This year, Glow switched over to using Github as it's code repository when it went open source to make collaboration easier. To be honest, getting used to git and github in general has been somewhat of an uphill battle for the team, but we've really found it's come into it's own recently now that we've adopted using submodules.

Glow 2 now includes Sizzle, Woosh and QUnit all as submodule projects of Glow, and doing so has instantly made Glow feel like a more team-playing product.

The whole many hands make light work approach is really quite good fun. For example, Jake started working up a design for Woosh, his new speed test framework for JS that he's also open-sourced, which was making default QUnit look a bit... uh... under-loved, so I forked QUnit and started to reflect the designs, and over the last couple of weeks worked it up to something that the QUnit team have decided to accept back into the main project. Github made that extremely easy and now Glow, jQuery and the wider JS community benefits from a little bit of time spent making something that was essentially made to please just 3 pairs of eyes.

Picture credits: QUnit Screenshot from John Resig's Flickr Stream, designed by myself.

Last week I was lucky enough to get to attend Full Frontal 2009 in Brighton with a whole bunch of my colleagues to lend a bit of support to friend and fellow Glow developer, Jake, after his previous highly successful first foray into the world of speaking at last year's @media ajax.

The range of topics was excellent. It was really good to see some more people speaking about server-side JavaScript and it seems that Simon Willison's talk and demo of node.js was a particular highlight for a lot of people and certainly seemed inspiring (which is possibly why he's always such a good last speaker).

I'm never terribly good at taking notes, but I didn't think there was an off session of the day. PPK wowed us with the frankly impossible task that is mobile browser testing, Todd Kloots did one of the better and more thorough introductions to ARIA and accessible JavaScript development talks I've seen (and it's a shame he ran out of time), and Robert Nyman did a gallant job of explaining closures and currying (amongst other things, via the inexplicable medium of Ben Affleck) - both of which I think are akin to explaining string-theory to primary-schoolers.

Of course, I'm slightly biased and I really want to tell you everyone else is just being kind and he actually sucked, but even though I'd already seen Jake's "Optimising where it hurts" practice run-throughs and had already heard many of his jokes and examples, I still laughed throughout and thoroughly enjoyed his animated way of explaining the topic (which he does fluently and coherantly) and thought he stole the day.

Generally, I thought the day was a total success. The venue was lovely (although it's a shame it wasn't a slight bit more central, and the rain always sucks) as it was a fully-functional cinema - seats were comfortable and the quality of the screen and sound were excellent. Everything seemed to be organised extremely well and can't really fault it, so big congrats to Remy and his lovely wife, and all the helpers. I really hope they organise one again next year - I'll definitely be there.

Emmy the Great

Not bad. Slightly underwhelmed and the sudden demise of the set was a let-down.

The Decemberists

Something very special. The beautifully orchestrated first set complete play-through of the new album, The Hazards of Love, then a second set of eclectic favourites from the past played by the massively multi-talented group was a sensation.

The Decemberists at The Coronet, 19th November 2009

This is an external post I wrote for the BBC Web Developer Blog

Now we've got Glow 1.7 out the door, our minds are turning towards planning for version 2, our next major release which will be out in the new year. We're planning a significant overhaul, and as the major version increment indicates this will include a fundamental rewrite of large portions of the library.

Now is also a great time for users and contributors to get involved. Please tell us what you've liked and disliked about version 1, and what features you'd most like to see in version 2.

We have produced a set of four themes that we'd like to explore in Glow 2. These might get you thinking about what your perfect desert island library would contain, or maybe you think we've missed something vital?

• Accessibility - provide a step-change in accessible and usable widgets
• Performance - reduce load and execution times to the bare minimum
• Design - build widgets that look fantastic alone or in combination
• Community - open up the project and help the community thrive

We really want to hear what you think. If you'd like to talk to us about your ideas then join us on our mailing list, chat with us on IRC or you can send @bbcglow a message on twitter or by adding the hastag #bbcglow2 - we'll do our best to respond to everyone who sends us a suggestion.

Cate Le Bon

Pretty cute set. Twangy plucked acoustic guitar and simple lyrics.

The Cheek

Deritive dullness. Felt like I should have been watching them reherse in their parents' garage. If they lost a superfluous guitarist and that too-cool-for-school vocalist/keyboardist* (*if you can call someone who pushes half a dozen keys in a set one) they might be able to sort themselves out a bit.

Slow Club

See previous gushing posts. I'm totally starting to get into the obligatory sing-a-long. Last mention though before this blog becomes about them exclusively.

Slow Club at Scala, 24th September 2009