Mark Drew (Redux)- cf_etc...

I was interviewed this week by Paul Vernon just before CFUnited Europe that starts this week here in London. If you fancy reading the article, click on over to http://www.fusionauthority.com/community/4735-an-interview-with-mark-drew-speaker-at-cfunited-europe.htm

At CFUnited 2007, I did a couple of presentations showing CFEclipse, which at the end of the presentation I mentioned was actually running on Eclipse 3.3. Not bad going considering that Eclipse 3.3 was released on the day of my first presentation huh? The issue now is getting everything REALLY working, I did a number of smoke tests and even did a whole presentation running Eclipse 3.3 but there are some things I want to tidy and other changes I want to make before I do a release (just doing a compatibility release seems a waste of time at the moment, considering the effort involved!) So, what and when should you expect? Well, I am going to be checking in stuff this week, I only do checkins against an issue so I have to create the right ones (if they are not there). You should see more activity over at the CFEclipse Trac website. Also, if you are planning on adding a ticket to Trac, make sure there isnt one there already, I have spotted a few been adding about Eclipse 3.3 already, there is no need to add more! I want to send out a big thank you to Dean Harmon as he did all the Eclipse 3.3 compatibility including the backwards compatibility stuff. Now, stop saying that Adobe does nothing to contribute!!! So, there it is, a semi-official announcement... saying not much... but at least now you know.

So, I am all packed, sipping the last of the coffee, about to leave in a few seconds to Gatwick to head to CFUnited 2007! I am really looking forward to this conference, it should be a blast! Those that can't make it this year, I promise, I shall try and blog and take as many photos as possible to keep you all in the loop. (ahh, promises promises!). So without further ado, see you on the other side of the pond!

I want to thank Ray Camden, Charlie Arehart and all the people at TeraTech that let me do a preview presentation before CFUnited. You can check out the recording of the presentation over at http://experts.acrobat.com/p70538852/

With CFUnited looming (only a week to go!), the Online ColdFusion Meetup Group have asked me to do a quick (20 mins) preview presentation on my forthcoming CFEclipse session for CFUnited. The description is as follows:

In this 20-30 minute session, Mark Drew will preview his one- hour class, CFEClipse Plus!, presenting how to use some advanced features in CFEclipse, with an in-depth look at modifying the libraries to add your own tags, using ant as part of your development process and demonstrations of the new features in CFEclipse. This presentation is geared towards current users of CFEclipse.

So come one, come all, especially if you cant make it to CFUnited! When: Thursday, June 21, 12:30pm EDT (GMT-4) (What time is that for you? See http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?hour=12&min=30&sec=0&p1=25) Where:http://experts.acrobat.com/cfmeetup/

Finally I have my flights booked to CFUNITED! I am arriving at D.C.'s Ronald Ray-Gun Airport on Tuesday 26th of June at 16:18. Anybody else arriving around the same time? Fancy sharing a bus thingy? Or is it tube-able? (I can't remember if Ray-Gun was on the tube or not) I am very excited about this conference, I think I might be releasing the final project (heh, right) for the summer called Project:C but details still need to be worked out (so if I dont release something, dont kill me ok?)

Finally the sessions are up for all the conferences, which for me, gives me an idea of when I shall be presenting, and more importantly who I shall be following onto the stage, which having looked at this years conferences, is a very scary proposition! Firstly at cfObjective I am following Mark Mandel, another Mark, and I am sure everyone is going to confuse his Australian accent for my London accent and thing we are either both from the same country, or the same person (just notice the difference in space I take up compared to him, that will let you know who-is-who), but at least I shall be pulling Project:U out of the bag then! What I feared the most come true, I am following Ben Forta onto the stage on the first day of Scotch on the Rocks. How can I follow that? Project:X is going to have to be really damned amazing to follow Ben "The Force" Forta! Then at CFUnited I seem to be presenting on the last day. The issue will be not so much following someone onto the stage but who else is presenting at the same time, and I have devastating opposition, Joe Rinehart doing a great AJAX presentation and John Paul Ashenfelter talking about Build, Test, Deploy, I doubt I will get anyone coming over to see what is happening with CFEclipse and Project:C !!! Nonetheless, I am really looking forward to the summer!

Jared has finally announced some of the speakers for the cfObjective conference, and amongst many of the luminaries such as Sean, Ray and Joe you will find me presenting on CFEclipse! This is going to be one hot conference so book your tickets early I say! If you don't you are going to miss the announcement of a new project I have been working on. This *top secret* project is so amazing, I am asking Jared to fit seat-belts to each of the seats as I am sure when I show this off, people *WILL* fall off their chairs. I am REALLY excited about this project, the few people I have shown it to have been very impressed and I know when I show it live and working, jaws will drop. So what are you waiting for? Go register now! Also, if you cant make it to cfObjective, there is also Scotch on the Rocks a month later, where we shall also be unveiling another feature that is going to make you so excited your socks will have to be stapled to your feet. This will be the year of massive announcements from me by the way :) Oh... and I am working on *ANOTHER* top secret project, which I hope to announce in the next few weeks. In the meantime, I am trying to fit something called *life* and *sleep* in somewhere but I can do those in the winter. P.s. Don't even ask me what I am announcing at CFUnited, I know that will also make people do a little wiggle too!

As some of you might have spotted, I have put up a couple of banners for cfObjective and Scotch on the Rocks. The reason for this is that is, surprise surprise, that I shall be presenting CFEclipse at these conferences! I haven't put up a banner for CFunited yet, but I shall also be presenting there too, definately a busy summer for me. To make it even more exciting (more? how much more exciting can it get?), I shall be presenting a brand new feature of CFEclipse at each of these conferences. I can't tell you what they are yet, but they are going to be some nice additions to CFEclipse. Not only that, but CFunited will be when we unveil CFEclipse 1.4! (no coldfusing marketing campaign this time)! How about THAT for an incentive to go? Edit: did anyone spot the donate button by the way? :)

Two thanks in one day? This is awesome! Yes, I got another donation from Christoph Shmitz and as a surprise addition, Spike, Project Lead for the cfeclipse project has also managed to send me £400 to the "Get Mark to a Conference" fund! This is a good way to start the weekend! I shall be able to get the flights in no time at all (well, I mean, the tickets to the flights, don't have time traveling plans yet!) Thank you guys!