I wanted to let everyone know about CITCON North America in Raleigh Durham on April 16 & 17 because I co-chair the conference and the more of you that come, the better the conference becomes. This is the 5th year for the conference. We started the conference back when I was at ThoughtWorks doing CruiseControl work and JTF was at Agitar. It’s great to see new and old faces alike each year. Maceij from Urbancode described it as “an annual reunion of sorts”.

I love the open spaces format, largely because I have no idea what I will learn until I get there. I learn whatever everyone else is interested in. That’s an amazing way to take in new information. It’s humbling. In fact it reminds me of one of the first concepts I had to accept when I studying the philosophy of Socrates in university, “Before we can learn anything, we must first admit we know nothing.”

Can’t make it to CITCON RD? Then make it to one of the other ones – Wellington, NZ – Prague, CZ – Singapore.

CITCON, the Continuous Integration and Testing Conference, is an open spaces conference in its 5th year. The topics aren’t decided until the first night of the conference, but past events have proven extraordinarily useful to anyone interested in Continuous Integration and the type of testing that goes with it. Developer-testers, tester-developers, tool creators, and Agile advocates have all gained a lot from attending.

The conference is free to attend! You have to pay $20 to register, but you get that back when you attend the conference. (We are using long time conference supporter Obtiva’s EventWax for registrations. Just follow the registration link below.)

This year, the North American event will be in Raleigh-Durham at the Sheraton Chapel Hill Hotel. Registration is open, but limited to the first 150 registrants. Sign up now to reserve your spot at this innovative, exciting, education, fun event.

http://citconf.com/raleigh-durham2010/register.php

The conference operates as a non-profit, so our advertising budget is basically zero. We can use your help to get the word out. If you know someone that might be interested, please pass this announcement along to them.

Also, if your company or a company you know would be interested in sponsoring CITCON, there are a wide range of sponsorship options.

http://citconf.com/raleigh-durham2010/sponsor.php

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact me.

Enjoying the sites of Paris.

While I was in Paris for CITCON, I met up with my old buddy Julian Simpson, aka the Build Doctor. I admire what he has been doing with his blog and we always have a good time chatting about old times, the present state of the industry and where we are going.

Julian was interested in interviewing me for his site. I was interested in being interviewed.
http://www.viddler.com/explore/builddoctor/videos/1/

He also interviewed Jeffrey Fredrick.
http://www.viddler.com/explore/builddoctor/videos/2/

Jeffrey and I both talked about relationship with CruiseControl, CITCON and various industry leaders. I think both interviews are a lot of fun to watch. Julian was limited to 10 minutes, so we didn’t get to everything. Feel free to ask any follow up questions!

CITCON, the Continuous Integration and Testing Conference, is a world-wide series of free Open Spaces events for developer-testers, tester-developers and anyone else with an interest in Continuous Integration and the type of Testing that goes along with it.
See the website for more details.
http://citconf.com/melbourne2008

We’ll be seeking volunteers to help make the conference a success. See the volunteer page for more detail.

http://citconf.com/melbourne2008/volunteer.php

And, of course, we will be looking for sponsors to make the conference possible. If you know a company interested in sponsoring, please let us know.
http://citconf.com/melbourne2008/sponsor.php

Thanks! We hope to see a lot of you in Melbourne.