Intro

When I started down the road of submitting an abstract, I was not an IBM Champion, I wasn't entirely certain people might want to listen to what I'd like to talk about, or even 100% certain I would be able to go to Orlando for IBM ConnectED 2015. Part of my motivations for submitting an abstract for a session was to make certain I would attend. I've been honored to be named a Champion for ICS in 2015 and thankful for the opportunity to talk and to attend ConnectED.

Chalk Talks

My session abstract, from when I first submitted it (and had to hack it down quite a bit in length, to fit), was ambitious, glorious, hit on everything I wanted to cover, and involved a fair amount of work for me; I wouldn't have it any other way. I submitted my abstract and thought nothing more, and even when I first realized my submission was up for voting as a Chalk Talk, it didn't entirely dawn on me what that would entail.

For the record, I thought I had submitted for a regular session. I've no idea if I was converted into a Chalk Talk due to <reasons> or if there was a snaffu somewhere along the way. I do know that my confirmation email of abstract submission included nothing about a session type or Chalk Talks. In the end, one way or another, I have to play the cards in my hand. I can't guarantee I'll be happy it turned out this way and I'm fairly certain I'll still have a good time and get to talk with some excellent people about some very relevant topics to development.

What Is A Chalk Talk?

According to the instructions I received,

A ConnectED ChalkTalk is a relaxed, interactive discussion, with no provided media or AV. The purpose of the discussion is to gather input, feedback, and learn from each other.

The instrcutions emphasized again, that there is to be no audio/visual aids. The idea is that I'm not presenting a session, but rather facilitating a discussion. As you may notice, this rather differs from my expectations based on what I submitted.

I Swear I'm Not Whining

I'm aiming to make this an excellent Chalk Talk. Hopefully one that people will remember, or at least think about long enough to challenge any preconceptions people have about how they build "business (web) applications". But I'm obviously, understandably irked, as where I've put some work into making a demonstration of what I want to talk about (aka- talk about, show off in a demo, then provide repository access as a take-away) just doesn't fit in the same format of session; just read the current (abbreviated) description for my chalk talk:

CHALK203: From Soup to Sandwich: Making MVC Java Classes and Front-end Development Work for You We'll cover Java controller class patterns in Domino, for an AngularJS application with Bootstrap 3 to create an interface that performs great across browsers and devices, enforces application logic on the server, and makes your interface compete with the big dogs. Note: meant to be a basic level walk through of MVC, client/front-end development against a RESTful servlet, and adaptive UI. Demo fie will be provided!

My Chalk Talk

So here are my current aims:

give a great Chalk Talk, in the style IBM says they want from me (aka play ball, after all, it's IBM's conference)
hit all the subjects I mentioned (I'm still greedy, hence Deadpool's friendly face)
complement the talk with a short series on my blog
provide my demo application via GitHub, for others to play with and learn from (this is the same, thankfully)

So that's what I'm thinking. My only fear is that my once sweeping epic of a session is now significantly subdued, in my mind. Only time will tell.

ibmconnected2015

A Quick Talk