My PyCon 2010 Talk

My talk is tentatively titled "Python's Dusty Corners."* It will be a brief overview of all the features in python that you don't need to know about right up until the moment you do. The list includes how comparisons work, descriptors, iterators, context managers, namespaces, else clauses on for/while loops (suggested by Hettinger), and whatever else you can suggest in the comments (please do!). The narrative of the talk is that these are features that you don't need and/or shouldn't use in your day-to-day code but that you need to keep in the back of your mind because other people's code and the stdlib do use them. As Alex Martelli pointed out in his wonderful talk Abstractions as Leverage you can't successfully function at one level of abstraction if you don't know what is going on at the next level down. This talk is a whirlwind tour of the next level down.

I'm honored to be an invited speaker this year. This just means the program committee has pre-approved any talk I give instead of going through the normal program committee proposal process. I had some stem-winding conversations with friends about what this means and what purpose it serves. Firstly it is a flattering inducement to get prior popular speakers to speak again, and possibly no more than that. Secondly it gives speakers a chance to do a talk that might not make it through the normal approval process. I knew a person in college** who's motto was "There is a fine line between being The Man and being That Guy." Imagine a Venn diagram with barely overlapping circles labeled "Good Ideas" and "Bad Ideas;" Being "The Man" is the thin overlap between the two, and committees are very good at avoiding any idea that is anywhere close to the "Bad ideas" region, let alone one that that is actually in it. Having invited speakers is a way for the committee to include those ideas with minimal risk by inviting people who have a proven track record and hoping they don't screw up.

That said my talk is pretty safe and certainly would have made it through the normal process. I would love to give a talk I thought was in the dangerous "The Man" zone but I haven't the foggiest idea of what that talk would be. Err, I have some idea but none long enough to be a proper talk. For lightning talks I'll be preparing "I love graphs" (I do, and I have the graphs to prove it), "The Physics of Bowling Balls" (waaay more interesting than you would guess), and my always-threatened-never-done talk "PyAsshole: Simulating a partial information, non-trump, drinking card game in Python."

* As much as I liked the title I proposed on twitter It wouldn't help the conference (or me, or anyone really) to have a talk titled "Strange Python Shit" on the program.
** He looked suspiciously similar to me, but with hair down to his shoulders and an eyebrow ring (lay off, it was the early 90s).

Your Talk Proposal Here

As it turns out one of the marginal items that gets trimmed in a down economy is conference jaunts [Q: who would have guessed? A: everybody]. PyCon 2010 needs talks, so if you have something interesting to say to a few hundred people this is your chance. I didn't volunteer for the program committee this year so I don't know the exact numbers but the acceptance rate is going to be much higher than the 50% for past years.

This is a great opportunity to practice your chops; I got my start when PyCon was 300 people and talks had a 90% acceptance rate. The last few years PyCon has had 1000+ people and even the smallest talk room gets 200 people. If you have anything interesting to say, this is your chance to say it.

NB, hopefully PyCon won't have to do what other conferences routinely do and say "we've extended the deadline, but this time we mean it!" For fuck's sake the conference is in Atlanta in February - I'll be happily golfing during the time I'm not speaking.

NB, by "golfing" I also mean "going to the shooting range" and "bowling" as weather dictates.

ENB: Anna Ravenscroft has a tidy short list of bogus reasons why you can't give a talk. The title is pointed at women but the excuses are universal.