At 10:06 AM 12/14/00 -0700, Nathan Torkington wrote:
>Gunther Birznieks writes:
> > However, I am willing to concede that as a first cut, fancy slides are
> > probably not worth it because the slides will change too often. Once v1 is
> > released, then someone can transcribe the slides to PPT (or maybe a tool
> > will exist by then) as a "stable release" if they want to (probably
> someone
> > like me.)
>
>Getting anything done with a mailing list full of programmers is
>nearly impossible. Everyone wants to write tools, but nobody has said
>"give me the slides for a week and I'll make them better". Instead
>we're arguing about the best source format :-)
That's to some degree why I had planned on being a bit quiet for a while
and not post these thoughts I was having until I had looked at the slides
in more detail and played with them a bit.
>I developed the slides in a POD-like slide format that Tom
>Christiansen uses. One of his trainers developed a slide2rtf
>converter, and the rtf can then be imported into PowerPoint. That
>doesn't work with StarOffice, as importing RTF immediately drops you
>into the WordProcessor.
>
>I think that my slides are pretty close to a v1. I don't know that
>the subsequent tweaks will be worth the hassle of PPT conversion.
>
>I'd rather not revert back to the POD-like format. Importing into PPT
>is a pain in the arse. I'd rather find someone who wants to work on
>the class and say "ok, it's yours for a week--fix it".
OK. One thing I was considering is that instead of being a monolithic
mod_perl class that it should be broken into modules with recommended ways
of piecing together the modules based on the amount of time people had.
Eventually then each module can having stats on it like how long it takes
to teach that module. If a module is a good module but takes an awkward
amount of time to teach (eg 4 hours) then maybe some material in that
module can moved to another one.
So if someone wanted to teach mod_perl at Perl Mongers in two 3-hour
sessions, we could recommend a certain set of modules. And then if someone
had 2-days to teach someone at work, then XYZ set of modules would be
recommended, and if someone has a week, we have some advanced modules at
the end.
Likewise, perhaps you are asked to go to a perl shop that has already
started using mod_perl and knows Apache::Registry, so you skip ahead to
other modules.
Anyway, if we stick with PPT as a format, then I think we would be more
likely to split the course into modules anyway because it makes it easier.
>So consider this a call to arms: anyone with StarOffice/Powerpoint
>want to bang on the class?
I won't have a solid block of time to really do justice to thinking about
this thoroughly until the weekend. So until then I am just running off at
the mouth. So now you know someone is interested, but now you also seem
annoyed with all the talking...
Anyway, I do think it's worth a week of going about to get input and
feedback on these things. I would be worried if 4 weeks had passed and
people were still screwing about talking about it and not doing anything.
BTW, how long (in time) was this course (in the lecture format you gave it
in)? And how well did the timing work out for the slides?
Later,
Gunther
