DemoCampGuelph 14 – Cottage Edition took place on July 21, 2010 at eBar in Guelph.
Speaker
The speaker this time was April Dunford, an experienced Product Marketer. Ms. Dunford presented 20 Minutes on Messaging for Startups. The core of the talk is that good messaging answers the following questions and does so in order.
- What the heck is it?
- Is it for me (the customer)?
- Why would I buy it from you?
For more details about Ms. Dunford’s presentation you can check out the slides and the explore the volumes of excellent information on her site Rocket Watcher.
Charity
This event’s charity is Habitat for Humanity, represented by Chris from Guelph ReStore who spent a few minutes letting everyone know about the electronics waste recycling collection available. Chris shared some impressive statistics, including:
* since opening, all donations to the ReStore mean that 350 full-sized elephants worth of building materials has been redirected from landfills
* in eight months, the Guelph ReStore has accepted 134,000 pounds of e-Waste, which is 73 skids stacked 6 feet high
As the end of the night approached it was revealed that $155 was raised for Habitat for Humanity.
Demo 1
- Who are you?
- Michael Lewkowitz
- What are you showing?
- epic.io
- What qualifies you?
- Thought of it.
- What do you get out of it?
- Feedback
- What do they get out if?
- Changes how you get shit done.
Classic project management techniques like Gantt charts and todo lists act as anchors on inspiration. Epic.io changes that by putting the mission in the middle, giving people place to talk about what they’re doing and clear dashboard information focusing on progress.
Announcement
Tsavo is hiring developers, DBAs, other positions. Some postings are on the site and more are coming soon.
Demo 2
- Who are you?
- Christina Moulton
- What are you showing?
- iBBQ – You’ve got food on the Q, then realize you need beer.
- What qualifies you?
- I wrote it.
- What do you get out of it?
- I want to show off Objective-C.
- What do they get out if?
- Ideas for different platforms.
iBBQ is a simple iPad application that sets the location, hits the LCBO API (unofficial, lcboapi.com) and finds a list of the closest stores with 6-packs of Corona in stock. (This was met with loud applause.) Christina then briefly demonstrated Interface Builder and XCode and the process by which interface elements and code are connected.
The code is available on github.
Announcement
Rob Day from crashcourse.ca encouraged attendees interested in Linux Kernel development to look into the 30-lesson course offered on the site.
Demo 3
- Who are you?
- Chris and Lars? I think I got these names wrong.
- What are you showing?
- Online appointment scheduling software (ReserveMe).
- What qualifies you?
- Built it.
- What do you get out of it?
- He works with the latest web technologies and emerging technologies.
- What do they get out if?
- See technologies like web sockets and HTML5.
ReserveMe is an online appointment scheduling software intended for small service organizations like salons. It allows clients to choose an appointment time. The demoers showed the real-time updates as an appointment dragged on the application from a desktop also moved on the iPad.
Demo 4
- Who are you?
- Moe Adham from groupvestor.com
- What are you showing?
- Groupvestor, put money into the community
- What qualifies you?
- Working on it
- What do you get out of it?
- Feedback
- What do they get out if?
- Some stats, comparing new media and old.
Groupvestor is a commercial-oriented community investment site. Visitors can contribute money to a defined cause with the expectation of getting something back. Moe showed that Twitter generated more visitors to the site than a mention on CTV news, but on average, more was donated per visitor to Mel’s Diner from those who came via CTV.
Announcement
Mark Connolly from Karos Health announced they are looking for a developer, a qa developer and a co-op intern for the fall term.
Announcement
Brainpark is hiring a junior developer.
Demo 5
- Who are you?
- I missed their names, but they’re from Bloq Software.
- What are you showing?
- 2 iPad Apps
- What qualifies you?
- They developed them.
- What do you get out of it?
- Feedback and beta testers.
- What do they get out if?
- Chance to beta test.
The pair first showed their King’s Cup game, which is a drinking game where a card is drawn at random and the player performs the actions on the card. They then discussed the framework for card games that was the foundation for King’s Cup and the second app they showed was a 6-player poker game that can be played entirely on the iPad or with each player using an iPhone or iPod Touches to manage their hand.
Demo 6
- Who are you?
- Chris Menezes a masters CS
- What are you showing?
- Thesis project named VidLog
- What qualifies you?
- 2 years of research
- What do you get out of it?
- Feedback
- What do they get out if?
- Free beer, what else do they need?
VidLog is a logfile analyzer that helps bridge the gap between the intention of the software creators and how the software is actually used. Existing techniques like usability testing or professional analysis are very expensive. VidLog recreates a user’s interaction with a site from the events recorded by the logfile.
Winner
After the demos were complete the demo review board took a few moments to discuss the winner before letting the audience volume decide between iBBQ and Bloq Software. The clear winner was Bloq Software.
posted by Rob Drimmie
