterprise apps and by night contributes to several open source projects and playing with whatever the hot-new-thing is. You can sometimes spot Ben up the back at @melbjs, pouring the beers.
Mark Dalgleish
The 'this' keyword is one of the most perplexing aspects of JavaScript, but understanding function context needn’t be so intimidating. In this session we’ll examine how ‘this’ works, how to control it, and how to harness its surprising flexibility. Finally, we’ll discuss how we can move beyond ’this’, looking at the ways in which we can write powerful code without it.
Mark Dalgleish is a senior UI developer at SEEK and the lead organiser of MelbJS. He’s obsessed with everything web and loves using JavaScript, CSS and HTML to create rich experiences that resonate with end users. In his spare time, he loves experimenting with the latest web technologies, sharing projects online and helping others learn progressive web development techniques.
Damon Oehlman
Tim Berners-Lee originally proposed HyperText as a way "to link and access information of various kinds as a web of nodes in which the user can browse at will". When we look at the web today, it is very easy to see that it has become so much more but also exactly that. As we strive to do more with this "web of nodes" there are certain developmental patterns that allow us to rewire the web to create sophisticated applications that can still be easy to understand. Streams are one of these development patterns and this talk will walk through how you can use streams both for your benefit and for the benefit of your fellow developers.
Damon Oehlman is an experienced web and mobile applications developer. He has worked with small and large companies to develop software solutions for desktop, web and most recently mobile devices. Damon currently works on WebRTC at NICTA, as well as numerous of his own open source projects.
Head to the buffet for Indian vegetable curry with chick peas, potato and cauliflower, along with butter chicken and basmati rice; marinated and slow cooked pork sliders; roasted pumpkin, rocket, beetroot and goat's curd salad; cauliflower salad with peas and turmeric dressing; assorted lavoche wraps and finger sandwiches and then finishing with a selection of fresh seasonal fruits and Australian and European cheeses.
Paul Theriault
This presentation reviews the most common client-side security issues and how to avoid them. Taking lessons learned from building a web-based OS and app ecosystem, we'll look at the underlying causes of front-end security issues. We'll examine strengths and weakness of common application frameworks and introduce tools and techniques for detecting, correcting and avoiding security issues in the first place.
Paul Theriault is the security lead for Mozilla's Firefox OS project - a project developing a mobile operating system based on web technologies. He has an extensive background in web security with experience ranging from application security testing and code review through to risk assessment and security management.
Mark Nottingham
What's happening in TLS (transport layer security)?
Web browser security nerds have been really busy lately, with a lot of proposals, extensions and experiments to TLS (a.k.a. SSL) happening. Find out what's happening, why, and what might make your browser safer in 2014 and beyond.
Mark Nottingham has helped develop Web technologies like Atom and HTTP for more than ten years. He is Chair of the IETF HTTPbis Working Group, an effort to first clean up HTTP/1.1 and then develop HTTP/2.0 and currently works for Akamai, the world’s first, largest and best public Content Delivery Network.
Alex Mackey
There are an annoying amount of things that can go wrong when making a call using the XMLHttpRequest object (that thing that makes Ajax possible) and to make matters worse many of these are outside of your control. Let's look at solutions for dealing with common ajax related issues such as timeouts & loss of connectivity to ensure our users can always buy those fancy silver cat widgets your boss is so eager to sell online.
Alex works as a Software Development Lead for Kiandra IT. He runs the non-profit conference DDDMelbourne.com & wrote the books Introducing .NET 4.0 & Introducing .NET 4.5 for Apress. When he’s not in front of a computer he enjoys cross fit, cat videos & kicking people at Taekwondo.
Give yourself an afternoon pickup with mini fruit tartlets, orange and poppy seed slice and european style cookies
Tantek Çelik
The once and future IndieWeb
In the beginning, the Web was a simple thing. A bit of HTML, running on a server you probably had root access to, and maybe even had running under your desk. Fast forward 20 years, and most of the Web's content resides in silos, like Twitter and Facebook and Instagram. Our Web sites have become Tumblrs, or blogs hosted at Wordpress.org.
But this poses huge challenges for the longevity, integrity, and ultimately ownership of the content we create.
In this presentation, Tantek Çelik, one of the great contributors to the open Web challenges us to re-imagine the "IndieWeb" from long ago.
Tantek Çelik currently works on Open Web Standards at Mozilla. His extensive history on the Web inludes authoring several key W3C specifications, leading the development efforts on Internet Explorer 5 for the Macintosh, co-founding the Microformats movement, and inventing the now infamous, though vital CSS box model hack. He continues to advocate for, and work tirelesssly to develop standards and technologies for an open Web.
hand picked speaker selection
Question Time
We'll close two intense days with a panel discussion featuring several of our speakers as we pick apart the big issues that have emerged during Code. There'll be a chance to help shape the agenda, and ask questions as well.
Before you jump on your plane, or head back home, it's Friday night, so why not stay for a drink with fellow conference goers and speakers?
John Allsopp
Offline First: smarter, faster, better web sites and apps
HTML5 and related W3C developments over the last few years have introduced numerous valuable features for more application like development. One area where the Web has made significant improvements in recent years is in the ability to work offline, and rely less and less on being always connected to a server side.
In this all day, hands-on workshop, John Allsopp will cover the technologies now available to help your sites and applications work while a user isn't connected to the Web, and better even when they are, including
Front End developers, with at least some exposure to JavaScript (but there's no need to be an expert to take advantage of almost all these features)
For nearly 20 years John has developed software (such as Style Master CSS editor) and written books (including Developing with Web Standards), courses, tutorials, and articles for web designers and developers, and he's one of the founders of the Web Directions Conferences.
In 2000, he wrote A dao of web design for A List Apart. Described as "A manifesto for anyone working on the web" by Jeremy Keith, and cited as a key inspiration for Responsive Web Design by Ethan Marcotte. It outlined the idea that the Web is its own medium, and we must embrace its characteristics, not decry them as bugs.
John is still as excited about the Web and all things computing as he was when he got his first computer, the venerable TRS-80, a lifetime ago.
Conference and Workshop are fully catered, and conference also includes an opening night reception, and closing night party.
Need to convince the boss or HR you have to get to Code? Download and print out (or forward to them) our "Why Web Directions Code"
If you've never been to a Web Directions event before, you might be concerned that while we talk a good game, it's a big risk of your time and money. So, here's our guarantee. If by lunch on the first day we aren't delivering the experience you expected, come tell us, and we'll give you your money back.
We promise. See terms of conditions for more.
Melbourne Town Hall,
90/120 Swanston Street,
Melbourne
Karstens,
123 Queen Street Melbourne
Melbourne
Traveling from out of town on a budget? We’ve pulled together a bunch of cheap and cheerful (as well as slightly more extravagant) options for accommodation and put them on a map for you. Check out Wotif and Airbnb as well. You can almost always find something affordable only a short walk from the venues. But hey, if you or you boss are happy to stump up for the Hilton, don’t let us stop you!
Attending a conference like Web Directions Code is a whole lot more than what happens from 9 to 5, and Melbourne has countless great places to grab a drink or a meal at any hour of the night or day. Impress your new friends by taking them to one of the awesome places on our map. And Melbournites, don’t hold back with sharing any awesome hidden gems we don’t know about!
Web Directions Code will be even more awesome thanks to the support of our sponsors. If you're keen to engage an audience of leading mobile and Web designers and developers, drop us a line.
