Lambda Lounge

Last week’s Strange Loop conference expanded minds in ways that may not be immediately obvious. Yet, time marches on and in this coming week, we find ourselves face to face with the next Lambda Lounge…. In which, Clojure  language contributor Daniel Solano Gomez will deliver a talk on Clojure Transducers. As well, in the second half of the meeting we will have a selection of Strange Loop attendees talking about notable sessions from the conference.

Food sponsor for the meeting will be Asynchrony Labs.  As usual, you are welcome to bring a tasty beverage of your choice.  Also, any non-perishable food or in-kind donations brought to the meeting will be delivered to Circle of Concern.

Doors open at 6. I really hope to see you there!

Another Lambda Lounge is around the corner and this next one should be a lot of fun. We have two talks to grow your mind: first, Bill Bennett will present “Finite State Machines as Bottom Up Function Evaluators”, followed by Lance Kidwell showing us “How to Use the Web for Evil”. The food sponsor for the night is Net Effects.

As usual, you are welcome to bring a refreshing beverage of your choice.  As well, any non-perishable food donations brought to the meeting will be delivered to Circle of Concern.

Doors open at 6.

The occasion of the next Lambda Lounge is nearly upon us. This month, we have two great talks from tech enthusiasts: Soumya Sanyal will deliver a talk called “Geometric Methods in Concurrency and Security” followed by Aditya Siram presenting on the ATS Programming Language. Our food will be sponsored by SBS Creatix, who have also made a generous donation to the Lambda Mentors program. Thank you SBS Creatix!!!

As usual, attendees are welcome to bring a beverage of their choice. Anyone interested in bringing non-perishable food donations for Circle of Concern will have their donations delivered on the weekend after the meeting.

Doors open at 6. I hope to see you at the meeting.

The July Lambda Lounge is this week and we have two talks that are sure to engage you. The first marks the just-passing-through-town return of Nate Young, who will be giving a talk on Continuations in Racket. Following that, Gary Sibbitts will present a talk called “Hack U” on why learning programing is unnecessarily hard.  The food sponsor for this meeting is Strategic Staffing Solutions.

Additionally, there will be a brief discussion with folks who have been participating in the Lambda Mentors program to hear about their experiences so far and the money raised by the program.

As usual, attendees are welcome to bring a beverage of their choice. Anyone interested in bringing non-perishable food donations for Circle of Concern will have their donations delivered on the weekend after the meeting.

Doors open at 6. I hope to see you at the meeting.

On Thursday, June 4th, come to Lambda Lounge to hear Chris Gore tell the entire history of computers and failure. Or the failure of computers? Whichever.

Following that, we’ll have a panel discussion (with plenty of audience participation) about: “What are the important problems in our field?” (where ‘important problem’ is defined by Richard Hamming as one whose solution will have an impact, and for which you have a reasonable attack.) Panelists include Josh Weaver, Alan DeGuzman, Ryan Richt, and Heath Borders. Jessitron will moderate.

Food is sponsored by Adaptive Solutions Group. Not sure what it’ll be yet, but it might be especially delicious.

Doors open at 6, meeting at 6:30. Bring any beverage of your choice, and nonperishable food items if you would like to donate to Circle of Concern.

Good people of Lambda Lounge, I am extremely excited to announce the next meeting, which will take place Thursday, May 7. We have two great talks that will entertain and boggle the mind.  First, in “Intro to Rust“, David Sullins will explore the Rust systems-programming language and highlight its safety, concurrency, and speed-related features. Next, a presentation by Soumya Sanyal and Chris Hathhorn will provide an “Introduction to Typed and Polymorphic Languages” with examples of typed and untyped lambda calculi in Haskell. Bring aspirin and a warm towel to wrap around your head for this one.

The food sponsor for this month is Preferred Resources, who will be providing a variety of pizzas from Fortel’s.

As usual, attendees are welcome to bring a refreshing beverage of their choice. Also, we appreciate any non-perishable food donations, which will be delivered to Circle of Concern by yours truly.

Finally, I am hoping to welcome some new folks to the group this month who will be participating in the Lambda Mentors program that I announced at the last meeting.  Please come and welcome new folks who are trying to get established in our field as well as support the mentors who will be working with them.

Doors open at 6.

April is almost here and the next Lambda Lounge is sneaking up on us. This Thursday, April 2, we have two great talks for the evening that I hope you will not miss.  First, Naeem Bari will present a talk called: Startups and the Techie, in which we will learn how to create a fantastically successful and profitable startup venture.  The second talk of the evening will be titled: Contracts and Clojure: The Best-Yet Compromise Between Types and Tests by Jessica Kerr, and will feature insights on how the Prismatic Schema library brings contracts to Clojure.

Food sponsor for this meeting will be Beacon Hill Technologies.  As usual, attendees are welcome to bring a delicious beverage of their choice.  Also, any non-perishable food donations brought to the meeting are greatly appreciated and will be delivered to Circle of Concern. A great thanks to all of you who have thought to contribute to our monthly donation to that organization.  It makes a difference!

Doors open at 6. See you Thursday!

The March Lambda Lounge will feature a series of lightning-talk style overviews of 11 different influential computer science papers. Originally listed on Michael Fogus’ blog, these papers cover some important thinking on the topics functional programming and distributed computing. Catered Mexican food for this meeting is sponsored by Asynchrony. As usual, attendees are welcome to bring a refreshing beverage of their choice (some soda will be provided). Also, if anyone would like to bring non-perishable food or other in-kind items for donation to Circle of Concern, those donations will be delivered on the Saturday after the meeting. This meeting will cover some great ideas in the field of programming. I hope you can join us and participate in the discussion.

The meeting will be held in room 225 of the Climate Corp offices. Doors open at 6. A map to the building of the meeting place can be found here.

The first Lambda Lounge of the 2015 is nearly here and there are 2 great talks that I am happy to announce. Andreas Grabner is coming from Austria to deliver a talk titled: Avoid the Top Application Performance Mistakes. Following that, Jessica Kerr will give a talk called Complexity is Outside the Code (which was delivered as a keynote address at the 2014 CodeMesh conference in London).  Food at the meeting will be sponsored by Fast.  As usual, you are welcome to bring a beverage of your choosing to enjoy during dinner and the talks.

This will be the first meeting at OUR NEW LOCATION (4 City Place Drive – Suite 225) in the office of our new hosts Climate Corp.

If you would like to bring a non-perishable food donation or child’s gift to the meeting, Mario will deliver it to Circle of Concern on the Saturday following the meeting.

Doors open at 6.  I look forward to seeing all of you in the facility on Thursday.

People of Lambda Lounge, it is with great excitement that I announce the next Lambda Lounge. This Thursday, December 4,  we have a very special guest traveling in from Chicago to speak to us: Coraline Ada Ehmke.  This meeting will feature two talks of hers: “He Doesn’t Work Here Anymore” and “Test-Driven Refactoring” (abstracts below).  I would like to thank Preferred Resources for sponsoring Coraline’s travel expenses.  Sushi on the night of the meeting will be provided by Fast.  As usual, you are welcome to bring a beverage of your choosing to enjoy during dinner and while Coraline is speaking.

On this 6th anniversary of Lambda Lounge, consider reviewing the meeting archives for our group.  We’ve had so many great talks, discussions, and coding events. We illustrate the deep and rich pool of programming enthusiasts in St. Louis (including those who have left the area over the years).

If you would like to bring a non-perishable food donation or child’s gift to the meeting, Mario will deliver it to Circle of Concern on the Saturday following the meeting.

Doors open at 6.  I look forward to seeing all of you in the regular meeting place on Thursday (1st floor meeting room, 680 Craig Road, Creve Coeur, MO 63141).

Abstracts for Coraline’s talks:

Test-Driven Refactoring:

There are dozens of code metrics tools available to Rubyists, all eager to judge our codebases and tell us things that we probably already know. But when technical debt is piled high and feature friction really sets in, we need more than to know that our User class has a “D” grade. How can we use tools and tests to help us formulate a refactoring plan that amounts to more than just rearranging bricks in a crumbling building? Let’s explore some of the more interesting code analysis tools, take a look at our testing techniques, and find novel ways to combine them into a meaningful refactoring strategy.

He Doesn’t Work Here Anymore:

What happens when a successful and visible software developer announces to the world that they plan to transition from male to female? I would like to share the lessons I’m learning, the perspective I’m gaining, and the inspiration I’m finding through the experience of living and working in two genders. How is this change impacting my career as a developer? My relationship with the development community? Is it influencing how I create and appreciate code? My hope is to spark conversations and create opportunities for shared learning and growth by exploring the intersection of gender and technology.