Wesley Chun

Speaking Sessions

• What is Python?

  3:30 PM Saturday   Room: 5015

  <p> Python is an agile object-oriented programming language that is continuing to build momentum... popular with Win32 programmers because of its ease of creating COM clients plus IronPython for the .NET world, Jython for Java developers, and always popular with the LAMP and Linux/*BSD/Solaris/MacOS X crowd for applications and web development -- especially for Python's frameworks that compete with Rails: Django (including Google App Engine), TurboGears, Pylons, Zope and Plone (all RIA platforms), plus Trac and Mailman, the wiki+issue-tracker and popular mailing list manager, respectively. Web developers know about JSON already, but did you know that it maps nearly identically to Python's dictionary/hash type? Of course Python can do XML/ReST/XSLT, multithreading, SQL/databases, GUIs, hardcore math/science, Internet client/server systems and networking (heard of Twisted?), GIS/ESRI, QA/test, automation frameworks, plus system administration tasks too! Python can also be found at the heart of the OLPC. If Python doesn't do what you want, you can extend it in C/C++, Java, or C# (and even VB.NET)! Have you noticed the huge growth in the number of jobs on Monster and Dice that list Python as a desired skill? </p><br><p> Python can do everything Java, C/C++/C#, Ruby, PHP, and Perl can do, but it's much easier and more fun! You can code as fast as you think! Because of Python's simple yet robust syntax, it's a great tool to teach programming (heard of Alice before?) with as well as a solid (first) language to learn for non-programmers and other technical staff. Come find out why Google, Yahoo!, Disney, Cisco, YouTube, BitTorrent, LucasFilm/ILM, NASA, Ubuntu, Slide, and Red Hat all use Python! This seminar is designed by Wesley Chun, software engineer, technical trainer, and author of Prentice-Hall's bestseller "Core Python Programming" (corepython.com), its video training course "Python Fundamentals" LiveLessons DVD (corepython.com/pf), and co-author of "Python Web Development with Django" (withdjango.com), for those wanting to find out what Python is all about!</p>

• What is Google App Engine?

  10:45 AM Sunday   Room: 5001

  <p> Google App Engine is an exciting development and cloud-hosting platform that lets you build & deploy web (and non-web) applications on Google's scalable high-traffic infrastructure. App Engine supports apps written in Java, Python, Go, or others, and they will execute on servers that use the same technology that powers Google's websites for speed, scalability, and reliability. App Engine applications are easy to build and scale as your traffic and data storage needs grow. With App Engine, there is no need to think about virtual machine images, operating systems, databases, Web servers, or other hardware requirements; you just provide the source: use our simple deployment system to upload your application, and in one minute or less, it's ready to serve your users around the world! </p><br><p> In this informative session, we'll cover Cloud Computing as an industry and where Google App Engine fits into the picture. Specifically, we discuss App Engine as a PaaS solution because of the inherent challenges of building web and other applications. We'll outline the architecture of App Engine, what it's major components are, introduce its features and APIs, discuss the service and how it works (including information on the free quotas), and finally present some information about current users and usage, including integration with Google Apps. </p><br><p> Also be sure to attend the hands-on session happening later in this conference. Hearing someone *talk* about App Engine is one thing, but it's another when you've actually coded it. </p>

• Google App Engine workshop

  1:15 PM Sunday   Room: 3525

  <p> In this session, we'll show you how to create applications that run on App Engine by building a simple but real web application from the ground up via a hands-on coding laboratory. Although based on the online tutorial, this codelab goes above and beyond what's in the online tutorial: you will get a more detailed step-by-step instructions and a more user-friendly walkthrough of the tutorial, and time-permitting, go beyond what it has to offer. The prerequisites below are REQUIRED. </p><br><p> PREREQUISITES <p> - This session is for technical professionals familiar with Python and perhaps one other high-level programming language (C/C++, Java, PHP, etc.) Another goal of this session is to gain some knowledge in writing web applications that are hosted in the cloud. <br></p> <p> - We also strongly recommend you attend the App Engine overview talk given earlier, "What is Google App Engine?" <br></p> <p> - Attendees must come with Python 2.5-2.7 installed on their computers—Macs and Linux machines already have Python on-board, so only PC users need to get Python on their systems. App Engine is not yet compatible with 3.x releases yet, so we recommend 2.5.4 to PC users at this time. It’s as easy as a single click: http://www.python.org/ftp/python/2.5.4/python-2.5.4.msi. If you already have 2.6 or 2.7 on your machines, that's fine too. <br></p> <p> - Download and install the latest Google App Engine SDK from http://code.google.com/appengine/downloads.html <br></p> <p> - When doing the app, you can just run your app locally on your machine; net access is not required for this, and I expect everyone to get this working. However, you also have the option to upload your app to Google production servers and making your app live to the world. If you wish to do the latter, you need a gmail or Google Account and a cell phone which does text messaging. Go to http://appengine.google.com to create an account which you need your cell phone and text message to verify. Once this is all set, you will be able to upload apps to Google to run on your behalf. </p>