Refresh 026 — Delivering a Responsive UI

Posted Mar 05, 2010   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

Location TBD — Thur, Mar 25, 2010, 6:30-8:00PM

As user interfaces get more complex and browsers become home to more and more application logic, front-end performance becomes a pressing concern. Add mobile to the mix, with its slow connections and brutal cache limitations, and front-end developers have a host of challenges on their hands these days. It’s no longer enough to be able to wrangle HTML and CSS into submission—front-end developers have to understand caching, cache-busting, HTTP response codes, combination and minification of files, lazy loading, and more. At this month’s meeting, we’ll talk about the know-how that today’s front-end developers need to bring to the table to develop rich, performant, scalable web experiences.

Speaker:
Rebecca Murphey is an independent front-end architecture consultant, helping companies understand, manage, and improve the client side of their applications. She is an active member of the jQuery community, a contributor to the upcoming jQuery Cookbook from O’Reilly, and a regular contributor to JSMag, the magazine for JavaScript professionals. She lives in Durham with her partner, two dogs, and two cats.

Location:
TBD

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 025 — The Luxury of Contemplation: Why we owe ourselves time to reflect on our work

Posted Feb 16, 2010   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thur, Feb 25, 2010, 6:30-8:00PM

This is not a talk about sunset meetings or debriefs. It’s a talk about spending sweet, aimless, one-on-one time with your medium. I’ll speak about why I think it’s important to reflect on your work, the tools and systems I use to facilitate “productive” contemplation, and what I’ve found to be most challenging and rewarding in my efforts.

Speaker:

Beck Tench is a simplifier, illustrator, story teller and 
technologist. Formally trained as a graphics designer at the 
University of North Carolina’s School of Journalism and Mass
 Communication, she has spent her career elbow deep in web work of all 
sorts – from the knowledge work of information architecture and design 
to the hands dirty work of writing code and testing user experiences.
 Currently, she serves as Director for Innovation and Digital
 Engagement at the Museum of Life and Science in Durham, NC where she
 studies and experiments with how visitors and staff use technology to
 plan, enhance and share their everyday lives.


Location:
Viget Labs
202 Rigsbee Avenue
Second Floor
Durham, NC 27701

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 024 — HTML 5 Now!

Posted Dec 21, 2009   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thur, Jan 28, 2010, 6:30-8:00PM

HTML 5 provides us with all sorts of new abilities as web designers. We have new tags and attributes, richer form fields, client-side storage, and more. We’ll talk about how you can start using these features today and how to use them in a cross-browser friendly manner.

Speaker:
As the development director of Viget Labs‘ Durham office, Clinton Nixon institutes Agile development methodologies to deliver RoR-based custom solutions to clients. Clinton has more than a decade of experience in the industry and is an enthusiast for test-driven development, esoteric computer languages, and kittens.

Location:
Relevance
200 North Mangum Street
Suite 204
Durham, NC 27701

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 023 — Delivering a Responsive UI

Posted Nov 05, 2009   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thur, Dec 3, 2009, 6:30-8:00PM

Update (Posted 12/1/2009):

Unfortunately, Rebecca is down for the count with back problems, so we’re going to simply meet up for drinks this month. Join us at City Beverage during the usual Refresh time slot of 6:30-8:00pm. Hope to see you there:

Thanks to iContact for the willingness to host again, and get better quick Rebecca! We’ll look forward to your presentation at a later date:

As user interfaces get more complex and browsers become home to more and more application logic, front-end performance becomes a pressing concern. Add mobile to the mix, with its slow connections and brutal cache limitations, and front-end developers have a host of challenges on their hands these days. It’s no longer enough to be able to wrangle HTML and CSS into submission—front-end developers have to understand caching, cache-busting, HTTP response codes, combination and minification of files, lazy loading, and more. At this month’s meeting, we’ll talk about the know-how that today’s front-end developers need to bring to the table to develop rich, performant, scalable web experiences.

Speaker:
Rebecca Murphey is an independent front-end architecture consultant, helping companies understand, manage, and improve the client side of their applications. She is an active member of the jQuery community, a contributor to the upcoming jQuery Cookbook from O’Reilly, and a regular contributor to JSMag, the magazine for JavaScript professionals. She lives in Durham with her partner, two dogs, and two cats.

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 022 — Designing Outside the Browser

Posted Oct 07, 2009   |   2 Comments   |   by pcrump

Raleigh, NC — Thur, Oct 22, 2009, 6:30-8:00PM

As designers, we’re constantly looking around for sources of inspiration and influence. Spending all day working on the web, it can be tempting to limit one’s gaze to other websites. While many of the challenges we face on the web are unique, in this talk, we’ll look beyond the browser window; at the techniques designers in other disciplines have used to solve their unique design problems and how we can apply those lessons to our own work on the web.

Speaker:
Richard Powell is a freelance web designer working in Chapel Hill. Working solo and as a Terralien crew member, Rich has had the opportunity to design and build sites for saddle pad vendors and underwater photographers, acupuncturists and investment firms, software consultants and massage therapists. He enjoys the challenges of finding just the right arrangement of pixels and tags to fit each client. When the glow of the LCD becomes too much, he loves taking a quick break to play “Hullaballoo” with his wife and 2 year old daughter.

Location:
Capstrat, Inc.
1201 Edwards Mill Road
First Floor
Raleigh, NC 27607

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 021 — The Future of Data

Posted Sep 09, 2009   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thur, Sep 24, 2009, 6:30-8:00PM

The future of data is more uncertain than ever – traditional, server-based relational databases are being assaulted from all sides, by document-oriented databases and other forces, and by HTML5 and client-side storage. Come and learn about these attacks on the status quo, and maybe we can all bring peace to the database landscape, together.

Speaker:
At Viget Labs, Ben builds Rails applications for Web 2.0 startups (for the past four years, exclusively in Ruby and Rails). He’s spoken at a number of conferences on Ruby, Rails, and programming in general, and is the author of Practical REST on Rails 2 Projects (from Apress).

Location:
Bronto Software, Inc.
Washington Building
324 Blackwell Street
Suite 410
Durham, NC 27701

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 020 — Profitable Design

Posted Aug 03, 2009   |   5 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thur, Aug 27, 2009, 6:30-8:00PM

Web design should be seen as one more way to make your business more profitable, or your organization more successful. Many times when a website isn’t performing, a complete redesign is proposed, but so often that is a long, expensive and ultimately, unrealistic option. The trick is to know where design changes make a big impact, and where they yield only incremental improvement. We’ll look at some concrete examples of design techniques that guide customers into profitable behavior, without sacrificing usability or aesthetics. The goal of the talk is to identify a few areas where small design changes can have big impact, and build a small tool kit of profitable design techniques.

Speaker:
Ferol Vernon is currently the director of product development at ReverbNation, a venture-backed, web start up that provides marketing and distribution services for musicians. A proud geek, Ferol has always had an unhealthy passion for all things web/tech/design.  Ferol graduated from Boston University with a degree in ancient Greek and Roman history, and received his MBA from Duke’s Fuqua School of business with a focus in technology and entrepreneurship.

Location:
The Solution Center
1101 Slater Road, Suite 200
2nd Floor, Brighton Hall
Durham, NC 27703

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 019 — Edward Tufte and Information Design Strategies for the Web

Posted Jun 26, 2009   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thur, Jul 23, 2009, 6:30-8:00PM

“Confusion and clutter are failures of design, not attributes of information. And so the point is to find design strategies that reveal detail and complexity - rather than to fault the data for an excess of complication.” --Edward Tufte.

No matter how sophisticated the technology nor pleasing the design, your Web visitors are really interested in one thing. (No, not that.) They’re after great content like your essay, your photo, your widget, your tutorial. It’s what makes the Web so great: exploring, learning, and sharing what we know. And the task of a designer - whether of user interfaces, graphics, data or type - is to present this information appropriately and elegantly; to remove obstacles to understanding, not introduce them.

In this presentation, Nathan Huening first presents an overview of the work of information design expert Edward Tufte and then discusses concrete applications and examples for applying his principles of analytical design to the Web. Selected themes include: contrast and meaning in design, avoiding “chartjunk” and “computer administrative debris”, clarity and clutter, the value of aesthetics, and simplicity vs. minimalism.

Edward Tufte is Professor Emeritus of statistics, information design, interface design and political economy at Yale University. In addition to his touring workshops, Mr Tufte has written four books on the display of information and analytical design: The Visual Display of Quantitative Information (1983), Envisioning Information (1990), Visual Explanations (1997), and Beautiful Evidence (2006).

Speaker:
Nathan Huening is a principal at Sprocket House, a creative firm based in Chapel Hill that specializes in Web and print design. When he’s not writing client copy or puzzling over UI design, he enjoys making messes in the kitchen and falling off his unicycle to the bemusement of curious onlookers.

Location:
Rigsbee Hall
208 Rigsbee Avenue
Durham, NC 27701

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 018 — Everything You’ve Been Told About Entrepreneurship is Wrong!

Posted Jun 15, 2009   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thur, June 25, 2009, 6:30-8:30PM

We’ll be joining forces with Startup Drinks and North Carolina Startup Blog this month, so you’ll hear a short bit from Marc DeWalle on those efforts. Also, be sure to follow in the Startup Drinks tradition and BYOB. Light snacks will be provided.

For the main presentation, Robbie Allen will share how his experience as an entrepreneur runs counter to much of the conventional wisdom in the startup community. He’ll talk about starting StatSheet and what it has been like to build a web startup from scratch in the Triangle.

Robbie is the sole founder and developer of the StatSheet Network, a collection of websites that do interesting things with sports stats.  He’s authored or co-authored a dozen books with O’Reilly Media on a variety of topics and has degrees from MIT in Information Technology and Engineering Management.

Location:
Viget Labs
202 Rigsbee Avenue
Second Floor
Durham, NC 27701

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 017 — The Semantic Web

Posted Apr 16, 2009   |   1 Comments   |   by pcrump

Cary, NC — Thur, May 28, 2009, 6:30-8:00PM

Phillip Rhodes is primary architect of the open-source social-networking platform OpenQabal. His previous experience includes software engineer with Lulu.com and software engineering positions with Ineo USA, Red Hat, IBM and Voice Data Solutions.

The Semantic Web is the World Wide Web Consortium‘s vision of a common framework that allows data to be shared and reused across application, enterprise, and community boundaries. It is a collaborative effort led by W3C with participation from a large number of researchers and industrial partners.  The Semantic Web is about common formats for integration and combination of data drawn from diverse sources, where the original Web mainly concentrated on the interchange of documents.

Location:
The Atrium
11000 Regency Pkwy
Cary, NC 27518

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 016 — Stand-Up Hour

Posted Mar 16, 2009   |   1 Comments   |   by pcrump

Carrboro, NC — Thur, Mar 26, 2009, 6:30-8:00PM

In true “we’re-being-hosted-by-a-comedy-theater” style, we’ll take a break from the formal presentations this month for some improv web sharing. We’ll take 45-60 minutes to geek out on some of the latest web industry news and share some personal favorites, valuable secrets, tips, tools, or whatever you feel could benefit the group.

Come ready to share anything you’d like — a headline or news item, a site, a tool, a snippet of code, a device, a book excerpt — anything large or small that you feel is current and elevates our web knowledge. And don’t think it has to be entirely unique (as in no one else knows about it already), it’ll kill the vibe. Just come with something that you know has been valuable/noteworthy to you, and don’t over-think it. It can be as quick as sharing a URL and a sentence about why we should visit the site. Or it can be as long as 5 minutes in a text editor demonstrating a few lines of code.

So stop for a few minutes before you head out and think of something to share. Do that, come relaxed, and the results will be sweet. See you there.

Location:
DSI Comedy Theater
200 N. Greensboro Street (at Carr Mill Mall)
Entrance behind Elmo’s Diner and Fleet Feet
Carrboro, NC 27510

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 015 — Ten Things Designers Do That Piss Developers Off (and Vice Versa)

Posted Feb 04, 2009   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

Cary, NC — Thurs, Feb 26, 2009, 6:30-8:00pm

This talk was originally going to be called “Effective Collaboration Between Designers & Developers,” but when they sat down to create their slides, David and Mindy realized they had deeper issues to resolve: he wanted to generate them with a custom templating engine; she wanted drop shadows and vector images of Che Guevara. Instead, they’ll battle it out at this month’s Refresh meeting and rant about all the things they just can’t stand about their web counterparts. You’ll be enlightened as to why your co-worker glares at you when you walk in the door and leave with a few good ideas on how to communicate, empathize and avoid bloodshed.

Location:
Calvert Holdings, Inc.
1225 Crescent Green, Suite 115
Cary, North Carolina 27518

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 014 — Barometer for the Web-Based: Lessons Learned, Current Pressures, & Future Forecasts

Posted Dec 30, 2008   |   1 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thurs, Jan 22, 2009, 6:30 - 8:00pm

Join us as Abe Crystal (Ruzuku), Stephen Fraser (Spoonflower), and Nicholas Napp (DisruptorMonkey) briefly share their adventures in web-based business through reflections on past experiences and outlooks for 2009. This will be a casual, conversational, panel-like group discussion, and will be an ideal opportunity to ask questions and discuss how we all might better leverage the potential of the web in 2009.

Location:
iContact
2635 Meridian Parkway
Durham, NC 27713

Filed under: Refresh Events

013 Recap

Posted Dec 05, 2008   |   0 Comments   |   by Emily Bloom

Steve and Matt presented to about 30 people last night on Progressive Enhancement. Steve kicked things off by providing some history on why he coined the term "progressive enhancement" and the landscape of web design at that time.  Matt brought us up to speed on how current best practices reflect progressive enhancement.

Hesketh was a terrific host (with very cool office space) - thanks again to them for the support. We had a great time at The Raleigh Times afterward. Check out the photos on Flickr.

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 013 — The Enhancement of Progressive Enhancement

Posted Nov 18, 2008   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

Raleigh, NC — Thurs, Dec 4, 2008, 6:30 - 8:00pm

Steve Champeon and Matt Henry of Hesketh.com will give a brief overview of Progressive Enhancement and then will bring us up to date on how it’s being affected/transformed by Web 2.0 and interactive Web applications.

Location:
Pilot Mill Building
1101 Haynes Street
Suite 109
Raleigh, NC 27604

Filed under: Refresh Events

012 Recap

Posted Oct 24, 2008   |   0 Comments   |   by Emily Bloom

Clinton gave an awesome presentation last night on all kinds of tips and tools for improving your productivity online. Full of humor and personal anecdotes, Clinton’s talk was very memorable and lots of fun. The main points seemed to be - reduce distractions! reduce repetitiveness! and be accountable! He showed us lots of tricks for using your computer more efficiently and pointed out several online tools for keeping track of your activity (to promote accountablity).  He was kind enough to make his links available to everyone - enjoy.

Thanks again to Brian Russell at Carrboro Coworking for hosting the meeting and providing delicious food and beverages.

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 012 — Unearthed Arcana for Web People

Posted Oct 01, 2008   |   3 Comments   |   by pcrump

Carrboro, NC — Thurs, Oct 23, 2008, 6:30 - 8:00pm

Clinton Nixon, senior developer at Viget Labs, will present and facilitate this talk about how to avoid trivial, repetitive tasks and increase your productivity with your computer. We’ll cover both software you already have, and free/cheap software you might not. If you’ve got a tip of your own, bring it! We’ll have some free time to share at the end.

Location:
Carrboro Creative Coworking
205 Lloyd Street, Suite 101
Carrboro, NC 27510

Filed under: Refresh Events

011 Recap

Posted Sep 26, 2008   |   0 Comments   |   by Emily Bloom

Last night, Simon Brown presented a great overview of Yubikey, an inexpensive encryption hardware device. Simon gave us a nice demonstration of how the tool works and presented some of the advantages and disadvantages of using it. He fielded questions from the crowd of 35 and we enjoyed lively discussion after the meeting. Photos of the meeting are up on Flickr. Viget Labs was happy to host. Thanks to everyone who came out!

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 011—DIY Hardware Based Authentication

Posted Aug 29, 2008   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thurs, Sep 25, 2008, 6:30 - 8:00pm

Simon Brown has been a software developer for more years than he cares to admit, currently specializing in the development of large scale web applications. He will discuss the new, open, and inexpensive encryption hardware Yubikey. We’ll look at ways it can be combined with open source or your own software to put a new twist on the problems of authentication. Come along and learn how to integrate encrypted one-time-passwords into your next software project. Simon promises not to go too deeply into hardware or cryptography details ... unless someone asks.

Location:
Viget Labs
202 Rigsbee Ave, 2nd Floor
Durham, NC 27701

Filed under: Refresh Events

010 Recap

Posted Aug 29, 2008   |   1 Comments   |   by pcrump

Last night’s Refresh on Social Design Patterns was both informative and thought-provoking. Jackson shared some brief but valuable history on design patterns in general, and then led us through some of the current thinking and examples surrounding social design patterns. One which raised a number of eyebrows was the “fake follow”, which looks to now be a reality rather than a discussion. Anti-Patterns were also a hot topic, and the follow-up discussion centered largely around many of the bad patterns that have been identified. There will be more resources to follow when Jackson is able to connect us to his slides, but in the meantime, check out Yahoo’s design pattern library or Chris Messina’s flickr collection of design patterns as general design pattern resources.

Thanks again to Jackson for preparing such an engaging presentation, and to Jeff and Calvert Holdings for being such amazing hosts and showing us such a good time.

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 010 — Social Design Patterns

Posted Aug 25, 2008   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

Cary, NC — Thurs, Aug 28, 2008, 6:30-8:00pm

Jackson Fox, user experience designer at Viget Labs, shares:

These days it seems like every new site, and even venerable old sites, are embracing social features. We have dozens of friends lists, more inboxes than we can count, libraries of avatars, and everything can be shared with anyone. In the process we’ve had to struggle with loss of privacy, new security challenges, and new forms of online etiquette.

As social software evolves, we’re starting to see emerging patterns of behavior and design. We’ll take a look at some of these emerging social design patterns, both good and bad, and look ahead at the patterns that we still need to create.

Location:
Calvert Holdings, Inc.
1225 Crescent Green, Suite 115
Cary, North Carolina 27518

Filed under: Refresh Events

009 Recap

Posted Aug 01, 2008   |   2 Comments   |   by Jackson Fox

This month’s Refresh the Triangle 009 was our quarterly show-and-tell meetup, where we geek out on some of the share interesting news, valuable secrets, hot tips, neat tools, or whatever else happens to pop into our heads.

Clinton Nixon kicked things off with a really-fast recap of OSCON 2008 where he gave a tutorial on building Rails plugins. He also recommended Douglas Crockford’s new book Javascript: The Good Parts.

Mindy Wagner shared two new sites she’s been using — PatternTap is a collection of web interface patterns and examples, and ScrnShots is a site for sharing and tagging screenshots. Both are great resources when you’re looking for some design inspiration, or if you’re interested in building out your own library of inspiring designs.

Casey was recently introduced to the prototyping tool Axure and gave us a tour of the kind of wireframes he’s been building with it. Axure lets you build interactive prototypes in a GUI designer, and then export those prototypes to HTML.

Casey also recommended SpringLoops, hosted Subversion service with some nice tools for deploying web apps and connecting to Basecamp, and IE Tester, a tool for running multiple IE versions. IE Testing lets you show versions side-by-side, but seems to be a bit rough around the edges still.

I attempted to demo the slick new user testing tool Silverback from Clearleft, but the projector refused to cooperate. Instead, I talked about using Ethnio and UserVue for remote usability testing, and demoed Balsamiq, a flash-based wireframing tool.

Following up on our Silverback discussion, Nathan talked about his new favorite screencasting tool - Screenflow. Screenflow does all the standard recording tricks, but also includes a decent video editor with effects for panning, zooming, and highlighting user actions.

Lastly, Michale Kimsal was nice enough to start our very own Refresh the Triangle room on FriendFeed.

Thanks everyone who came out and shared with us! You can check out photos from Refresh 009 on Flickr.

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 009 — Fresh Perspectives

Posted Jun 27, 2008   |   1 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thurs, Jul 31, 2008, 6:30-8:00PM

As we’re trying to do once each quarter, we’ll take a break from the formal presentations this month to have a group share. We’ll take 30-45 minutes to geek out on some of the latest web industry news and share some personal favorites, valuable secrets, tips, tools, or whatever you feel could benefit the group.

Come ready to share anything you’d like — a headline or news item, a site, a tool, a snippet of code, a device, a book excerpt — anything large or small that you feel is current and elevates our web knowledge. And don’t think it has to be entirely unique (as in no one else knows about it already), it’ll kill the vibe. Just come with something that you know has been valuable/noteworthy to you, and don’t over-think it. It can be as quick as sharing a URL and a sentence about why we should visit the site. Or it can be as long as 5 minutes in a text editor demonstrating a few lines of code.

So stop for a few minutes before you head out and think of something to share. Do that, come relaxed, and the results will be sweet. See you there.

Location:
Independence Park Apartments
(mini-movie theater!)
215 William Penn Plaza
Durham NC, 27704

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 008 Recap

Posted Jun 27, 2008   |   1 Comments   |   by Emily Bloom

Thanks to everyone who came out last night to watch and discuss the webinar from Jared Spool. We drew a small crowd by the usual standards (about 17 people attended), but our discussion afterwards was Refresh at its finest.  If you were there and you learned something or shared something, feel free to leave a comment.

Mindy Wagner wrote up a recap of the meeting and we posted photos on Flickr. We’re looking forward to seeing you next month on July 22nd. We’re looking for a host / sponsor - let us know if you’d be up for it.

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 008 — UIE’s Strike Up the Brand

Posted May 23, 2008   |   10 Comments   |   by pcrump

Location: Durham, NC — Thurs, June 26, 2008, 6:30-8:00PM
In this virtual presentation, Jared M. Spool, User Interface Engineering’s Founder, will discuss UIE’s recent usability research into how people perceive brands on the internet and how teams can ensure their designs strengthen each user’s relationship with the brand. You will learn:

• The two important outcomes of branding efforts—affinity and dispositional returns—and why designers need to understand how these work
• Why ‘message’ branding doesn’t strengthen engagement, but ‘experience’ branding does
• The important role that user experience research plays in the design process for branding
• How measuring brand engagement can show the effects of a design

In his presentation, Jared will show how Amazon, Walmart, Ford, Apple, and Netflix have attempted to increase their users’ brand engagement ... more

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 007 Recap

Posted May 23, 2008   |   0 Comments   |   by Emily Bloom

Refresh 007 was a big hit! Stuart Halloway was highly engaging and his presentation, “Ending Legacy Code in Our Lifetime,” gave everyone lots to talk about - not just the developers, but the designers and “others,” too.  Stuart’s slides are available, and I know of at least one recap of the event.

Many thanks to Stuart for being our speaker. We’re also grateful to the West End Wine Bar - they let us have their downstairs, The Cellar, all to ourselves at no charge.  The ceilings were low, but the vibe was great. I think everyone had a lot of fun. 

Photos are on flickr.  See you next month!

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 007 — Ending Legacy Code In Our Lifetime

Posted May 07, 2008   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

Location: The Cellar — Thurs, May 22, 2008, 6:30-8:00PM

Most software developers don’t have an exact definition of legacy code, but to paraphrase Potter Stewart, they “know it when they see it.” Unfortunately, legacy code has something else in common with Stewart’s famous subject — it is embarrassingly ubiquitous.

It doesn’t have to be this way. Stuart Halloway, CEO of Relevance, will share:

• A better definition of legacy.
• How existing technologies and development practices guarantee that most code will slide into legacy immediately.
• How you can stave off legacy by writing low-ceremony, essential code.

Agility can be done right. By respecting the dynamic, living nature of software/human systems, you can create systems that evolve to meet changing needs ... more

Filed under: Refresh Events

006 Meeting Recap

Posted Apr 28, 2008   |   0 Comments   |   by David Eisinger

Refresh 006 was a major success. Nathan Huening from OnWired gave a great talk called “Dr. jQuery (Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the DOM),” and his passion for the material was evident. In a series of increasingly complex examples, Nathan showed off the power and simplicity of the jQuery JavaScript library. He demonstrated that most of jQuery can be reduced to “grab things, do stuff,” starting with simple CSS modifications and moving to AJAX, animation, and custom functionality ... more

Filed under: Refresh Events, Sponsors

Refresh 006 — Dr jQuery (Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the DOM)

Posted Apr 01, 2008   |   2 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thurs, Apr 24, 2008, 6:30-8:00PM

The web isn’t what it used to be: with advanced browsers and powerful Javascript frameworks like jQuery, websites deliver user experiences that rival those of traditional desktop software. Nathan Huening, Director of Web Development at OnWired, will share the nuts and bolts of jQuery and how you can use it to build rich, professional interfaces. It’s easy! No programming experience required ... and feel free to bring your laptop since you can expect live, hands-on examples. To participate, you’ll need a copy of Firefox with the Firebug extension installed ... more

Filed under: Refresh Events

005 Meeting Recap

Posted Mar 28, 2008   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

The laid back, free-form approach to the meeting was sincerely enjoyable and on spot. Thanks to Ogilvy and specifically to Callie, Noah, Chris, and Kendall for making it all happen. If you missed the meeting but have the chance later, make a reason to head over to Ogilvy for a visit — awesome people, immaculate space, and a ton of engaging work. There was no lack of sharing either — thanks to everyone for being plugged in and willing to speak up. If you’re looking to catch up on what went on, here’s the flow ... more

Filed under: Refresh Events, Sponsors

Refresh 005 — Kick Back, Freshen Up

Posted Mar 06, 2008   |   4 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thurs, Mar 27, 2008, 6:30-8:00PM

For various reasons, we’ll take a break from the formal presentations this month. Come on out to Ogilvy where we’ll socialize a bit more than usual, eat, drink, and share. Share what? We’ll take 30-45 minutes to geek out on some of the latest web industry news and share some personal favorites, well kept secrets, tips, tools, or whatever you feel could benefit the group.

Come ready to share anything you’d like — a headline or news item, a site, a tool, a snippet of code, a device, a book excerpt — anything large or small that you feel is current and elevates our web knowledge. And don’t think it has to be entirely unique (as in no one else knows about it already), it’ll kill the vibe. Just come with something that you know has been valuable/noteworthy to you, and don’t over-think it. It can be as quick as sharing a URL and a sentence about why we should visit the site. Or it can be as long as 5 minutes in a text editor demonstrating a few lines of code.

So stop for a few minutes before you head out and think of something to share. Do that, come relaxed, and the results will be sweet. See you there.
... more

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 004 — Justifying Design

Posted Jan 25, 2008   |   4 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thurs, Feb 28, 2008, 6:30-8:00PM

Great design requires every design decision to be rationalized and justified. Explore the design process of great designers and discover tools and techniques to justify your own work.

Rob Goodlatte is an award-winning interactive designer and developer. Currently an undergraduate at Duke, his short design career has included work for Disney, Microsoft, and Stanford University. After graduation, he will be joining Facebook as a product designer ... more

Filed under: Refresh Events

003 Meeting Recap

Posted Jan 25, 2008   |   0 Comments   |   by Emily Bloom

Last night we gathered at Bronto’s inspiring office for our first “Lightning Sessions” meeting. If you missed it, you should check out the flickr photos and Wayne’s video. Attendance was awesome as the Refresh momentum continues to build - we had about 35 people come out.  The Lightning Sessions approach was successful - presentation links are below. We hope to do Lightning Sessions about 4 times per year, but we have some ideas for improving the model next time around ... more

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 003 — Lightning Sessions

Posted Dec 10, 2007   |   19 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thurs, Jan 24, 2008, 6:30-8:00PM

Starting in 2008, we’ll be using the first monthly meeting of each quarter for “lightning sessions”. Think of this meeting type as a 1.5 hour BarCamp or similar event where members shape the outcome, and the approach toward sharing and discussing is rapid fire. The meeting will consist of 5 predetermined presenters each facilitating a 10 minute lightning session on a predetermined topic. Topics will be a mix of web design, dev, and technology. So for the January meeting, we’re looking for 5 topics and 5 presenters. Please share comments on topic ideas and/or express your willingness to lead a session ... more

Filed under: Refresh Events, Announcements

002 Meeting Recap

Posted Dec 07, 2007   |   0 Comments   |   by Emily Bloom

Last night’s meeting may go down in RTT history as the most amusing talk ever.  Clinton R. Nixon has a knack for not just explaining web app security vulnerabilities and solutions, but for doing so with humor and flare.  We had about 30 people in attendance and another 5 or 6 following live on ustream.tv.  If you missed the talk, you can watch the video or check out the photos ... more

Filed under: Refresh Events

Refresh 002 — Fortified Web Projects: Fundamentals for Security

Posted Oct 26, 2007   |   0 Comments   |   by pcrump

Durham, NC — Thurs, Dec 6, 2007, 6:30-8:00PM

Clinton Nixon will share a high level view of common security risks and suggest some very practical approaches for protection. Clinton is a enthusiast for test-driven development, esoteric computer languages, and kittens. He serves humbly as a senior web developer at Viget Labs ... more

Filed under: General Discussion, Refresh Events, Industry Events

001 Meeting Recap

Posted Oct 25, 2007   |   1 Comments   |   by Emily Bloom

Thanks to everyone who came to the first meeting. I hope you enjoyed it as much as we did.  About 28 people came out in the rain to hear Jackson’s talk and share in the conversation.  From our informal poll, it seemed that a little more than half of us are developers, a little less than half are designers, and a solid handful of us identify as “in between.” This is exactly the kind of mix we’re going for at Refresh, so we’re off to an exciting start.  We created a flickr account and posted some photos from the first meeting ... more

Filed under: Refresh Events