Slides for Google App Engine Presentation

Aloha,

Today I had the pleasure of presenting an overview of Google App Engine to my former company. I want to thank them for taking time out of their busy day to let me talk story.

I've published the slides for reference. I hope they are useful to others evaluating App Engine.

As a Developer Advocate for Google, much of my job is helping developers and organizations become successful with Google's products and technologies. Today's presentation was great practice, and I learned a few tricks.

  1. If it's a lunch-and-learn, go ahead and start presenting while the team is eating. No need to scarf down your food so you can begin presenting.
  2. Test the laptop/projector connections before you start!
  3. At the beginning, ask the team what their background is and what their current pain points are. This helps to frame the conversation.
  4. Meet with the Director of Development, or the person that invited you, to ensure that you cover the material most interesting to the audience.
  5. The first presentation should probably not show code. You need to first set the tone and explain the technology's place in the world before diving in.
  6. It's not a presentation, it's a conversation or story.

I'd love to bring freebies next time as giveaways.

If you are interested in learning more about App Engine, this is the newest book I could find. It's authored by a Google Developer Engineer, so you know it'll be good.



All in all, it was a lot of fun and I look forward to talking story with other developers!

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