[Twisted-Python] Re: Teach Me Twisted Redux

[J. Clifford Dyer]

On Thu, 2008-03-20 at 07:33 -0400, Steve Holden wrote:
> glyph at divmod.com wrote:

> I left the session feeling we had accomplished hardly anything, but was 
> persuaded afterwards that wasn't the case.
> 
> One of the tragedies of the session was due to the blue screen crash of 
> my own computer I have absolutely nothing left of the code we developed. 
> I had hopes that one or two blog entries might appear to allow me to 
> lift it from those attending, but so far the success of the session is a 
> closely guarded secret among PyCon attendees (thought it's been 
> gratifying to have people saying "I wished I'd gone to that").
> 
> If someone can provide me with the code I will undertake to produce some 
> sort of blog entry, and this might further publicize Twisted. Never 
> underestimate the value of marketing: the Twisted community is a subset 
> of the Python community, and it's my particular vanity that PyCon has 
> helped to increase the Python community. It's important to keep feeding 
> introductory material into the process as growth continues, because 
> typically 50% of those present are likely to be newbies.
> 

Having contributed the replacement laptop, I've got the "official"
working code from Teach Me Twisted.  I'd be happy to send it to you,
Steve, or anyone else who wants to blog on the session.  One caveat: the
laptop I had with me at python belongs to my employer, so it's sitting
in my office right now, and I won't be able to get to it until Monday.

> 
> > Next year, we should definitely have more regular Twisted talks; I'd say 
> > that someone else should do another "teach me twisted" session, but I 
> > don't know if anyone else has the raw charisma and pedagogical expertise 
> > that Mr. Holden combined with Twisted ignorance to make this session so 
> > great :).
> > 
> Don't forget the whisky ...
> 

Believe me, I won't. ;) Actually I think the whisky was a minor but
essential ingredient in making the event as fantastic as it was.  Just
having the bottle sitting up front was a good reminder to people that we
were there because we think this stuff is fun.  It took a lot of the
formality off of the learning process, and that informality helped
people get excited about the endeavor.


> What we possibly need first of all is for someone to do a "Teach Me 
> Teach Me" in the tutorial track, with myself and a number of the more 
> experienced trainer types as the "subject matter experts". These things 
> are always one-off in nature and it's unrealistic to expect that they 
> will all have the same charm as "Teach Me Twisted" did this year for all 
> the reasons I mention above, but if it gets information out more 
> effectively about "difficult" topics it's probably worth a try if we can 
> find someone to facilitate them.
> 

I'd love to try my hand at "teach me" style teaching, for what it's
worth, and would be interested in a Teach Me Teach Me session.

> regards
>   Steve