DemonWare have been using and abusing the excellent Python programming language since 2004, and it’s also been responsible for the server-side code of our lobby services (i.e. matchmaking etc.) since 2005. We’ve seen the language grow and mature and gain more widespread acceptance as industry heavyweights such as Google get behind it. We felt it was high time to give something back to the language that had saved our bacon (The server logic was originally written in C++).
Last year we were a
PyCon Ireland sponsor (we’re
sponsoring 2011), and this year we were also a sponsor of
EuroPython 2011 which was hosted in the city of Florence. So, when presented with the opportunity to talk tech with some of the active developers of the language and connect with the Python eco-system in a Unesco World Heritage city with more history per square meter than well, anywhere, we could hardly refuse.
The conference is held over a week – with talks scheduled in five concurrent tracks running Monday to Friday. There’s so much choice, that a lot of time is spent agonizing over whether to attend a talk on
enhanced generators or a talk on Google App Engine. Each evening there are hosted events – such as the Google Code Jam (3 hour programming challenge) to the Python Challenge (a series of excellent puzzles) to the more social PyFiorentina (a total steak-fest – 200+ Python users chomping down on steak at a packed Italian restaurant).
Highlights included Mark Ramm’s entertaining and informative
“Relate or !Relate” discussion of the the NoSQL/alternate persistent storage options, including lessons learned using mongoDB at sourceforge. An introduction to the use of
OpenStreetMap data was another well received talk. Raymond Hettinger gave a series of packed talks and tutorials on getting the most out of Python by using the right tools for the job – see the
tips and tricks video. There were a large number of talks on the Django framework, and the various NoSQL offerings were namedropped in quite a few talks. It was interesting to see others’ interpretations of the non-relational storage systems, and hear real war-stories from those that have used them.
For a break from the purely technology-focussed talks, Google’s talk
“The Myth of the Genius Programmer” attempted to address the tendency of some programmers to want to cover up their mistakes and false starts and present their code as a fait accompli. The speaker argued that when open-sourcing your project, timing is critical. Too early and you will lose the singular vision required to set a definite direction, and open sourcing too late will not attract any programmers to the project.
For a full list of all the talks you can browse
the schedule and download the videos via bittorrent from the individual talk pages.
DemonWare also had a slot during the hiring session. But you already knew that
we’re hiring right ?
Posted by Morgan Brickley
