Author Scott Knaster will deliver the Thursday, June 19, keynote address at the 18th annual MacHack, “the Annual Conference for Leading Edge Developers.” The conference will be held June 19-21, 2003, in Dearborn, Mich.
Knaster is best known for Mac programming books such as “How To Write Macintosh Software” and “Macintosh Programming Secrets.” He was developer technical support manager at Apple, wrote technical documentation for General Magic and Microsoft, and is now a columnist for MacTech Magazine and a freelance writer. Knaster’s keynote will be presented using an interactive, experimental format, codenamed Vervays, and will contain anecdotes, snack foods, live quizzes, and more.
The theme for MacHack 18 “MacHack: Unstoppable.” Despite the date change of Apple’s own Worldwide Developers Conference, MacHack, the “advanced developer hands-on conference,” stayed on course, leading to the theme, according to Conference Chairman Dave Koziol.
“It was obvious,” said Allon Stern, MacHack Theme Coordinator. “With OS X, your Mac keeps on churning with or without you. What could be more unstoppable than that?”
On March 21 Apple announced that it was rescheduling the 2003 WWDC from May 19-23 in San Jose, California, to June 23-27 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, California. The company said the change was made to offer attendees a “more complete preview release” of “Panther,” the next major version of Mac OS X. MacHack 18 was already slated to run June 19-21 in Dearborn, Michigan.
“Speakers, sessions, travel plans, people have had arrangements in place for months now,” Dave Koziol, MacHack conference chairman, said. “Our dates may make it difficult for some to attend both conferences, and we intend to work with them to find ways for them to continue to participate. MacHack offers many things to attendees beyond what they can learn at WWDC. There is plenty of expertise in a lot of areas committed to a strong MacHack.”
Registration for the conference is US$550; the price includes access to all conference events, three meals, and the conference banquet. MacHack consists of three days of sessions and development of innovative, and often very unusual, programs that are showcased in the “Best Hack Contest.” Technical papers are also part of the MacHack experience. This year’s papers will include safeguarding use of commercial wireless networks, hacking possibilities of Mac OS X, extending Palm OS 5, and building POSIX features in a Mac way.