Vlog: On the Road Again, Episode 1

Welcome to the new Vlog, On the Road Again, from NearForm hosted by Michele Riva. Michele is a Senior Software Architect here at NearForm and has a prolific speaking schedule. On his excursions to various conferences around the world Michele meets all kinds of interesting people and has new experiences which he will be sharing with us here and on his YouTube channel .

Michele is a Google GDE and Microsoft MVP and the author of Real World Next.js . You can learn more about Michele through this blog post or through his own website .

Episode 1 of On the Road Again is about Michele's time in Berlin for Stackconf in July 2022.

Below is a text transcript of the video with timestamps as well as links to some of the things he talks about in the video. Michele (00:10):

Okay. That's my first try vlogging, I'm with my friend Miki Miki (00:15):

Hi! Michele (00:15):

Say hello! Miki (00:16):

Hi to everyone! Michele (00:17):

He's also speaking at the same conference. This is Berlin by night, I'm loving it. What do you think about Berlin? Miki (00:25):

It's very nice. Also the lights into the Spree. Michele (00:28):

Yeah. I hope we are on focus! Miki (00:31):

I hope so! Michele (00:33):

Yeah. We'll see together tomorrow at this Stackconf. See you there! Michele (00:55):

So we just went out having dinner in the center of Berlin. We meet the organizers of the Stackconf. They are super lovely people, and I can't really wait to speak tomorrow and give my talk: "Are all programing languages English?". So yeah, I guess you will find the recordings online, I don't know when, but yeah, I will make sure to put the link into the description for this video. So make sure to check it out. Right now, I am super tired, so yeah. We'll see you tomorrow! Michele (01:27):

Hello, world! Ready for day one of Stackconf 2022 in Berlin. See you there! Michele (01:45):

So it was going all fine, but one speaker won't be able to join tomorrow, and they asked me to reschedule the talk. And not a problem. So today we get some work done and tomorrow I will have my talk. I can't wait! Michele (02:20):

So while in my room, I had the opportunity to work a bit on Lyra , which is a full text search engine that I built using TypeScript. And I've been able to make several releases, I would say. So it's now in beta, but it's going to become stable, I guess, during the next few days. Michele (02:45):

I had to dress decently. I had to go to the party. So yeah, I go there, and I can't wait to meet all these speakers and the attendees. And they say there might be the opportunity to play golf. Never played golf in my whole life, so that's something else that I'd like to explore today! Michele (03:47):

Here, again, with Miki here! Miki (03:50):

Hi! Michele (03:50):

I can't remember the name of this place. Any idea? Miki (03:53):

Golf club... Michele (03:53):

Okay. Miki (03:53): Capitol Yard Golf Lounge

Michele (04:01):

Okay. Beautiful. Okay. We just had dinner. Was really nice, and the view is stunning. So yeah. Very, very good. Katja (04:09):

Hello. My name is Katja, and I'm part of the Netways event services team. My task in the few next days is to promote the conference on social media. So we use the platforms Twitter and Instagram. So I prefer uploading lots of videos so that everyone gets the impression how the conference is all about. Michele (04:35):

Okay then! Now, how can we follow you on social media? Katja (04:37):

So Instagram, our name is Netways GMBH, Netways GMBH . And on Twitter, we have NetwaysEvents, @NetwaysEvents . Michele (04:49):

Awesome! Michele (05:02):

So eventually I had to move my talk for today and I'm heading to the Stackconf. This morning, I had to work a lot and I find some time in the lobby of the hotel, went out with my colleague Paolo, which will give a talk at the Prisma meet up this evening. And we worked together. We had lunch together. So right now I'm heading to have my talk and then we will meet again and go to Prisma. So yeah, I can't wait! Michele (05:43):

So all good. I had my talk. It was very interesting. And I had the opportunity to interact with people, which is something I definitely love when doing talks of any kind and people were laughing at all the strange programming languages I was talking about. And I will put the full video of my talk in the description field for this video. So if you're interested, you know where to find it. And after I gave my talk, they also gave me a very nice present. So let me show you what I'm talking about, because it's really interesting. This is like Lego of the television tower here in Berlin. And it's beautiful. That's very beautiful. I can't wait to mount it. I really love this kind of stuff. Michele (07:18):

So we just finished the Prisma meet up and Paolo had his talk. What was your talk about? Paolo (07:25):

How not to break GraphQL spec rather you have to extend it and embrace the extensions that are already in the spec. Michele (07:33):

And it was beautiful and all the people seemed really happy, I would say, about the talk. Paolo (07:37):

I hope so. I mean they're very kind. If they didn't like, they haven't told me, which I appreciate! Michele (07:45):

So we are now going into the hotel again and maybe Paolo we eat another kebab. I don't know? Paolo (07:50):

Maybe, or something else, but I'm hungry because I was so stressed that I haven't touched any meats there. So I have to eat something. Michele (07:56):

I can confirm. So tomorrow we will be working from a co-working space. Hopefully, we can find one and the vlog will continue tomorrow. Paolo (08:06):

Yep. Cheers! Michele (08:17):

Today we worked a lot in a co-working space here in Berlin, near to the hotel, and we made so many beautiful things, especially on Lyra, again, the full text search engine. We are planning to give it support for running on the edge and we can't really wait. That has been our last day in Berlin. Tomorrow, we will leave to go back home. Michele (08:43):

Okay. So this morning I had to prepare my luggage, my bags to go back home in Italy. And people seem not to realize how hard developer relations can be, because while it's true that you travel a lot, you might go to parties sometimes, but you always work when you're at parties with other speakers, with attendees and other developers, you always speak about work. You always advocate for the products you build and you establish relationships. And while this is something I absolutely love doing, don't get me wrong, because I love doing this you know, sometimes after one week you just want to go home and have some rest. So this is my plan. This is what I'm going to do. I can never thank enough NearForm for letting me come to Berlin and also Stackconf and Prisma for hosting the conference and the meet up and all the people I met. So thank you all. See you in the next vlog. Thanks again for watching this!