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Google App Engine

This talk will introduce software engineers to Google App Engine.

Event Details:

• Google App Engine — Mass GTUG Meeting
• Location: MIT Campus, Building W92 at 304 Vassar St, Cambridge MA.
• Date: Tue, January 12, 2010
• Time: 6pm – 8pm
• To register, click here

It is not an introduction to web programming or a Google Apps session. It is assumed you know server-side web development — perhaps ASP, JSP or PHP. Please note, this session will be based on Python. Still, it is not a programming language session — the emphasis will be on learning the available APIs which are common between Java and Python on GAE. The idea is to familiarize everyone with the basic App Engine APIs.

We will create a toy bank and be able to transfer “money” between accounts.

Agenda:

1. Getting Started – What is App Engine
2. Structure of an App Engine Application
3. Data Store — the data store is common between Python and Java.
4. Template Engine — the Template Engine is unique to the Python environment.
5. Transactions — the transaction model is common between Python and Java.

Prep Work: To get more out of the meeting, you may want to

• Visit the Google App Engine Getting Started Guide.
• The Downloads page also has instructions on setting up a development environment such as Eclipse.
• Walk through the Hello World example ahead of time.
• Walk through this Data Modeling presentation presentation ahead of time.
• The design of the bank application is based on this blog post by Nick Johnson.

If you do some of the prep work outlined above, you may be able to ask more pointed questions. I will make sure to allocate plenty of time for questions.