LA Drupal meetup on Tuesday, May 25th at 7:30-9:30pm in Santa Monica, CA

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christefano's picture
Start: 
2010-05-25 19:30 - 21:30 America/Los_Angeles
Event type: 
User group meeting

It's time for another LA Drupal meetup! We're being graciously hosted by Causecast at their offices in Santa Monica on May 25th, 2010. Please join us!

Attending the LA Drupal meetups is one of the best ways to meet and talk with other Drupaleros. Whether it's about finding solutions to problems you've been having, sharing something you've learned or just meeting interesting like-minded people, the LA Drupal meetups are an essential resource for Drupal professionals and hobbyists alike.

At this meetup there will be several presentations as well as time for open discussions and job announcements. Afterward, several of us will be going to a local bar or restaurant.

This event is free – in fact, there will be raffle prizes and food and drinks will be provided – and no RSVP is required. As always, last minute details (if there are any) will be sent before the meeting to those who sign up, so please consider logging in and clicking the Sign up button below.

When: Tuesday, May 25, 2010 from 7:30-9:30pm
Where: Causecast, in Santa Monica, CA at 1558 10th St. (Unit D), Santa Monica, CA 90401

Location

Google MapWe're meeting at Causecast at 1558 10th St. (Unit D) on the corner of 10th and Colorado in Santa Monica, California. There's plenty of free on-street parking.

Dubbed "a one stop philanthropy shop" by TechCrunch, Causecast is a platform where media, philanthropy, social networking, entertainment and education converge to serve a greater purpose. From the environment to human rights and animals to the arts, Causecast helps members connect to the causes, charities, and nonprofits they care about.

Causecast has been a long-time venue sponsor of the LA Drupal meetups and we're grateful for their support.

Agenda

   Community and job announcements

There's a lot going on in LA Drupal and we'll kick off the meeting with community announcements. This is also an opportunity for local businesses to make job announcements and ask for referrals and recommendations.

   An update from the LA Drupal web team

Many people know that LA Drupal has a presence on Facebook and Twitter, but you might not know that we have our own website at ladrupal.org. The LA Drupal web team has been hard at work and most will be present to introduce themselves, give an overview of the project and answer any questions from attendees.

   Panel discussion on managing online communities

Social networking sites attract all kinds of characters and occasionally a site experiences a community shifting event, like online bullying, flame wars, revolts against site management, or worse, stalking and harassment. These are defining moments in the life of a site and several LA Drupal members will describe what they've done in the past, what they would do differently today and which tools are available to facilitate community management, encourage positive behaviors and create healthy online communities.

   Raffle! Prizes! Collect them all!

We love our sponsors and have several raffle prizes from our sponsors in the Los Angeles area and around the world. If you or your company would like to sponsor a raffle prize at the LA Drupal meetups, please come early or contact the LA Drupal managers at managers at ladrupal.org.

No purchase necessary, void where prohibited and you must be present to win.

   Open Q&A

Everyone has a problem every now and then and the open Q&A session is a chance for attendees to divine answers from the collective wisdom from the group. There's no such thing as a bad question, just bad answers!

   Lightning talks

We'll also have lightning talks from attendees who would like to share something with the group. Each attendee will have at least 5 minutes and no more 10 to present on a topic of their choice. If you'd like to give a lightning talk, be sure to come a few minutes early and bring your laptop (and power and display cables) and whatever else you need.

As always, please feel welcome to leave a comment below and let others know what you'd like to present.

   Networking and cleanup

There's plenty of time for people to make connections when the presentations are over. It seems the same people are always left cleaning up, though, and we ask that everyone pitches in and helps clean up. When our beloved venue is cleaner than when we found it, several of us will be going to a local bar or restaurant.

   Afterparty at La Cabaña

In the past we've had as many as 15 people go out for food and drinks after a meetup and we hope it's no different this time. We'll be headed to La Cabaña, known for having some of the best margaritas in Los Angeles. Their tacos (made with corn and flour tortillas that are handmade on site) are half-price during Taco Tuesdays.

La Cabaña is at 738 Rose Ave. and is on the corner of Lincoln Blvd. and Rose Ave. directly across from Whole Foods.

About LA Drupal

The LA Drupal community in and around Los Angeles, California, is one of the world's largest regional Drupal user groups. With regular Drupal trainings, monthly meetings and social gatherings, LA Drupal is Southern California's largest hub for all things Drupal. LA Drupal is also the producer of the annual DrupalCamp LA conference, the largest independent Drupal event in the world for two years running.

If you aren't already part of LA Drupal, it's easy to become a member. We have several meetings every month that are free and open to everyone. There are also social gatherings and formal working meetings that sometimes happen throughout the month. Events are announced here and at the LA Drupal website.

Comments

If there is interest, I would

BTMash's picture

If there is interest, I would be happy to talk about some of the things I've been working on which include:

1) Using the farbtastic color picker on your site for color options that may not be offered by the color module. I am developing for a project which currently has an unknown set of areas that can be 'customized' by the site editor and as an end result, we have a fully working module which we're hoping to contribute back to Drupal.org.

2) Clickheat Module: As part of a site redesign, we wanted to look at how our site is currently being used. While google analytics (and the google analytics module) does a fantastic job, we have a series of external links which require some setup work for GA and we wanted to get a better idea of areas that are most scanned by visitors to our web page. We have been using the Clickheat module to help us get a better gauge on where to place important sets of information.

I'd like to hear about either

oseldman's picture

I'd like to hear about either or both of these topics

Clickheat module sounds interesting

Techivist's picture

It sounds like the Clickheat Module is a good starting point for doing A/B Testing. Looking forward to learning more about it, Ashok, as I'm planning to give a lightning talk on A/B Testing in the near future.

Miguel Hernandez - www.migshouse.com
Founder & CEO - The OpenMindz Group
Writer- Linux Journal & TechZulu

I can do a lightning talk on Pressflow

christefano's picture

I can do a lightning talk on Pressflow, a Drupal "derivative" for high performance websites. At Exaltation of Larks we've been using it exclusively instead of Drupal (that is, the Drupal download from http://drupal.org/project/drupal) and haven't looked back in well over a year.

The idea for this talk came up at the meetup at Causecast last month during Chris Miller's presentation on earthday.org and how Trellon scaled it to handle 85 million hits in 3 days. One of the key parts of their strategy was using Pressflow.

Gets My Vote

snorkers's picture

I'd love to see a punchy overview of Pressflow - performance has always been a big issue on any Drupal site I've worked on, so would interested in pros and cons of using it, as well as a developer's view after 12 months' use.

Sounds great!

Techivist's picture

+1

Miguel Hernandez - www.migshouse.com
Founder & CEO - The OpenMindz Group
Writer- Linux Journal & TechZulu

Proposed Lightening talk about VPS Hosting

nbluto's picture

I would like to suggest that possibly Christefano do a lightening talk about Linnode or anyone else who would like to share what they use for VPS for their drupal set up especially as it pertains to hosting for multiple clients on one server with or without a multi-site set up.

I will be making the transition away from shared hosting for my company and I am interested in what other people are using and how they like it and maintain it.

Ack! I wont be there!

nbluto's picture

I just found out I won't be able to make it to the meetup. Thanks for all the feedback though, it's been VERY helpful. :-)

Setting up a VPS for Drupal event

christefano's picture

There's a Setting up a VPS for Drupal event happening June 8th in Orange County. Do you think you might be able to make it to that? The discussion so far has been pretty lively.

I'll speak on the VPS I use

bvirtual's picture

A group of 16 LA Linux users (LUG/UUASC members) formed the UML Coop, and converted to OpenVZ over a year ago, and now are VPSCoop.org. We have an 8 CPU, 32G RAM, 1 terabyte RAID host in downtown LA. My VE is 20 gig HD with up to 4 gig RAM. It's fast.

Peter

LA's Open Source User Group Advocate - Volunteer at DrupalCamp LA and SCALE

Very interested to hear about this

Techivist's picture

I agree w/Nicole that a talk on Linode would be great & I also nominate Christefano since he mentioned them to me last year. Personally, I tried out Slicehost last year for a couple months & while it was decent & I had zero issues, it just sounds like Linode is a better solution for me going forward Especially since there's an install script for Pantheon/Mercury for Linode hosting. It'd be interesting to hear others' experiences on similar VPS hosting like Rackspace or AWS since those 2 seem to also be Pantheon "partners."

I'd really like to hear about the UML Co-op, Pete. I chatted briefly w/Chris Smith about the Co-op, from the same list, when I was looking into VPSes but a more detailed chat/presentation would be great. I recall almost going that route but really wanted more info. Bonus points for VPScoop.org being a Drupal site. ;)

Miguel Hernandez - www.migshouse.com
Founder & CEO - The OpenMindz Group
Writer- Linux Journal & TechZulu

Let's talk about hosting

christefano's picture

Let's talk about hosting during the open Q&A. I'm already doing a lightning talk on Pressflow and don't want to hog the spotlight.

Who uses VPS? Stand up! Share!

mike stewart's picture

I agree with Christefano, to mix it up, I'd love to hear from anyone else locally using a VPS solution, especially Mercury, on Linnode, Rackspace, AWS, etc. The more experience the better!

--
mike stewart { twitter: @MediaDoneRight | IRC nick: mike stewart }

I love to hear a talk about

dishui's picture

I love to hear a talk about linnode as well. However, this Tuesday, I will not be able to come since I have an iphone dev meeting. Hope to catch the Tuesday meetings in about 2 months time.

GRAMMY job announcement

kevcol's picture

Planning to attend, and would like to announce the GRAMMY job opening (which is also listed here: http://groups.drupal.org/node/70173.)

Cheers,
Kevin

I did build mercury image on

dishui's picture

I did build mercury image on Rackspace (using chapter 3's instruction) and also uses AWS drupal hosting with EBS or RDS hosting mysql database.
Creating AWS images either from linux distro or base on the chapter3's mercury, Using pressflow drupal instead of the regular drupal. Would love to exchange information with others who are interested in getting better performance using drupal. I am unable to come to the drupal Tuesday meetups for a little while due to schedule conflicts. So hope to participate in other ways.

Great meetup last night

BTMash's picture

Yesterday was seriously jam packed from beginning to end! The announcements, LADrupal announcement, QA session, and Chris and Christefano's lightning talks were awesome :)

As a continuation after my lightning talk from last night, I am moving forward with releasing the flexicolor module to the public (I have committed the code and opened a project on Drupal.org at http://drupal.org/project/flexicolor). An official release of the module (ie not checking out via cvs) is planned in the coming weeks.