I was at this specific session. I was one of those who left early.
I honestly didn't think it worked out and most people I talked to after the session didn't think it worked either. To put it lightly: People had rather mixed impressions.
He was progressively writing Node.js-code without explaining any of it in detail. His way of illustrating what his code was doing, was by cross-referencing his Node-stuff to some Ruby-based BDD framework.
How do I connect that to Node? Do I need Ruby to run node?
It came off wrong to most people. Especially with the techo-music glaring in the background, some people thought he just wanted to show off how cool he was and brush his own ego.
Other's complained that if you could actually follow his demos, you already knew the stuff he was demoing, so what was the point? So what had you just learned?
And like he said: Some people directly told him it was a waste of time.
IMO it was an interesting idea taken too far.
He makes it come off as a success, but I think that is disingenuous. This session probably disappointed more spectators than any other session on that conference. And I say that as someone who knows how good Rob can be when he's at his best.
So don't be afraid to experiment. But be prepared to see your experiments fail. Every now and then they will. Even for a guy like Rob. Especially when you take it to the extreme, like he did here.
I'm watching the video right now (got interrupted, I'm 30min in).
For me this is interesting and cool. That said, my benefits are
- I can mute the video. Seriously, the (loud, annoying) music would've been the one single reason to leave the place if I'd have been there.
- I can, of course, pause and rewind, if anything happens to fast (so far I only needed to pause it for phone calls etc)
- I actually dabbled in node (and used express) before. So while some things were new to me and really nice (I liked the mongoose intro and totally loved (ab)using the mongoose tests as a storyboard), I felt that I can follow along quite nicely.
Most certainly I wouldn't have enjoyed it on-site though. This is more the kind of 'Watch notch code' format, to be enjoyed at home.
It was Mocha with CoffeeScript, not Ruby. It actually didn't come off "wrong to most people" - it was exactly 12 who left and didn't like it. Currently it's the second most watched video from the talk, and the organizers have told me it was in the top 5 in terms of interest and people's "choice".
Ultimately, I'm sorry you didn't like it, but it's disingenuous for you to paint it as a failure.
But the point is that this wasn't clear. I thought it was neat to watch (I watched a few minutes, skipped thru) but I've used node before and write a lot of JS; if I were new to this (or if you had been, say writing Lisp or something I don't know from) it would have been very confusing. The tests thing in particular was confusing. Lesson: strings resolve to true (??).
That said I think it is a great idea to do talks more like this; I've been to talks where people go on and on about the benefits and I'm thinking "where's the beef?" But a balance would be good: x% here's how you use node y%: here's WHY you use node. The latter was missing, and the former was missing if people go slowly or get stuck on the syntax or anything.
Why does it need to be clear? That is the point - I'm challenging people to think, solve, see what's happening and digest the code - and yeah I know some people won't like it. In fact I want those people to hate it. I have a sore spot with the "entitlement crowd" who need everything wrapped up sweetly with a bow - the ones who sit on their laptops in the back of the room, geek out on Twitter, and then give your talk a low rating because it was "boring slides".
Is it hard to figure out that it's CoffeeScript? I don't think so - specifically because I said that it was CoffeeScript in the beginning. You just had to read it :).
And yes! Strings resolve to true :). Madness that people got to figure that out with some code, and not a bullet point slide!
Ultimately, I'm sorry you didn't like it, but it's disingenuous for you to paint it as a failure.
Fair enough, but I just felt like painting another picture.
If I were to offer two core criticisms of the session (as I experienced it), it would be
1. that it got sort of repetitive after a while.
2. It was a constant stream of information, a constant stream of how, without any context, or small breaks where you got explained what just happened or what we were about to do. Lots of how. No why.
Without a "why", "how" will much more quickly turn "too much how". While these are just my 2 cents, I think there is some objective lessons to be learned at the bottom of this as well.
Still. I'll give you credit for not being a cliché at the conference. You are always willing to try something new and for that I admire you.
I honestly didn't think it worked out and most people I talked to after the session didn't think it worked either. To put it lightly: People had rather mixed impressions.
He was progressively writing Node.js-code without explaining any of it in detail. His way of illustrating what his code was doing, was by cross-referencing his Node-stuff to some Ruby-based BDD framework.
How do I connect that to Node? Do I need Ruby to run node?
It came off wrong to most people. Especially with the techo-music glaring in the background, some people thought he just wanted to show off how cool he was and brush his own ego.
Other's complained that if you could actually follow his demos, you already knew the stuff he was demoing, so what was the point? So what had you just learned?
And like he said: Some people directly told him it was a waste of time.
IMO it was an interesting idea taken too far.
He makes it come off as a success, but I think that is disingenuous. This session probably disappointed more spectators than any other session on that conference. And I say that as someone who knows how good Rob can be when he's at his best.
So don't be afraid to experiment. But be prepared to see your experiments fail. Every now and then they will. Even for a guy like Rob. Especially when you take it to the extreme, like he did here.