James Andrews

While its fresh in my mind I think I am going to write about the DragonCon iPhone application. Thursday evening I was browsing either Twitter, or Facebook or Livejournal. I don’t remember which when I saw a link advertised for a Dragon*Con iPhone. It was basically advertised as a replacement for the little panel list booklet that I can’t read because the text is so fraking small. I was pretty psyched.

The application is pretty simple in design. There is a main page that has update information. There is an “Events” button, a “My Schedule” button, and a “Speakers” button. For DragonCon the “Events” button gave you a list of all the panels on all the different tracks and concerts from various acts at the convention. This was really handy. Not having to dig out a little booklet that was hard to read was a real PITA. You clicked on an event and the there was a way to add the event to your “schedule” page that had a day calendar look. You could plan your entire weekend and then all you would have to do is go to your “Schedule” page and see what you had chosen and life was nice and easy, not marking the little book and trying to find an event you read about but were unsure about, simply add it, and then go through the schedule and cull out the things that overlapped or were too far away for you to make it from the previous track. The idea at it’s simplest form is great. No wasted paper, and much easier to find panels.

It’s got problems thought, and to be fair the Application is called “Follow Me” and is created by “Core-apps LLC”. It is an event organization app that allows you to have information on panels exhibitors and updated information on. DragonCon is simply their client.

The biggest problem is the load speed. DragonCon has a LOT of events, and since the application talks to the internet to update those events you’re talking a connection EVERY time the application is loaded. It seems to load the XML (assuming it’s XML) EVERY time instead of doing something simple like checking the last modified date against a db to see if the schedule has changed. With 30000 people at the convention and most of them connected to cell towers trying to make connections for tweeting, surfing or using FollowMe. That lead to a VERY slow user experience. The app should only ever update when the data has changed, and then, only modify new data since that change. There are also a lot of things that they could have added to make the experience of using the application a lot better. “Speakers” for example gives list of all the speakers, there’s no cross talk to the events telling allowing me to see what events that speaker was in. There was no way to search only different tracks. All 3 days of events were listed in one list. Separating out Friday, Saturday, and Sunday would have made it easier for those of us trying to get to the sunday list late friday night to plan things. Instead you have to scroll through hundreds of panels that happen Friday and Saturday. Little things that with a little more thought could make this application rock the convention world.

Basically the idea is great, the execution needs some work. Yay DragonCon for doing this, They may want to consider a web version as well for those non-iphone users. Any web developer with half a brain could write something similar in a couple weeks, and then you’d make everyone’s life easier.

FollowMe gets 2 of 5 stars. DragonCon for using the tech to make my con experience better gets 5 for 5!

Saturday I was in a bad mood. Things had happened that just really irritated me. Lots of Friday night drama with one of my con-room-mates having his phone stolen, and a bunch of other stuff that just shouldn’t have been included in a convention weekend. I wandered around the con until I found the Hacker 101 panel. It really wasn’t what I expected. I expected more discussion of well, actual hacking. It ended up being more of a discussion on ways to protect yourself from hacking. I had a good time, and left in better spirits, so thanks to “Pope Johnny X” and crew for a good Hacking 101 session.

Still down and planning to go to my con room and drink I bumped into a couple felling 501st NEGers. Who oddly enough were also not really enjoying the convention. We started chatting and eventually we ended up back in my room, and them my room mates showed up and they brought more people, and before I knew it I was feeling like D*C 2009 was the best thing ever. I just didn’t enjoy the crowds and much preferred the debauchery and hanging out with friends while observing the crowds from the 4th floor of the Marriot. My Saturday ended much better than it began and I am grateful to those friends who let me go off on my drunken tangent.

Sunday was spent roaming around taking pictures, wishing I had bought more liquor and trying to fin gifts for my 2 nieces an my nephew. I eventually ended up at the Hacking 201 panel where we talked about a bunch of different things as well talked to a Hacker over the phone who is currently serving time in Prison. Who wouldn’t go into details as to why he was in prison. It was interesting for a while, but eventually I decided to jump ship, and go try to find something else. I have decided that I want to spend some time learning how to hack programs. Not do do anything illegal, but to understand how it is done. Something I currently don’t know. I am bummed I didn’t get to see the sucker who had to drink the shaken piss warm colt 45 for asking the worst question of the night, but oh well. Ended up at the pirate party which was fuck lame, an then finally just wandered around taking pictures, until I felt it was time to go to bed.

I ended up meeting a really cool woman on the flight home. Made for a nice short flight (the flight down felt way long). DragonCon 2009 has come to an end and I am back home in Massachusetts. I am exhausted, and glad to be home with the family.

It’s more than halhway through day two. After a late night drunken stupor. trying to keep conmate A from killing the jerk who stole his iPhone, and keeping conmate B from vomiting in the hotel room I managed to get a good nights sleep.

The marriot is a madhouse. Back escalators are already busted, so you have to take stairs and they only have one set of the emergency stairs open.

Went for lunch away from the food court maddness. Found a great sushi shop about 4 blocks down near the parade starting ground. I got the spicy beef bowl. Totemo oishiikatta!!!

On the way to lunch we walked by the line to the Patrick Stewart panel, which went out of the marriot and down into the food court hampster tunnel. Totally ridiculous. I personally have not made to any panels yet, and probably won’t.

Time to find an ATM that has money in it ciao…

In Atlanta for Dragon*Con 2009. Another year of nerd debauchey is about to begin. As ivwrite this I sit in line for the “Stargate Atlantis: Supergate” panel listening to the crap that is the Cruxshadows playing on the mezzanine level of the marriot, 2 floors below me.

D*C has done a lot to try and improve the convention and only time will tell ifit succeeds. One of the additions is th iPhone app that helps you plan your convention experience. Complete with a list of all panels and a mini calendar, no more do you have to try and read the track booklet that has text too small to be read. This app was much needed and greatly appreciated. it still has a couple bugs where it crashes for no reason, but I am not unhappy with that.

the Marriot and Hilton hotels now have a bridge connecting the mezzanine level of the Marriot to the 2nd floor of the Hilton making travel between the two hotels.

I have yet to seek out the fan tables. Apparently they are spread out amongst the 4 host hotels. Which in my opinion sucks ass.

That’s enough for this report more later