Philly Mac Programming Group    

Philly Mac Programming Group Presentation History 2009

Saturday, January 3rd, 2009

No meeting.
Cheers,
John



Saturday, February 7th, 2009

Our own Chris Heimark spoke on: "How to take a concept for an iPhone application to reality"
Check out his apps at: http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewArtist?id=283927949 There are directions to Cheyney University on their web page (http://www.cheyney.edu/pages/index.asp?p=142) . If these aren't clear enough, I found it helpful to bring up Google Maps, then put in as your destination "Cheyney University", nothing else. Once you get to the campus, the Duckrey building is on University Circle. This is near the bottom on Cheyney's campus map (http://www.cheyney.edu/pages/flash/map/index.htm?p=429). For some reason, their map has north to the right, which is a bit confusing.
Cheers,
John



Saturday, March 3rd, 2009

No meeting.
Cheers,
John



Saturday, April 4th, 2009

For a change of pace, we'll do an open discussion this coming Saturday, on debugging: debugging horror stories, how to debug, bug prevention!, any special tricks for debugging on the Macintosh, and so on.
It is estimated that 50 or 80% of programming is spent debugging; we have all had long days & late nights tracking down & fixing some stubborn bug. Now is the time to share your stories! All contributions will be kept anonymous. Participants will be allowed to assume a nome-de-bug for the discussion. I've been collecting notes for a book, Zen & the Art of Debugging, for some years now, under the principle "write what you know". I'll lead off with a few of my favorite horror stories, then throw the floor open to discussion! By way of fueling the discussion, I'll bring some food. Not possible to talk about debugging without late-night-sugar. Sorry about the late notice on this: had to get the abstract of my dissertation off to a conference & just met deadline yesterday! The Macintosh Programming SIG [phillymacprog] meets the first Saturday of every even numbered month (Feb, Apr, Jun, Aug, Oct, Dec) at Cheyney University, room #117 in Duckrey, which is great space: large, wired, & quiet (except for us). There are directions to Cheyney University on their web page (http://www.cheyney.edu/pages/index.asp?p=142).
Cheers,
John



Saturday, May 2nd, 2009

May 2009 No meeting
Cheers,
John



Saturday, June 6th, 2009

June 2009 We' had enough people this Saturday and had a good discussion when our own Chris Heimark talked about SQLite. He's up for this: he's been putting in the hours with SQLite & is ready to share his experience with us! It's a great tool; every Mac programmer should know how to get the best out of it!
Cheers,
John



Saturday, July 4th, 2009

No meeting. Enjoy your holiday!
Cheers,
John



Saturday, August 1st, 2009

No meeting.
Cheers,
John



Saturday, September 5th, 2009

No meeting.
Cheers,
John



Saturday, October 3rd, 2009

October 2009 This coming Saturday, at 10:30, our own Michael Flynn will give a talk on: Introduction to MacPorts Do you feel that some useful Unix software is missing from OS X? Then MacPorts may provide you with the software you're seeking. MacPorts is a framework of port files that allows the you to download, compile, and install Unix software (including all the necessary dependancies). I've used MacPorts a few times & am looking forward to this!
Cheers,
John



Saturday, November 7th, 2009

No meeting.
Cheers,
John



Saturday, December 5th, 2009

We are meeting at an unusual place and time this coming Saturday at 10am at The Church of the Good Samaritan in Paoli (directions), probably in room 263. This is 1/2 hour earlier than usual and as part of theMLMUGmeeting.
We have a very unusual topic as well: "Quantum Time". I've just finished the calculations for my physics dissertation about how time might be "fuzzy" & Chris Heimark suggested I do a talk about this. Some others have said they would be interested, so here goes:
Quantum Time
What if time is fuzzy? Usually we think of time as something that just goes forward & we are stuck with it. But in quantum mechanics, we learn that space is fuzzy (nothing has a definite position); we know from relativity that space and time are interchangeable; so time almost has to be fuzzy! What does this mean? How do we look for it? What can we do with fuzzy time? I've done this as a popular talk at a science fiction convention, slides on myblogin the PDFs section, and people really seemed to enjoy the topic so we should have fun.
We can also talk about some of the software I used to build the paper, if people are interested (or feel guilty about not doing software at a programming SIG). And there are a lot of related topics that are interesting (time travel for one thing); I'm happy to let the discussion go where it goes. I'd like to thank Gene & Mark & MLMUG making the space available! And Gene has thrown in a projector as well, which is great! Thanks!
I've put a post up summarizing today's meeting at myphysics blog. The slides are online as well.
I'd like to thank MLMUG & especially Mark Bazrod & Eugene Coggins for providing the space, the projector, the laser pointer, & their usual gracious hospitality! And I'd like to thank everyone who came for lots of good questions & general support!
Cheers,
John