This month's topic: The Feel of Scala

Scala is a new language for the Java Platform that blends object-oriented and functional programming concepts. This talk will focus on the design choices of Scala, and what they mean for developer productivity. The talk will highlight what it means to program in a functional style, and show you how Scala facilitates a hybrid of functional and imperative programming styles. The talk will also explore how Scala compares to dynamic languages such as Ruby and Python. And you'll see examples of real, production Scala code that will illustrate what it feels like to program in Scala.

Speaker: Bill Venners

Bill Venners is president of Artima, Inc., publisher of Artima Developer (www.artima.com). He is author of the book, Inside the Java Virtual Machine, a programmer-oriented survey of the Java platform's architecture and internals. His popular columns in JavaWorld magazine covered Java internals, object-oriented design, and Jini. Active in the Jini Community since its inception, Bill led the Jini Community's ServiceUI project, whose ServiceUI API became the de facto standard way to associate user interfaces to Jini services. Bill is also the lead developer and designer of ScalaTest, an open source testing tool for Scala and Java developers, and coauthor with Martin Odersky and Lex Spoon of the book, Programming in Scala.

PJUG meetings start with some time to eat and socialize (pizza and beverages are provided), followed by the featured speaker, then Q&A, discussion, sometimes a drawing to give away swag. :)

Though we like knowing how many people to expect, you don't have to RSVP, on Upcoming or otherwise. Go ahead and just show up!

Many people also go for a drink and further discussion following the meeting, at a location determined ad hoc (more often than not, Jax on 2nd).

http://twitter.com/pjug http://pjug.org/ (join our mailing list, linked from the website!)

This month's topic: Java Performance Testing with Project Bonneville

Project Bonneville is Chris Cowell-Shah's evenings-and-weekends open source project for measuring the performance of certain core Java SE features. Chris will review the results of these benchmarks with an eye to addressing the following questions:

How does performance vary across JVM vendors?

How does performance vary across JVM versions?

How does performance vary across operating systems?

How does the performance of 1.4 features differ from their 1.5+ replacements?

How true are commonly held assumptions about Java performance?

Can we generate simple rules of thumb for high-performance Java SE programming?

There will also be a short discussion of the tradeoffs between micro- and macro-benchmarks. Because this is a work in progress, comments and observations about Project Bonneville's benchmarking methodology, or suggestions for future benchmarks, are especially welcome.

Chris promises a LOLCAT-free presentation, though there may be a slide or two of his kids.

Speaker: Chris Cowell-Shah

Chris does quality assurance for Oracle's Java-based Rules engine. He has also worked as an IT consultant for Accenture, and as a researcher for Accenture's Palo Alto research and development lab. He studied computer science and philosophy, and is always on the lookout for points of intersection between the two. http://www.cowell-shah.com/

PJUG meetings start with some time to eat and socialize (pizza and beverages are provided), followed by the featured speaker, then Q&A, discussion, sometimes a drawing to give away swag. :)

Though we like knowing how many people to expect, you don't have to RSVP, on Upcoming or otherwise. Go ahead and just show up!

Many people also go for a drink and further discussion following the meeting, at a location determined ad hoc (lately, the Market Street Pub at 10th and Market: http://mcmenamins.com/index.php?loc=24 ).

http://twitter.com/pjug http://pjug.org/ (join our mailing list, linked from the website!)

This month's topic: Java Performance, the Lifecycle Approach: The Game Has Changed

Java Enterprise Performance Tuning typically is viewed as someone else's job.

QA will do it. Operations will figure it out. Isn't the Dev guys supposed to find these things? But in fact it can and should be done across the lifecycle.

We will explore this new concept and other topics such as:

GC diagnosis while under load

Is my Framework doing what I want?

Hello? Is this thing (caching) on?

Who's your daddy? (How do services really interact)

Speaker: Joe Hoffman

Joe Hoffman has been designing, building and debugging Enterprise Applications for over 25 yrs, the last 11yrs in Java. He currently specializes in resolving complex performance problems for large enterprise customers across the globe. He holds a Bachelors in Computer Science and a Masters in Software Engineering but still has a blinking VCR clock. When not walking his dog, he can be found usually losing another game of racquetball.

PJUG meetings start with some time to eat and socialize (pizza and beverages are provided), followed by the featured speaker, then Q&A, discussion, sometimes a drawing to give away swag. :)

Though we like knowing how many people to expect, you don't have to RSVP, on Upcoming or otherwise. Go ahead and just show up!

Many people also go for a drink and further discussion following the meeting, at a location determined ad hoc (lately, the Market Street Pub at 10th and Market: http://mcmenamins.com/index.php?loc=24 ).

http://twitter.com/pjug http://pjug.org/ (join our mailing list, linked from the website!)

Title: The Java Hoonmobile: Designing for performance on the JVM Speaker: Cliff Moon, Boundary CTO

Abstract: The vast majority of code in this world doesn't do very much. Most code calls into a database, tweaks a few domain objects, and renders an HTML page. This talk is not about that kind of code. Sometimes your code has to go fast, as fast as the machine will run it. Which turns out is really fast in 2014. Faced with this challenge, you might reach for C, or god forbid, C++. But wait, despair not. Your life doesn't necessarily need to devolve into memory management and template hell. There is another path: Java. It turns out that if you start with the right kind of raw material with some tweaking and tuning you can turn this lowly blue collar grocery getter into a fire breathing dragster. I'll share theory, experience, and working code from one gearhead to another.

Join us Saturday, November 13th for a special showcase of audiovisual performance and interactive art.

8pm-11pm at theSlate cultural incubator in Northwest Portland. Free and open to all. The schedule:

VISITING FROM LONDON! The “Magic Wall” Antique Video Installation

Glitch-Hop-Folk-Tronic and Visuals by one-man-band Midlman Live DVD Album Recording!

Augmented Reality Mural by Studio 1

Interactive Drawing Station by Light Troupe

Multi-mapped surface laser drawing app by Ether Skawtus

You can RSVP on Facebook if you’re into that sort of thing: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=158991537467895

The Pioneer Lecture Series: Network Performance Management is coming to Portland on Wednesday, March 9th. Gain insight from the creators of TCPDUMP, WinPCap and Wireshark. You'll find out how Dr. Steve McCanne, Loris Degioanni and Gerald Combs came together as the pioneers of packet capture and analysis. You'll also find out what they see as the next generation of application aware network performance management and what it means for you.

Sponsored by Riverbed Technology