One of the things I really enjoy about traveling in Europe is the train system. They have a vibrant train system; something that we’re missing in North America.
This week, I’ve been in Europe, attending both ECOOP and Java Forum Stuttgart. Unfortunately, the “Eclipse Bistro” I assembled for ECOOP didn’t go off quite as well as I had hoped: we were scheduled opposite a handful of other events (some of which started earlier) and there was no actual advertising done by the conference to let folks know we were even there. Still, we managed to attract a good number of people for the event and had an excellent (albeit somewhat quieter than expected) event.
Java Forum Stuttgart was an entirely different experience. The place is packed and totally hopping. My talk was very well attended and–judging from the questions asked at the end–pretty well received. I quipped to Bjorn recently that I am starting to get a little tired of presenting my Eclipse RCP talk, but I think I spoke too soon: I really do love the topic, and I tweak the presentation almost every time I deliver it. It’s a pretty fun talk (IMHO).
Since I know that Gunnar loves the pictures, here’s one of the folks attending my talk (at least many of them, I couldn’t get an angle that got everybody in).
Apologies to Gunnar. I was thinking of him when I originally typed the named “Gunther”; I was talking with a gentleman named Gunther today and that–combined with a spot of jetlag–has me bewildered.
Since I started on the topic of trains, here’s a picture of the train I wanted to get on.
Unfortunately, this one wasn’t going where I wanted to go, so I instead got on the IC which was still pretty cool (even after the conductor shooed me out of first class–oops). I learned two valuable lessons while on the train: don’t try to write code on a train (I got so absorbed in what I was doing, that I almost missed my stop) and buy a first class ticket (better air conditioning).
