ActivePerl 5.10.0.1003 and a Trick Question

Q: What's better than May Long Weekend?
A: Nothing, eh!

Well, I suppose the new release of ActivePerl comes pretty darn close.

That's right! We've just released ActivePerl 5.10.0.1003 and it's yours for the taking.

In addition to adding the DBD::Oracle module, ActivePerl 5.10.0.1003 includes new modules for encrypting web connections using https, creating color graphs and charts, and automating interaction with websites.

NOTE: OS X builds will now require a minimum version of 10.4

 

Number of ActivePython downloads EXPLODED!

Exploded in a good way (thankfully).

Our ActivePython downloads tripled last month, which is pretty awesome!  We are obviously providing some useful stuff for Python developers out there and that feels pretty good.

Don't know? Jump on the bandwagon here and find out for yourself.

How Many Geeks Does it Take To Screw in a Lightbulb?

More than we've got, apparently, as we're looking for some more geeks to share our office space. C'mon, get outta your basement or garage or wherever your soon-to-be-fabled start-up is hanging out, and bring your crew to our digs at Hastings and Granville. Hard to write this without it sounding like a bizarre clash between a personals ad and a dodgy craigslist pyramid marketing company, but here's the scoop:

  • The space would hold the same number of people as the average elevator; so a team of 12 or less, depending on your personal space requirements. Except it's larger than an elevator, thankfully. About 1,200 sq ft.
  • We're on the 16th floor, with great views. Except developers like the blinds closed and the lights off. But you could leave the blinds in your area open, we'll just squint if we come over and visit.
  • It's open plan, but we prefer our taste in music to yours, so we'll probably keep our headphones on and be pretty quiet.
  • We're only mildly antisocial, except around the Wii at beer-o-clock.
  • We have a lot of meetings. I don't know why that might be relevant to you, but I needed to vent. Oh, cause I was going to mention that there's a boardroom you can use. Please, book it now and book it often.
  • We'll set you up with fancy schmancy phones, but won't pay for your 1-900 calls.
  • You can have those security cards. You probably have a lanyard from OSCON that you can use for it, no?
  • Rackspace in the server room. Something about 2 U's. Isn't that a W?
  • There's a kitchen you can use with 3 different coffee makers to choose from. And 3 cafes within crawling distance. Caffeine, guaranteed.
  • BYOC. This is a bring your own computer party.
  • You're on the hook for your own chairs, desks, or yoga mats or maybe magic carpets if you're into cloud computing or something.

Well, I've probably made nonsense of the whole prospect, but if you are interested, drop me a line and I'll hook you up with the serious guy that's actually handling all this.

ActiveState Bombarding Your RSS Feeds!

Something to do with updating the RSS feed to 2.0 instead of 0.91, which didn't contain publish dates. Does this mean we're web 2.0-enabled? Always wondered what that meant. Just when web 3.0 and cloud computing are taking over the memespace....

Our apologies. You can now go back to reading your favourite blog in peace. We'll be good now, promise. (You can sign up again at http://planet.activestate.com/)

Loco at the Co-Lo (ActiveState webservices downtime)

Time to move those lovely servers that keep us ticking, so we'll be off the grid for a bit while you enjoy margaritas for Cinco de Mayo.

It's a new co-location site, only about four blocks away (wave to our web kids hauling servers down the streets of Vancouver tonight). It'll make for happier sites for ActiveState.com (accounts, downloads, and purchases will be affected), ASPN, the Open Komodo website, and the Community Site. Don't click those links I just mentioned in the next few hours though, or you'll probably get our little "no one is here to take your call" message or somesuch tech-roadblock nicety.

It'll be less than two hours—assuming no one from our team orders pitchers of umbrella drinks from the local cantina (that's a big assumption, btw). ¡Salud!

We support Oracle® Enterprise Linux

We are happy to announce that ActiveState now supports Oracle® Enterprise Linux - yup, all ActiveState products have been tested for compatibility. Oracle customers can leverage the our dev expertise and get full support for developing and deploying applications running on Oracle Enterprise Linux-based systems. Along with this announcement we have also become part of the Oracle Partner Network.

Read the official news release here.

... and don't miss out LinuxFest Northwest and eLiberatica.

Your plan for this coming weekend? Don't miss out the LinuxFest Northwest on April 26-27 in Bellingham, WA. It's a huge grassroots event that showcases Linux and open source software. Not only are we sponsoring the event, but our Shane Caraveo will be there with his presentation "Open Komodo development environment." Open Komodo is a high quality, open source development environment based on Mozilla technology. Not familiar with Open Komodo? Have questions on how to utilize its features and functionality to meet your needs? Be sure to drop by the presentation to voice your questions.

Eric Promislow will also present his talk "Scaling up With JavaScript Without Annoying Users" at the conference. Learn techniques on writing responsive applications that are user-friendly and don't take forever to load. As a heavy user of web-based apps, that's a feature I'd love to see!

Later in May, in Bucharest, Romania, Shane is going to speak at eLiberatica (May 30-31), a conference to foster discussions on open and free technologies and bring together community and business leaders from around the world to share best practices. His presentation "Why we chose to make our product open source" will explain why ActiveState open-sourced our proprietary product, Komodo Edit, and share with you the successes and challenges we've encountered.  If you ever thought of building value-added commercial software based on open source languages or open sourcing your products, definitely join Shane's discussion.

So much to learn, so little time!

Did your New Year's resolution include polishing up scripting skills and/or learning a new language—a programming language that is?  

Workshops and conferences of all sizes are happening around the world in the next two months. First up, Python Italia Due (May 9-11) in Florence. The conference, organized by enthusiasts and non-profit groups, is structured to help Python users of all experience levels gain more insights on the use of the language. Talk topics for the second annual conference are divided into three tracks: "Discovering Python," "Spreading Python," and "Learning Python," so there's something for every level of Python programmer.

Back home in Vancouver, Drupal Camp Vancouver, coming up May 9-10, will have everything you need to take your Drupal development and content management skills to the next level.  Organized by volunteers, this multi-track conference covers presentations for a wide range of audiences, including non-profits, marketers, and individuals who are simply interested in Drupal. Nothing compares to giving back to the community! If you would like to share your knowledge and be a local star, submit a talk to Drupal Camp Vancouver now. Registration for this 2-day conference is only $20. What a great event! The Komodo team is sponsoring.

YAPC::Asia - Yet Another Perl Conference in Asia will take place on May 15–16 in Tokyo Institute of Technology in Tokyo, Japan. This conference is always packed with a wide range of interesting and useful talks. Topics range from Perl testing and automation, building a highly scalable crawler, to moving from POE to Erlang. Hope you registered already because this conference is sold out!  

Back by popular demand, YAPC::Russia "May Perl" (May 16-17), previously Russian Perl Workshop,  is the second annual spring Perl workshop there. The goal of the workshop is to share ideas and practices on what Perl may be used for and where it may be used in. To encourage as many Perl enthusiasts to attend as possible, currently the workshop is free of charge to register. ActiveState is excited to sponsor such community driven event.  

Speak French and just so happen to be in Europe in May? The Afpy (French Python User Group) has packed two days full of talks into the second annual French Python Days, May 17-18. Don't just learn to build and deploy a Python application: explore how you can use Python for running database analysis, use of Django, and ensure quality and performance of the app. The event will be held at Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie in Paris.

Organized by the local Perl Mongers, the annual Nordic Perl Workshop will take place on May 24-25 in Stockholm this year.  As a workshop for the community by the community, it accepts a wide variety of talk subjects from algorithms for social graphing and web-technologies to Perl5 core optimizations and language implementation targeting the Parrot VM.  Never been to Stockholm?  Submit a talk now and you might get a chance to visit the home of Nobel Prize.

Drop by Albi on May 30-31 for the French Perl Workshop. The previous workshops have been highlighting sessions on Perl development for industries and services. This year's focus will be on the Perl capability to support scientists and teachers. In fact, there's a session dedicated on the topic: research and teaching. Amateurs and students, fear not, the workshops promise to bring you the knowledge and skills needed for programming in many styles. Professionals? Learn how to apply the power of Perl on lead projects.  

On June 2-3, the 3rd Annual DC PHP Conference & Expo will be held in George Washington University in DC. Our very own Jeff Griffiths will be there with his presentation "RIA with PHP and Open Standards" to show you how to build dynamic and pretty Rich Internet Applications with PHP and open standards. In addition to that, don't miss out the PHP IDEs panel discussion on June 3. Find out which PHP IDE is the best for you!  

Back in Europe, the Portuguese Perl Workshop, organized by APPP (Portuguese Association for Perl Programmers), will take place on June 6-7 in Braga. If you're interested in getting more out of the workshops, Brian D. Foy is giving an Intermediate Perl Training session on June 4-5. The registration to the training also includes workshop registration. Hurry up, seats are limited.  

YAPC::NA - Yet Another Perl Conference in North America, organized by local Perl user groups, is to provide an affordable conference for Perl masters and newbies alike with an amazing price of US$100 for the 3-day event. This high-profile yet inclusive conference will be held on June 16-18 on the campus of IIT in Chicago this year. Test your Perl skills and participate in the Hackathons if you'd like. Kudos to those volunteers who organize the grassroots event.  

So much to learn, so little time!  

TDK 4.1 released

Even with our fearless leader at Toolapalooza this week, we have gone ahead and released TDK 4.1. This version includes some great new features and is now available for purchase or a 21-day free trial.

Along with bug fixes, some new features include:

  • Static syntax checking (tclchecker) extended with support for some 00 extensions for Tcl
  • Tcldebugger with support for multi-threaded debugging, based on the existing feature of spawnpoints
  • Tcldebugger extended with support for snit and Tcl00

For an overview of TDK visit our website.

XTech 2008

Open data standards development has led to web-wide programming APIs and virtualization. Not only data are on the move, but applications and servers are too. This year's XTech conference in Dublin, Ireland gathers developers, information designers, and managers that work with web and standards-based technology to examine the tools and concerns of developing today's web. Join them on May 6– 9th to find out how you can have virtually everything stored and run on the Web. Of course, as Komodo team is always keen in promoting the use of open standards and initiatives, we are a sponsor!