Jun 10 2010
If I had to choose just one word to describe EECI 2010 it would be... humbling.
The number one reason I signed up and went to EECI is because I had heard so many great things about the experience from a social perspective at the EU version last year in Leiden, The Netherlands. So naturally, I mainly expected to meet and enjoy the company of a lot of great people. I came away with a lot more. I met a lot of incredibly intelligent (and friendly) people that I had either already interacted with online in some way or that I only knew of in some fashion. Meeting them is one thing, but then to learn so much from these folks is nothing short of awesome. And I'm not just referring to the presenters.
The Talks
I didn't partake in any of the Masterclasses the first day. No particular reason, but I'm glad I didn't. Not because I hadn't heard good things, but because I ended spending that day meeting and getting to know some of the aforementioned people I had only "met" online and was introduced to some other great folks. That was priceless.
The first conference day itself though was packed with great info and inspiring takeaways, starting with the morning keynote by Rick Ellis & the EllisLab team. Their emphasis was on community, which gets thrown around a lot on the forums and Twitter. In fact, the concept of community gets thrown around so much that it's becoming a bit cheesy and cliched. But I'll take it. The EE community (I can't really speak to the CI community) is an incredible one. A lot of smart designers and developers helping each other out whenever we can and rallying behind an incredible CMS platform.
The rest of the morning was filled by a great presentation by Simon Collison, a well-known designer at Erskine Design, followed by Adii Rockstar of WooThemes, and a surprise by the EllisLab crew. Lead by Derek Allard, EllisLab announced their lightweight CMS, MojoMotor. I don't think I've seen so many excited designers and developers in one room before. MojoMotor looks incredibly promising for those tiny sites that need plenty of control over content without a lot of features or fluff. But that's a topic for another blog post.
The afternoon was then filled by two tracks: one for ExpressionEngine and one for CodeIgniter. Seeing as how I'm a designer / front-end developer, I stuck with the EE track and enjoyed all 4 presenters (Jamie Pittock, Lea Alcantra, Leevi Graham and Ryan Irelan). Each had great info, but for me, Leevi's presentation (The Art & Science of Designing, Planning & Constructing a Maintainable Content System) and Jamie's presentation on organizing code within ExpressionEngine, were awesome. While I've always considered myself adept at planning and having streamlined code and a workflow to keep development time down, both of these guys presented information that I've already implemented into my ExpressionEngine workflows. Nice job to both of them!
Conference Day 2 was just as informative with a trio of great presentations for the EE track: Brandon Kelly of Pixel & Tonic, Michael Boyink of Train-ee.com and Matt Weinberg. Again, I truly, truly enjoyed all three talks (and it was especially nice to finally meet Mike Boyink in person), but the one that stood out the most for me was Matt's presentation on E-commerce & ExpressionEngine. He had so much information on not just the e-commerce options for ExpressionEnigne, but their pros and cons, and even more importantly, PCI compliance and what our choices, options and responsibilities are as developers serving clients. My head felt like it was ready to explode, but Matt did an incredible job of explaining things clearly and succinctly.
My Overall Take
Would I recommend EECI to other EE developers? In a heartbeat. It's one of the best ways to further immerse oneself in what truly is a community of pretty cool people who happen to love two pretty cool pieces of software. Yeah, I know I'm playing into the community cliche, but it truly is a community. What makes it even more special is the fact that EllisLab knows, acknowledges and caters to it.
So if you're an EE developer and you're not already on your way to being an active member of this community online, you're missing out. If you didn't get a chance to go to EECI this year, sure go ahead and order the DVD. Just know it's nothing like actually being there - some of the best stuff comes out of the conversations before, between and after all the talks.
And to my fellow EE devs I met for the first time ever, or for the first time in person... it was a true pleasure!