Note: This is a guest post written by Nancy Perkins
Conferences can provide countless possibilities for developers in all sub-divisions of technology development. It primarily gives them the opportunity to keep themselves up-to-date with the latest happenings in their respective turfs, and at the same time gives them the chance to meet and network with fellow developers to gain new and different perspectives, and perhaps to foster new relationships that could lead to collaborations or projects in the future.
Here are some of the most important technology conferences that developers shouldn’t miss.
Google I/O
Perhaps the most anticipated and most important annual conference for developers in recent times is the Google-organized I/O (“I” and “O” stand for input/output or “Innovation in the Open”) conference, which follows the same format as Google’s Developer Day. Google I/O features highly technical and in-depth discussions focused on building solutions around Google and open web technologies such as Android, Chrome, Google APIs, App Engine, and others.
Key activities include Google Code Labs where participants get to roll up their sleeves in hands-on labs to get elbow-deep in coding; and Google Hackathons where attendees get to apply what they learned from the developer tracks during the previous sessions. Finally, delegates get to celebrate in an afterhours party, Google-style.
TechCrunch Disrupt
TechCrunch Disrupt is the place to be for the tech and business savvy individuals who want to be introduced to outstanding startups and influential speakers from today’s changing tech landscape. There are three key activities that fill up the slate of Disrupt conferences, namely:
- Hackathon. Participants will join teams to hack a product within 24 hours, after which, they will present their hack to a panel of judges and audience members.
- Startup Battlefield. Companies get to launch their products on stage through demos and pitches, both before a live and an online audience followed by a tough round of questions from a panel of experts.
- Startup Alley. Existing startups that are less than two years old and with less than $2 million in funding can compete to win the favor of the audience for a $50,000 grand prize.
Cloud Connect
CloudConnect describes itself as “the defining cloud conference and expo for IT professionals, developers, and leading cloud providers.” Started in 2008 and held in multiple locations like Silicon Valley, Chicago, and even as far as India, this series of events brings together the entire cloud computing ecosystem in a series of panel discussions, hands-on demonstrations, keynote speeches, and candid interviews with important people in the cloud computing industry.
Participants usually attend Cloud Connect to learn about infrastructure, platforms, storage, development, applications, security, funding, and product strategies related to the cloud.
CloudBeat
Top business and tech portal VentureBeat is responsible for the annual staging CloudBeat, a conference whose aim is to assemble the biggest names in the cloud’s quickly evolving landscape. Unlike other popular cloud conferences, CloudBeat is more customer-centric in the sense that audiences are given a behind-the-scenes look at what goes on inside the turf of vendors and experts.
Big announcements on cloud technology are made during this gathering as well. This year’s event saw the revelation of the ground-breaking Business SMS feature from phone service industry leader RingCentral and the victory of funding platform Kabbage as the overall winner of the 2012 Innovation Showdown.
WWDC
One of the most important annual conferences for developers and programmers around the world is the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference, often abbreviated as WWDC. Each year, Apple gets to showcase its new software and technologies for developers in this event usually held in California. In recent years, the conference has also evolved into a place for Apple’s hardware announcements. Attendees usually come from more than 60 countries and the headcount often reaches an impressive number of as many as 5,000 developers.
There are perhaps several other buzzworthy conferences developers should attend. If you know one and are willing to recommend one, feel free to add it in the comments section below.
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