OpenWest Conference 2017
12 - 15 Jul 2017 at South Towne Expo Center

Notes/feedback that I was capturing into a text file during the tutorial:

* Sending out the setup instructions in advance would be helpful

* …but the setup instructions on the viking1 server were actually pretty useful and well written!

* it would be better to use the screen during the instruction time to display a set of steps for folks to carry out, to get them to viking1

* Given that MacOs and Linux both come with SSH, it might be easier to skip the VMs and just tell the Windows folks to install the Linux subsystem (in advance)

* Would be nice to set up `/etc/hosts` with the IPs for `alpine0` and `alpine1` in advance (assuming the `192.168.56.*` network)

* Don't say "guys". Approximately 1/3 of the audience was women.

* Don't OS shame ("I won't hold running Windows against you.")

* Maybe go a *little* bit less minimal on the alpine install - `man` wasn't installed

* Having printed-out instructions, or slides, or something, would help people trying to follow along. You could also include the diagram stuff you did on the white board then.

* I would move the SOCKS proxy bit to the end, after the regular tunneling, or even later, into an "advanced topics" section or something. You almost didn't get to `ssh-agent` and that's a pretty important thing, IMO.

* It's probably also worthwhile to set up the firewalls on the VMs to actually block the traffic instead of asking people to imagine

* I think you probably assumed more networking knowledge than a lot of the attendees had. Thinking about ways to reduce the amount of assumed knowledge would probably be a good idea.

* Including a shell script in the VM image for the netcat "server" would be a good idea. Or find a very minimal HTTP server and include that along with a really basic webpage, or something.

* You did a really great job when asking if people knew something, explaining that it wasn't their fault if they didn't know it. Really liked hearing that.

* You've got some good stuff in your tutorial. I think the next time you do it -- and you _should_ look for additional places to do this! -- it'll go more smoothly.

Thanks!

test comment?

Filled with pseudo-scientific malarky (the position you stand on the stage influences which brain hemisphere people process you with?! Pish and tosh.) and advice that *might* be appropriate for a sales presentation but that really wouldn't work in conference talks.

Good solid talk. Interesting insights.

One suggestion for improvement: work on not reading directly from your speaker notes. In the later parts of the talk, you relaxed a bit and seemed to be going more "off script" -- but the first 30 minutes or so, it was pretty clear you were directly reading your speaker notes.

Excellent talk; I already knew (I thought) a fair bit about IA but I learned a bunch of new stuff, particularly about the available APIs

Only suggestion for improvement (and this may have only been an issue due to the area the talk was in): some of the photos were very dark, making it hard to see any detail in them.

I was only present for about the first 30 minutes of the presentation.

The speaker went *way* too fast, and assumed knowledge far in advance of the listed prerequisites. Following along was *extremely* difficult, making this less of a "tutorial" and more of a "watch the speaker live code".

Slow down, provide more upfront information about what attendees should install on their laptops in advance, and provide more exact information about what knowledge will be assumed on the part of attendees.

Very thorough and helpful tutorial for Alexa.

Great talk.

Loved Whurley