0:10

Hi and welcome to

0:10

another special Do Iris episode

0:14

of my podcast. I'm sitting here

0:14

with Drew McCormick. He's one of

0:17

the people behind Agenda Dotcom,

0:17

a note taking app that has been

0:22

an Apple Design Award winner.

0:22

But that's not the only project

0:25

that he's working on, and we'll

0:25

probably dive into that a little

0:28

bit as well in our conversation.

0:28

Drew, first of all, welcome for

0:32

being on the podcast. How are you doing today?

0:35

I'm doing fine. And thanks

0:35

for having me. Just back from

0:38

the summer holidays here in

0:38

Europe. So all fresh to go.

0:42

Ready to go?

0:43

So already in the thick

0:43

of things or is it still

0:46

catching up, what you're doing?

0:48

Yeah, it's still still

0:48

catching up a bit. We get a lot

0:51

of back support and things like

0:51

that, so haven't really got

0:54

completely back into it, but

0:54

it's getting

0:56

So

0:56

the

0:57

so is that mostly

0:57

support on existing products

0:59

that you're getting yourself

0:59

through, or is it also other

1:02

kinds of work that you need to catch up on?

1:05

Yeah, it's, it's a mix.

1:05

There's agenda is always got a

1:09

lot of support just general

1:09

support for, for, for the

1:13

customers. But of course you've

1:13

got WWC a few months ago and

1:18

we've got the releases coming up

1:18

probably a week or two away and

1:22

that means we have to get the

1:22

widgets working

1:25

Mm hmm.

1:27

the

1:27

People

1:27

stuff

1:27

want widgets.

1:27

from WWE. See, basically,

1:27

yeah, the

1:30

Yeah.

1:30

new stuff from WWC. So

1:32

So you already mentioned

1:32

agenda back there. Can you, like,

1:36

give a quick recap of what

1:36

agenda is probably a lot of

1:40

people will know about because

1:40

of the interesting business

1:42

model behind it. But what is

1:42

agenda?

1:47

Agenda is a no taking up.

1:47

Like you said, the main

1:51

difference with agenda is that

1:51

it has a very strong focus on,

1:54

on dates. So it's it's really a

1:54

little bit like one of those old

1:58

agenda books that people would

1:58

have, which would basically have

2:02

one page per day and you

2:05

Hmm.

2:05

would take, take notes and

2:05

appoint, you know, notes about

2:08

appointments that you've got

2:08

that day, that sort of thing. So

2:12

we thought we've sort of made a

2:12

digital version of that. So you

2:15

can take notes, you can connect

2:15

notes to calendar events to

2:20

reminders. The notes appear in a

2:20

in a sort of a timeline in order.

2:26

So there's a chronological

2:26

aspect to the whole app. So it

2:30

works really well for things

2:30

like meetings for for, for your

2:34

work in general. I use it for

2:34

programming, so I take all my,

2:38

you know, making tasks lists for

2:38

projects.

2:43

So yeah, it's really it's quite

2:43

flexible really, but it's got

2:46

this whole chronological idea

2:46

that, you know, you've got

2:50

projects that move forward

2:50

through time and you keep this

2:54

list of notes.

2:56

Yeah. And I do know

2:56

Agenda has like the most insane

3:01

domain name attached to it as

3:01

well. Agenda Dot. That's that's

3:05

quite a feat having getting your

3:05

hands on one of those domains I

3:07

guess. So agenda is like

3:07

probably a big part of your day

3:13

to day right.

3:15

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

3:15

That's the main focus. Yeah.

3:18

But as you already mentioned there, it' not the only thing that you do right?

3:21

You know, I've always had

3:21

a, you know, a diverse interest

3:25

in various things and, and I've

3:25

got some projects that have sort

3:29

of carried over from the past

3:29

ones. A flashcard app app called

3:34

Studies, another which we'll

3:34

probably talk about a bit more

3:39

today is called Ensembles.

3:39

That's a core data sync

3:44

framework that's

3:44

Mm

3:45

actually

3:45

hmm.

3:45

for developers. And just

3:45

recently I introduced something

3:49

else called Glisten, which is a

3:49

it's a podcast app for language

3:55

learners.

3:57

Okay. So so

3:58

Yeah,

3:58

what's different about

3:58

listen then, because it's

4:01

podcast app for language

4:01

learners, that's okay. Help me

4:05

out

4:05

very

4:05

here.

4:05

specific. Very specific.

4:05

Yes, of course. It looks a

4:09

little bit like a normal podcast

4:09

app. The difference is, of

4:12

course, as a language learner,

4:12

you're not you're not completely

4:15

capable of of understanding

4:15

everything that's being said.

4:18

And so what it will do is it

4:18

will extract the transcript

4:22

using the speech framework,

4:27

just like dictation does, and

4:27

then it will then it can

4:31

playback each sentence several

4:31

times and slow down sentences

4:36

and putting pauses all to make

4:36

it much easier to understand for

4:41

for someone who doesn't speak

4:41

the language. So it's a great

4:45

way to get great content because

4:45

podcasts are generally got great

4:49

content, but it's difficult to

4:49

understand when you're learning

4:52

because it's a native speakers

4:52

often speaking quite fast. And

4:57

so what Glisten does is it

4:57

repeats each sentence, slows

5:03

down sentences and makes it a

5:03

lot more digestible for for

5:07

someone learning.

5:09

All right. So it is is

5:09

it like a thing that you do

5:13

picked up and that you created

5:13

because you had, like,your own

5:18

interest in that area or what's

5:18

the deal there?

5:20

Yeah, it's a it's really a

5:20

I'll be projected that up that

5:24

I've just put on the market. But

5:24

it's, it's for myself. I made it

5:27

for myself and I'm developing

5:27

the features that I develop are

5:31

mostly things that I want. So.

5:31

So yeah, I'm learning. I mean, I

5:37

speak Dutch because I live in

5:37

Holland, but I've started to

5:43

learn. The last few years I've

5:43

been learning Spanish

5:45

Mm hmm.

5:46

as a hobby and one of the

5:46

things I noticed was that there

5:51

is an enormous amount of, of

5:51

things you can listen to as a

5:55

learner. It's usually, if you

5:55

watch, say, Netflix, it's it's

5:59

too difficult. You can turn on

5:59

the subtitles, but it's not

6:02

quite the same when you're when

6:02

you're reading as it is

6:06

listening.

6:07

Yeah.

6:07

So I wanted something

6:07

which would make it easier for

6:10

me to listen to things by native

6:10

speakers. Yeah,

6:15

But just thinking back

6:15

on the list of projects that you

6:19

have worked on and that you're

6:19

working on, it does sound like

6:23

that everything you create is

6:23

something

6:24

yeah,

6:25

that you also use

6:25

yourself. Is that correct?

6:28

yeah. That's absolutely

6:28

correct. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's

6:31

I think you know that the old

6:31

term dog feeding, which we have

6:34

in our, you know, in the

6:34

developer community I think is

6:37

perfect for that today. I like

6:37

to dog food, everything and

6:41

that's true of agenda. I use it

6:41

every day for all my planning,

6:45

for all my development. So I

6:45

develop agenda with agenda,

6:49

which is nice and circular, but

6:49

all of my apps. Yeah, even my

6:54

flashcards app that I still

6:54

develop a bit. That's that

6:58

originally came about because I

6:58

wanted to learn to learn words

7:03

and things like that. When I was

7:03

learning Dutch. I think that was

7:07

a long time ago and

7:09

So

7:09

yeah,

7:10

speaking of history, how

7:10

long have you been living in the

7:12

Netherlands, and where are you from originally?

7:16

you might hear from my

7:16

accent that I'm from Australia,

7:19

but I've been living in the

7:19

Netherlands for now 20, 25 years.

7:24

Long time, long time.

7:26

So.

7:26

No

7:26

But

7:26

excuse, no excuse for not

7:26

speaking. Dutch.

7:30

so what was the reason

7:30

for you to to basically migrate

7:34

from Australia to the

7:34

Netherlands? Because that's,

7:37

first of all, a bit of a climate

7:37

difference, I would guess a lot

7:41

less sunshine here. And so there

7:41

must be reasons that you that

7:44

you made that move right?

7:46

Yeah. And the main reason

7:46

is that my wife is Dutch. So we

7:50

met overseas

7:50

Yeah.

7:51

and after a few years of a long

7:53

distance relationship, I moved

7:57

to the Netherlands

7:58

Yeah.

7:58

at the same time. At that

7:58

time I was also in the

8:01

scientific community, so I just.

8:01

I just finished doing a PhD. And

8:05

after that you usually go into a

8:05

postdoc and most people do that

8:09

overseas. So

8:10

Yeah.

8:10

this this was a nice

8:10

coincidence and I was able to go

8:14

to Leiden in the Netherlands and

8:14

do a postdoc there and later on

8:18

the food

8:19

Yeah.

8:19

in Amsterdam.

8:21

And then

8:21

So

8:21

you stuck

8:21

yeah,

8:21

around

8:23

yeah, yeah, yeah,

8:25

which, which

8:25

yeah,

8:26

is understandable

8:26

because even at a postdoc, it's

8:29

not something you do in just two

8:29

years or something. It takes a

8:31

lot of time and effort. And then

8:31

you do build a life where you're

8:35

actually doing your studies and

8:35

your your postdoc.

8:39

yeah.

8:40

But the agenda app, we

8:40

quickly mentioned that it has an

8:44

interesting business model. I

8:44

don't want to like like go deep,

8:47

depend on that one. But can you

8:47

give a quick recap on that? And

8:50

because I know you wrote an

8:50

interesting and quite long blog

8:53

post about that already, I think

8:53

over two years ago, maybe even

8:59

longer, that describes this

8:59

model because it's a little bit

9:02

different to to your standard

9:02

subscription app model that a

9:07

lot of people are using nowadays. Right?

9:09

Yeah, that's right. So

9:09

when we were first developing

9:13

agenda before it was on the

9:13

market, we talked a lot about

9:16

sales models and what we didn't,

9:16

didn't like about subscriptions

9:22

was that most apps have a what,

9:22

what I would call a rental model

9:26

of subscription where you, as

9:26

long as you keep paying, you

9:32

have the features and you can

9:32

use the app. As soon as you stop

9:34

paying the app becomes pretty

9:34

useless. You can't. You kind of

9:38

lose your data. You don't

9:38

literally lose your data, of

9:42

course, but you can't do

9:42

anything with it. So so we

9:46

didn't particularly like that.

9:46

What we thought what we wanted

9:51

to do was to have a model of a

9:51

similar model to subscription

9:56

where you would get recurring

9:56

income. So that was we need that,

10:00

of course, but people would feel

10:00

like they had ownership of of

10:05

what they paid for. And so the

10:05

way it works is when you pay,

10:11

you get a year and everything

10:11

that's all about pro features

10:17

that are released before that

10:17

year and also during that year,

10:21

you get to keep forever, right?

10:21

So you unlock them forever, even

10:25

if you stop paying after a year,

10:25

that's that's fine. And then in

10:30

the future there might be new

10:30

pro features which you don't get.

10:35

And of course you can always pay

10:35

a gain to

10:37

Yeah.

10:37

get those. So this is the

10:37

idea that you've got some

10:41

ownership of what you actually

10:41

paid for. You never lose

10:43

anything with our model.

10:45

Okay. So it is sort of,

10:45

again, something that is date

10:50

bound, right? Like the app

10:50

itself, It's you basically

10:53

Yeah,

10:53

put put a stake in the

10:53

ground which attaches to a date

10:56

and everything that is before

10:56

that. At that point in time, you

11:01

get and everything that is after

11:01

this point in time, you don't

11:03

get. But of course, when you

11:03

sign up for a paid tier with an

11:08

agenda, that's that specific

11:08

date that is selected for you is

11:12

sometime in the future based on

11:12

the amount of money that you

11:16

actually transfer to at that point. But just for context, how big is

11:19

the company behind agenda?

11:24

Because I think it's like only a

11:24

few people right?

11:27

yeah. It's not a big

11:27

company. It's this the two of us.

11:30

Most of the time we have, um, we

11:30

have a few developers that we've,

11:33

we've bought in occasionally to

11:33

do, you know, a bit of, I guess,

11:37

subcontracting In the beginning we had a great

11:40

designer and that helped us win

11:44

that design award. You mentioned, unfortunately, he was a bit too

11:47

good because Apple poached him

11:51

so, so he's now at Apple. But so

11:51

yeah, you will see some things

11:55

coming up with

11:56

And

11:57

from him but they won't be

11:57

agenda.

11:59

yeah, yeah. So, so so

11:59

grabbing back to this whole

12:04

design and what thing what's the

12:04

what's the what's it like?

12:06

What's the process then. Is it

12:06

like out of the blue you get an

12:08

email and that it's like, hey,

12:08

is this, is this for real? Is

12:12

somebody trying to fetch me? It'

12:12

like, is this apple actually

12:15

sending me a message? What's the

12:15

process there? To the extent

12:18

that you can actually divulge yet.

12:20

Yeah I think I think you

12:20

have to I think with that that

12:25

sort of thing you have to be

12:25

active a bit, you have to

12:29

network and you have to, you

12:29

have to be in contact with

12:31

people at Apple and try to just

12:31

get the app noticed because

12:38

something like the Apple Design

12:38

Awards, as far as I understand

12:42

it, it's something that they

12:42

that you can nominate from

12:45

inside of Apple. And I think

12:45

anyone can nominate an app and

12:50

then they'll look at the apps

12:50

that have been nominated and say,

12:53

Oh yeah, this is and you can.

12:53

Yeah. So basically, if you've

12:56

got a good contact at Apple in

12:56

the developer relations or

13:00

something and they like your app,

13:00

then they then they will they

13:04

will push it for you to some

13:04

extent.

13:06

Yeah.

13:07

So I think we had a bit of

13:07

that So it wasn't completely out

13:10

of the blue but it's always a

13:10

it's always a nice surprise that

13:13

that, that, you know, that

13:13

networking pays off

13:16

But is it also true that

13:16

at some point your end, if you

13:20

find out of Apple and they give

13:20

you some feedback? Yeah. It's

13:24

you're a candidate for being on

13:24

the list for a design award, but

13:29

could you maybe please take care

13:29

of these and these issues or

13:33

items within your app?

13:34

and

13:34

Uh, just, uh, just for

13:34

their, for their specific

13:38

reasons, which are always bit

13:38

fake, of course. Or is it like

13:42

that they don't give you any

13:42

feedback at all on your product.

13:45

my experience with Apple

13:45

is that they don't give any

13:48

feedback at all, at least, which

13:48

is extremely frustrating because

13:52

they could they can say, yeah,

13:52

it's a pretty good app, but what

13:55

if you just fix this up? And

13:55

that would be that would help so

13:58

much. But

13:59

Yeah.

13:59

they in my experience they

13:59

don't do that they that there's

14:03

some policy I think where

14:04

Yeah,

14:05

you simply never tell and

14:05

I actually I was lucky enough to

14:09

meet Tim Cook a few years ago

14:09

when he was in Amsterdam and I

14:13

had a meeting with him with a

14:13

few other developers. And he

14:17

also was was kind of the same.

14:17

He would sort of, you know, he

14:22

knew stuff about he must have

14:22

known stuff about all of the

14:24

developers there, but it was

14:24

sort of nudge, nudge, wink, wink.

14:28

It was never, you know, you

14:28

should do this, you should do

14:30

that,

14:31

yeah,

14:32

which is frustrating

14:32

because otherwise you're

14:35

guessing a lot of the time.

14:36

yeah.

14:36

But it's

14:37

They

14:37

a

14:37

probably have to be very

14:37

careful about all kinds of

14:39

liabilities and stuff,

14:40

right,

14:40

but

14:41

right,

14:42

yeah,

14:42

exactly.

14:43

so but then at some

14:43

point you get a message that

14:46

you're, uh, an Apple Design

14:46

Award candidate, that at some

14:49

point this gets converted into

14:49

being a winner. And is that then

14:53

when the whole process starts

14:53

that Apple suggests that you

14:57

come over to a WDC? And it's my

14:57

understanding is they said, Yeah,

15:01

we got access for you, but you

15:01

need to take care of your plane

15:04

tickets.

15:05

Yeah, exactly, exactly.

15:05

That's exactly how it went.

15:11

Just like when I met Tim Cook

15:11

and it was exactly the same.

15:14

They never say directly, you're

15:14

going to meet Tim Cook. They

15:17

they say you might we might be

15:17

able to arrange a meeting. You

15:22

know what I mean? It's it's

15:22

always hedged. And the same was

15:25

with the it was exactly the same

15:25

with the the designer award. It

15:31

was you know, you're in the top

15:31

few.

15:34

Yeah,

15:36

It

15:36

it's

15:36

would be a good idea if

15:36

you came over. Okay.

15:38

yeah,

15:39

Well, five grand later was

15:39

you paid for your hotel and your

15:43

airfare from

15:44

yeah

15:44

Europe. It's not cheap.

15:46

I know.

15:46

Oh, yeah.

15:46

I went to WW to see and

15:46

that was all the way back in

15:49

2013

15:50

Yeah,

15:51

and even then it was

15:51

already prohibitively expensive

15:55

to,

15:55

yeah.

15:55

to be able to go there.

15:55

You really needed to have like a

15:58

company or an employer that was

15:58

willing to to back you up on

16:01

that. Uh,

16:02

Right.

16:02

fortunately you had a agenda as a company

16:04

Yeah,

16:04

then, so yeah, but it's

16:04

still people,

16:06

yeah.

16:07

so it's

16:07

Well, it comes

16:07

still.

16:07

straight out of our profits, of course.

16:09

Exactly.

16:09

Yeah,

16:10

That's, that's a big

16:10

chunk of change that you then

16:12

don't have to spend on other things anymore.

16:15

right.

16:15

Convenient luxury to be

16:15

able to not get. Not be able to

16:20

spend money anymore. Well, but

16:20

then, uh, you're in. I think it

16:27

was Cupertino back then. Or was

16:27

it still San Francisco

16:30

I'm

16:30

that you. I don't

16:30

remember how many years ago it

16:33

was.

16:33

try to remember, it was

16:33

2018. I think it was. Oh it was

16:38

already San Jose, I

16:39

Yeah.

16:39

think.

16:39

San Jose. Yeah, that's the way they are.

16:41

I think. Yeah. Yeah.

16:42

So. But you're

16:43

But.

16:43

there in the US, you

16:43

have the information that there

16:47

is a likelihood of you being a

16:47

design award winner. When do you

16:52

actually find out that you're

16:52

going to be pulled onstage and

16:57

get one of these cubes shoved in

16:57

your hands?

17:01

I think when they

17:01

announced the winner I think, I

17:04

don't think we would exclude it.

17:04

I mean we kind of knew, we kind

17:07

of figured we would win,

17:07

otherwise they wouldn't ask us

17:10

to come all the way out. But I

17:10

don't think they told us from my

17:14

my recollection was just that we

17:14

had to be there

17:18

Yeah.

17:18

and that we might win.

17:20

Yeah. And then

17:21

And

17:21

the.

17:21

then they say, are you are you willing?

17:23

So but that's that's

17:23

literally in the keynotes that's,

17:26

uh,

17:26

Yeah,

17:26

they announced their Apple Design Award winners and then they, they

17:29

right.

17:29

have to the ceremony.

17:29

That's a separate event. And by

17:32

then you've probably been

17:32

contacted by some PR person to

17:35

like make arrangements with you.

17:35

So like be at

17:38

They just they have they

17:38

don't have anything in the

17:41

keynote. They don't announcing

17:42

now.

17:42

the cards. It's it's in

17:42

the Apple Design Awards ceremony.

17:45

Like

17:45

Yeah.

17:45

you say, it's it's kind of

17:45

a little bit like the Oscars, a

17:48

mini Oscars or something like that, you know. So. So there's a little bit of

17:53

And

17:54

a show, at least it was

17:54

back then. And we didn't know,

17:58

as far as I remember, exactly

18:00

so I.

18:01

what would happen.

18:02

So you were in the

18:02

audience and I was like, okay,

18:04

we won. Now what do we do?

18:08

Well, yeah, I mean, it was

18:08

obvious from the other

18:10

candidates that we had to go up

18:10

on the stage and

18:13

Yeah.

18:13

and

18:13

Does help that you're

18:13

not the first being announced.

18:15

That, of

18:15

yeah,

18:16

course. All right.

18:17

yeah,

18:18

But that was like a

18:18

really fun experience, of course.

18:21

And I think from what I could

18:21

can tell is agenda as a product

18:25

is it's doing quite well over

18:25

the years. Um, so, so how big of

18:30

a user base, uh, ballpark does

18:30

agenda have right now? Is that

18:35

something you are aware of or not?

18:38

it's not something we

18:38

track really closely, but I mean,

18:42

we have thousands of active

18:42

users per day. I didn't even

18:45

know what that means, to be

18:45

honest. I'm not enough into the

18:49

app world to know what's

18:50

Yeah.

18:50

good and what's bad. I do

18:50

know how much money comes in. Of

18:53

course I have to know that. But

18:55

Yeah,

18:56

we're not a huge we're not

18:56

a huge app. Otherwise we would

18:58

have more than two people

19:00

of course. Um, but

19:00

another thing that you, uh, work

19:04

on is ensembles, and that's

19:04

probably the biggest reason why

19:09

you are a speaker at, uh, at the

19:09

I, And that's not because of the

19:13

product itself, but because of

19:13

the experience that this product

19:16

is based on, which is a lot of

19:16

experience and exposure to core

19:20

data. Um, and I expect that at

19:20

some point you need to get

19:25

ensembles and all the other

19:25

products that you're working on,

19:28

get those products ready for

19:28

Swift data, which is kind of a

19:31

change. I was told by people who

19:31

actually investigated those

19:35

frameworks a little bit, but a

19:35

change, yes, but

19:38

or.

19:39

a lot of things are

19:39

staying the same. So so can you

19:42

like give a quick overview of of

19:42

what Swift data is in comparison

19:46

to core data?

19:49

Sure. To be honest, yeah,

19:49

I'm quite new to it myself. I

19:53

mean, it's only a few months old

19:53

and I don't I haven't started

19:56

moving any products over, so

19:56

it's a little bit from what I've

19:59

just at the moment, it's from

19:59

what I've just seen on Mastodon

20:03

and things like that. And I'm

20:03

going to before that, before I

20:06

give the talk, I am going to

20:06

deep dive. So don't worry about

20:10

that. I'll, I'll find out what's

20:10

really in there.

20:14

I think this is a what you say

20:14

is correct. I think what they've

20:19

done and what I, I think he

20:19

found me actually from an

20:22

article I wrote several years

20:22

ago where I predicted what they

20:25

would do. And I predicted that

20:25

they would put in a swift UI

20:32

type of interface on top of core

20:32

data. And that's pretty much

20:36

what they they did do. And as

20:36

far as I can tell, and the two

20:41

are, I think, somewhat

20:41

compatible, you can, you can

20:44

migrate from one to the other. I

20:44

think the main difference

20:47

between them is that with core

20:47

data you had a sort of a

20:50

graphical scheme builder, the

20:50

graph, the core data modeler, I

20:56

think it was called Always cool,

20:56

where you would lay out the

21:02

entities, the relationships, the

21:02

properties and I think swift

21:08

data works basically underneath.

21:08

It's working the same. It's

21:12

built on top of school lights

21:12

and cloud kit for full sync. But

21:18

until you don't use this this

21:18

graphical editor any more, you

21:23

simply writes swift code. You

21:23

write swift types classes and

21:30

they they have used the new

21:30

macro system to to basically

21:36

build up this this internal

21:36

model of entities and

21:39

relationships. I think

21:39

underneath it's all the same

21:43

probably if I look if I dig down

21:43

I'm sure I'm going to find

21:47

somewhere in this managed object

21:47

or something very similar.

21:52

And the persistent store

21:52

coordinator somewhere?

21:55

Exactly. I'm sure it's all

21:55

there, probably not very deep

21:59

either, because I've just got

21:59

this macro stuff. So in theory,

22:02

that's, that's the stuff which

22:02

allows you to, you to just

22:06

convert from one to the other

22:06

effectively. I think I think

22:09

doing it before now would have

22:09

been very difficult to, to make

22:11

it nice. But the macro, the

22:11

macros in SWIFT are very

22:16

powerful it looks like. So

22:16

they're able to be very

22:20

expressive. And so now you can

22:20

very easily just make a class.

22:24

The macro can determine what

22:24

properties there are, what

22:27

relationships you have to use

22:27

some some annotations if you've

22:32

got a, for example, a relationship, you might need to tell it how,

22:37

what, what should happen if, if

22:39

the object is deleted, that sort

22:39

of thing. Deletion rules. And so

22:43

you annotate, annotate the code

22:43

rather than edit the, the core

22:49

data modeler.

22:50

And would you say that

22:50

looking at, uh, the syntax that

22:54

is being used with these macros

22:54

and on these swift classes on

22:58

its trucks, Actually, I think.

22:58

Is it like, uh, do you, do you

23:03

guess that it's like, built up

23:03

in such a way that it is

23:07

something that will get a visual

23:07

editor eventually? Or do you

23:11

think it will stay mostly in

23:11

code? Uh, as it is right now?

23:16

I don't think there will

23:16

be a visual editor. What I'm

23:20

while I, I think the trend is

23:20

definitely to doing everything

23:24

in code.If you look at swift UI.

23:26

Yeah,

23:27

I

23:27

definitely.

23:27

think that people like

23:27

that it's it's nice that you can

23:30

check things easily into your

23:30

source management. You can diff

23:35

source code much more easily

23:35

than than a XML file for example.

23:41

So I think that's that's the

23:41

trend that we're seeing and I

23:45

don't think that's going to

23:45

change. We do of course in SWIFT

23:48

you I have a preview which is

23:48

useful for for you. I don't know

23:53

if it's that useful for or for

23:53

data, but maybe at some time we

23:59

will have also some sort of auto

23:59

generated preview of just to

24:03

show you the relationships in a

24:03

visual way that might be useful,

24:07

I guess because because code is,

24:07

you know, trying to see the full

24:12

the full model just from some

24:12

source code is a little bit

24:14

tricky at times.

24:15

Yeah.

24:16

It'd be nice to get a map if you like.

24:18

Yeah. That you have a

24:18

visual guide to to really see

24:21

how things tie together. And also,

24:23

Exactly.

24:23

you know

24:23

Yeah,

24:24

what? Some errors between. It's indicating what's a cascading rule. Sorry, that's

24:25

the deletion rules. You

24:27

mentioned.

24:27

right,

24:29

So

24:29

exactly.

24:31

and how deep of an

24:31

understanding of the macro

24:34

system as a, as a language

24:34

feature, you do need to have to

24:37

be able to be effective with

24:37

swift data. You guess?

24:42

I haven't dug into it

24:42

enough, but I suspect not very,

24:47

very much. The idea of macros,

24:47

of course, is to to hide a lot

24:51

of complexity. And

24:52

Yeah.

24:53

it's nice that you can,

24:53

you can sort of say debug, but

24:57

you open up the macro

24:57

effectively and say, you know,

25:00

show me what's inside. That's very useful, I think, to

25:03

understanding how it works. But

25:06

that's really a I think a pro

25:06

feature. I think someone who's

25:09

just starting out with Swift

25:09

data and wants to make an app,

25:12

you know, you don't need to I

25:12

don't think you need to

25:15

understand all the intricacies

25:15

of macros. It's you can just

25:20

think of it as, as a as an

25:20

adaptation of a property, you

25:23

know, and this is a relationship

25:23

and this is a property. And you

25:28

said that there were structs. I

25:28

have I think there's still

25:31

classes.

25:32

Oh, okay.

25:33

I was actually kind of

25:33

disappointed. I thought I

25:36

thought they would allow little

25:36

abstracts and I think there's

25:39

probably reasons why they don't

25:39

related to, you know, how you

25:44

relate them back to this this

25:44

managed object context, which is

25:47

a single object. So as far as I

25:47

know, there still are still

25:52

classes. Maybe that will though

25:52

allow you to use structs in

25:57

future? I don't know. Yeah,

25:58

Yeah. I haven't looked

25:58

into core data and data I have a

26:02

lot of experience with, but

26:02

swift data are not that much yet,

26:06

because just I don't have the

26:06

time yet. Because every year

26:08

they release so many new

26:08

features to just the language

26:11

itself. And then you have to get

26:11

acquainted with all the new APIs.

26:15

right,

26:16

So your talk, uh, of

26:16

course, we're still two months

26:20

out of the conference, but uh,

26:20

what is your general direction

26:24

Right.

26:25

of your talk right now?

26:25

What are your, what are you

26:27

planning on, on helping people

26:27

with if they, uh, are visiting

26:31

your talk?

26:33

Yeah, I would I think I'll

26:33

I'll plan to do is try to give

26:40

not just give us sort of an

26:40

intro to Swift data because I

26:43

think I think you can get that

26:43

out of the WWC videos and there

26:50

is also I think is is a Donnie

26:50

Walsh that's going to do a I

26:55

know it might have been Daniel

26:55

was it someone's going to do a

26:58

workshop

26:59

Yeah.

27:02

on that. So if you really

27:02

want to know the details, I

27:04

think you're probably best to go

27:04

to the workshop. I will keep it

27:08

kind of high level, I guess, and

27:08

I will talk about what we've

27:13

been talking about a little bit

27:13

here where, you know, what's the

27:15

relationship to core data? Oh, of course, show a little bit

27:19

of of how you how you actually

27:22

write swift data. But it'll be

27:22

kind of high level. It'll be,

27:25

you know, just here's an example

27:25

of of a few different things

27:30

I'll try to touch on things like

27:30

migration from core data, also

27:34

migration from one version to

27:34

the next, just just how these

27:38

things are handled and give

27:38

people a reasonable idea. And of

27:43

course I'll try to talk about

27:43

gotchas and things like that,

27:46

things that Apple will never

27:46

talk about. Right. You know, is

27:49

this is it actually ready for

27:49

prime time, that sort of that

27:55

sort of thing, which Apple's

27:55

never going to say? Of course,

27:57

they never going to say, yes,

27:57

this is this is not really for.

28:02

So those those are the sort of

28:02

things you can get, I think from

28:05

a conference talk where you

28:05

can't which you can't get from a

28:08

WWE DC video,

28:10

Yeah.

28:11

you know, basic general

28:11

advice to what do I think of it

28:13

as someone who's used core data

28:13

for so long and have actually

28:17

written a ST framework with core

28:17

data, which means you have to

28:20

dig quite deep already. Is this?

28:20

Yeah. Is it a good framework? Is

28:26

it the ultimate framework in the

28:26

sense that is, is that is it

28:31

going to be like combine, Is

28:31

there going to be like, you know,

28:35

they introduce combine and then

28:35

they select it within two years

28:38

or something with a different

28:38

approach with async await. So is

28:43

this just a temporary framework

28:43

or is this really their final

28:49

station?

28:50

Yeah.

28:51

They sort of questions and

28:51

I don't know some of those

28:55

answers yet, but I'm going to

28:55

know by the time by the time I

28:58

get there, I think

28:59

Yeah. If people are

28:59

attending the conference, they

29:01

really want to dive deep on our

29:01

Swift that they definitely

29:05

should check out Daniel

29:05

Steinberg's workshop on November

29:08

7th. The day before the

29:08

conference, because he's really

29:12

planning on, uh, you know, just

29:12

giving an overview of what Swift

29:15

Data is, how you attach to if

29:15

you then explore what state and

29:19

binding does for you, how

29:19

observable objects and published

29:22

properties should tie into this,

29:22

and then also how you can add

29:25

asynchronously to this whole

29:25

process. So that stuff coming in

29:29

from the network that it's

29:29

actually not freezing your UI,

29:32

updating your data storage and

29:32

then being reflected on the on

29:35

the screen. And uh, yeah, by the

29:35

end of a day with Daniel, you

29:40

will be, I guess you will be tired. But

29:42

you know a lot more about swift

29:46

data, so people interested in

29:46

swift data, check out through,

29:50

um, talk at the conference

29:50

itself, but also make sure that

29:55

you consider going to Daniel's

29:55

workshop because that's a full

29:57

eight hour long session that

29:57

you'll get with, uh, well, is

30:02

there something he's not an expert on? I'd say,

30:04

he's is a very smart guy,

30:04

Daniel.

30:07

and

30:07

He's a

30:08

also an excellent

30:08

teacher because, uh,

30:10

writer.

30:10

yeah, he is. He has a

30:10

lot of background in actual

30:13

teaching of complex, uh,

30:13

material. He's from. He's

30:17

originally a maths teacher. Even

30:20

Yeah,

30:20

so,

30:20

exactly.

30:20

um, so. But

30:22

Yeah, I,

30:22

go ahead.

30:23

I was just going to say I

30:23

followed some of his courses in

30:26

Paris a few years ago,

30:27

Yeah.

30:28

combined, and and switched

30:28

swift UI, and they were very

30:31

good. He's he's an excellent teacher.

30:33

Yeah. So, um, that

30:33

concludes the planning of a

30:36

workshop for a conference which

30:36

people should attend. But so

30:40

back to you. Um, so we talked a

30:40

little bit about the, the, the

30:44

conference talk that you're

30:44

planning on giving a little bit

30:47

of your background on, on what

30:47

products that you're working on.

30:51

Um, so Ensembles uses core data

30:51

because it's like a

30:55

synchronization and persistence

30:55

layer on top of core data, if

30:58

I'm correct. But does agenda

30:58

also use a lot of core data or

31:02

is there a different persistence

31:02

mechanism being used?

31:06

We actually built

31:06

something custom there. There

31:10

was, there was certain things

31:10

that we wanted to do which

31:12

didn't fit that well with the

31:12

approach that this ensemble uses,

31:17

which is just to sync up the

31:17

stores. But of course I have a

31:21

lot of experience with ensemble,

31:21

so I know the sort of the corner

31:24

cases and so we need to actually

31:24

build something custom. It's not,

31:28

it's not really we do use

31:28

coordinated but more as a sort

31:33

of a database type approach.

31:33

It's

31:35

Yeah.

31:35

not not the way it's

31:35

supposed to be used. I guess

31:38

it's kind of a cheap way to get

31:38

SQLite working.

31:42

Yeah. So

31:42

It's

31:43

it's it's a local

31:43

storage mechanism that you do

31:45

not sync directly with the cloud.

31:45

Get this thinking you do

31:48

yourself, uh,

31:49

right,

31:50

in a different way, because

31:51

Exactly.

31:52

I've heard very diverse

31:52

experiences of people using

31:57

cloud get thinking and how

31:57

successful they've been with

32:00

thinking up a core data store.

32:00

So, uh, it's always a bit of, uh,

32:05

yeah, I would hope that Apple

32:05

with Swift data finally tackles

32:10

these, uh, these lingering

32:10

issues with, uh, with, with,

32:13

with persistent store, uh,

32:13

synchronization because,

32:17

Yeah.

32:18

yeah,

32:18

They've

32:18

it's,

32:18

got a terrible history of

32:18

it. Really. I,

32:20

yeah,

32:21

i the reason I developed

32:21

ensembles in the first place was

32:25

simply out of frustration with

32:25

the core data thing at that time.

32:30

yeah,

32:30

And if you think that the

32:30

cloud kit sync is bad, you

32:34

should have tried the core data

32:34

sync in in 2000 and what was it,

32:37

12 or whatever?

32:38

yeah. That was, that

32:39

Terrible.

32:39

was the general, the

32:39

general advice back then was do

32:42

not use, it was

32:44

Yeah,

32:44

like

32:44

that was

32:44

the core

32:45

that

32:45

data

32:45

was

32:45

is

32:45

easy,

32:45

fine but sync on your

32:45

own. Don't, don't use what Apple

32:48

provides

32:48

right?

32:49

because it might work in

32:49

your, in your development

32:52

environment, but in production

32:52

you will run into issues and

32:56

Yeah,

32:56

uh.

32:56

exactly.

32:57

Yeah it's and that that that's

32:58

Yeah.

32:58

that's that's a legacy

32:58

that that Apple is still dealing

33:01

with with their synchronization

33:01

frameworks because every time

33:05

Apple releases something new

33:05

that does some form of

33:08

synchronization, pretty much all

33:08

developers go like, well,

33:13

Yeah.

33:13

let's

33:13

Very

33:13

just see, let's just see

33:14

dubious.

33:14

how this works in practice,

33:15

Yeah,

33:15

right?

33:16

right,

33:17

So,

33:17

exactly.

33:18

um, what are you

33:18

expecting from the, the

33:21

conference itself? Because

33:21

you're not only going to be

33:24

presenting there, you're also

33:24

going to be part of the

33:28

conference as an attendee for

33:28

the rest of the time. So what

33:31

are your expectations there?

33:34

Well, I think I, I think I

33:34

guess pretty much at least I was

33:39

there last year and I've been a

33:39

few years ago. I think Alex gave

33:42

a talk one year and I was there.

33:42

So I think I've been to two or

33:45

three

33:46

Yeah.

33:47

of them to do it. So I

33:47

always see conferences and so I

33:52

have a vague idea at least if

33:52

it's going to be the same. I

33:55

know what, I know what to expect, but

33:57

Mm hmm.

33:59

yeah, so I really enjoyed

33:59

it last year. It's not too long.

34:04

It's at least it was to two days

34:04

last year I think.

34:06

Correct.

34:08

And the talks are really

34:08

the speakers are really good. So

34:13

yeah, I'm expecting, I'm

34:13

expecting good things. And you

34:19

know, I noticed it's a different

34:19

location this year in North

34:21

Yeah.

34:22

Amsterdam.

34:23

Yeah. We, we were in the

34:26

bakehouse despite her for the

34:26

first two editions. That's like

34:31

back in 2015. Uh,

34:33

You

34:33

and that was a really

34:34

know,

34:35

small space

34:35

comparatively, because that

34:37

could fit like close to 100

34:37

people. I think it was, uh, and

34:41

then the two editions after that

34:41

one that was those were run

34:45

makokha hats had know they were

34:45

done in the student hotel in the

34:49

old theatre. So that's on the,

34:51

Right,

34:51

on the, on the viable

34:51

strand And we had

34:55

120 seats and 120 seats was

34:55

already pushing it for that room.

35:03

And the biggest complaint that

35:03

we got was that uh, because it's

35:06

like wooden benches that, that they're like

35:07

right.

35:08

people are like really hurting at the end of the day because of the sitting. So, uh,

35:10

we, and then that's, I did a

35:15

podcast episode on it, but then

35:15

the whole thing happened that

35:18

Coco had to know. And I, I'm a

35:18

part of co cats now that we

35:22

decided, okay, we need to take

35:22

the conference out of the, uh,

35:25

booking of the, of the

35:25

conference financially. So

35:29

that's when I picked up the

35:29

conference myself on my own. And

35:33

then we had to decide because I

35:33

still use a few people in

35:37

organizing, of course, uh, then

35:37

we had to decide, okay, do we

35:40

stay with the same venue or do

35:40

we pick another venue that's

35:43

maybe a little bit bigger? And

35:43

that's why we moved to the Nemo

35:47

Science Museum. It is that. Well,

35:47

there are not there's not a lot

35:52

of locations in Amsterdam that

35:52

are more central than that one,

35:55

I guess.

35:55

Yeah,

35:56

And it's within

35:57

right.

35:57

walking distance of the

35:57

train station itself. And it's

36:00

Yeah.

36:00

very easy to reach and

36:00

it has a room that allows for

36:04

201 individuals.

36:06

Well,

36:07

So we're making the

36:07

conference a little bit bigger.

36:10

And

36:10

yeah,

36:11

uh, the, the venue also

36:11

allows us to, to do all the

36:15

activities that we have

36:15

organized with the conference in

36:19

the same building. So people

36:19

who've had a conference day, the

36:23

first conference day, all the

36:23

lunches are like right outside

36:26

of the of after the presentation

36:26

space. At the end of the day,

36:30

we'll have like drinks and

36:32

well,

36:32

dinner after first day,

36:32

and that will be like at the

36:35

rooftop terrace, which is in a

36:35

glass box. So even if it's bad

36:39

weather, we have excellent space

36:39

available there. So

36:42

yeah.

36:42

we people just need to

36:42

walk up the stairs and they can

36:45

enjoy themselves and mingle and,

36:45

um, and then the workshop, uh,

36:51

the workshops, it's actually two

36:51

now we can also do that a day

36:54

before in like smaller meeting

36:54

rooms that they have available

36:57

in the museum as well. And yeah,

36:57

just that convenience having

37:01

everything in, in a single venue

37:01

and also uh, the staffing

37:06

support that's the museum is

37:06

able to provide essay

37:09

experienced um, meeting

37:09

conference, whatever venue was

37:15

really helpful there. The

37:15

cheapest spots to to actually go

37:19

to because if you look at the

37:19

ticket price it's €300

37:21

excluding Texas into some charges. It's it's like off those

37:29

€300. I'm already spending

37:29

like €168 just on your food

37:35

and drinks alone. And

37:36

So.

37:36

then and then I still

37:36

and then I still need to cover

37:38

the staff and and the location

37:38

and everything.

37:40

Oh

37:41

And

37:41

yeah.

37:41

it's actually if I would

37:41

not have sponsors. Thank you.

37:44

Revenue card. Thank you stream

37:44

thank you ABN Amro plugging them

37:48

as well

37:49

Yeah.

37:49

is that if I would have

37:49

sponsors I would not have been

37:52

able to execute the conference

37:52

because

37:54

Oh

37:55

it would just

37:55

well,

37:55

be like and that would

37:55

me that there would be no march

37:59

and then the risk would be just too big.

38:01

yeah,

38:01

And I think I still need

38:01

to sell like a few more tickets.

38:07

And then, uh, based on the

38:07

ticket revenue alone, I can

38:10

cover the venue, the staff and

38:10

the, uh, catering. But then

38:16

there's a whole list of other things that

38:18

yeah.

38:18

also needs to be taken

38:18

care of. So like certain

38:21

speakers, they, they travel a

38:21

little bit further, so they,

38:24

they, they get some, some

38:24

financial support which they're

38:27

able to airplane tickets. They

38:27

also need to be lodged somewhere

38:31

in a hotel. I have some people

38:31

helping out as staff that I gave

38:34

like a free ticket, free access,

38:34

but they help me out during the

38:37

day. But some of them are also

38:37

travelling quite far from the

38:41

Netherlands, so I need to put

38:41

them up somewhere as well. And

38:44

it's all these, these, these

38:44

small things that, well, if I've

38:47

got a spreadsheet and uh, it's,

38:47

it's that, that's, that's,

38:52

that's a good amount of money in

38:52

there and it's a lot of people

38:56

in the Netherlands, if that would be their yearly gross salary, the final number they

38:58

would, they would, they would

39:01

consider themselves

39:01

would be happy

39:02

financially well-off.

39:03

to.

39:04

But of course a lot of

39:04

money comes in and a lot of

39:06

money goes out. So there's hardly

39:08

Yeah,

39:08

anything left at the

39:08

bottom line, which is fine

39:10

because

39:10

yeah,

39:11

I'm organising this because I like doing it.

39:13

yeah.

39:13

But uh, yeah, that's,

39:13

that's a conscious choice that

39:16

we made and that we were able to

39:16

make because we had one sponsor

39:21

that signed up very early in the

39:21

organisation in organising and

39:25

we had a second sponsor that I

39:25

had a good enough relation with

39:29

that I would be able to trust

39:29

that they would actually sign up

39:33

as a sponsor like one and a half

39:33

month after I started. Uh,

39:38

getting financially committed to the whole thing.

39:40

Right, right,

39:41

So. And I still have an

39:43

Yeah.

39:43

extra sponsor. Uh, well,

39:43

I'm waiting for the final

39:47

paperwork to pass through and

39:47

then the transaction, and then I

39:50

can announce them as well,

39:50

because they, uh, if this all

39:54

works out, then they're actually

39:54

paying for all the drinks after

39:57

the workshop and first

39:57

conference day. So

39:59

Oh that's it. Very important.

40:02

it's also, it's also a

40:02

big ticket item for them to, to,

40:05

to be able to attach their name

40:05

to because they're

40:07

Yeah.

40:07

their revenue cat, They

40:07

really to sell the product in a

40:11

purchase

40:11

The

40:12

and everything stream

40:12

wants to get their products out

40:16

as well which is a chat and

40:16

video SDK and then

40:19

Yeah,

40:19

ABN they basically in

40:19

there to just get acquainted

40:23

with people and advocate for

40:23

themselves as an interesting

40:27

place to work. And

40:28

yeah.

40:28

then the fourth sponsor

40:28

is on the same level as, uh, as

40:31

ABN Amro. They just want to get

40:31

exposure to their brand and

40:35

advocate for themselves. That's

40:35

a great place for software

40:37

developers to work.

40:39

Right,

40:39

So

40:39

Yeah.

40:40

no, no, no, no. Real

40:40

conflicts between the sponsors

40:43

as well, which is good to have

40:43

because I haven't had it myself.

40:46

But I've heard stories of

40:46

conferences having sponsors that

40:49

were like behind

40:50

Sure.

40:51

the curtains. They were

40:51

basically rolling over the

40:53

carpet, fighting for people

40:55

Okay.

40:56

almost. So not something

40:56

you want to have

40:59

The

40:59

because we like a no

40:59

violence policy in our in our in

41:04

our conference space and some

41:04

other policies as well. Just,

41:08

you know, proper human, decent

41:08

behavior. If you do that, then

41:11

you're fine. If you if you do

41:11

all that stuff, then you'll get

41:14

to deal with me or one of my

41:14

teammates. So just

41:17

Yeah.

41:17

take care of the

41:17

situation. So, yeah, it's it's

41:22

the same as last year and last

41:22

time I should say, because it

41:25

was not last year, but it's the

41:25

same as, oh, this last year.Wow .

41:29

Okay,

41:29

I think

41:29

I'm

41:29

at this

41:29

confused.

41:29

time it was last year Right.

41:30

Yeah, it is last

41:31

It

41:31

year because

41:31

was nice.

41:31

we had a few years in between,

41:33

Yeah.

41:33

but it's. It's a little

41:33

bit bigger, uh, but not bigger

41:36

to the extent that I expect that

41:36

the intimacy of the conference

41:40

will be negatively affected by

41:40

it. Because the one biggest

41:45

piece of feedback that I got

41:45

from people who attended do I

41:47

was in previous years is that

41:47

they, uh, they really felt like,

41:51

yes, I was able to really

41:51

connect with people who were

41:54

also an attendee at a conference

41:54

and not just like go to talks,

41:57

get exhausted, and then having

41:57

to enjoy myself on my own in the

42:02

evening. It's like people were

42:02

able to mingle and interact

42:04

during the day. And then on the

42:04

first evening we have like

42:08

everything taken care of until

42:08

you had your dinner. And then

42:12

people can whatever they want.

42:12

And then on the next evening,

42:15

probably some people need to

42:15

travel, some people are staying

42:18

a night and then they can just

42:18

venture off with a smaller group

42:21

and have dinner or do whatever

42:21

and enjoy themselves and have

42:24

some extended conversations

42:24

after the the second conference

42:28

day and then just go home again

42:28

with a lot of new knowledge and

42:32

a lot of new people in their

42:32

network that they can rely on

42:35

sometime down the line in the future.

42:37

Yeah exactly. I think, I

42:37

think that's the charm of the

42:40

conference that, that it's not

42:40

too, too massive

42:44

Mm hmm.

42:44

and that you, you, it does

42:44

feel a little bit like a, you

42:47

know, like a, I mean it's 100,

42:47

100 or 200 people or whatever.

42:51

It's still, it still feels like

42:51

a Yeah. A tight group. It's

42:56

Yeah.

42:56

not, it's not like these

42:56

massive conferences with

42:59

thousands of people.

43:00

Yeah. I always envision

43:00

a conference day for do I was to

43:03

be like a basically, uh, for co

43:03

cats and L meetups attached to

43:10

each other. And that's also

43:10

pretty much the, the vibe I'm

43:13

going for. It's like people help

43:13

each other. They, they, if

43:17

somebody has a question,

43:17

probably you're sitting next to

43:20

the person who has an answer on

43:20

that or, you know, just maybe

43:22

two seats down that they just

43:22

know thinks about really

43:25

practical things. Okay, I need

43:25

something fixed on my bike.

43:28

Somebody can help you. I need

43:28

something messed up with my

43:31

hotel. Anybody can help me. And

43:31

quite likely there will be

43:34

someone who will just. Yeah,

43:34

just. I'll go with you. And then

43:37

you just have a native speaker

43:37

with you who can yell at a hotel

43:41

staff and get things started for

43:41

you. Those kinds of things. And

43:44

Yeah.

43:44

it's

43:45

Yeah.

43:45

really it's really

43:45

welcoming to, to new people. And

43:47

I also hope that it's reflected

43:47

in the speaker lineup because I

43:53

was positively surprised by the

43:53

diversity of people who actually

43:58

entered the CFP. And it was a

43:58

lot, but the diversity was

44:03

completely true and true to the

44:03

entire,

44:05

Mm.

44:05

uh, list of people who

44:05

who actually entered with a

44:10

suggestion on the, on the CFP.

44:10

Uh,

44:12

Is, is the speakers all

44:12

announced now. At last time I

44:16

looked it was just a few people

44:17

I've

44:18

but

44:18

got

44:18

I

44:18

two

44:18

guess.

44:18

spots open still. Uh,

44:18

but those spots are uh,

44:22

allocated to sponsors. Um, one

44:22

of the sponsored speakers will

44:28

be Charlie Chapman. I'm

44:28

expecting and hoping, but I

44:31

haven't had final confirm

44:31

confirmation on that because

44:34

Josh Holtz is doing a talk on

44:34

his own. Uh, and that just, I

44:40

mentioned that in previous

44:40

episodes, the dates of the

44:43

conference are actually chosen

44:43

because those were dates that

44:45

Josh Holtz was actually able to

44:45

travel and the venue actually

44:50

had availability as well. So that was the two

44:52

Yeah.

44:52

things that came

44:52

together. But um,

44:57

I am told that Charlie Chapman

44:57

will do like to sponsor a

45:00

session for revenue cards and,

45:00

and ABN Amro will do a 20 minute

45:07

session uh, next to Charlie

45:07

Chapman. So it's like each my

45:12

regular slots like 45 minutes

45:12

and one slot is divvied up

45:15

between two sponsors, each gets

45:15

20 minutes. And then I have a

45:20

third sponsor, which is not yet

45:20

announced, and they will do a

45:24

full on technical talk, not just

45:24

about their company and their

45:28

product or whatever, but the technical

45:30

hmm.

45:30

talk about an

45:30

implementation detail that they

45:33

have in their product. So it's

45:33

it's a really big application in

45:37

the Dutch market and they

45:39

Right.

45:39

have some experience and

45:39

interesting things to share

45:41

there. And they, uh, they

45:41

basically want to showcase for

45:45

what they can do as an

45:45

engineering group

45:47

Mm.

45:47

and that hopefully then

45:47

interests, uh, peers to actually

45:51

come have a conversation and ask

45:51

an inquiry about potential job

45:55

openings with them.

45:57

Right, right. Yeah.

45:58

So

45:58

Yeah.

45:58

that's, that's why

45:58

there's still two spots open

46:01

Hmm.

46:01

in the schedule. And

46:01

those are, those are reserved

46:05

right now at least for three

46:05

sponsors. So one

46:08

Right.

46:09

shared

46:09

And

46:09

once you had slots and

46:09

one for a dedicated.

46:12

the other, the other

46:12

speakers are on the website. Is

46:15

Yeah,

46:15

that right? Yeah. So

46:16

yeah

46:16

that's public

46:16

I've,

46:17

meeting.

46:17

I've

46:17

Yeah.

46:17

put um I think I've put all the

46:19

speakers online now let me

46:24

Okay.

46:24

check. So yeah yesterday

46:24

I pushed pushed Tianna Henry

46:29

Lewis and she will do a talk

46:29

about mental status and that was

46:33

the

46:33

Ri.

46:34

that was the final

46:34

speaker I needed to have final

46:36

confirmation on and yeah, it's a

46:36

complete list now. So I have

46:41

Cool.

46:42

Tim Condon,Daniel

46:42

Steinberg has a workshop host

46:44

and conference host, so he will

46:44

be on stage with me announcing

46:48

people, Donnie

46:49

Yeah.

46:49

Walls as a workshop host

46:49

and a backup speaker. If

46:52

something goes wrong. Phillip

46:52

Sadowski Gianna, Henry Lewis,

46:56

Josh Holtz, Mar Dimitrescu from

46:56

Stream. Alayna Bush, Cinco from

47:01

Jet Brains. Rudy Longoria, who

47:01

is a solopreneur aka Yuki from a

47:08

Japanese bank in their markets

47:08

doing a talk. Zachary

47:12

Hmm.

47:12

Brass are doing a sort

47:12

of like a coaching uh uh, type

47:17

of talk at the end of the

47:17

conference then, Monica, about

47:20

fashion OS And I

47:22

Oh,

47:22

think

47:22

yeah.

47:22

Vincent here presents he

47:22

does a talk about macros if, um,

47:27

if I'm correct at the top of my

47:27

head.

47:31

Cool.

47:31

So

47:31

Sounds like a really good, good lineup.

47:33

yeah, so it's,

47:34

But

47:34

it's,

47:35

I'm sorry. You you had me

47:35

when you mentioned that the

47:38

seats would be better. So

47:40

yeah, that was,

47:41

that

47:41

that

47:41

was

47:41

was,

47:41

a probably.

47:41

that was, that was the

47:41

one bit of negative feedback we

47:44

got last year. And then

47:44

basically somebody told me on

47:47

Twitter my butt hurts the day

47:49

Yeah.

47:49

after and it

47:50

Yeah,

47:50

was let's fix that next

47:50

year. So

47:52

yeah,

47:53

we thought

47:53

I guess.

47:53

about

47:53

I guess it's just not

47:53

designed for, for sitting there

47:56

all day. I guess maybe

47:57

no,

47:57

that theater.

47:57

no, it's really the old

47:57

venue is like really a space for

48:01

like, you know, uh, an a session

48:01

of an hour or maybe a bit of

48:05

theater for 2 hours. But then

48:05

that's already long.

48:07

Yeah,

48:08

And what we have this

48:08

year is it's really a proper

48:11

auditorium with like a really

48:11

big screen and a cinema style

48:15

seating arrangement which goes

48:15

up quite nicely. So, um,

48:20

right,

48:20

I'm told, and I tried it

48:20

in the, uh, venue myself. It's

48:24

like basically have a good view

48:24

on the screen and the speaker

48:26

from every seat in the room.

48:28

right.

48:28

So, uh,

48:29

Sounds

48:29

and

48:29

great to

48:30

so the one drawback is

48:30

that there's a good chance of

48:33

jetlagged people starting to

48:33

snore at some point

48:35

sleep.

48:35

during some sessions,

48:35

but that,

48:38

Yeah,

48:38

I guess that's like

48:38

something we can live with and

48:41

then help these people out with

48:41

a coffee break or something.

48:46

yeah, yeah. The name I

48:46

think is really interesting too.

48:48

I, I actually don't know if I've

48:48

ever been, you know, maybe

48:51

you've been there once,

48:52

Yeah,

48:53

but

48:53

it's,

48:53

this is good science.

48:53

Theatre and science museum,

48:55

yeah,

48:56

right?

48:56

it's the, the, the venue

48:56

itself is a museum, but it's, uh,

48:59

it's a kids focused, uh, science

48:59

museum. So

49:03

Yeah.

49:04

people travelling to

49:04

Amsterdam, if they just so

49:07

happened that their partner and

49:07

kids have some time off,

49:11

probably not, because I think

49:11

it's a school week in most

49:13

countries. Um,

49:14

Oh, right. Yeah,

49:15

they can, they can just

49:15

bring their spouse and, and kids

49:19

and they can just, uh, have an

49:19

enjoyable day in the, in, in the

49:23

maybe.

49:23

museum itself,

49:24

Yeah,

49:25

Uh,

49:25

yeah,

49:25

because it's as, as an

49:25

adult, you'll probably run

49:27

through the museum in like, you

49:27

know, one and a half, 2 hours.

49:30

But kids, they just want to,

49:30

they want to, they want to try

49:33

every installation in there.

49:34

yeah,

49:34

So it's really things

49:34

like kids, they can like be

49:38

engulfed in a in like a soap

49:38

bubble, for example, a like a

49:42

human sized lobe. So bubble or

49:43

yeah,

49:44

all

49:44

yeah.

49:44

kinds of light

49:44

experiments or electricity. And

49:47

it's like basically any kid who

49:47

has like an interest in

49:51

something science that they will

49:53

Mm.

49:53

have they will have a

49:53

blast in this museum, actually.

49:56

And

49:57

Yeah.

49:57

also to the how central

49:57

it is. It's like you can from

50:00

the rooftop of the museum, you

50:00

can see the central station and

50:04

you can see a lot of the

50:04

waterways at the eye harbor of,

50:09

uh, of Amsterdam City and uh,

50:09

that there's some really posh

50:14

hotels in line of sights as well.

50:16

Mm.

50:17

You probably don't want

50:17

to book a room there because

50:19

they're quite

50:20

Very

50:20

expensive.

50:21

expensive.

50:22

Yeah,

50:22

Yeah .

50:22

so that's that Emirati

50:22

hotel and stuff like that. And,

50:25

but you can also see the, uh,

50:25

the cruise terminal and the,

50:28

Mm.

50:29

uh, I think it's a big,

50:29

um, a big space for, for, for,

50:35

for, for stage shows as well.

50:35

Tha somewhere in the same corner

50:39

as the, uh, the cruise line

50:39

terminal. So if we're lucky, you

50:42

can actually see a cruise ship

50:42

coming in from the rooftop of

50:46

the museum, and you would be

50:46

looking at that and it's like,

50:50

how is this Africa going to fit here?

50:51

Yeah,

50:51

But it does fit actually, which

50:53

yeah,

50:53

is wonderful

50:53

yeah,

50:53

to see.

50:54

yeah. It's surprising

50:54

isn't it, that they can come all

50:56

the way to Amsterdam. That doesn't

50:57

Yeah,

50:58

feel like it should fit.

51:00

it seems like it's

51:00

impossible, but still, they they

51:02

managed

51:02

Yeah.

51:02

to do it. So

51:03

Yeah,

51:04

I'm down with that. I

51:04

think we covered everything that

51:08

we needed to cover. Or do you

51:08

have the feeling that we

51:12

yeah.

51:12

forgot something to

51:13

No, I think we should

51:13

leave some for the conference.

51:15

add? That's always a

51:15

good one, right? Anyways, um,

51:19

people who are interesting

51:19

interested in joining us at Do I

51:22

was in November. Make sure that

51:22

you get your tickets quickly

51:25

because I have less than 30

51:25

tickets available. I still have

51:30

some tickets available for

51:30

Daniels workshop, so definitely

51:35

check those out and consider

51:35

those. Um, and that's a number

51:38

that I have available as at the

51:38

time of this recording, which is

51:42

September 5th. Um, so I don't

51:42

know where my tickets will be

51:46

next week. So that's probably

51:46

when we will be releasing this

51:49

episode. So who knows? I hope

51:49

people who are willing to come

51:54

already bought tickets or that

51:54

they're lucky and they're still

51:56

one available or maybe through a

51:56

waitlist that they can get in

51:59

because of a late cancellation.

51:59

But I hope people get their

52:03

tickets early and not be

52:03

disappointed for not having a

52:07

ticket because last year

52:08

Yeah.

52:08

we had like a waitlist

52:08

of over 90 people. Uh,

52:11

Well,

52:13

and that's the, that's

52:13

the first list of people I sent

52:15

an email when I opened up

52:15

tickets this year. So,

52:18

yeah,

52:18

uh, and that works

52:18

because I immediately got a few

52:23

super early bird ticket sales

52:23

back then. So that's basically

52:27

that it's like ten or ten or so

52:27

tickets that I'm basically

52:31

losing money on. But I just

52:31

needed to like be able to say to

52:35

sponsors, Yeah, this, this conference is

52:36

yeah,

52:36

going to be a success

52:36

because I already sold X amount

52:39

of tickets.

52:39

yeah, yeah.

52:40

That's

52:40

It's

52:40

the whole reason.

52:41

going to be full.

52:42

That's the whole reason

52:42

people do the super early birds

52:44

and early birds tickets is just to be able

52:46

As

52:46

to

52:46

I've

52:46

claim

52:46

said

52:46

that they have

52:47

it.

52:47

a number of tickets sold

52:47

already because

52:50

It's

52:50

that's

52:50

a trick.

52:50

not a lot of money. That's that's not a lot of that's not a lot of fat on on on

52:52

these early tickets sales

52:57

anyways

52:57

Yeah, Yeah.

52:58

so. All right.

52:59

You sell them, sell them

52:59

for cost, price and.

53:01

Exactly.

53:02

Yeah.

53:03

Well, Drew, I see you in

53:03

two months, maybe a little bit

53:06

earlier at a caucus, and I'll

53:06

meet up and, uh, otherwise, uh,

53:09

we'll catch up then. And I look

53:09

forward

53:11

Okay.

53:11

to seeing your

53:11

presentation in November. And,

53:13

uh, thank you for your time.

53:14

Well, yeah. Thanks a lot.

53:14

Thanks for inviting me to speak

53:17

at the conference. Looking

53:19

No problem.

53:19

forward to it.