Speakers

Yukihiro “Matz” Matsumoto

Creator of Ruby

Yukihiro Matsumoto 松本行弘, also known as Matz, is a Japanese computer scientist and software programmer best known as the chief designer of the Ruby programming language and its original reference implementation, Matz's Ruby Interpreter (MRI). His demeanor has brought about a motto in the Ruby community – "Matz is nice and so we are nice," commonly abbreviated as MINASWAN.

Nadia Odunayo

Founder and CEO of The StoryGraph

Nadia Odunayo is the founder and CEO of The StoryGraph, the app that helps you to track your reading and choose which book to read next based on your mood and favorite topics and themes. She previously worked at Pivotal Labs as a software engineer and originally learnt to code at Makers Academy in London. In her spare time she loves to take dance class and, naturally, read!

Brandon Weaver

Senior Staff Software Engineer at One Medical

Brandon is a Senior Staff Software Engineer at One Medical. He's an artist turned programmer who teaches Ruby with a series of colorful cartoon lemurs going on storybook adventures. These talks have featured everything from conducting symphony orchestras on cellphones to the deepest and darkest corners of the Ruby programming language. This time? He's brought something special to share, and he looks forward to sharing it with you.

Drew Bragg

Senior Product Developer at Podia, Podcast Host of "Code and the Coding Coders who Code it"

Drew is a Senior Product Developer at Podia. He is the host of the monthly podcast "Code and the Coding Coders who Code it", and a co-organizer of Philly.rb, the Philadelphia Rubyist meetup. When he isn't hunting for weird Ruby syntax, he enjoys playing Ice Hockey, playing board games with his wife and daughter, and trail running with his dog, named Matz of course.

Nickolas Means

VP of Engineering at MedScout

Nickolas Means loves nothing more than a story of engineering triumph (except maybe a story of engineering disaster). He’s a student of building healthy cultures for technical teams and thinks we have a lot to learn from those who have come before us. He lives Austin, TX, and spends his spare time hanging out with his wife and kids, building keyboards, and pursuing the perfect cup of coffee.