Details (location, map, time) are at the Group Site. Hope to see everyone there !

Details are at the Group Site. Hope to see everyone there !

Cult of Mac, originally uploaded by tombolav.

I finally posted all my photos of WWDC2008 in flickr. This has got to be my favorite shot.

I also have some pictures of the CocoaHeads meeting at the Apple Store. Including this one of Gus Mueller

Gus Mueller, originally uploaded by tombolav.

I still need a lot more practice before I can get as good as Gruber or BagelTurf, but I think I still manged to add some value.

Oops I almost forgot to post to this blog. The official announcements for NSCoder Nights DC have moved to this google group. The plan is to meet at La Madeleine in Bethesda at 7:00p tonite. Sorry for the short notice in this blog.

OK, so we have not found the perfect spot yet… but we’re getting there! Tonite we will try to meet at Camille’s Sidewalk Cafe which should be very close to the Courthouse Metro Station (on the orange line on the Metro Map) As always the meeting should be from 7:00pm to 9:00pm. This will be interesting since Camille’s closes at 8:00pm. Like I said, we have yet to find the perfect place.

To facilitate communications withing our little community, I created a new group in Google called NSCoderNightDC. I sent out invitations to the email addresses I have, but if you want to be added to the group I guess you can contact me or do it directly through the group. I am new to this, so please be patient with me. 

If you plan on comming please let me know, you can either mail me directly (jose at teguz dot com) or comment here. This is not the best day for me to have forgotten the iPhone… but that is exactly what I did!! Please be prepared for last minute changing plans. Try to be in touch via as much as possible in case we need to change plans (like say when they kick us out at 8:00pm). I will try to comunicate as much apossible. I will twitter our moves (assuming twitter is working). My twitter ID is josevazquez, not very mysterious or fun I know…

OK, I think that is it for now. Hope to see you soon.

Today we will try out our new location in Downtown DC. I know this location is a compromise, and it probably is not “ideal” for anyone. Hopefully it is not too painful for anyone. I really hope it does not prevent anyone from coming. The idea of the new location is the everyone will be able to get here.

The best place I have been able to find is Caribou Coffee at 13th & G. I liked Metro Centro for the obvious reason that it is in the center of the Metro system. Plus the Red, Green and Blue lines seem to cover most of the the directions we are comming from.

The idea is to meet from 7:00pm to 9:00pm. Since this is the first time we meet there, I am guessing we might have some trouble getting the timming just right. I will try to be there early just to make sure.

Please let me know what you think about the new location in the comments.

I have been talking about the meetings with a bunch of people today and we will be moving the meeting to the downtown DC area. I have been looking at maps, metro lines, and Coffee places with WiFi. The best place I have been able to find is Caribou Coffee at 13th & G. I liked Metro Centro for hte obvious reason that it is in the center of the Metro system. Plus the Red, Green and Blue lines seem to cover most of the the directions we are comming from (except for the Green line which I will be using I guess I’ll have to transfer after all)  My plan is to start meeting there starting next week. As for this week, we’ll be meeting in the Panera’s at Tyson’s  as usual.

I am sorry I have been so inconsistent for the last month or so. Since Luis de la Rosa organized the Cocoa coders get together, I have been doing the NSCoder Night thing in Silver Spring, MD at Mayorga’s. That location is closer to where I work, while Tyson’s is on my way home. We have a small but consistent group going at Silver Spring, but I really do not want to abandon the Tyson’s area. So I think I will start alternating. One week here one week there. It is not the perfect plan, I wish we had larger groups so that the meetings would go on even if I was not there. So far, most meetings would not be meetings at all if I wasn’t there

I will try to come up with a calendar or something to publish dates well in advance of where I will be at any given day. I have a couple of other ideas I would really like to implement. I definetly need to start an online group (google or yahoo group) to facilitiate notification of upcoming events and such. I need to seriously clean up this blog page so it is more informative. but most importantly I would like to give the meetings some more purpose. So far, most meetings wind up being just social get togathers where we discuss the latest mac/cocoa news. This is GREAT! never the less I want this to be more of a vehicle for learning cocoa and I feel I have made little progress in this respect. I am going to buy the new Hillegass book and I was thinking maybe we could all work on chapters together. I know a lot of the book might be repetition for the more advanced people out there, but still it might be a good excercise to refresh knowledge. The idea would be to anounce at least a week in advance the chapter for the week. Everyone would then be responsible to read the chapter, follow the tutorials and more importantly work on the challenges. We could then compare notes during the meetings and help each other out. Think about it, in a couple of months we would have a very strong comunity with know how in things like Core Animation and Core Data. Once we finish the book we could move on to coumunity projects… anyways… I’m getting ahead of myself.

Please chime in with your own ideas in the comments. I would really love to see this DC area comunity grow in the ways of Cocoa!

Ohhh yes… and in case you don’t know here are the directions to the Panera’s near Tyson’s Corner for tonite’s meeting (7:00pm)
View Larger Map
 

Sorry for the short notice. I am not feeling well so I can not meet tonite. I sent e-mail to those who were signed up for today, but everyone seems a little tied up today.

Once again, I plan on being at Mayorga Coffee Factory in Silver Spring for this week. It turns out, there are people interested in meeting out here (I work in this area, but live closer to Tyson’s Corner). So, as long as people in the Silver Spring area are interested in meeting, I will be holding the meetings there. If people are interested in meeting around Tyson’s Corner (or perhaps other places) please let me know and I will try to work it out.

I am really interested in meeting with as many people as possible. I think discussion and sharing ideas are powerful tools indeed. I don’t mind having to move my commute around (it’s already an hour long as it is… so what the heck!). I am even open to trying other days of the week.

So if you are in the D.C. area and you want to talk about Cocoa or Apple in general, you know how to contact me.