You should really ask this question in the StlRuby group on Google
Groups, to get better feedback from more Ruby folks.

Rails does not generally perform as well as PHP, but it is usually a
lot quicker to write a large Rails app than a PHP app. For Rails
deployment, you'll want to go with one of the Rails-specific hosts
(EngineYard, SliceHost, RailsMachine, Site5), or use a dedicated or
virtual machine. They're usually more expensive, but provide good
support, and you don't have to worry about the shared hosting security
issues. SliceHost is local, but I've heard recommendations from many
Rails developers.

If you go with PHP, be sure to use an MVC framework. That'll get you
about half way to Rails.

Where I have a choice, I usually go with Rails. When faced with
existing crappy PHP code, I try forcing some of my own PHP framework
in, to preserve my sanity.

Craig

I'll be there. I speak in the St. Louis NFJS symposiums, but not in
other cities. I'm giving a talk on ANTLR, the parser generator. I've
given a lot of technical talks in the past and I can honestly say I've
put more effort into this one than any previous talks. Hopefully the
quality will match the effort. ;-)

On Feb 6, 2008 11:23 AM, Scott Delap <scott@...> wrote:
>
> John,
>
> I speak on the NFJS tour and would happy to answer any questions you have.
> We try to put on a great conference.  From the comments I've heard from
> previous year's attendees, they all find the cost/value worth it.
>
> Scott
>
>
> On Feb 6, 2008, at 11:20 AM, John Sextro wrote:
>
>
>
>
> XPStl'ers,
>
> How many of you are making plans to attend NFJS in March?  I've read through
> the sessions and looked at all the speakers.  Some of the topics interest
> me, I recognize a few of the speakers and I am trying to decide if I should
> pony up the 800 beans for the early bird registration.
>
> Let me know if you have any thoughts on the topics or speakers for this
> year.
>
> --
> Regards,
> John Sextro
> http://www.johnsextro.com
>
>
>



--
R. Mark Volkmann
Object Computing, Inc.

Mark Your Calendar....

The No Fluff Just Stuff Software Symposium series is pleased
to announce the premier technically focused Java/Agility event,
2008 Gateway Software Symposium returning to St. Louis on
March 7-9th!

Event Name: Gateway Software Symposium 2008
URL: www.nofluffjuststuff.com/sh/2008-03-stlouis
Dates: March 7-9th
Venue: St. Louis Marriott West

GSS 2008 will offer six (6) concurrent sessions for you to choose from.
You will have the opportunity to attend multiple sessions on variety
of interesting topics covering core Java, Enterprise Java, Web 2.0, Dynamic Languages,
Architecture, Security, Testing, CI and Agility.

We have a great set of speakers lined up for you to enjoy featuring:

Brian Sletten, REST Expert
Scott Davis, author of "Groovy Recipes"
Neal Ford, Application Architect with ThoughtWorks
Ted Neward, author of "Effective Enterprise Java"
Venkat Subramaniam, co-author of "Practices of an Agile Developer"
Richard Monson-Haefel, author of "J2EE Web Services"
David Geary, co-author of "Core JSF"
Mark Richards, author of "Java Transaction Strategies"
Nathaniel Schutta, co-author of "Foundations of Ajax"
Michael Nygard, author of "Release It"
and many more....

The No Fluff Just Stuff Symposium series is regarded as the premier
Java/Agility event series anywhere serving over 22,000 attendees with
some 130 events since 2002. The popularity of the NFJS symposium series
can be traced to the following:

1). Exceptional Speakers
2). Limited Attendance - capped at 250 people
3). No Vendors, No Sales Pitches, no Marketecture
4). Excellent networking opportunities with speakers and fellow
attendees
5). The Best Value in the Java conferencing space period

************************************************************************
******************************

Early Bird Registration: $800/person good thru February 18th, after $900

Registration Fee includes:

1). Three Day All Access Pass to GSS 2008
2). All Meals/Snacks - duration of the symposium
3). Custom Laptop Bag - Best in the Industry ($150 Retail Value)
4). One Gig USB Drive - All Symposium Content included
5). Custom NFJS Binder

Special $50 discount available to all XP STL members, use the discount
code, nfjsusergroup50 when registering. NOTE: This discount is not
combinable with the group discount.

Excellent Group Discounts Available - bring your entire development team
to the show: (good thru 2/18/08)

5-9 Attendees: $700/person
10-14 Attendees: $675person
15-24 Attendees: $650/person
25-over Attendees: $625person

Excellent Giveaways - Apple iPods & iPhones

Join us for a great show! We appreciate your support and patronage!!

Gateway Software Symposium 2008: www.nofluffjuststuff.com/sh/2008-03-
stlouis

Venue: St. Louis Marriott West - rate of $99/night available

All the Best,

Jay Zimmerman
2008 NFJS Symposium Director
jzimmerman@...

This will be my 3rd year attending NFJS... and the 4th time I've been
there. I've been to OOSPLA, Agile, and JavaOne... but I still think
NFJS is my favorite conference to go attend. The speakers are always
top notch, they always have VERY interesting sessions, and it's just
fun running into all the people I know from St.Louis down there. ;)

I guess I'll see you all there too!

Thanks,
james

On Feb 6, 2008 11:20 AM, John Sextro <john.sextro@...> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
>
> XPStl'ers,
>
> How many of you are making plans to attend NFJS in March?  I've read through
> the sessions and looked at all the speakers.  Some of the topics interest
> me, I recognize a few of the speakers and I am trying to decide if I should
> pony up the 800 beans for the early bird registration.
>
> Let me know if you have any thoughts on the topics or speakers for this
> year.
>
> --
> Regards,
> John Sextro
> http://www.johnsextro.com

Ron Jeffries says, "CARFAX has a great team with great management,
doing the right things right".

CARFAX, Inc. in Columbia, MO, is looking for experienced software
developers who want to work in a full-on eXtreme Programming shop.
Must have demonstrated ability to develop high quality object-
oriented software in Java. Must have the desire and ability to work
in a highly collaborative self-directed team environment.

Other important traits and skills include self-motivated learner,
initiative, leadership, communication, courage, Test-Driven
Development, Pair Programming, Simple Design, Refactoring,
Oracle, Model-View-Presenter, WebLogic, and Fitnesse.

Great place to work and live, salary appropriate to experience,
relocation available. Profit sharing. If you are interested, send
me your resume. I will get it in front of the hiring managers ASAP.
No sponsorships are available at this time, must be legally able to
work in the USA.

http://www.carfax.com/about/jobs/jobs.cfm

Gary Brown
XP Coach
CARFAX, Inc.

garybrown at carfax dot com

Hey, it's about that time. Are we going to have a Code Camp this year?
I've got several things I'd like to show off -- especially the jQuery
JavaScript library.

Craig

Hey, it's about that time. Are we going to have a Code Camp this year?
I've got several things I'd like to show off -- especially the jQuery
JavaScript library.

Craig
Yahoo! Groups Links
<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/xpstl/
<*> Your email settings:
Individual Email | Traditional
<*> To change settings online go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/xpstl/join
(Yahoo! ID required)
<*> To change settings via email:
mailto:xpstl-digest@yahoogroups.com mailto:xpstl-fullfeatured@yahoogroups.com
<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
xpstl-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/

Brian,

Well, if you need help, I'd be glad to join in and participate. ;)

Craig: what kind of jquery stuff you planning on presenting? We've
been using it a lot lately, and currently I'm toying with jquery UI on
a project.

Thanks,
James

On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 9:22 PM, Brian Button <bbutton@...> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
>
>  Craig Buchek wrote:
>  Hey, it's about that time. Are we going to have a Code Camp this year?
> I've got several things I'd like to show off -- especially the jQuery
> JavaScript library.
>
>  Sigh...
>  I'm so darn busy right now... I need to either start planning it, or plan
> on doing it this fall...
>
>  What do you guys think?
>
>  bab
>
>  Craig
>
>
>
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> --
>
>  Brian Button
>  VP Engineering
>  Asynchrony Solutions, Inc
>  St. Louis, MO
>  bbutton@...
>  Blog: The Musings of Brian Button
>  Blog: One Agile Coder
>  636.399.3146 ________________________________
>  Value, Value Stream, Flow, Pull, Perfection

> Craig: what kind of jquery stuff you planning on presenting? We've
> been using it a lot lately, and currently I'm toying with jquery
> UI on a project.

Mostly the same stuff I presented at last month's STLRuby meeting:

http://stlruby.googlegroups.com/web/jquery-form-demo.html?gda=G3Rb-EYAAACzMh9VBf\
fVXjQ4WKZH2cwoCva9WvD2T0qBpxfb_L-kiWG1qiJ7UbTIup-M2XPURDQYBs_o1ASmIwnQBkOu0xRTVZ\
yV-dsBF7OAUyDQwk6p7g
http://groups.google.com/group/stlruby/t/fe4b9b996897a553
http://groups.google.com/group/stlruby/t/49b9d8b8e929a24c

I actually wrote most of the jQuery code in my demo during the live
presentation. (Although I had previously written it a few hours before
as practice.) Tough to do, but it showed how simple it can be to use
jQuery in the real world.

I've used jQuery in a medium-sized Rails app with a pretty complex
input form. The jQuery is used to modify fields when other fields are
changed. Some of the changes require AJAX calls back to the server,
and others just do client-side modifications.

Last night I started working on a client-side unobtrusive validation
framework. All the HTML does is declare field types (as classes) and
whether the field is required. The jQuery code finds all the types,
runs validations, and marks each field (and associated labels) as
valid or invalid. I'm hoping to make the code available as Open Source
when we're done with it.

Craig

Last Call....The No Fluff Just Stuff Software Symposium series is pleased to announce the premier technically focused Java/Agility event, the 2008 Gateway Software Symposium returns soon to St. Louis on March 7-9th!  Join Us!

Event Name: Gateway Software Symposium 2008
URL: www.nofluffjuststuff.com/sh/2008-03-stlouis
Dates: March 7-9th
Venue: St. Louis Marriott West

GSS 2008 will offer six (6) concurrent sessions for you to choose from.
You will have the opportunity to attend multiple sessions on variety 
of interesting topics covering core Java, Enterprise Java, Web 2.0, Dynamic Languages,
Architecture, Security, Testing, CI and Agility.

We have a great set of speakers lined up for you to enjoy featuring:

Brian Sletten, REST Expert
Scott Davis, author of "Groovy Recipes"
 Ted Neward, author of "Effective Enterprise Java"
Venkat Subramaniam, co-author of "Practices of an Agile Developer"
Richard Monson-Haefel, author of "J2EE Web Services"
David Geary, co-author of "Core JSF"
Mark Richards, author of "Java Transaction Strategies"
Nathaniel Schutta, co-author of "Foundations of Ajax"
Michael Nygard, author of "Release It"
and many more....

The No Fluff Just Stuff Symposium series is regarded as the premier
Java/Agility event series anywhere serving over 22,000 attendees with
some 130 events since 2002. The popularity of the NFJS symposium series
can be traced to the following:

1). Exceptional Speakers
2). Limited Attendance - capped at 250 people
3). No Vendors, No Sales Pitches, no Marketecture
4). Excellent networking opportunities with speakers and fellow attendees
5). The Best Value in the Java conferencing space period

************************************************************************ 

Early Bird Registration: $900/person

Registration Fee includes:

1). Three Day All Access Pass to GSS 2008
2). All Meals/Snacks - duration of the symposium
3). Custom Laptop Bag - Best in the Industry ($150 Retail Value)
4). One Gig USB Drive - All Symposium Content included
5). Custom NFJS Binder

Special $50 discount available to all XPSTL members, use the discount
code, nfjsusergroup50 when registering. NOTE: This discount is not 
combinable with the group discount.

Excellent Group Discounts Available - bring your entire development team
to the show: 

5-9 Attendees: $800/person
10-14 Attendees: $775person
15-24 Attendees: $750/person
25-over Attendees: $725person

Excellent Giveaways - Apple iPods & iPhones

Join us for a great show! We appreciate your support and patronage!!

Gateway Software Symposium 2008: www.nofluffjuststuff.com/sh/2008-03-stlouis

Venue: St. Louis Marriott West 

All the Best,

Jay Zimmerman (jzimmerman@...)
2008 NFJS Symposium Director

Hi Again,

In my usual style, the next scheduled meeting announcement is followed
up again by a correction. I forgot to mention the time of the meeting.
:(

We will be meeting at 6pm. You're still welcome to drop in even if you
can't make it by that time though. ;)

Thanks,
James

On Wed, Apr 2, 2008 at 6:10 PM, James Carr <james.r.carr@...> wrote:
> Hi All,
>
>  The next Mid MO XP Usergroup meeting will be on April 9th. Our guest
>  speaker will be Kenny Rubin
>  (http://www.scrumalliance.org/profiles/77-kenny-rubin) and his
>  presentation topic will be "Agile Requirements or Us." More
>  information on his presentation will follow.
>
>  As usual, the meeting will be held at the CARFAX Data Center in
>  Columbia, MO. For those of you who haven't been here before, refer to
>  the following google map:
>
> 
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=2301+Maguire+Blvd,+Columbia,+MO\
+65201+(Carfax,+Inc)&sll=38.930037,-92.308502&sspn=0.044401,0.11467&ie=UTF8&t=h&\
z=16&iwloc=addr
>
>  Please RSVP by monday so we can get a head count for refreshments, but
>  if you cant rsvp you're still welcome to attend.
>
>  Thanks,
>  James
>

Hi All,

The next Mid MO XP Usergroup meeting will be on April 9th. Our guest
speaker will be Kenny Rubin
(http://www.scrumalliance.org/profiles/77-kenny-rubin) and his
presentation topic will be "Agile Requirements or Us." More
information on his presentation will follow.

As usual, the meeting will be held at the CARFAX Data Center in
Columbia, MO. For those of you who haven't been here before, refer to
the following google map:

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=2301+Maguire+Blvd,+Columbia,+MO\
+65201+(Carfax,+Inc)&sll=38.930037,-92.308502&sspn=0.044401,0.11467&ie=UTF8&t=h&\
z=16&iwloc=addr

Please RSVP by monday so we can get a head count for refreshments, but
if you cant rsvp you're still welcome to attend.

Thanks,
James

Hello, All!

Kenny Rubin's presentation is really titled "Agile Requirements 'R
Us", like Toys 'R Us.  Kenny is a very knowledgeable and interesting
speaker.  He teaches user stories in the style of the Mike Cohn
book, "User Stories Applied".

GB.


--- In xpstl@yahoogroups.com, "James Carr" <james.r.carr@...> wrote:
>
> Hi All,
>
> The next Mid MO XP Usergroup meeting will be on April 9th. Our
guest
> speaker will be Kenny Rubin
> (http://www.scrumalliance.org/profiles/77-kenny-rubin) and his
> presentation topic will be "Agile Requirements or Us." More
> information on his presentation will follow.
>
> As usual, the meeting will be held at the CARFAX Data Center in
> Columbia, MO. For those of you who haven't been here before, refer
to
> the following google map:
>
> http://maps.google.com/maps?
f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=2301+Maguire+Blvd,+Columbia,+MO+65201+
(Carfax,+Inc)&sll=38.930037,-
92.308502&sspn=0.044401,0.11467&ie=UTF8&t=h&z=16&iwloc=addr
>
> Please RSVP by monday so we can get a head count for refreshments,
but
> if you cant rsvp you're still welcome to attend.
>
> Thanks,
> James
>

Hi All,

Sorry for the late notice, but unfortunately our guest speaker isn't
feeling too well this afternoon and won't be able to make it. So our
April meeting will be cancelled this evening unfortunately.

Regards,
James

On Fri, Apr 4, 2008 at 6:49 AM, Michael and Diana Finney
<lovefinney@...> wrote:
> I plan on attending.
>
>  http://upcoming.yahoo.com/event/468857
>
>  Mike
>
>
>  --
>  Michael Finney - "Always Striving To Serve You Better Every Day"
>  finney@...
>  http://www.SmilingSoftwareSolutions.com
>
>
>
>  -----Original Message-----
>  From: mid_mo_xp@yahoogroups.com [mailto:mid_mo_xp@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf
>  Of Gary Brown
>  Sent: Thursday, April 03, 2008 8:17 AM
>  To: mid_mo_xp@yahoogroups.com
>  Subject: [mid_mo_xp] Re: [ANN] Mid Mo XP User Group Meeting April 9th
>
>  Hello, All!
>
>  Kenny Rubin's presentation is really titled "Agile Requirements 'R
>  Us", like Toys 'R Us.  Kenny is a very knowledgeable and interesting
>  speaker.  He teaches user stories in the style of the Mike Cohn
>  book, "User Stories Applied".
>
>  GB.
>
>
>
>  --- In mid_mo_xp@yahoogroups.com, "James Carr" <james.r.carr@...>
>  wrote:
>  >
>  > Hi All,
>  >
>  > The next Mid MO XP Usergroup meeting will be on April 9th. Our
>  guest
>  > speaker will be Kenny Rubin
>  > (http://www.scrumalliance.org/profiles/77-kenny-rubin) and his
>  > presentation topic will be "Agile Requirements or Us." More
>  > information on his presentation will follow.
>  >
>  > As usual, the meeting will be held at the CARFAX Data Center in
>  > Columbia, MO. For those of you who haven't been here before, refer
>  to
>  > the following google map:
>  >
>  > http://maps.google.com/maps?
>  f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=2301+Maguire+Blvd,+Columbia,+MO+65201+
>  (Carfax,+Inc)&sll=38.930037,-
>  92.308502&sspn=0.044401,0.11467&ie=UTF8&t=h&z=16&iwloc=addr
>  >
>  > Please RSVP by monday so we can get a head count for refreshments,
>  but
>  > if you cant rsvp you're still welcome to attend.
>  >
>  > Thanks,
>  > James
>  >
>
>
>
>  ------------------------------------
>
>  Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>  No virus found in this incoming message.
>  Checked by AVG.
>  Version: 7.5.519 / Virus Database: 269.22.5/1358 - Release Date: 4/3/2008
>  6:36 PM
>
>  No virus found in this outgoing message.
>  Checked by AVG.
>  Version: 7.5.519 / Virus Database: 269.22.5/1358 - Release Date: 4/3/2008
>  6:36 PM
>
>
>

AppFuse:
Igniting your applications with AppFuse

by
Ryan Withers, Senior Software Engineer
Object Computing, Inc. (OCI)
Introduction

"How soon can you have it done?" Sound all too familiar? Managers over
the years have been faced with ever increasing demands to produce more
software over shorter delivery cycles. As the economic landscape has
gone global, these pressures to deliver have increased dramatically.
For software developers this results in a responsibility to achieve
the highest levels of productivity. Given this, any well meaning
developer must constantly search for the appropriate tools for the
job. In the world of J2EE, many of us find ourselves writing a little
code, adding a little configuration, writing a little code, adding a
little configuration, so on and so forth. Much of our time is spent
worrying about configuration, and this is time better spent on
business logic. Time spent configuring does not translate well into
real value. In addition, it has a huge associated risk, in that
configuration errors can introduce problems. In addition, writing the
wrote boilerplate code to glue together the various layers of a system
can be time consuming and monotonous work. If this sounds familiar,
read on to see how AppFuse can accelerate development cycles, and help
to mitigate the risks associated with configuration heavy projects.

AppFuse provides standard project templates, code generation, and a
shell of application code to get projects up and running quickly. One
of its primary strengths is the automation of configuration and setup,
two things standard in most J2EE projects. This article will show the
following three things: First, we will create a shell project. Second,
we will extend the project by hand, adding a basic time tracking page.
Third, we will wipe the slate clean, and create the same time tracking
page again. Only this time we will use the appgen tool to perform
complete code generation of the whole thing.

You can find the rest of this article at
http://www.ociweb.com/jnb/jnbMay2008.html

Best regards,
Lance Finney

In just a few short weeks (August 22nd), there will be an event called
the ITEN Elevator Pitch Intensive.  This event is an opportunity for
IT startup founders or potential founders to come and practice your
pitch.  We'll be doing this in a fun competitive manner.  It will be a
great chance to hone your pitch and meet other startup founders in the
St. Louis area.

Even if you don't have a pitch to give, you can come and see the
winning pitches!

Registration is open now!
   http://demo.busyevent.com/Gateway.aspx?GID=25

The event is being presented by ITEN
(http://www.innovatestl.org/ITEN.html) and held at the TEC incubator
(http://tecstl.org) in downtown St. Louis.

If you have any questions, drop me a line...

Alex Miller
http://tech.puredanger.com

Free Lean Software Development Course Taught On-line by Alan Shalloway