[Pipet Devel] Re: [tol-advisors] barCode

[Kenneth A. Marx]

Hey Jeff, Dave and Rick,

Good for you! I didn't know you could have that much fun at a seminar.
As an aside, was it explained to the audience what IBM's motive is in
hosting such a conference? 
				TGIF,	Ken Marx 



				"J.W. Bizzaro" wrote:
> 
> Greetings all.
> 
> I just got back from a conference/shin-dig in Boston, hosted by IBM.
> It's called 'barCode', and it's a 'developerWorks' conference they hold
> at....bars, thus the name.  Well, this was at a very big bar/nightclub
> called 'Jillians'.
> 
> David Lapointe (from UMass, and on the Loci list) found out about it and
> sent me an e-mail.  I then sent an e-mail to Rick Ree (Pyhy/Mavric
> coordinator from Harvard, also on the Loci list).  And, we all met
> there, and I got to meet Rick for the first time.
> 
> So, why am I bringing this up?  Well, the guest speaker at the
> conference was Miguel de Icaza.  If you don't know he is, I can start by
> saying Loci would not be quite the same without him.  Miguel is the
> founder and project leader of Gnome.
> 
> Miguel spoke for nearly an hour under colored lights and in front of a
> big-screen TV that sits behind a bar, normally showing hockey games.
> Needless to say, it was quite a bit different from the scientific
> seminars I am used to.  And his speeking style was right for the
> atmosphere: Several times he yelled out that people in the audience were
> drunk :-)
> 
> He, of course, presented Gnome, using some new presentation app that
> runs in Gnome.  From time-to-time he switched to the desktop and demoed
> some features.  He got some laughs when Gnumeric (the Gnome spreadsheet
> app) crashed.  And they often booed when Miguel chose some tacky Gtk
> theme.
> 
> Besides the chuckles, I did learn a little bit about Bonobo and thought
> a bit about how it could be used in Loci.  I saw a Bonobo component that
> drew vector graphics from an SVG file and did very cool things like
> antialiasing and alpha-channel semi-transparencies (while being
> DnD'd!).  I think this is what we're looking for to do our
> bioinformatics viewers, as I reminded David several times during the
> talk.
> 
> A little while after the presentation (and after some more free drinks,
> pizza, and a nifty pen from IBM), David, Rick and I went up to meet
> Miguel, who was mobbed by dozens of people.  We all got to meet him, and
> I got to talk to him about The Open Lab and Loci.  In fact, I got to say
> quite a bit, and I was surprised that he seemed very interested.  One
> thing I mentioned was that the name of his company in Boston (Helix
> Code) sounds like their involved in bioinformatics.  He said that his
> girlfriend is a biologist, thus the use of names such as Bonobo and
> Evolution (the PIM).  After several minutes, I gave him my card (which
> has no e-mail address on it, duh), and he asked for my e-mail address.
> 
> Shortly after meeting Miguel, the three of us went to grab some more
> goodies from IBM.  We got a 'squishy alien head', a stainless steel
> thermo mug, a coaster, and an even cooler pen.  IBM paid for everything:
> all sorts of food AND AN OPEN BAR.  It didn't cost anything to register
> either.  They said they'll be holding these conferences once per
> quarter.  (Do you see what your missing out on Gary?)  :-)
> 
> Well, it was nice, and it was good to see David and Rick.  And I'd like
> to see the rest of you guys some day.
> 
> Cheers.
> Jeff
> --
>                       +----------------------------------+
>                       |           J.W. Bizzaro           |
>                       |                                  |
>                       | http://bioinformatics.org/~jeff/ |
>                       |                                  |
>                       |        BIOINFORMATICS.ORG        |
>                       |           The Open Lab           |
>                       |                                  |
>                       |    http://bioinformatics.org/    |
>                       +----------------------------------+
> 
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