Vegas, Baby!

I'm off to MIX. Though I've presented at a few smaller, regional conferences in the past, this is my first time ever attending a big developer conference. It'll be exciting to attend MIX but there's a much more important reason for the trip. Tendr.me is gathering there (we're bi-costal) to celebrate and hold our first hackathon. Why the celebration? The heavens smiled down upon us last week and final approval went through with our ACH provider. For those not in the know, ACH is what makes Tendr.me possible: it's the means by which Tendr.me can debit and credit bank accounts. Without it, Tendr.me would have been DOA.

In the tradition of successful hackathons before us we'll be hacking all week and subsisting on a strict diet of high octane, highly bad-for-you sundries. Actually, I'm lying. I hate junk food. Not to mention my stomach is extremely sensitive and that stuff causes me much gastro discomfort. However, I will make sure my web developer adheres to the hackathon diet. My stomach will live vicariously through his. Also on the agenda is playing a continual loop of movies in the background. This is our list so far:

• Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure
• The Breakfast Club
• Ferris Bueller's Day Off
• The Great Gatsby
• Hackers
• The Hangover
• Office Space (thanks Bill)
• Pirates of Silicon Valley
• Sneakers
• The Social Network

Any essential flicks we're missing?

Please get in touch with @xanadont if you'd like to meet up. See you there.

Blog Commitment

I've been quiet here for a while, folks. This is me making a new commitment to my blog. You'll find regular posts about zigGIS, Tendr.me, and Current. A quick word about Current - you haven't heard about this one yet but it's a startup I'm involved in that hopes to apply a software engineering discipline to revolutionize (excuse the hyperbole) the mom & pop / boutique construction industry. We're hoping to bring an elegant and user-centric experience to the inudstry's process of estimating and managing projects.

I've been doing 100% of the engineering work for the past 8 months. The CEO is a good friend of mine who is doing an excellent job of dreaming big and exposing our ideas to the industry. A quick & dirty demo may be seen here. Note that you won't be able to see the realtime estimate report unless you right-click > Install onto this computer (do the reverse to painlessly uninstall). In the future I'll get into the technology and write up a tutorial or two on the various things I've been learning while developing with Silverlight.

Quick updates about my other endeavors:
1. zigGIS is NOT dead, I promise. I'm currently in talks with a company (to remain unnamed until things are finalized) about a partnership that should greatly increase zigGIS's reach and resources.
2. Tendr.me is in the final stages of securing our payment provider. Fingers crossed!!!

Thanks for your time. I'll be back soon.