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hidden in plain sight

In the process of hacking on a plugin for the Uptime project I realized that I needed a simple HTTP server capable of receiving and dumping JSON data via POST. I'm well aware of the awesome Python SimpleHTTPServer module, but alas it doesn't support POST requests.

Fortunately I was able to throw together a quick little server using the sample HTTP server on the Node.js project website along with their API docs. I know this is a ridiculously simple daemon, but someone else might find it as useful as I did.

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Just this morning I discovered the Uptime project over on GitHub. The author bills it as "A simple HTTP remote monitoring utility using Node.js and MongoDB". I'm already in love with this tool thanks to its composability and ease of use.

The documentation over at the Uptime project is quite good, so I won't bore you with the details. The basic gist is that you'll want to have a MongoDB server available (OS X users can just brew install mongodb) and Node.js (at least version 0.8). Clone the repo locally and then run node app.js to start the monitor (web UI) and analyzer (check engine).

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Registration for Monitorama opens up one week from today. We're in the highly unusual situation of being a first-year conference that will very likely sell out in almost as short a time as it took to plan it. However, while I'm thrilled that so many incredible people want to attend, I want to take a moment to make sure everyone fully understands what this event is truly about, and what I personally expect to come out of it.

Monitorama will be an inclusive conference. There will be no discrimination according to race, gender, sexual preference, programming language, operating system or editor. You will not be judged on your experience, your abilities as a programmer or the number of followers on GitHub. The only tacit requirement will be a passion for our shared open-source monitoring toolset and the tenacity to dig in, have fun and help advance the state of our craft over the course of this two-day event.

Many of you will write code. Some of you will work on documentation. Others will speak or present workshops to inspire the other participants and help bring focus to our mission.

Everyone who registers should do so with the understanding that they are expected to participate. Attendees are for other, lesser, conferences. Monitorama is all about getting shit done and having fun doing it. Do not let this scare you. We will all walk away from Boston knowing that there is great work yet to be done, but with the collective wisdom and progress gained from an intense program of collaboration and learning.

There are only 200 seats available for Monitorama 2013. I hope to see your name on the ledger, one week from today.

A few stray bits of information following my presentation at DevOpsDays Roma.

The talk has received a ton of positive feedback from everyone. The slides in particular have been getting a ton of redistribution on Twitter. I'm not sure if this is a sign that my deck is that much better than the actual talk, but whatever. I'm glad that people are finding it useful and/or informative.

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I've just concluded a week in Italy as part of my visit to speak at DevOpsDays Roma. Most people don't know this, but I was an Architecture student at Georgia Tech many years ago. As such, I was exposed to a lot of Greek and Roman history. This made a lasting impression on me; I've always dreamed of visiting Rome and it was a stroke of luck when I heard about the conference and was eventually accepted to speak.

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