Food, fun, and so much code at EEConf 2024.
What a success this year’s EEConf 2024 was. This year, the annual community conference for the ExpressionEngine content management system was held in warm and overcast San Diego, CA, and as a cornerstone sponsor, we were able to bring six Hop folks – because we love ExpressionEngine so much!
As ever, EEConf was a very well-run gathering, yet still had a casual and collegial vibe. You have to love any conference that includes a bourbon-and-donut tasting! So many ideas and questions were shared freely and without judgment. We left recharged and thankful to be part of this truly supportive community – something we should never take for granted.
“MY LOGIC IS SOUND”
- What you say when your coworker attempts to question your code in the middle of a presentation
Several Hop ducks led or participated in sessions at the conference:
- Senior Developer Rowan Sentesy‘s talk “Cache Me if You Can” toured folks through the (many! tricky!) ways to handle caching with ExpressionEngine, particularly on high-traffic, high-activity websites where performance is crucial. Hint: We love Speedy.
- Gilbert Lin, Hop’s director of add-on development, presented “Power Up Your RTE Field with Custom RedactorX Plugins,” a deep dive into customizing RTE so content creators can insert everything from AI-generated tiramisu recipes to custom pie charts into a field. Later, Gil also did some quick demos of Hop 404 Reporter and his own add-on GB Relay.
- Special Projects Lead Susie Gardner did an info-packed overview of The BIG JOY Project (slides), a free, seven-day program of mindfulness practices (micro-acts of JOY) prefaced and followed by an assessment survey that generates a personalized BIG JOY Report. This citizen science academic research project, done in concert with the Greater Good In Action, presented our team with some truly unique challenges.
- Hop’s President Travis Smith participated in the final roundtable, offering their insight on everything from how best to structure contracts to the coming AI armageddon. Quotable quote: “We’re at an oddly positive place where I’m more worried about the future of the world than I am about ExpressionEngine’s future.”
Susie Gardner and Diana Lizarraga
We were also thrilled to see longtime client Diana Lizarraga, who runs Cal NERDS at UC Berkeley, at the event. It’s always a thrill to meet a person IRL after years of Basecamp messages and phone calls!
Special surprises abounded: The creator of ExpressionEngine, Rick Ellis, dropped in for a quick impromptu chat on the last day. Rick is such a cool guy, and we’re so grateful to him for creating the software we now rely on every day. His current project is The Art of Skill, a resource for mastering physical skills like jiu-jitsu.
EEConf featured a surprise appearance by Rick Ellis, OG creator of ExpressionEngine.
The attendees ranged from first-timers to old-timers, and the topics were useful for heavy devs as well as for the non-techy types as well. Thanks again to the fabulous organizers of EEConf! Why not join in next time?
