That would be presentations by yours truly!

I am obviously no stranger to thrilling presentations, nor am I a stranger to writing thrilling presentation abstracts.  Despite how exciting my proposals were, however, I was frozen out of DevTeach 2007: The Montreal Years.  Sure, I got reasons like, "You're up against MVPs who are presenting similar topics" but I think we all know that the legitimate reason was that people in Montreal are frightened of too much rampaging masculinity.  As you all know, I am used to being shunned and hated for being this attractive, so I let it slide.

Things have changed.  DevTeach in November will *not* be in Montreal.  Instead, it is going to be in my favorite city of all time. In Vancouver, beauty and narcissism are not feared - they are commonplace; this alone ensures me an easier battle than the one I faced submitting to Montreal.

Like last time, I was warned that I'm up against stiff competition - people like Jeremy Miller, JP Boodhoo, and Ayende have all submitted talks that cover some of the same subjects I am.  I remain unfazed; while I do not possess an MVP or a book deal, I *do* possess unbounded charisma and unmatched sex appeal, which are of course far more important than technical credibility!   If that alone were not enough, two of my abstracts are team presentations that absolutely no one in their right mind would refuse.

I figure that my talks being accepted are a foregone conclusion and I'll be entertaining you all in Vancouver this November.  However, in the million billion to one chance that my talks are not included in the DevTeach presentations, I wanted you to all see the stellar material the DevTeach exec rejected.  This way, when you picket the conference with your signs and your rotting vegetables, you can know you are doing so with an informed mind. Here they are:

A guide to Resharper because I want a free license (300 level)

Forget about continuous integration and let's talk about continuous orgasm - that's what Resharper does for all those who dare to wield it.  You pretty much can't attend a .NET themed presentation without someone talking about how Resharper improved their development life, their family life, *and* their sex life.  Justice is here to give you the *details*, and show you exactly how Resharper can fix your code, fix your house, and even fix your dog!  If you've ever wondered what all the hype is about, this presentation is for you!  Presenters everywhere use Resharper, and *they* get free licenses from JetBrains...why doesn't Justice?  Will JetBrains pony up with the potential announcement of this presentation?  You'll have to attend to be sure!

Silverlight: We have seen the future and it is SEX (200 level)

Are you ready to redefine software development as we know it?  Are you ready for a new era of rich web applications?  Most importantly, are you ready to get laid anytime you *want*?  If the answer is yes, then *you* are ready for Silverlight!  Is this really the Flash-killer it is touted to be?  Will you ever need Javascript again?  The hottest new thing in software development gets presented by the hottest new thing in software developers as Justice Gray brings you the technology that may change EVERYTHING YOU KNOW about web development!

Scott Bellware: A Retrospective (400 level)

Why didn't Justice get his talks accepted at the last DevTeach?  No one is really sure, but he's definitely bound to get on the speakers list with the most obsequious presentation in DevTeach history!  See Justice suck up to Scott for 70 minutes straight!  We'll visit the laughter, the loves, the triumph and the tears of the most controversial figure in the .NET world today.  Is there any way Scott Bellware can justify vetoing over an hour of hero worship?  I don't think so either!!

.NET 3.5, the language that borrows from Ruby (300 level)

Everyone wants a piece of .NET 3.5, and for good reason; the latest iteration of the .NET Framework is bundled with a whole host of incredible features, including extension methods, LINQ, and lambda methods!  Sure, most of these were all in Ruby before but at least now they're in .NET!  Join Justice for an introduction to the language upgrade that might give you a bad case of deja vu, as we go through the major new features of .NET and where they *really* came from.  Bonus: watch Justice pick fights and start religious wars with random zealots in the audience!

IronRuby: It’ll make you cut yourself (200 level)

This is so bleeding edge that Justice needs bandages just typing about it!  The top-rated introduction to Ruby is back, with a *massive* difference: it's now in .NET!  All of the seductiveness, the sassiness, and Transformers of the original - only this time wrapped up in the DLR!  This just might be the last chance you have to get onboard the Ruby train before you're left behind...FOREVER!  IronRuby isn't out yet, but it *will* be out prior to DevTeach 2007 and that's all the time Justice needs to take you on a magic carpet ride through the ins and outs of Ruby's crystal persuasions!

27 books in 75 minutes (400 level)

Justice Gray had a lofty goal of reading 27 technical books in 27 weeks; by the time DevTeach Vancouver hits, that goal will be achieved!   But you're a busy person - you don't have 27 weeks!   Don't worry, Justice has read all of these books so that you don't have to!  With a whopping *3 minutes* per book, you'll finally know enough of the important points to pretend *you've* read them all as well!  "Learn C# in 30 days" has *nothing* on this, the hour that turns *you* into a software development expert!

Mock Objects Demystified (300 level)

No discussion of mock objects seems to be without an explanation of the Model-View-Presenter pattern and a lecture on why coding to interfaces is useful.  But what about a presentation on all the in-depth details and analysis on the mocking frameworks themselves?  Justice Gray provides you with the mocking presentation you’ve been waiting for without all the sidebars into pattern discussion.  Learn what mocking is, why mocking makes unit testing totally awesome, and most importantly, all of the details and differences between the three major mocking frameworks (TypeMock, Rhino Mocks, and NMock)!

Stop the Insanity: Refactoring for Fun and Profit (300 level)

Get ready to be completely indispensable to any of your clients, companies, family and friends!  Are you ashamed of the application you're currently working on?  Does your architecture make you want to break down in tears?  Do you think it would be nice if it looked like your application even *had* an architecture?  Then this is the presentation for you!  Justice is here to show you how to TAKE CONTROL of your codebase without simply tearing everything down and starting over!  There are countless applications with a tangled code-base that are *begging* for even a semi-talented software developer to come in and work their magic!  And if a clueless himbo like Justice can do it, just imagine what you can do with actual talent!!!   The road to sleeping on giant piles on money starts here!

Pimp Your UI With AJAX – Javascript doesn’t suck, but *you* do: a cooperative presentation with D’Arcy Lussier (300-400 level)

The Mad Mexican and the Mad Metrosexual pair up to give the presentation of a LIFETIME!  That's right, the red-headed stepchild of the development language family has finally had enough of being beaten across its backside with a Singapore cane!!  Now it's your turn!  For the first time in recorded history, D'Arcy Lussier *and* Justice Gray show you the wonders of closures, prototype and classic inheritance, JSON, private instance methods and *MORE*, finishing off with what everybody wants but nobody gets - deep exploration of the Javascript code beneath the ASP.NET AJAX Framework!!  If Javascript is good enough for Google and Microsoft, it's good enough for you, you thankless strong typers!
 

Drunken Design Patterns: now a team presentation with Donald Belcham~~~! (300-400 level)

Yes, you read that right - history will be made at DevTeach 2007 as Justice Gray and Donald Belcham JOIN FORCES for the biggest team-up since Michael Knight met KITT!  You've read Design patterns.  You've seen The Gang of Four.  BORING!!!  Sure, it's a good book, but we all know it is *tremendously* dry; this presentation is anything *but* dry!!  Have you wanted to learn design patterns but been put off by the academic tone of the GOF book?  Too ashamed to buy "Head First Design Patterns" because of the porn-star cover?    This presentation will give you all of the thrills of design pattern goodness but with Justice *and* Donald taking shots of tequila at 2 minute intervals!!!  Watch as the leaders of the Edmonton .NET User Group get progressively more inebriated, eventually degenerating into abusive rants at the audience, and finishing the presentation with Justice's spectacular projectile vomiting and Donald's awkward groping of front-row audience members!   Guaranteed to be the one presentation you will *NEVER* forget, no matter how badly you want to!!

How to be a better *looking* developer (400+++++)

Most of the presentations at DevTeach might help you get better at developing software.  But only one of them will show you the *other* way to stand out among your peers and get recognized by management - by being incredibly good-looking.  And who better to show you how to get there than North America's Favorite Metrosexual Software Developer?  Justice Gray is here to help in the session that will bring you closer to sexual encounters than you ever thought possible!  Silverlight and IronRuby are great to know, but all of your knowledge is useless if you keep wearing white socks with black pants!  Whether it's the wonders of basic color matching, the controversial topic of regular bathing, or a guide to shaving off that neckbeard, Justice has you covered!