The Great Asynchronous Learning Experiment – Day 3 (some days take longer than others!)

Well, it has been nearly 5 days since day 2, and that is because so much has been happening!

 One tremendous — and for me very exciting — event has been that Laurence Moroney has undertaken the adventure of working through the Learning Experience, and I urge you to check out Laurence's blog. as it will almost certainly be a more "linear" approach than mine.

My problem is that when I see a "hole" in the user's learning experience it's my responsibility to stop and figure out how to fill that hole (just writing it down and hoping someone else will fill it won't cut it).

So, I've spent the past week filling holes and figuring out how to get out of "planning mode" and into "action mode" and I'm happy to say that today, Monday August 13, is the very last planning day. Tomorrow morning, at 8am, begins action. (Of course, lots of action has started already).

 What can you expect going forward?  Remembering that much (most?) of this work won't be done just by me (I'm continually amazed at how many people are working on Silverlight-related projects), and that everything I say here is subject to change as we all learn more and as you tell us what you need, here's what I'm thinking…

 1. The Great Asynchronous Learning Experiment.  I'd like to keep pressing on, trying to recreate the experience of .NET developers learning Silverlight through the resources available on our site, and, along the way, finding the holes and filling them.

2.  I'll be creating videos on a regular basis. Expect a video right away on creating Silverlight 1.0 applications using Visual Studio 2008 with 1.1 installed!  Lots more videos coming. I want to be sure to cover the fundamentals, then move on from there. I'll be focusing on 1.0 for a while, but I know some of you would like to see more on 1.1, and I'll be sure to cover that as well. 

3. Alternative Media.  Some folks love videos, but others feel that even a 10-15 minute video takes longer to convey information than other media might, so I'll be experimenting with videos vs tutorials; videos vs podcasts; videos vs white-papers. That is, parallel ways of conveying the same information so you can decide which way you like to get the information. Your preferences will be registered by what you choose to download and what you pass by; if we see that tutorials are more popular than podcasts, guess what? more tutorials.

 4. Webcasts. These are live and interactive (and, of course, archived for downloading at any time later).  I'd like these to be highly interactive, with Q&A, and like the videos, they'll be "Developer to Developer" — not high gloss, not lots of sizzle; but down and dirty and in the code.  One Web Cast I know I want to do (look for it among the first half dozen) will be titled "Silverlight: What Are You Waiting For" — and in that one I'd like to discuss all the benefits of getting started with 1.0 rather than waiting for 1.1 or a later version (I know, I  know, never use an x.0 product from….) Stay tuned for announcements.

 5. More blogging.  It's been 5 days!! Unforgivable. There has been plenty to say and I've been too quiet. There is no reason to bother you with drivel, but that doesn't mean that I need to go dark for extended periods of time.  I believe folks want a steady rhythm of information. I'll try to provide it. Along the way (not too much ) I'll tell you a bit more about this job, why I took it, and what I hope to do in it. Mostly, though, I'll focus on what is going on with Silverlight, and how to get the most out of the technology.

6. Events.  I'll be at AJAXWorld in SantaClara in September, and an event in New Hampshire October 11. I'm discussing going to an event in Boston on October 8 (watch this blog for announcements), and possibly another in November.

In short, I'm interested in talking about Silverlight, if you can put me in front of a couple hundred people, please don't hesitate to contact me.

[Edited 20:53 EDT 8/13 because the first time I wrote this blog entry I was incoherent]

About Jesse Liberty

Jesse Liberty has three decades of experience writing and delivering software projects and is the author of 2 dozen books and a couple dozen online courses. His latest book, Building APIs with .NET will be released early in 2025. Liberty is a Senior SW Engineer for CNH and he was a Senior Technical Evangelist for Microsoft, a Distinguished Software Engineer for AT&T, a VP for Information Services for Citibank and a Software Architect for PBS. He is a Microsoft MVP.
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