Matt, Hal, Good. I'm glad it came across ok. :) And i'm happy to hear the enthusiasm! I have a lot of it for this topic of efficient learning. And i'd also love to see courses from Dave Ross, Chris Scott, Hal Helms, Joe Reinhart, everyone that's pushing the envelope. I really think you guys could, and certainly should make a decent buck doing this, and collectively we'd all gain a lot from it.
One thing tho'. I really think it's easy to create these AV courses for CF'ers. Why? Because newbies, programmer newbies, are curious. Hungry curious. All a trainer would need to do is take 20 or 30 minutes to plan what you'd talk about for a lesson, set up your computer, maybe scribble a few notes for yourself, and then hit the record button and go. Just say and show everything you know on that topic. Let it come to you as you move through stuff. Be spontaneous, but thorough. That would be tremendously helpful, because as you spoke and demo'ed things, you'd naturally put it all in context. You'd show all the relevant stuff, and your experience with the framework would shine thru. Joe has an excellent example in his ARF! videos. And Hal, your online pod casts are plenty sufficient in quality. The same approach with video showing how to use Mach-II would be perfect. Or anything else you can teach. Like feuuu ... feuuu ... feeuuuz - bauwks. The toughest part about being a newbie is that none of the dots are connected yet, and it takes a long time to work that out on your own in fragments. Each individual dot you can learn about pretty quickly, but putting them all together so it makes sense as a system, as a whole, is hard when reading fragmented posts scattered across the internet. When someone experienced shows you and talks you through it, it helps very much to connect the dots, to connect the detail as part of the system. Hearing "the voice of experience" connects the dots. So no need to make it fun or entertaining or top notch quality, just thorough is plenty. Newbies are curious, very curious, and their curiosity will already make it very interesting to them. No need to edit it afterward if you get stuck for a few moments or cough. It doesn't need to be a professional video at all. Just say and show what you know as if a new hire was looking over your shoulder, and that's more than enough. Talk and show for 20, 30, 40 minutes, whatever time you need until you can't think of anything else to say on that topic. Take a break and if you think of something else, come back, hit the record button again and say "Hey, you know, i thought of something else i should show you." And you've got a very helpful lesson done in an hour or an hour and a half. Do 6 or 8 of those, whatever, enough to cover everything you can show about Mach-II without swimming too deeply into OO. And then upload it. You could add a lesson or two on later covering questions that have come up. Put a price on it, and sell it. And it'll be well worth it for ALL of us. Come to think of it, you can make the OO course the second in the series! People will need help with that too. Designing a model, UML and UML tools, how to implement OO constructs with CFC's, using ColdSpring with MachII, how your model connects with the Listeners, etc. - There's all kinds of things there, simple, practical, down to earth things that would be very helpful for people trying to understand OO more deeply. It could be called something like "Putting OO into Practice with Mach II." By the time you're done, Mach-II will be very, very easy to learn. And hopefully you'll have earned enough to have made it very much worth your while financially. I'm a little sorry i'm not an accomplished programmer/innovator. I see a great business opportunity here. A very strong need, and a way to fulfill it, one that could be distributed widely and created fairly cheaply. And a great value for the one paying for an online course like this. :) n. >-----Original Message----- >From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] >Behalf Of Matt Woodward >Sent: Friday, January 13, 2006 5:20 AM >To: [email protected] >Subject: Re: [CFCDev] State of Coldfusion UI Development > > >On 1/12/06, Nando <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> Mach-ii was released in a different way. It was the first OO >framework for >> CF, so the fact that it broke new ground made it look more difficult. No >> quickstart guide. You could sign up for a training with Hal and Ben. I'm >> REALLY SURE it's well worth it but any way you slice it, earning >the money >> or getting your boss to pay for it or trying to find enough developers in >> your area to join you so you could invite Hal and Ben out to >your area, and >> taking the time out for travel and the course IS harder than >reading through >> Joe's quickstart guide and starting to experiment. >> >> So that's more than perception. Mach-II is simply harder here. > >Understood, and this is something we're working on improving. I think >you'll find that the new Quick Start Guide and some of the other Intro >docs are helpful in this area. > >> The other way is to tough it out and study the source code of >the framework, >> search thru the list archives and ask a series of somewhat embarrassing >> newbie questions on the list, which nobody likes to ask. I hate >appearing as >> clueless as i am. You gotta want it to take that route. > >Isn't that a big part of what being a developer is all about? If we >don't get in and break stuff, and ask for help when we need it, I'm >not sure how we'd ever learn anything. A huge part of being a >developer in my mind is experimentation and persistence. That's one >way we learn. > >> And it could be made a lot easier to learn. Lots easier than MG is today. >> For instance, someone could set up a series of simple online courses and >> charge for them. You or Peter, Phil all come to mind. And people >would pay >> for them. And it wouldn't necessarily take you more time than >the quickstart >> did. All you'd need is Camtasia or even SnagIt would do. > >I've been considering doing this with a couple of the presentations >I've done, without the price tag. :-) I'll take that as a bit of >motivation to get off my rear and do something like this in the >not-too-distant future. > >[snip] > >> But more importantly, because we all know that our time spent >with them is >> much more worthwhile if we come knowing the basics. It just >isn't right to >> learn addition and subtraction from a calculus professor. "Let >me learn that >> on my own and then i'll go to the class." we say to ourselves. >"I don't want >> to be embarrassed." Which makes the basics hard to learn for most people, >> doesn't it? >> >> The fact that there's no easy entry for beginners is a barrier. > >Good point and again, I've received quite a bit of "thank yous" from >people for the couple of beginner-oriented documents I've done, and >I'm sure Peter's FAQs are equally helpful to beginners. We'll try to >get even more helpful stuff out there as we have time. > >[snip] > >> I'm talking the time to write all this out because i'd love to >see a bunch >> of audio visual courses online for all this stuff avalanching >down on us to >> learn in the CF world. > >Excellent thoughts. I thought the same thing when I saw the Ruby >intro video (as well as other things, but that one comes to mind in >this context) and I think you're absolutely right that this would be >helpful. Maybe some of the Mach-IIers can get together and do a "Car >Talk" type thing for Mach-II. :-) I think keeping it fun particularly >for beginners is the way to go, and it sounds like this sort of thing >would be helpful and well-received. > >[snip] > >> I hope that came across as well-intentioned as i mean it to be. > >Absolutely Nando, and thanks for taking the time to express your >thoughts in such detail. This is EXTREMELY helpful. Knowing what >people want is a huge part of the battle; the other part is just >finding the time to do it. As we make progress in this area we'll >definitely keep everyone posted. > >Thanks again, >Matt >-- >Matt Woodward >[EMAIL PROTECTED] >http://www.mattwoodward.com > > >---------------------------------------------------------- >You are subscribed to cfcdev. 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