Some Assembly Required

Posts tagged with "prizes"

We're done (for 2006...)

By Charles McCathieNevile. Sunday, 13. August 2006, 22:09:35

I am returning to Oslo tonight, the last of the Opera ASM'06 crew to get back to the office. We had a lot of fun, we worked pretty hard, a few of us went to Tallinn afterwards for a couple of days (Thanks for having us, Estonia!) and then, as always, we have to get on with bringing you the best browser there is.

The final work item was handing over the last of the prizes, an N770 internet tablet, to Eripaha for the widget "My simple friend fred" that he co-wrote with Asobu. Many thanks to Velmu for (yet again) doing the hard yards.

Good luck in the Widget World Cup to all the people who entered as part of the assembly competition, we hope you have enjoyed the t-shirts, Opera mobile licenses, squeeze balls, caps, lanyards, and the rest of the swag that we gave out. We're happy we didn't have to carry it home, and we believe it all went to good deserving homes.

Tonight I am not sleeping on the floor, but on a proper couch in Vihti, having spent a few more days getting to know a bit more of Helsinki. I would love to be back for next year, to meet people again or those I missed this time (I am pretty sure there were a couple of people I never even saw). Thanks to the organisers, the crew, and most of all the people, who make the assembly what it is.

And to all you folks across the road, and to Mikko in Vihti, Kippis!

--chaals

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Packing up...

By Charles McCathieNevile. Sunday, 6. August 2006, 12:57:15

sleep, assembly, prizes, team

OK folks, we are packing up. We have given out prizes (congratulations to Gasman for winning the standards prize in the browser demo, Jobe for winning the widget compo with badboll, and to everyone who won prizes or created entries in the compos), slept on the floor, lived on pizza and coffee and stayed out of the sun, helped people make widgets, explained dozens and dozens among the many things that makes Opera a truly great browser.

Now it's almost time to say goodbye. Many many thanks to Velmu for all his help here. Thanks to everyone who turned up at the stand to say hello or to ask about something or tell us something they thought was cool. Thanks to the organisers of the event, and all the staff who helped keep the event running.

And thanks to my colleagues on the Opera Team. It's been a lot of fun to hang out with you, even during the time when you were working in the day and I was sleeping behind you, or when I have been on the stand at the end of my night shift, eyes barely open but just a little more to get done before I sleep...

Bye all, and thanks. It's been a great party

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And the widgets start rolling in...

By Charles McCathieNevile. Saturday, 5. August 2006, 12:55:12

widgets, compo, prizes, technology

Well, it has taken some people a while to get into widgets. After all, just knowing that writing

<widget>
  <widgetname>My hello world widget</widgetname>
  <width>100</width>
  <height>100</height>
</widget>

and

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
  <head>
    <title>Hi</title>
  </head>
  <body>
    <h1 style="background:#dff">Hi!</h1>
  </body>
</html>

is easy. Put them in the same directory as config.xml and index.html, open the config.xml in Opera 9.01 (or 9 if you haven't upgraded yet), and you have made a widget.

Put them in a zip file together, register at http://widgets.opera.com and upload your widget, remember to tick the checkbox that includes it in the Widget World Cup, and you're a published widget developer. Come by our stand to tell us your username and widget name by 1800 today and you are in the running for the assembly prizes. Win and you get first pick between the

Nintendo DS Lite with Opera on it
Nokia N90 phone with Opera on it
Nokia N770 tablet. Oh, yes, with Opera on it

But the hard part seems to be thinking of a widget that is a bit more interesting than that, to win one of those prizes. Maybe people are thinking they need to re-write the office suite. But there aren't that many people at Assembly - don't be frightened to write something small, simple and useful or entertaining.

The good news is that it isn't hard. Whether (like me) you are terrified of javascript, and just want to write something simple in SVG or HTML, or you expect a DOM API to your breakfast and write scripts to wash your dishes, you just put together something that would work on a web page.

The fastest developers I saw sat down at one of the computers on the stand for half an hour and got their entries completed. Although once your widget is registered, you can update it with your improved version until midnight tonight...

So keep them coming folks.

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Winning with widgets (or without)

By Charles McCathieNevile. Tuesday, 1. August 2006, 17:24:24

assembly, nintendo, widgets, swag ...

Well, we are sponsors for several competitions at the assembly, so we're putting up various prizes.

The big one is for the Browser demo competition. This year, Opera is the default browser - if you use another one, we ask for an explanation of what didn't work in Opera that you needed. Even the most useful report will win a small thank you prize. The best demo, on the other hand, wins a big cash prize. And because we're into open standards we have put up a special standards prize. The highest-ranked demo that runs in Opera without using plugins or java (there is an exception for audio only) will receive the standards prize of 500€. Even better, we will probably throw in a t-shirt! So, if you can make do with CSS, XHTML, XML, HTML, some of the cool HTML 5 features like canvas and Audio(), serious SVG support, fast Javascript, WML, Ajax, widgets, and a few other acronyms, and top the list, you can take off both prizes - well over 1000€ (and that's not even counting the T-shirt

).

Speaking of Widgets, we're running a seperate widget competition for Assembly '06. It works like this: You write a widget, and submit it for the Widget World Cup. That puts it in the running with the others in that competition, so you could win another 3000€ there. But if you come past the Opera stand and register your widget as an Assembly'06 widget, it will also be entered into the local competition. Since we had a hard time deciding what order to make the prizes, the winner picks from the prize pool, second place chooses between what's left, which goes to the third placed widget.

Oh, what are the prizes in the widget competition? Well, they include a Nokia N90 telephone (with Opera installed). And a Nintendo DS Lite (with Opera installed).

If you're desperate for Opera swag, these are both good ways to get some. We'll run a couple of little compos too - just stuff for fun.

Or you could win the ultimate prize - a job at Opera, where you get a salary, cool workmates, various kinds of loot, and maybe get paid to go to a demoparty or two (this will be my second this year

Of course I have to work while I am there, so it might be a bit different). OK, strictly speaking that isn't a compo, but since you have to apply for it and convince us that you're the right kind of person to make a better browser, it is sort of like one...

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