Name: There's No Such Thing As Plain Text - with Dylan Beattie
Start: 2025-11-25T18:00:00Z
End: 2025-11-25T21:00:00Z
Location: Barclays Eagle Lab Liverpool

For our November meet-up, we are excited to announce Dylan Beattie will be joining us to deliver his talk on "There's No Such Thing As Plain Text".

Software is complicated. Machine learning, microservice architectures, message queues… every few months there’s another revolutionary idea to consider, another framework to learn. And underneath so many of these amazing ideas and abstractions is text. When you work in software, you spend your life working with text. Some of those text files are source code, some are configuration files, some of them are documentation. Editors, revision control systems, programming languages - everything from C# and HTML to Git and VS Code is based on the idea that we’re working with “plain text” files. But… what if I told you there’s no such thing?

When we say something is a plain text file, we’re relying on a huge number of assumptions - about operating systems, editors, file formats, language, culture, history… and, most of the time, that’s OK. But when it goes wrong, good old plain text can lead to some of the weirdest bugs you’ve ever seen. Why is there Chinese in the SQL event logs? Why has the city of Aarhus disappeared? And why does Magnus Mårtensson always have trouble getting into the USA? Join Dylan Beattie for a fascinating look into the hidden world of text files - from the history of mechanical teletypes, to how emoji skin tones actually work. We’ll look at some memorable bugs, some golden rules for working with plain text, and we’ll find out what the phrase “PIKE MATCHBOX” has to do with driving in the Soviet Union.

**Food**

We have a selection of food available including Vegan options but if you'd like to know more please drop one of our organisers a message before the event via the group message forum. (https://secure.meetup.com/messages/)

If you would need assistance to leave the building in the event of an evacuation then please let us know via the group message forum. (https://secure.meetup.com/messages/)

**Schedule**

Doors open from 18:00

Pizza at 18:30
Intro and welcome 18:40
Speaker Starts 19:00
Close \~21:00 (Don't feel bad if you have to leave early for a train/bus/lift home - no one will be offended)

**Live Steam Link**
(Please like and subscribe to show your support)
[https://youtube.com/live/u5c0Gzg7T90](https://youtube.com/live/u5c0Gzg7T90)

**Travel**

Train - James Street station is a 2-minute walk from the Lab. Liverpool Lime Street is approx 15-20 minutes walking distance.

Driving - Underground parking available.

Bicycle - Cycle rack available.

Christopher Daly

Joshua Duxbury

Nwizugbe Samson

Dot NET Liverpool

.NET Foundation

International staffing Solutions for Emerging Technology Markets.

Hyperloop Recruitment

JetBrains provides product licenses to give away at each meeting

JetBtrains

Leaders in Professional Apprenticeships, Corporate Training & Education

S&A Academy

Technology

.NET

Software Development

JavaScript

SQL Server

New Technology

Web Development

ASP.NET

Mobile Development

Computer Programming

Microsoft Azure

Dylan Beattie is a consultant, software developer, and international
keynote speaker. He's been building data-driven web applications since
the 1990s; he's managed teams, taught workshops, and worked on
everything from tiny standalone websites to complex distributed systems.

He's a [Microsoft MVP](https://mvp.microsoft.com/en-us/PublicProfile/5002699), and he regularly speaks at conferences and user groups all over the world.

Dylan is the creator of the [Rockstar ](https://codewithrockstar.com)programming
language, the director of [Ursatile](https://ursatile.com), and the founder
of [The Linebreakers](https://dylanbeattie.net/music), the world's greatest tech comedy party rock band.

He's online at [dylanbeattie.net](https://dylanbeattie.net/) and on Bluesky
as [@dylanbeatt.ie](https://bsky.app/profile/dylanbeatt.ie/).



Dot NET Liverpool

There's No Such Thing As Plain Text - with Dylan Beattie

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