Our May 2014 meetup is up on YouTube, and it was awesome! Self-professed computer geek Dan Lyke visits the WIMP Meetup shark tank and gives his witty talk about Node.js and why, despite that JavaScript sucks, you should be using it everywhere! Don’t forget to stay off his lawn!

Video

Node.js Summary
JavaScript is a necessary evil for web apps. That aside, how can Node.js help us use JavaScript everywhere, on clients and servers. Learn to deploy higher quality software through code sharing, test-driven development, and other best practices. No programming experience necessary.
Slides
http://www.flutterby.net/2014-05-28NodeJSPresentation/
Outline

Your project includes JavaScript because JavaScript is everywhere.
MVC – how applications are “supposed” to be structured.
A tangled mess – how web apps are actually structured.
Here’s how JavaScript at all layers can help make that tangled mess more maintainable.
NodeJS can help you do that through:

Test Driven Development with Mocha
Sharing code between Model and Controller
Amazing frameworks, like Meteor and Derby
Integrating Node.js for other server apps
A few related technologies, or how Node.js can help you not write in JavaScript: CoffeeScript, C++/emscripten, TypeScript

About Dan Lyke
Former professional whitewater guide and current computer geek Dan Lyke has credits in blockbuster films and bestselling games, has written code that is in consumer products that have touched your life, was a “blogger” before that term was ever coined, and aspires to being a square dance caller. He wrote his first HTML browser in 1993, started an ISP shortly afterwards, worked at Pixar, on the Cricut family of products, is handy with a soldering iron, and relaxes by building wooden boats using hand tools in under 3 hours.

You can learn more at Dan Lyke’s website.