XP West Michigan User Group

Imagine my surprise when I learn that there has been an Extreme Programming user group in my own back yard for the past year! One of my contacts at Seimens (thanks, Jim) pointed me to the XP West Michigan User Group. The most exciting news is that Ron Jeffries (Editor of XProgramming.com, among other things) is speaking at tonight’s meeting in Grand Rapids. Ron is one of the original XPers, and this is a rare opportunity to hear directly from him. From their meeting description:

September 28, 2004 - "Implications of Delivering Software Early and Often" and "Test Driven Development: Demonstration and Discussion" [Priority Health]

Ron Jeffries, prolific author, industry leader and practitioner in the XP movement, will be our guest speaker at the September XP West Michigan meeting. This is one meeting you won't want to miss

Ron Jeffries is one of the earliest XP pioneers. He was the on-site coach for the original XP project at Chrysler in 1998 and has been involved in XP ever since. Now an independent consultant, he has presented numerous talks and published several papers on the topic. He and his teams have built operating systems, compilers, relational database systems, and a wide range of applications (although he wonders why he didn't get any of the money for such efforts).

In addition to his consulting work, Ron Jeffries is author or co-author of several articles and books including Extreme Programming Installed and his most recent book, Extreme Programming Adventures in C# (DV-Microsoft Professional). Ron is editor of the website XProgramming.com and is the most prolific on-line author by far in Extreme Programming and related topics.

For more information and directions to tonight’s meeting, visit their meetings page. I hope to see you there!