Behind the Scenes at PernambucoJS 2012

April 8, 2012

Starting to write a summary before the event takes place, what do you mean?

Well… I wanted to reverse this order, because for me, it actually started 2 months ago.

Let's get started, PernambucoJS 2012 was born after some conversations with Luiz Tiago (@luiztiago) about the need to organize a meetup for PernambucoJS group, which already existed on Facebook. We teamed up with Thiago Azurem (@azurem) and developed a initial project for the event. The photo below is from our first in-person meeting to finalize the project document.

It wasn't easy for us to find a place for the event, given the initial budget we had for the project, which was R$ 0. But the desire to create something awesome for our city was stronger, so we went after it. We initially secured the auditorium at Faculdade Mauricio de Nassau, which kindly supported the event. Without this space, it would have been difficult to move forward with the project.

Considering our time constraints, as each of the three of us had professional obligations, it was quite challenging for us to create a website and a cool visual identity for the event. This is where PianoLab came in to help us and gifted us with a beautiful website, showing their full support for the event.

From there, we faced a big challenge: How to create an impressive lineup of talks, bringing in prominent names from JavaScript development in Brazil?

We didn't think small in this regard, as we wanted to bring in strong names that have made an impact on JavaScript in Brazil recently. Let's go through the names (in alphabetical order):

Bernardo Heynemann

He's currently the technical lead for Globo.com's homepage. He has extensive experience in software development, working for companies in Brazil and the UK. He's a major contributor to projects like Pyccuracy, Skink, Ion, Thumbor, and pyVows. He played a key role in implementing responsive design on etc's homepage.

Eduardo Lundgren

A former contributor to jQuery and jQuery UI projects, and now one of the main contributors to YUI in Brazil. He's also one of the creators of AlloyUI. This raises the question in our minds: Why did he leave jQuery and move to YUI? I believe that's one of the most anticipated answers of the event. He was a speaker at yuiconf 2011 in Santa Clara, California. Currently, he's the development lead at Liferay, splitting his time between Recife and California.

Jaydson Gomes

One of the creators of BrazilJS, the largest JavaScript conference in Brazil, and founder of the JavaScript developers group in Rio Grande do Sul, RSJS. He's currently a Senior Software engineer at Terra Networks.

Jean Nascimento

A NoSQL evangelist in Brazil and a major contributor to nosqlbr.com.br, javascriptbrasil.com, frontendbrasil.com.br, and jquerybrasil.org, as well as an organizer of Sampa.js. On top of all this, he manages to work as a Senior PHP Programmer at GoNow.

Luiz Tiago

A member of frontend-br, a group that started a long time ago in Recife, around 2006, I believe. He won the 2007 Big Fish Award, promoted by Arteccom. Co-founder of jQueryBrasil and PernambucoJS. He's currently the Frontend Manager at MGR Tecnologia.

Zeno Rocha

We almost had to ask his parents for permission for him to come to the event. He's one of the creators of jQuery Boilerplate and Wormz of Chrome Experiments. He used to work as a software developer at Petrobras and now works at Globoesporte.com. The permission part is a joke, as he's already 21 and studying Information Systems at the Federal University of the State of Rio de Janeiro.

Bruno Souza, Dennis Calazans, and Djalma Araújo

The first is also from the early days of frontend in Pernambuco and is now one of the development leaders at Ogilvy Recife. The second was one of the first JavaScript course instructors in Recife and is now a professor at Unibratec and Marista College. To wrap up the lightning talks, we'll have Djalma Araújo, the development lead at PianoLab and a columnist at JqueryBrasil, talking about his experience with Bootstrap.

The sponsorship of companies like Liferay, Globo.com, EIA Cursos, MV Sistemas, Terra Networks, and Servhost was of paramount importance in creating this lineup of talks. Supporting initiatives like PernambucoJS is crucial for cultivating future professionals and clients. Nowadays, it's quite challenging for companies to hire frontend developers with strong JavaScript skills.

Once registrations were opened, we didn't expect them to sell out so quickly – 100 registrations were sold in just 6 days! For the first event, this was fantastic. We're very thankful to both the registered and non-registered attendees. Due to the numerous requests for registrations that we received and the long waitlist we had, we decided to rent a larger venue and opened up 80 more slots, which are also almost sold out again! Stay tuned for the new event location, it will be at Park Hotel, near Praça de Boa Viagem in Recife.

Tweets:

Pinceladas da web

Maujor

YUI Team

Richard Worth, jQueryUI Leader

There are attendees from various cities in Brazil, such as Brasilia, Rio de Janeiro, João Pessoa, and Maceió, organized by @juarezpaf. That's all folks!

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