Morning Keynote Presentation

This morning I got up early beacuse I was nervous about my presentation later today, the "Who wants to be an Engineer?" game show. After finding the Blessed Drink (coffee) and drinking it with great thanks, I went into the meeting room and sat down next to David Baer from Oakland, California. (He does some of the best 4D systems I've ever seen -- he's a big-time oncologist, and his stuff helps sick people get better while spending less money.) We chatted while waiting for the keynote address to begin. David's system uses AreaList extensively, and he was happy to have the new PowerView option on the horizon. (Now, if there was only something that could be done with CalendarSet...)

4D and Dreamweaver

The keynote address began and Brendan Coveney started out by welcoming everyone back. Then he got down to business by demonstrating something new, a 4D web tags module for Dreamweaver. It allows a web designer to insert and manipulate the new 4D 6.7 tags directly in the Dreamweaver design environment. It works in a way similar to the Object Properties palette in the 4D form editor: a user drags an element (4DVAR, 4DACTION, 4DIF, etc.) from a palette to the web page design area. Then, the parameters associated with that object can be edited using another special dialog. To show how it works, Brendan directed Jim Staples in a hands-on demonstration. Jim started out in 4D, where he made a table with a couple of fields and a method. Then he used a special tool to export the description of that table, its fields, and the method into a text file. Then he took switched to Dreamweaver and used the special module to import those definitions. Then, the 4D web tag editors inside Dreamweaver are aware of the definitions and present them when using the tags. This reminded me of using the ASP editors, and will be a great boon for those 4D developers who use Dreamweaver or work with or designers who use it. (I can also imagine that there will soon be a Dreamweaver module for Active4D...)

The new 4D Tech Support System

Brendan then called on Kent Wilbur to demonstrate the new 4D Technical Support database. It looked pretty nice! Kent took the occasion to announce that the 4D Tech Support web site is completely served up on 4D 6.7, and has been so since August 9, 2000. He then put the system through its paces, and explained some of the history behind implementing it. It looks very nice, and is a fine example of what can be done with the new features in 4D 6.7. Probably the most interesting new feature is the feedback system, where a developer will be able to track the progress of a tech support call as the tech support staff is working on it. When a tech support engineer posts an in-progress update during the course of solving your problem, you'll be able to see it on the special web page set up for your case number. This is cool! Kent explained that it will be available for general use "soon."

Personalized 4D Web Page

Brendan then mentioned that the entire 4D web site is being re-worked with the idea of personalization toward the developer... he showed a prototype version of the new site that had the name of the logged-in user. He said that it would be further customizable, including having technotes of interest appear in a list on the home page. [This level of developer supoprt via the web seems excellent, and is really a welcome change to see. I am excited about seeing the new sites!]

New commands for 4D WebSTAR V

Brendan then breifly reviewed some new features that will be in 4D WebSTAR 5 (which for some unknown reason, perhaps to come in line with MacOS X, is being presented in print as 4D WebSTAR V, as in roman numeral "vee" instead of 5). These include: a 4D connection module and special support for PHP, JSP, Active4D, and Lasso. Wow! This seems like great news for WebSTAR users.

4D Open for Java

Brendan then introduced one of the French engineers (Matthieu -- e-mail me your name!), who then demonstrated the new 4D Open for Java package. It is written entirely in Java, and has been certified by Sun Microsystems as being 100% pure Java, whatever that means. 4D Open for Java is also multithreaded, and can even run a stored procedure on the server. The demonstration was fairly standard fare, and showed a record being created and manipulated via a Java-based form as hosted on a 4D Server. The coolness of this product is more in how it opens up 4D to the Java world. If your 4D database has some exposure to a Java, having this native driver is way, way better than using the JDBC-ODBC bridge and the ODBC Driver for 4D Server. If none of this makes any sense to you, then don't worry too much -- it will be very pleasing to the Java-heads who used to poop on 4D because it didn't have a native driver.

New Stuff at the Wrap-Up

Brendan promised that we would see some "new stuff at the wrap-up." We'll see, I suppose!

Keith Goebel wins the Attendee of the Summit Award

Brendan then called up virtual attendee Keith Goebel, and presented him with the Attendee of the Summit Award. Hurray, Keith! It couldn't have happened to a nicer guy. Good thing you were here to receive the award... ;-)

Now would be a good time to mention the Kieth Goebel goes to the Summit web site again. Jim Rietz put it together. It is extremely funny, and well worth the trip. I have heard that Kieth's recent adventures include having a Mariachi band serenade him during dinner at a local Mexican restaurant.

http://www.think-different.com/KeithsGreatAdventure/

Rich Gay presents Karen Sabog with a special award

At the very end of the keynote address, Brendan called Rich Gay to the front, who polled the audience with the following question: How many of you use the NUG? Of course, we all raised our hands. Rich then called up Karen Sabog, the owner and administrator of the NUG, and explained that she has been keeping the list running seamlessly continuously since 1993. And, he added, she keeps doing this job even though she no longer develops with 4D! He explained that her air fare and conference fees had been covered by 4D, Inc., and that during the conference he had been soliciting the developers present for donations to cover her hotel and other expenses. (This is true, he pretty much hit us all up for a donation, and wouldn't take more than about $10 from any one individual to keep it fair.) Rich then awarded Karen with the grand sum of US $605 he collected, which will no doubt help substantially in covering her expenses. Karen graciously accepted the award, and the crowd clapped and cheered -- and a standing ovation spontaneously emerged, with practically everyone jumping to their feet as she made her way back to her seat.

It's people like Karen who make this community what it is, and we owe her continuous thanks for her tireless efforts in maintaining the list behind the scenes -- thanks, Karen!

Karen Sabog (left) receives accolades from Rich Gay at the Saturday morning keynote

With that, the morning keynote on the last day ended...

Sessions

DataGrid

Because I was nervous about my presentation later that day, I figured I needed some extra "quiet time" to smooth myself out before going on stage. So, I actually planned on attending only one of the day's presentations, even though I really wanted to go to them all. The one I attended was Sebastian Frey's DataGrid show. Sebastian and I had been planning on inflicting some 4D humor during his presentation, for which I was the straight man. Our two big jokes were are follows:

Bryan: So, Sebastian, how's the presentation going so far?

Sebastian: Well, Bryan, everything seems OK.

(This one is hilariously funny because it mimics the famous 4D Tools wording that indicates no problems were found. It seems ambiguously un-reassuring, and therefore the butt of the joke.)

Here's the next joke:

Bryan: Sebastian, how do you feel about meta-data?

Sebastian: Well, Bryan, I never meta-data I didn't like!

(This one is more punny. DataGrid uses lots of meta-data, and therein lies the humor.)

So, before the presentation began, Sebastian asked me to come up on stage with him to help run the slides and provide moral support. This was fine with me, since I've done it before for him last year during the 4D Assimilator presentation.

Sebastian then reviewed DataGrid, which is a deep code library inspired somewhat by Apple's Enterprise Object Framework component of Web Objects. It provides for the developer a consistent programmatic interface for handling data, no matter its source. The supported sources include the local 4D database, a 4D Server, Oracle, Sybase and SQL Server, and any ODBC-compliant data source. This is a tall order, and Sebastian's tool does it fairly well. It's a lot to explain in only an hour or so, and Sebastian did a yeoman's job. It operates quite differently that the way that 4D does, but is quite normal for the rest of the databases in the world. Instead of maipulating selections, sets, and current records, everything is manipulated through arrays and variables. This is a paradigm shift that every developer making the switch from 4D to some other platform faces, and DataGrid is at least worth reviewing to help understand this shift. At the core is EDM, the Enterprise Data Module, a portable code library for which DataGrid provides the user interface and example code.

Sebastian explained DataGrid in general, and then gave some practical applications. He first used it to deconstruct a remote 4D Server database, and then he manipulated data from it. This same mechanism applies to Oracle or any other supported database type.

After a question-and-answer period, Sebastian wrapped things up and we were done! Bravo, Sebastian!

Who wants to be an Engineer?

After the DataGrid presentation, I went up to our room and worked with my -- I should say our, since Webwoman helped -- presentation. I went down for lunch at noon, where Webwoman and I had a quick lunch (which was that fried -but-really-baked chicken that seemed like it could have been pulled out of a box) with a bunch of other developers and then I made my way back upstairs to continue refining. Then came showtime!

The premise of the game is pretty simple. A contestant is asked a series of 10 questions, for each of which there are four answers presented, only one of which is right. The questions get progressively more difficult, and the contestant is allowed the assistance of three life-lines, which may be used only once and in no particular order. The first life-line is to ask the audience which answer they think is correct. The second life-line is to have two of the wrong answers randomly removed, and the last is to call a friend for help with the question. This last life-line has a time limit of 60 seconds, so the friend has to both think and talk fast!

In this case, we gave out raffle tickets to choose contestants. The contestants included Dennis Carnine, Myles Wakeham, Lisa Dorenkamp, Christos (whose last name I don't remember), and Tony Ringsmuth.

I would talk about the special prize that the first contestant was awarded just for being first, but I really shouldn't. Suffice it to say that any pictures of Dennis Carnine should be closely examined.

The contestants were all good sports, and everyone went away with a prize -- or two! Tony made it almost to the end, but flamed out in a blaze of glory at the level 10 question. The tension on that questions was palpable!

Tim Tonooka provided the "phone a friend" support, essentially opening up 4D Tech Support in a one man show. He did pretty well, and it brought the house down when he asked for my partner number when I called him the first time. He even took the time to make sure it was valid!

One of the questions practically incited a riot. It was the one that asked: "what is the largest value an integer variable can hold?" See if you get the right answer.

The question that I hoped would show up appeared at the last, which was extremely appropriate. It was: "what is the first name of Mr. Coveney, the President of 4D, Inc.?" I bet you can't guess which one is right on that one.

Here are some pictures that Webwoman took:

And here are the questions that were asked, with the correct answers. See how you do!

Questions

1. In the abbreviation 4D, what does the letter "D" represent? A: Debonaire. B: Developer. C: Dimension. D: Derriere.
2. What kind of database is 4th Dimension? A: Flat-file. B: Articulate. C: Relational. D: Pensive.
3. Which of the following is a product by Committed Software? A: CoatCheck. B: CardCheck. C: SanityCheck. D: CashOrCheck.
4. What is a table? A: Where you eat lunch. B: A place to hold your computer monitor. C: A database construct that holds records. D: A marketing ploy.
5. What is the data cache? A: A special extra license fee charged for 4D Server. B: The memory area reserved to hold records. C: The money you paid for extra RAM. D: The price of a record.
6. What is 4th Dimension? A: A millenial cult. B: A whimsical term from the world of high-energy physics. C: A relational database/RAD/Web tool. D: A creepy television show from the 1960s.
7. Which of the following is a product by Committed Software? A: PayCheck. B: RainCheck. C: DataCheck. D: Chech Republic.
8. What is 4th Dimension? A: A millenial cult. B: A 1960's rock and roll band. C: Time. D: A relational database.
9. What is a method? A: What you use in Vegas. B: A script that runs code. C: What married couples who want to become parents use for birth control. D: What you explain your madness with.
10. What is the title of 4th Dimension's bi-monthly journal? A: Dimensions. B: Relations. C: Pretentions. D: Indexes.
11. What is a field? A: Where the Lone Ranger keeps Trigger. B: An electromagnetic phenomenon. C: What records contain. D: Where you walk barefoot in the grass.
12. What is a record? A: A bad idea for a President. B: The question your kids will ask you when you tell them about your music collection when you were their age. C: A collection of fields that lives in a table. D: What you might get if you go to Tijuana.
13. What is a megabyte? A: A heavy-metal band. B: 1048576 bytes. C: Something that cracks your teeth. D: An orthodontist's next house payment.
14. What is a string? A: The thing you hang by most of the time. B: What you tie your shoes with. C: What a package comes wrapped in. D: A collection of characters.
15. What do the initials "JPR" abbreviate? A: John Peter Richeleu. B: Jean-Pierre Ribreau. C: Just Plain RIght. D: Jacque-Paul Rinard.
16. In which Hollywood feature film is the blue ACI logo prominently, if briefly, featured? A: The Matrix. B: The Net. C: Sneakers. D: Mad City.
17. What is the first name of the creator of 4th DImension? A: Francois. B: Bernard. C: Laurent. D: Jean-Pierre.
18. What is the maximum number of fields allowed in a table? A: 255. B: 254. B: 511. D: 512.
19. What is the maximum number of tables allowed in a 4D 6.5 database? A: 256. B: 255. C: 128. D: 511.
20. What television program inspired the name of 4th Dimension? A: The Twilight Zone. B: Laugh In. C: Bonanza. D: Lucky Luke.
21. What Marvel comic book character inspired the name of the first beta versions of 4th Dimension? A: The Silver Surfer. B: Doctor Doom. C: Doctor Strange. D: The Incredible Hulk.
22. Which of the following 4th Dimension version numbers was never released in the United States? A: 1. B: 2. C: 3. D: 4.
23. Which of the following is not a command in the English-language version of 4D 6.5? A: Arctan. B: JOIN. C: OLD RELATED ONE. D: Blob to longint.
24. Which of the following is not a field type in 4th Dimension? A: PICTURE. B: INTEGER. C: TEXT. D: STRING.
25. Which of the following letters does not begin the name of a command in the English-language version of 4D 6.5? A: J. B: F. C: R. D: Y.
26. Which of the following letters does not begin the name of a command in the English-language version of 4D 6.5? A: U. B: I. C: X. D: E.
27. What is the largest value that an integer variable can contain? A: 32767. B: 16383. C. 2147483647. D. 32768.
28. In 4th Dimension, what is the value of the following expression: 2 + 3 * 10 / 5 ? A: 8. B: 12. C: 6.4. D: 10.
29. What is the maximum number of records that a table can contain, assuming that none of its fields are indexed? A: 2147483647. B: 16777216. C: 16777215. D: 25165824.
30. What is the significance of the number 14566? A: Nothing; it is a random number. B: It is the ASCII value of the string "4D4D". It is the birthday of Christian Quest. D: Is it the square of the hexadecimal value 0x4D.
31. Which of the following commands is fastest, according to the book, "Programming 4th Dimension: The Ultimate Guide" ? A: QUERY. B: GOTO RECORD. C: GOTO SELECTED RECORD. D: QUERY SELECTION.
32. Which of the following has never been a utility command for 4th DImension? A: FlushKeys. B: 4D CUST Editor. C: 4D Renamer. D: 4D Old ROMs Utility.
33. What is the first name of Mr. Coveney, the President of 4D, Inc.? A: Timothy. B: Sean. C: Daniel. D: Patrick.

Answers

1. C.
2. C.
3. C.
4. C.
5. B.
6. C.
7. C.
8. D.
9. B.
10. A.
11. C.
12. C.
13. B.
14. D.
15. B.
16. B.
17. C.
18. B.
19. B.
20. A.
21. A.
22. D.
23. B.
24. D.
25. A.
26. C.
27. C.
28. D.
29. B.
30. C.
31. C.
32. B.
33. C.

Closing Keynote

The closing keynote followed the last sessions, and Brendan Coveney emceed. Webwoman and I sat behind the rest of the San Francisco Bay Area contingent, who were imbibing in some afternoon libations. Mmmm... I'm pickin' up good libations...

A spoonful of liquor helps the Q&A go down for (from left) Larry Sharpe, Stacey Blaney,
Karen Sabog, John Barrymore, and Ron Dell'Aquila.

Sad News

Brendan started out with some sad news. Frédéric Grandjean, the engineer responsible for the web server built into 4D, has died. As a memorial, his personal web site is now hosted at the 4D SA web site.

http://www.4d.fr/shadows/

4D InstallerMaker

Brendan then showed something new: the 4D Installer Maker. This is extremely interesting for those of us who distribute 4D to users on a regular basis. It is essentially a cross-platform installer, suitable for use with up to 12 languages. It also comes with a serial number generator that works from a seed value, and does "pre-flight" checks of installers. It supports a slide-show interface, and looks about the same as anything else out there. It reminded me of both StuffIt InstallerMaker on MacOS and InstallShield on the PC. It doesn't appear to have a gnarly scripting language (like InstallShield), which is nice, and it also appears to have the ease of the StuffIt product. Brendan put the demo through its paces, and it looked fairly easy to use. Time will tell... and it will be nice to actually have a cross-platform installer. There was no indication of how detailed an installation it could make on the Mac, and no indication was made of its MacOS X compatibility, but stay tuned...

4D Web Architecture

Brendan then next announced that there would be a version of the 4D Web Server that would run on 4D Client "not in the next few weeks, but in the near future." About time! Can't wait!

Shipping Date for 4D 6.7: October 23, 2000.

The entire audience clapped for a good minute when Brendan announced that 4D 6.7 would ship in the US on October 23, 2000. (Hmmm... the beta password times out on October 15, 2000... sure hope there's a new password before then.)

Question and Answer Session

Next was the traditional "the crowd asks questions that Laurent answers while Brendan cringes and subsequently clarifies with a certain vagueness" session. I attempted to get these right; please verufy them for yourself before basing any business plan or NUG flame on them. Where possible, I identify the questioner.

Q: Will you give ability to edit the HTTP stream? Will you reduce the chattiness between client and zerver?

LR: Yes, we are working on this... in the near future. [Possibly around 2nd Quarter 2001, Mike Erickson clarifed].

LR: It will improve quite a lot. (He then explained how to distribute a database web server over several clients, which is not what the questioner meant). Load balancing will allow one single IP address, so every request will look like it's going to one machine, which will dispatch to the client... if you really need to scale, you will be able to divide the requests between the clients.

[Note: a later comment in the David Adams class on Sunday revealed that there was also a request made to allow sending a partial page, which Laurent said would be implemented in a near future version of 4D 6.7. This becomes especially handy for emulating the NetLink command NL_AppendReply.]

Q: Tell us your vision about merging the WebSTAR and 4D teams. I'm confused about the purchase.

LR: We bought WebSTAR (StarNine) because it is a really a great product. And, we are a technical company, not a bullshit marketing company. We had been using WebSTAR for a long time, and knew it was a good product. The opportunity came along, and we said why not? It was also the fact that we are going into that direction. More applications have something to do with the web, and it's good to have a high-level web server, plus WebSTAR may not always be on Mac only... we really want to push in that direction.

Q: Will a future version of 4D be a front end to Oracle?

LR: Yes. It's a bit early [to talk about]. We are working on this, but cannot talk about it. [It will be] not in the too far future.

Q: Are we gonna see multi-processor support?

LR: In several ways. With WebSTAR itself, [there is] support for SMP right away. With WebSTAR V, the more processors you get, the better. For 4D, the first release of MacOS X will optimize somewhat, network access, disk access will benefit from dual processor machine. You will not get full scalability.

Q: What about Windows SMP?

LR: Yes. Right now on [Windows] NT, we already see improvement with SMP. It is not handled in threaded version.

Q: What version is that?

LR: I cannot talk about that.

Q: [What about] LINUX support for 4D?

LR: Yes. I wasn't supposed to talk about it, but yes.

[Mike Erickson: his answer was no.]

Q: Do you have plans to have enhanced report writing, beyond the Quick Report Editor, like Crystal reports? (Much clapping at this question.)

LR: This is one of the weak points of 4D right now, the Quick Report Editor. We are working that direction, but it won't be in the near future. On the other hand, in 6.7 there is one small thing that will help. Moving object through methods works during printing. It seems like a small detail, but really helps in making generic reports. It also helps for making user-defined reports using get and set object rects. It's not an answer, but a partial answer.

Q: I'd like to say thta PowerView is looking good, it's showing 4D is really listening. My question is everybody knows 4D is great, but how will you increase its profile? Its problem is still market share.

LR: I agree with you. We need to build name recognition of 4D. Basically, there are two directions: do it all by ourselves, self-financing, which is the slow way -- but maybe not actually all that slow if 6.7 and WebSTAR are well-received. We have already started with current sales in 1998 and 1999 to keep money for marketing. We keep some for devlopment, but keep quite a lot for marketing. We have enough to start some good marketing campaigns to build name recognition. I undersatnd it is a difficult task to convince a customer to use 4D... why it is not Oracle... we are working on this... the fast way would be to find outside investors to go faster... we internally build different marketing plans based on what amount we could get. We are ready to go further.

(This next one is the white-hot question of the bunch.)

Q: Does that mean an IPO in the future?

LR: We definitely will do everything to achieve that goal. We are also thikning of a way to actually let 4D developers be early stock buyers. (Much and vehement applause here.)

BC: We'll have to check all the legal ramifications... (Great laughter)

Q: (From Dave Adams) One reason for having trouble in corporate shops with Windows is that 4D is a good good tool for implementing design but not for doing design. Are there plans to enrich this?

LR: Yes, [but] I promised not to talk.

DA: Future? Far future?

LR: I promised not to talk.

Q: (From Doug Hall) I like components... it would be great to have a plug-in interface for components.

LR: I agree with you (clapping). This is the first step (6.7). In the future you will have dynamic plug-ins but with support for the current interface. In the current implementation of the kernel it was quite difficult.

Q: (From Ed "what the" Heckman) What vision do you have for the future?

LR: This is a trick question! I am not supposedto talk about this... (laughter from the crowd)

LR: The development team works as a team. We try to listen. It is not always easy... we want to come up with a next major release... we are not supposed to talk about it (laughter and clapping from the crowd). Let's say that it has already been started a long time ago... it is far advanced, and we hope to be ready sooner than you expect... (more big laughs from crowd.)

LR: One last word: it is difficult to make new release and tje same release with the same team... we split the team, and that is why we hope things will go faster.

Q: I want the ability to detect when large fields change for my synchronization work.

LR: Yes, I know what you want. It is difficult, and I won't say anyhting about it.

Q: What are the plans for PowerView licensing?

LR: I thought it was going to be free... (great laughter, hooting, and clapping from the audience)

BC: He didn't say it was gonna be free.

LR: Just a bit early to talk about.

Q: (From Mehboob Alam) I like components, but I want subforms, and they need to be modular and reusable.

LR: Piece by piece, you want to know about the next release. (Great laughter from the crowd.)

(At this point, Brendan got up from the stage.)

LR: Sit down, Brendan!

BC: We are good cop, bad cop. (Referring to himself and LR.)

Q: if you want us to buy stock, we want to see a better vision for future.

(Great laughter from the audience.)

Q: When will we see nested 4D includes?

LR: In the current version of 6.7 it wasn't there, but it will be in 6.7.1. 4DACTION, 4DVAR, 4DINCLUDE will be recursive... 4DINCLUDE will include 4DINCLUDE...

Q: I'd like to be able to parse the page itself...

LR: Basically you want control over the stream? This is somthing we will implement... we haven't thought about it... but we will.

Q: PowerView was fabulous; I really enjoyed the demo. Thanks for listening... but... with market share with Windows users... make included layouts work the way the beginning developers expect them to work... it looks like it oughta, but it doesn't.. .so you gotta use another product that is much harder to use...

LR: I agree with you... there are a lot of bugs (with included layouts) that are annoying... there are usually work-aroundss... now that 6.7 is shipping, we will be working on all the bugs we know about, the small tiny things... the things that have been wrong for three or four years...

Q: (From Dave Adams) I won't ask about the next realese... I wat to say something about the conference... many developers have been with you for a long time... and we notice a clear and consistent focus on customers this time... and with the OEM agreements. I want to say thanks...

(Much clapping from the audience.)

Q: I second that motion... found this beneficial and fantastic... technical question.. we saw CGI 4D... this works only on Windows? What about LINUX?

LR: You can call from any web server on any platform, because it goes through TCP/IP...

Q: I was thinking that the module that was for 4DCGI was Windows only...

LR: Yeah -- Windows only.

Olivier Boulland: We have 6.5.7, we have 2 components in 4DCGI and 4DISAPI -- these are both stdin apps, we could re-compile... as Laurent told you, WebSTAR and the database need not be on the same machine... you can have 4D Server on Mac and PC...

LR: It can go through TCP/IP connection and use 4D as CGI.

Q: (From Jack Des Bouillons) My question is about components... are there mechanisms for naming conventions? Anything with that?

LR: Yes, it is limiting...

Q: I am not talking about the product... I am talking about the company...

BC: We have talked about this... tell us if you want it...

JDB: We want it.

BC: Okay. (Great clapping from the audience.)

Q: What about a commerical site for uploading components? You're gonna do that?

BC: yes... (More great clapping from the audience)

Q: I want to set the server parameters in http header.

LR: I am not sure what you mean... I will check... you would like to change third parameter?

End of Questions

Raffle

After the Q&A, there was a raffle. Many developers won lots of prizes; I won the Braided Matrix Mongolian Bones! Webwoman won her own copy of 4D Developer! It was great fun, except for the people sitting on the "wrong" side of the room where there were no winners...

The Brothers EricksonPicture

I thought this picture was so nice I just had to post it.

Brothers Dave Erickson (left) and Mike Erickson show some love.

Playing some pool

While we were waiting for a critical mass of Summiters to arrive for a dinner outing, some of the group played pool. Here are some pictures.

(Karen won the pool game.)

Dinner at the Casa Guadalupe

A bunch of us took the trolley to the real San Diego Old Town for some genuine Americanized Mexican food at the Casa Guadalupe. It was a hoot! Kieth even joined us, and we had the Mariachi band play for him.