So, last night was it – the first ever meeting of the Web Standards Group in Perth.

There was a good turnout – almost 40 people. A few familiar faces, a few new ones, plus I got to say hello to a few people I knew online but not in “meat-space”.

Russ’s “live coding” presentation ran through the assembly of a quite simple two column floated layout in a fixed width container with header and footer and two list-based navigation bars. At each step of the way, he explained what he was doing and why, as well as discussing how to workaround some common browser issues. It’s easy to see why Russ’s presentations are raved about – he does a great job of clearly explaining not only the how but also the why.

There was some consumption of beer and chips (although surprisingly, there’s an unopened carton in my kitchen right now), then a few of the hard-core standards geeks moved on to the Queens hotel, mainstay of the Port80 crowd, for some dinner and more drinks (all well-formed, semantic and accessible of course).

Huge thanks are due to both Russ and Peter, who are far too generous with their time and resources, not only for making the trek across to our side of the continent (it’s a long flight from Sydney) but also for providing all of the drinks and food. These guys rock!

Thanks are also due to Joe Luca and ECU for providing the venue – it’s great to see a university supporting web standards.

We’re in the process of scheduling a follow up meeting – at this point we’ll probably go for one every second month and keep it to the fourth Wednesday. If anyone has any ideas for future presentations or just for topics you’d like to see covered, please let myself, Vicki or Nick know by emailing perth@webstandardsgroup.org. (Bryan, I have my cross hairs focused on you!)

I’m so chuffed that it turned out so well, and now I’m really looking forward to the next meeting!