Homebrew Website Club Meetup Pasadena/Los Angeles 8/10/16

Last night we continued the blossoming group of indiewebbers meeting up on the East side of the Los Angeles Area, leading up to IndieWeb Camp Los Angeles in November.

We met at Charlie’s Coffee House, 266 Monterey Road, Pasadena, CA.

Quiet Writing Hour

The quiet writing hour started off quiet with Angelo holding down the fort while others were stuck in interminable traffic, but if the IRC channel is any indication, he got some productive work done.

Introductions and Quick Demonstrations

Participants included:

Chris Aldrich

Angelo Gladding

Michael Kirk

Following introductions, I did a demo of the browser-based push notifications I enabled on this site about a week ago and discussed some pathways to help others explore options for doing so on theirs. Coincidentally, WordPress.com just unveiled some functionality like this yesterday that is more site-owner oriented than user oriented, so I’ll be looking into that functionality shortly.

Angelo showed off some impressive python code which he’s preparing to opensource, but just before the meeting had managed to completely bork his site, so everyone got a stunning example of a “502 Bad Gateway” notice.

At the break, we were so engaged we all completely forgot to either take a break or do the usual group photo. My 1 minute sketch gives a reasonable facsimile of what a photo would have looked like.

Peer-to-Peer Building and Help

With a new group, we spent some time discussing some general Indieweb principles, outlining ideas, and example projects.

Since Michael was very new to the group, we helped him install the WordPress IndieWeb plugin and configure a few of the sub-plugins to get him started. We discussed some basic next steps and pointers to the WordPress documentation to provide him some direction for building until we meet again.

We spent a few minutes discussing the upcoming IndieWebCamp logistics as well as outreach to the broader Los Angeles area community.

Next Meeting

For a new group, there’s enough enthusiasm to do at least two meetings a month, in keeping with the broader Homebrew movement, so we’re already committed to our next meeting on August 24. It’s tentatively at the same location unless a more suitable one comes along prior to then.

Thanks for coming everyone! We’ll see you next time.