Viva ExpressionEngine!
Bright light city gonna set my soul
Gonna set my soul on fire
Train-ee is pleased to offer ExpressionEngine classroom training in the bright light city of Las Vegas, Nevada. Enjoy 4 days of learning about EE elbow to elbow with other like-minded folks with plenty of opportunity to also experience the gaming, shows, golf or countless other attractions that Vegas has to offer.
The Location
This class will be in Las Vegas, Nevada USA.
More detail? Vegas?
It’s the place with the hotel named after a mobster’s girlfriends legs. It’s the place where a famous recluse spent so long at a hotel he was asked to leave - so he bought the hotel. It’s the place with the largest mechanical neon sign. It’s the city with 17 out of 20 of the USA’s largest hotels. The town with the tallest freestanding tower in the USA. The town where more shrimp is eaten than the rest of the country combined. The town with more hotel rooms than anywhere else on earth.
You get the idea.
Getting here is easy— you can fly into the McCarran International Airport which is only 3 miles from the training venue and a number of available hotels.
The Venue
This class will take place at the Regus Offices.
Regus
3960 Howard Hughes Parkway
Suite 500
Las Vegas, Nevada 89169
The nice part about this class is that the Regus location is within walking distance of several hotels - listed below. There is also a bus stop close by so you can find that screaming deal across town and still make the class without renting a car. Note that all distances and costs are approximate, and that there is no “class discount” program - you are free to choose any hotel and any deal you can dig up.
Closest Hotels
- Residence Inn Las Vegas Hughes Center
370 Hughes Center Dr
Las Vegas, NV 89169
.1 mi / 2 mins walking distance from classroom
Rooms start @ 129.00 (USD) per night
All rates at this hotel include complimentary breakfast and in-room high speed Internet access
Website - Fairfield Inn Las Vegas Airport
3850 Paradise Road
Las Vegas, NV 89169
.2 Miles / 3 Minutes walking distance from classroom
Rooms starting @ ~$93 (USD) per night
Website - La Quinta Inn & Suites Las Vegas Airport
3970 Paradise Road
Las Vegas, NV 89109
.2 Miles / 4 Minutes walking distance from classroom
Room starting @ $99 (USD) per night
Free Breakfast
Website - Best Western Mardi Gras Hotel & Casino
3500 Paradise Road
Las Vegas, NV 89109-3611
.6 mi / 6 minutes walking distance from classroom
Rooms starting @ ~$60 (USD) per night
Website - Renaissance Las Vegas
3400 Paradise Road
Las Vegas, NV
89169-2770
.8 mi / 15 minutes walking distance from classroom
Rooms starting @ $103 (USD) per night
Website
The Instructor
This class will be taught by Michael Boyink.
I’ve worked on dozens of ExpressionEngine-based websites, wrote the first ExpressionEngine book, produced the first commercial EE screencasts, and offer the first (and currently the only) EE classroom training available.
The Schedule
This class runs from Tuesday, February 9th, 2010, through Friday, February 12th, 2010.
The daily schedule is:
- 8:30 - 9:00 AM: Setup
- 9:00 - 10:30 AM: Instruction Time
- 10:30 - 10:50 AM: Break
- 10:50 - 12:00 PM: Instruction Time
- 12:00 - 1:00 PM: Lunch (provided)
- 1:00 - 2:30 PM: Instruction Time
- 2:30 - 2:50 PM: Afternoon Break (snack provided)
- 2:50 - 4:00 PM: Instruction Time
- 4:00 - 5:00 PM: Q&A
- 6:00 - ??: Optional evening activities (TBD, dinner may be provided, bring your friends/family)
Note: If you have any special dietary or physical requirements please let us know when registering so that we can accommodate you.
The Class Details
During the class we’ll cover the following:
- Brief history of EE
- Review of the “EEcosystem”
- Getting a conceptual understanding of EE
- EE Control Panel Overview
- Basics of coding in EE - tags and loops
- EE linking variables
- Loading an existing design template into EE
- Chunking the visual design into parent and embedded templates
- Passing variables to embedded templates
- Designing an ExpressionEngine architecture to power the visual design
- Implementing EE weblogs, custom fields and categories to hold content
- Building dynamic navigation menus
- Building page titles and setting navigation states dynamically
- Working with categories
- Working with relationships
- Using EE conditionals
- Using EE variables
- Troubleshooting tips
- Using plug-ins, modules and extensions
- Implementing different content types
- Setting up the site for client access and workflow
- Fighting SPAM
- Improving performance
- EE search engine - constraints and implementation
- Multiple Site Manager Overview
- EE Public Beta 2.0 Preview/Tour
What About EE 2.0?
Here’s the deal - our experience with the training tells us the best approach is to use the latest released version of ExpressionEngine as our basis for the class.
As of this posting, EE 2.0 has been released in public beta form - so unless that changes (and soon enough that I have time to revise the class materials) the class will use the latest version of the 1x branch of EE.
I’ll, however, work a preview/tour of EE2 into the class.
Keep in mind that while EE 2.0 has a redesigned Control Panel and several new features the fundamentals learned in this class will still apply and be valuable.
The Testimonials
Mike Boyink offers quality hands on EE training that makes you wish he’d hit the road and tour annually. I have never come across such a humble developer who has the patience and dedication that Mike gives to his students. EE is an amazing CMS tool and Mike certainly helps make EE more inviting and manageable. I highly recommend his training and his educational materials.
Josh Rubinstein
Thanks for a great week of training and fun. I wish you and your team (wife) the best in the future and I hope to do more training with you in the future as well.
Bryan Juber, US Synthetic
Loved the training. The overview of concepts and work flow, hands-on group exercises and behind-the-scene peeks at existing sites really brought to life what you read in the forums and documentation. The resulting “a ha” moments made it all worthwhile. Combined with the
Paula McIntyre, Loracs Design LLC
thoughtfulness of Mike Boyink and our Idea Foundry hosts, the week was a real pleasure!
Mike was an absolute Godsend! I went in to the training knowing nothing of ExpressionEngine, just HTML and CSS. A month later and I’m developing two university sites on EE which is allowing me to command a much higher project cost with a minimal impact on development. This course is an absolute must for anyone who is interested in getting started with the software!
Christopher Kennedy, OneBrightLight.com
It took me a while after the class to have my light bulb moment and for me to fully realize how great ExpressionEngine is and at the same time what an amazing teacher you are. Because of you I have an extra layer of job security and increased confidence in myself when it comes to making websites.
Keith Heustis, Clear River Advertising & Marketing
Class Prerequisites
- Working knowledge of (X)HTML and CSS
- A Laptop
- MAMP/WAMP installed
- ExpressionEngine installed
To Signup
This class has already taken place - visit the Classroom Training page for information on current classes.
