Yesterday our group participated in a rather special hack day at the local.ch offices. The topic was JavaScript, and all engineers that were already fairly knowledgeable in it picked a topic and presented it in 15 minutes. Additionally, they created a "mission", which was a short exercise that should be solved in pair programming and that required using the techniques that were presented.

We developers that are working with the local.ch team each did a short presentation:

• JavaScript Tools - Tricks and Tipps by Patrick Jezek
• JavaScript the right way by Joël Bez
• Functional programming in JavaScript by Michael Käser
• Modular JavaScript by Marco Bohler

At the end of the day I finished with a much shorter version of my talk about node.js from the last webtuesday. For the mission, I tried to create something that is easy, fun, and highlights the ideas behind node well.

The task was creating a small asynchronous web application where engineers can register themselves for Foosball, and then get immediately alerted when there are enough players. I provided a skeleton that already does nearly everything and only needs about 10 lines of code to be finished - but these lines require you to think a bit about asynchronous programming, events, closures and the concepts behind node.js.

If you are interested, you can download the mission for yourself here and give it a try. It includes the skeleton and a manual explaining everything. More information about it can be found on my personal blog, where I can also be contacted in case of open questions.

 

Bruno Mattarollo @ 17.03.2010 14:50 CEST
Michael, thanks for the great post. Just a quick note, the nodemission.tar.gz that you have linked here is actually the image (from the photo of this blog post) and it's not the code (as linked from your personal blog).

Michael Käser @ 17.03.2010 14:57 CEST
Thanks for testing, Bruno! I have uploaded the file again and it seems to be the right one now.

Bruno Mattarollo @ 17.03.2010 15:03 CEST
Thanks Michael, it's working now! I will definitely check node.js now!