Community Stories

Video description: My first interview for Ugtastic is with Sergio Pereira who runs the Chicago Alt.NET group. Chicago Alt.NET holds a special place in my heart as it's the first user-group I attended and the first user-group I ever spoke at. Sergio shares his feelings on providing a platform for developers who may not otherwise have an opportunity to get up and share their experience and passions via Chicago Alt.NET. This was my first interview so comments and tips are welcome. Sergio is a great sport and I really appreciate him taking the time to sit down and chat about Chicago Alt.NET.

Video description: Interview with Dustin Updyke at Software Craftsmanship North America 2011 on pittsburgh sc. Themes include Ruby, software craftsmanship.

Video description: Interview with Ross at Software Craftsmanship North America 2011 on south bend software craftsmanship. Themes include Ruby, software craftsmanship, Python.

Video description: Interview with Drew Shefman at Software Craftsmanship North America 2011 on houston adobe user group. The conversation captures practical lessons shared at the event.

Video description: Interview with Ray Hightower at Software Craftsmanship North America 2011 on chicagoruby. Themes include Ruby, Rails.

Video description: Interview with Michael Norton at Software Craftsmanship North America 2011 on cleveland & pittsburgh community. Themes include Agile methods, Ruby.

Video description: Interview with Max Lancaster at Software Craftsmanship North America 2011 on dc alt.net. Themes include JavaScript, technical leadership, Rails.

Video description: Interview with London Software Craftsmanship at Software Craftsmanship North America 2011 on community building and user-group organizing. Themes include software craftsmanship, Ruby, technical leadership.

Video description: Interview with Zach Shaw at Software Craftsmanship North America 2011 on boston sc. Themes include software craftsmanship.

Video description: Interview with Bobby Johnson at Software Craftsmanship North America 2011 on south sound .net. Themes include testing practice.

Video description: Pat Paasch and Clark Sell founded angleBracket, a hands-on web-tech focused hackfest type users' group up in the Far Northern Suburbs of Chicago. I attended a meeting and then recorded the interview at a post-meeting get-together at a local bar. Not the best sound quality but the meeting was a lot of fun and provided a great opportunity to spend a little time pairing and hacking on a variety of things in a relatively short time.

Video description: Scott Seely runs a .NET users' group up in Grayslake, IL. He's also extremely active in the Chicago-land Microsoft Developer community that Microsoft recognized him as a Regional Director. He explains why he founded LCNUG and what exactly is a "Regional Director".

Video description: Brian Ray (@brianray) took the time to sit down before the April 2012 ChiPy (pronounced Chippy) and chat about the Chicago Python community.

Video description: Geekfest was considered the heart of Obtiva and since the acquisition by Groupon it has grown from a small group of developers to what feels almost like a weekly mini-conference. Dave Hoover chats with me about the origin and growth of Geekfest.

Video description: I stopped by the Chicago Software Craftsmanship meeting and got a chance to chat with Steve Kim and Jim Suchy. Steve and Jim run the Chicago Software Craftsmanship group at the 8th Light office in downtown Chicago. This interview is a little bit chaotic because we did the interview as people were beginning to file in for the meeting.

Video description: After a couple months of fighting schedules Ethan, Ryan and myself were able to sit down and chat about the work they're doing on Gathers.us and the ChicagoDB. This video is actually the second as we had a technical difficulty with the first recording. I really appreciate that we were able to finally get this interview recorded! Oh, and they did end up getting some chicken.

Video description: Justin Love is very active in the Chicago Ruby & JavaScript communities. He’s also starting up a “Demo Days” group out in the far suburbs of Chicago to help with aspiring entrepreneurs learn how to pitch their ideas.

Video description: Interview with Milan Dobrota and Jen Lindner on Tribune Tech's community engagement, including hosting local meetups and connecting Tribune engineering with Chicago user groups.

Video description: Interview with Kevin Zolkiewiecz at WindyCityRails 2012 on ruby and rails practice. Themes include Rails, Ruby.

Video description: Interview with Ryan Singer at WindyCityRails 2012 on Ruby and Rails practice. Themes include Rails, Ruby.

Video description: Interview with Brian Liles at WindyCityRails 2012 on conference speaking and presentation skills. Themes include Rails, Ruby, testing practice.

Video description: Interview with Benjamin Oakes at WindyCityRails 2012 on Ruby and Rails practice. Themes include Ruby.

Video description: Interview with Movie on 9-6-12 at 1.05 PM at WindyCityRails 2012 on conference speaking and presentation skills. The conversation captures practical lessons shared at the event.

Video description: Not everyone who is involved in running a technical user-conference is a programmer. Adam Grandy is the “A-V Guy” for the WindyCityRails conference. While most of us are watching the conference for entertainment and education, Adam is carefully watching every second of the conference to keep the speaker in focus and make sure that all the valuable information that’s being shared is captured in high-quality, professional-level video. Adam is one of those unsung people that puts in a great deal of

Video description: Ginny Hendry started as a member of ChicagoRuby and before she knew it she was running Ruby Hackfests and now she’s helping facilitate Railsbridge Womens Outreach workshops.

Video description: Interview with Jim Remsik at WindyCityRails 2012 on conference speaking and presentation skills. Themes include Ruby.