The Java 6 (Mustang) release should make your life easier, for a change. It doesn't alter the core language like Java 5 did. It doesn't pack in so many sub-JSRs that you'll be overwhelmed by the amount you have to learn. Instead Java 6 adds several handy things that honestly should have been added before. Among the improvements we'll cover in this fast-paced class:

• A new Console class
• A real Compiler API
• A GIF writer
• Pluggable Locale data
• Access to disk partition size data
• Array reallocation
• Low-level floating point functions
• Reflective access to parameter names
• Access to network interface details
• Pluggable annotation processing
• Improved class file format
• Streaming XML with StAX
• A new Scripting interface

With Sun developing Java 6 in public, you can not only learn about these changes but provide feedback as well.

The classic searchable email archive system is cluged together -- a frankenstein monster combining a relational database with a search engine, with Java just barely able to keep the two together. In this talk we'll demonstrate how email is more content than data, how it's better encoded in XML rather than relational tables, and how Java can convert emails to XML and drive an XQuery backend to produce a simpler and more scalable email archive system.

Attendees should be familiar with XML and have an interest in text search and back-end architecture design.

If we're moving toward Web 2.0, what does that mean for online publishing? In this talk I'll answer that question. Based on my experience as Principal Technologist at Mark Logic working with dozens of the largest online publishers, I'll present a vision for how the Web 2.0 concepts like personalization, collective intelligence, the long tail, and the importance of "owning the data" can and should reshape the face of online publishing -- and how XML, XQuery, and XML-aware text search act as the key enablers. I'll also introduce new Web Publishing 2.0 concepts like "Sweat the content" and "Give answers not links".

(Not content to be a windbag, I'll use practical examples and demos to help get the points across.)

In this talk I'll explain -- without any needless math or boring proofs -- several fun algorithms of interest to back-end web programmers. Each algorithm was selected because it's really practical, really interesting, or both. The algorithms aren't always the same but can include: public key cryptography, credit card checksum validation, TCP Slow Start, two's complement, priority queues, the XOR swap, and the Google MapReduce function for massively distributed calculation.

Attendees need only come with a curiosity about the algorithms that go into the programs we use every day.