Skete and Category Practice
Details
As usual, we will be meeting at Akamai from 7-9pm.
7:00-7:30: Alec Heller - Skete: Exploring Distributed Package Management
We thought it would be nice to have a completely local hackage. To this end we've spent the past few months experimenting with a new distributed package management system called Skete. Our primary backend for Skete is based on Git. Using that, we've built a functional hackage repository. This combination allows us to keep a local copy of all of hackage in ~1GB of storage. Additionally, Skete provides a clean approach to maintaining curated collections of packages (such as stackage) or private collections (such as internal company software or local forks) which can still be refreshed from upstream (public) repositories.
7:30-9:00: Dan Doel - Category Practice
Many people in the Haskell community are fans of category theory. The motivation often given is that it provides a common vocabulary relating many areas of math. But what good does that do if you're just into programming? Are Haskell users just mostly weirdos into obscure mathematics?
Dan thinks that there is a more immediately practical justification. In this talk he will try to explain a different sense of what category theory is 'all about' than you usually hear in the introductory books recommended for Haskell users, and show how that translates into a collection of tricks that are surprisingly useful in Haskell. You will (hopefully) come away with an understanding of why you'd want to learn about categories in practice, not in theory.
Speaker Bios:
Alec Heller:
Alec Heller is a human. He may or may not have a real bio that will be filled in here later.
Dan Doel:
Dan is a weirdo who's into obscure mathematics, although he tries to keep himself somewhat grounded in practical programming. He began learning Haskell around a decade ago, using the infamous Gentle Introduction. He writes software at McGraw Hill Financial when Ed Kmett isn't distracting him with math problems.
Logistics:
If you can, please plan on arriving between 6:45pm and 7pm, but there will be someone in the lobby to greet stragglers.
Food:
Pizzas, salad and soda.
Afterwards:
If you'd like to stick around, a number of us tend to head down to the CBC (http://www.cambrew.com/) or another pub afterwards to socialize. If you would like to give a talk or if you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to follow up here or email one of the organizers.