Meetup on Google TV in Google Campus.

Agenda. Photo by Paul Masquelier.

This meetup on December 1 was with an agenda shown in the picture to the left. Unfortunately, as happens to the best of us, it was not possible to set up the demo in time, and this paved the way for a substantially longer, and livelier, Q & A session after the presentation.

Before the main presentation, there were several announcements:

1. A Winter 2011 course at Foothill College on Application Software Development with AJAX by Elaine Haight
2. A Winter 2011 course at Foothill College on Using Cascading Style Sheets for Design by Newton Chan
3. Job openings at Logitech by Pat Ransil
4. Job openings at Appirio by Iein Valdez

Andres Ferrate and Daniels Lee, Developer Advocates in Google, discussed salient features of Google TV by showing several Google TV applications, built using the Android SDK, scheduled to be released in 1Q 2011:

Andres Ferrate. Photo by Paul Masquelier.

Daniels Lee. Photo by Paul Masquelier.

1. YouTube
2. Chrome
3. Flixster
4. Chow
5. Cartoon Network
6. MeeGenius
7. Net-a-porter
8. Vimeo

In these days, where several HTML5 enthusiasts advocate the use of HTML5, CSS3, JavaScript combination for creating rich Internet applications, why Android SDK for Google TV applications? It must be that the HTML5-CSS3-JavaScript combination comes up short somehow - ? - in creating Google TV applications.

Several interesting aspects of man-machine interface design were also mentioned:

1. Leanback experience, where the TV viewer would have no reason to lean forward, and can operate the contents on the TV screen by leaning back on a couch.
2. 10% minimum padding is recommended in the use of the TV screen real estate
3. An aspect ratio of 16:9 is recommended for effective viewing.

A final interesting part of the evening was the use of software called JUG Spinner Wheel to select winners of raffle of 4 Logitech Revue devices from among the attendees of the meetup. After all, what is a technology meetup if technology is not made use of to the hilt? The attendees' list must have been automatically captured by the JUG Spinner Wheel!

Overall, a very satisfactory introduction to Google TV and its applications.

GTUG Meetup on Google Apps Script: A Review.

Cross-posted from The Browser Platform, Clouds & Computing


This meeting on 6 October 2010 was primarily about Google Apps Script by Martin Omander, Developer Advocate at Google.

After a greeting by Van Riper, lead organizer of the Silicon Valley GTUG Meetup Group, the following initial announcements were made.

1. Bess Ho gave out the discount code for Paypal X Innovate conference; also mentioned games design, Oct 12.
2. Kevin Nilson talked about the upcoming Silicon Valley Code Camp, October 9-10. 
3. Wesley Chun, the chief organizer of the Google tracks in the camp, briefed the audience on what is to come in those tracks.

The main talk began by showing the home page of Google Apps Script:
Subsequently, Martin went through examples of different functions created by Google and others in the Script Gallery, e.g., =weather(), =getTweets(). He also went through a simple mail merge example.

The message was that, basically, if you were familiar with JavaScript and related concepts of HTML, CSS, etc., you could create an application that made use of information from across several Google products such as Calendar, Doc List, etc. and 3rd party services. You could create scripts that made use of SOAP and REST services within the script.

He mentioned that Motorola has created IT portfolio tracking system in Google Apps Script. 

When asked what kinds of debugging facilities existed, he showed the debug icon in the script editor window, but it wouldn't work for some reason.

If you submitted your own application or scripts to the gallery, then others could make use of your submitted functionality through an URL.

Fusion table support is not yet available.

Is there a published roadmap? No. Martin hoped they will get to it some day.

Can you access spreadsheet visualization application? Martin didn't know.

Google Apps Script T-shirt were given away to those that had done subatantial Google Apps Script implementations. Recipients:

1. ourprojectteam.com, creating a project management application
2. Karl Pohl, an independent software engineer, who has created stock portfolio analysis application using Google Apps Script. At the moment, he wants to keep the application for himself, thank you very much, as he has been able to extract 'good' money from the stock market using his Google Apps Script implementation.

Paul Masquelier has uploaded the photographs that were taken at the event. 

Overall, a very good introduction to the subject matter of Google Apps Script.

GTUG Campout and Beyond

Kevin Nilson submitted this excellent guest post about GTUG Campout to the Google Code Blog. I won't repeat everything he said again here. If you do nothing else, you should at least see the sketches, photos and video from the event and the San Jose Mercury News Article about camp. Needless to say, the event was a tremendous success and you can expect it to become an annual summer event for the Silicon Valley GTUG going forward.

Kevin and I are now feverishly working on plans for Silicon Valley Code Camp at Foothill College on October 3-4, 2009. This will be the fourth annual Code Camp. Silicon Valley GTUG is a Community Sponsor of the camp again this year. We had more than 700 developers attend last year's camp and this one is shaping up to be even bigger and better. Attendance is FREE, but, the space and the sponsorship funds do have limits. So, I recommend signing up sooner than later because registration may be capped at some point.

On the future meetings front, we have one of the main members of the Guice team, Jesse Wilson, coming to present at our September Meeting. At our November Meeting, the topic will be Google Health. We will have an overview of what Google Health is plus several related application demos including two Google Wave applications created during GTUG Campout: Chief Medical Officer and Patient Aware Wave. No specific plans for October or December yet, but, you can always contact Kevin Nilson or Van Riper to suggest a topic. Suggestions that include speaker recommendations along with speaker contact info are more likely to be realized.

That's All Folks!

GTUG Party in San Francisco on May 26th

Google and the Silicon Valley GTUG are sponsoring this party in San Francisco for Google Technology enthusiasts on the night before Google I/O officially kicks off. People arriving early for the conference and the local members of Silicon Valley GTUG are invited to this party. For those interested in presenting, the room will be setup to allow for some low key lightning talks throughout the evening.

Although this is a free event open to the public, the party space at Google's San Francisco office can hold a maximum of 200 people. Please register in advance to reserve your spot at this party. If you are interested in giving a lightning talk that night, please add yourself to the Lightning Talk List AFTER you have registered through the SV-GTUG Meetup site for the party. Thanks!

Python 3.0 & GAE/J on April 8th

Thanks again to Paul Masquelier, we have this Picasa web album to share with pictures from the April SV-GTUG meeting:



We also recorded the April meeting and it will be available soon on YouTube. When it is ready, I will update this blog post to include a link to the video. By the way, we have a dedicated Google Technology User Groups Channel on YouTube now. This is not just for the Silicon Valley GTUG, but, the videos in the channel so far are mostly from past SV-GTUG meetings.

After the demos of various OpenSocial applications to start the evening, Alex Martelli gave a fairly detailed overview of the changes in Python 3.0. I was impressed that in many cases the changes were simplifications rather than additions to the language. The better support for Unicode in Python 3.0 was enough by itself to convince me to upgrade. Alex was kind enough to share his slides in PDF format.

Jeff Scudder was up next to talk about Google App Engine. The original plan was for him to talk about the Python runtime. However, that was before the Campfire One Announcement just 24 hours earlier about the early access release of the new Java runtime for GAE. So, Jeff took advantage of the timing to spend much of his time talking about and taking questions with respect to the new Java runtime for GAE. He also discussed some of the new general features of GAE like cron job support and data import support.

If you are interested in trying the new Java runtime, you had better hurry. The early access is being capped at the first 10K developers to sign up. If you were following the SV-GTUG Twitter Feed, you would have heard about the early access program along with link to register on the night the announcement was made. This is exactly the kind of time sensitive information that will be going out first on our group twitter feed from now on.

We concluded the evening with a short talk by Dave Westwood, founder of BuddyPoke and GAE Developer. BuddyPoke is the poster child for the scalability claims of GAE. In just one year, they have had 40 million installs of their OpenSocial application for Orkut/MySpace and GAE scaled to the challenge as advertised.

Our next meeting will be covering the Android Platform on Wednesday, May 6th. Please be sure to sign up early. This could easily be another sold out event. We will also be raffling off one more Google I/O Free Pass on May 6th. Sam Gu was the lucky raffle winner for a Google I/O Free Pass at the April 8th meeting.

Our meeting timing has been excellent so far this year. Kevin Nilson and I are not Google employees. We really do not have Google insider information. It was pure dumb luck on our part to schedule a GAE meeting for the day after GAE/J was publicly launched. Similarly, we had no idea that the early release of the Android 1.5 SDK would be this month. We should have more details soon for the May 6th meeting, but, I think it is a safe bet that Dan Morrill will be devoting a fair amount of his talk in May to the new 1.5 SDK release for the Android Platform.

That's All Folks!

The Times They Are A-Changin'

Welcome to our new Blogger hosted blog. It replaces the old blog that we were hosting ourselves using JRoller. I've migrated the few posts we had made so far from the old blog to this new one. To steal a verse from an old Bob Dylan song:

Come gather 'round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
You'll be drenched to the bone.
If your time to you
Is worth savin'
Then you better start swimmin'
Or you'll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin'.

The times are a-changin' for SV-GTUG. In addition to the blog hosting change, we just migrated from our old web site to our new meetup site. We have a dedicated GTUGs YouTube Channel for hosting our event videos going forward. Plus, you can now stay connected to SV-GTUG and your fellow group members on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter. Finally, Google is showing GTUGs around the world some love primarily through the efforts of Googler Stephanie Liu. Stephanie was instrumental in getting Googler Roman Nurik to create this new GTUG Logo:

We have not been very good with respect to blogging about our past events. That is another thing that will be a-changin'. Personally, I still don't have enough time to do this blog justice. However, I am hoping we can get some help from the community with SV-GTUG members as major contributors to this group blog going forward.

Finally, I think the message of this song is so appropriate for our group. Technology keeps evolving at a faster and faster pace right before our eyes. It really does feel like it is necessary to keep swimming in the stream of new technologies or you will start sinking and get left behind. Come swim with us at future GTUG meetings because technology keeps a-changin'. =)

Using the Google Collections Library for Java

If you missed this meeting, it was recorded and it is now available on YouTube in two parts:

Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeO_J2OcHYM
Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ni_KEkHfto

Please note: The slides within the video are easier to read when you choose the high resolution video option. However, you can also download a crystal clear version of the slides in PDF format from the Google Collections Library project's downloads section.

After a nice introduction by Josh Bloch, Kevin Bourrillion dived into his talk. I won't rehash it blow by blow here, but, Kevin made two important points at the beginning that I will reiterate. First, Jared Levy and Kevin are the two primary authors of this library at Google. However, many Googlers have made contributions to the library and Josh Bloch in particular has provided them with a lot of guidance in their efforts. Second, this library is not intended as a replacement for the JDK collection classes. Rather, they complement and extend the core JDK collection classes. Kevin strongly urged anyone that was not already intimately familiar with the JDK collection classes to spend some time with them before attempting to take advantage of the additional functionality in the Google Collections Library.

Thanks to Paul Masquelier, we also have this public Picasa web album to share with pictures from the meeting.




That's All Folks!