This is a guest post from Cian Ó Maidín, of Irish Mobile Web and Apps development company Nearform. Cian is promoting a conference called NodeDublin on 18-19th October (www.nodedublin.com) which should be of interest to many EI client companies in ICT.

What is Node.js?

Node.js is a revolutionary new system for building cloud based services, Node.js uses the JavaScript programming language.

Revolutionary – how?

(1) Node.js allows JavaScript (the common programming language of the web) to be used to develop cloud services, enabling web programmers to do much more than ever before.
(2) Services built using Node.js have performance characteristics which are in line with the C programming language.
(3) Node.js utilises tiny amounts of computer system resources when compared with other systems like .NET and Java, this means that services written in Node cost significantly less to run.
(4) Node.js will run on everything from a low power device to a big server which means it can be deployed in a huge range of environments.
(5) Node.js is designed for building high volume high concurrency cloud services

It considered the perfect system for implementing real-time-web applications, which are at the forefront of the next generation of start-up web companies.

Matthew Ernesse (Lead Node.js Engineer for Yammer), speaking shortly after Microsoft acquired Yammer for $ 1.3bn said;

“We would like to thank the Node.js project, as we can directly attribute a large amount of our acquisition value to our widespread use of the Node.js system. Node.js allowed us to outpace our competitors (iterating faster) which ultimately lead to the acquisition of Yammer by Microsoft.”

Other companies using Node include Linkedin, Joyent, EngineYard, AppFog, Amazon Microsoft (the Windows Azure team) as well as some Irish startups.

Why NodeDublin?

There is no other major Node.js conference in Europe in 2012. All the major names in the worlds Node.js community are coming to Dublin to talk to the European Node.js community for 2 days – establishing Ireland as the focus point for the Node.js community in Europe.

Who’s Attending?

Key influencers in the future of cloud and online services such as Google, Microsoft, Joyent, Mozilla, Engine Yard, Intel, and many others will be there. The conference will be held in an intimate setting where both speakers and attendees will be able to hang out together.

Use the Code EIBCON for a €100 discount on a ticket to NodeDublin on October 18-19th (www.nodedublin.com). Contact details for Cian on that the site for more information.

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This is a guest post from Dermot Daly, of Irish Mobile Apps development company Tapadoo. 

The introduction of the iPhone, along with the ability to create applications to run on the device is said to have created a whole new industry.  Ireland has been no exception, with a number of new companies sprouting up offering app development services, or creating their own unique apps over the last couple of years.

With such an interest in app development, and with so many new exciting app companies here in Ireland developing for Apple’s iPhone and iPad we realised that there’s enough interest to hold a world-class conference for the app community right on our own doorstep.

Our discussions took us to consider what would make such a conference unique?  We wanted to reflect the passion that developers bring to their apps and to do so, we recognised that excellence is what would tie it together.  We wanted to ensure that every aspect of the conference would exude this excellence.

There are three important aspects when organising a conference such as this:

The venue - We wanted to ensure that the venue would impress; Historic in nature, centrally located and well appointed for conferences .

The content – People come for the talks.  We contacted the very best speakers; world-renowned in their circles of iOS development, Mac Development and Design.

The experience – we’re attracting an audience from all over the world; we feel their needs should be considered – We’ve picked local entertainment on Friday evening, and have engaged Ross Lewis, of Chapter One to design the menu for our gala banquet.

The result ?

Úll is a conference for iOS / OSX / mobile web developers and designers. The three day event will include workshops, keynotes, talks and in-depth presentations on all the aspects of building, designing and marketing your apps; It will be held in Dublin on April 27th-29th in the Coach House, Dublin Castle. See http://www.ull.ie for more information.

There are a limited number of discounted tickets offered on a first come, first served basis for Enterprise Ireland Client companies. Please contact Ruarí Ó hAilín on Ruairi.OhAilin(AT)enterprise-ireland(DOT)com for details.

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One of many interesting talks at last week’s DevDays Mobile/iPhone developers event, was a session entitled “Engagement through Gamification” by Chris McClelland of Ecliptic Labs.

Not a completely new idea, but great to spend some time listening to someone who has put a good deal of thought into it. I’ve read about people using games controllers for education and other non-game applications, but here the focus was on the social interactions in gaming and taking those into the “real” world.

The idea is that people are more likely to participate in a community if they are engaged using some or all of the basic human triggers common in games – the desire for reward, status, achievement, self expression or respect whether it is driven by competitiveness or even by altruism. Chris went on to give examples of social media companies who use these triggers in their products and also to outline some software frameworks that can be used to provide much of the functionality if you don’t want to build your own.

A question to readers of this blog – are there elements of gamification that you could use to engage your customers further? Apart from the obvious areas of social media and elearning, could it apply to enterprise applications? Should you incorporate a leaderboard into your next release?

Reference: Chris recommended a book called Total Engagement on the subject of gamification.

DevDays: Mobile developers from across the island gathered in Belfast and Dublin last week for DevDays 2010 (http://devdays.info). I attended the  Dublin session although the agenda was similar at both events. There were talks on Facebook integration from Tapadoo.com, Connected/Mobile Health solutions, Card Payments in iPhone Apps separate to the AppStore, adding location to your apps from OS3.ie , good/bad product strategy from Des Traynor of Contrast and the importance of good design.

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