Happy Hours

Tuesday, July 18, 5:00pm - 6:00pm
Wednesday, July 19, 5:00pm - 6:00pm

Join us after class for food & drinks! This is the perfect time to mingle with your fellow attendees, conference sponsors and your favorite speakers.

Birds of a Feather Gatherings

The Challenges of Embedded/Real-Time Development
Stephen Mellor, Chief Scientist, Embedded Systems Division, Mentor Graphics
Monday, July 17, 7:30pm - 9:00pm

Embedded and real-time developers face different challenges than those pursuing, say, Web development. This BoF session will explore these challenges from the perspective of understanding required skills and technologies. What do we need to learn? What can we learn from others? And what can we teach other kinds of developers? Or is software just software?

What's Next for Data Middleware?
Ken Rugg, Vice President of Data Management Products, Progress Software
Tuesday, July 18, 7:30pm - 9:00pm

An important kind of software infrastructure is the middleware that delivers data to applications. Object/relational mapping and distributed caching have become mainstream technologies for managing data within enterprise applications. Data replication and data synchronization increase the scalability of data and support applications that manipulate data even when they're disconnected from the network. These data middleware technologies are used by enterprise developers to shorten application development, accelerate performance and enable flexible deployments. Join us for a discussion on where data middleware technologies will go next. What data management problems remain unsolved? What emerging technologies show promise? How will we conquer the growing complexity of enterprise application development and deployment?

Evolution of Model-Driven Development
Gary Cernosek, Offerings Manager - Analysis, Design & Construction, IBM
Tuesday, July 18, 7:30pm - 9:00pm

Modeling and model-driven approaches to software development have been in practice for some time now. Computer-Aided Software Engineering (CASE) marked the first generation of MDD in practice as it automated structured and functional decomposition methods prevalent in the 1980's. A move to object-orientation and the emergence of the Unified Modeling Language (UML) in the mid-90's sparked a second generation in MDD. Today we see application modeling starting to meld with business and data modeling, suggesting a third generation where different types of modeling and their associated languages start to coalesce. We also see the effects of a global economy and a shifting of staffing responsibilities for supporting geographically distributed development that pressures code-centric developers to find new ways to add value to their organizations. The purpose of this Birds of a Feather session is to discuss these and related trends in the software industry and gain a better understanding in how MDD is evolving and how practitioners and managers can incorporate these trends into planning the future.

XP, RUP, Scrum, MSF? Picking the Right Software Process
Scott Ambler, Senior Consultant, Ambysoft Inc.
Wednesday, July 19, 7:30pm - 9:00pm

Everywhere you turn, a new software methodology seems to pop up. Should you consider an agile approach such as Extreme Programming (XP) or Agile Unified Process (AUP), or a traditional CMM-based approach? Let s get together to discuss what works, what doesn t, and why, and have some fun doing it.

Panels

Software Design, Interaction Design: The View Across the User Interface Divide
Panelists: Jeff Patton, Author and Architect/Interaction designer, ThoughtWorks; Scott Ambler, Senior Consultant, Ambysoft; Hugh Beyer, Author and Cofounder of InContext; Larry Constantine, Author and Principal of Constantine & Lockwood; Michael Rosen, CTO, WiltonConsultingGroup
Monday, July 17, 5:30pm - 6:30pm

In software development, exactly what is design, and who does it? At Dr. Dobb's Architecture & Design World, you ll find at least two groups that refer to themselves as designers. One group, let's call them Software Architects, take software requirements and use them to design technical solutions with objects, patterns and services to meet goals for performance, scalability and maintainability, as well as the demands of the domain in question. Another group, let's call them Interaction Designers, conduct research on users, their goals and usage, then use that research to determine what software will best address user goals, and exactly how that software will look and behave. The work and the result of Interaction Design is often referred to by software architects as "requirements." The work and result of software architects is often referred to by interaction designers as the "implementation." It s easy to infer that each group believes its own discipline is most critical to the success of a software product.

As an audience member, you'll be the judge as luminaries from both sides of the divide square off to discuss what really is the essence of software design. Panelist will answer such questions as:

• What is the definition of design?
• Exactly how and when do we involve end users in the design of our software?
• Where do architects and developers fit into the project? Initial chartering? After initial requirements work is done? After scope refinement?
• Describe a project where Interaction Design made an impact, either positively or negatively on the outcome of the project.
• Describe a project where Software Architects made an impact, positively or negatively on the outcome of the project.
• What do you have in common with your peers on the other side of the user interface?
  

Model-Driven Development Face-Off
Panelists: Granville Miller, MSF Process Authority, Microsoft; Scott Ambler, Senior Consultant, Ambysoft Inc.; Jon Kern, Agile MDA Evangelist, Compuware; Robert C. Martin, President, Object Mentor; Stephen J. Mellor, Chief Scientist, Embedded Systems Division, Mentor Graphics; Rebecca Wirfs-Brock, President, Wirfs-Brock Associates
Wednesday, July 19, 5:30pm - 6:30pm

Over the last year, model-driven development has become one of the most talked about topics in the industry. Which approach is better able to realize the promise of model-driven development in the real world? What are the strengths and weaknesses of each approach? Where are they heading? Come hear from industry-renowned experts in the area of MDA, Software Factories, Agile Model-Driven Development and more. This panel will shed some light on this topic. At the very least, we can expect some heat!