Paging all developers: The full Spec 2019 agenda is live

Developers, get excited: Spec 2019, the conference for anyone who builds on Slack, is coming up on October 22 and 23 at SVN West in San Francisco. We recently told the Slack community what Spec is all about. Now we’re giving you the lowdown on everything you need to know and sharing the complete Spec 2019 agenda.

Spec is an annual meeting of the minds for developers who create apps for Slack. Whether you’re building a business for millions of Slack users or simply connecting Slack to the tools, systems and data your team uses each day, Spec is for you. It’s the place to get a first look at new Slack platform products, refresh your creative process, and troubleshoot coding conundrums among peers.

This year, you’ll hear from leaders at Wired, Workday and Guru. You’ll also learn from developers at Slack-first companies, including Workstreams, Troops and Toast.

We’ve planned an action-packed two days, so we recommend taking a look at the agenda ahead of time and picking out the sessions you don’t want to miss. Here’s a taste of what you can expect.

Day 1: October 22

How Workday is building enterprise-grade Slack apps

Featured speaker: Josh Lannin, senior director of engineering at Workday

Workday, the cloud-based system for financial management, HR and planning, has an app on the way for Slack. Spec attendees will get a behind-the-scenes look at how Workday developers are bringing this kind of enterprise-grade experience to life. You’ll come away with technical pointers and organizational best practices for simplifying the path to a secure, reliable and delightful Slack app.

Future-proofing your app with Block Kit

Featured speaker: Pete Michel, chief architect at Guru

You can’t succeed in tech without an eye toward the future. If you’re a developer, that means keeping a pulse on system upgrades and redesigns. But how do you know when it’s time to refresh your app? In this session, you’ll hear from builders who already took the plunge with Block Kit, our UI framework for customizing the order and appearance of the information your app delivers.

Day 2: October 23

Continuous discovery and innovation in Slack

Featured speaker: Aubrey Tatarowicz, senior software engineer at Troops

Learn how Troops, a sales management platform, uses Slack to smoothly update systems without disrupting the user experience. From early feedback cycles to continuous deployment, Troops will be sharing rapid iteration tips to help you build an app that your customers will enjoy using again and again.

Driving adoption and engagement with outstanding onboarding

Featured speaker: Rea Loretta, co-founder and CEO at Toast

Now that you’ve heard how developers are unblocking their teams and streamlining work with apps for Slack, it’s time to zero in on getting users to adopt what you build. In this session, developers from Toast and Halp offer the inside scoop on onboarding users and keeping them engaged. Then you’ll get your hands dirty by building your own onboarding app. Find out how:

• Toast uses the app_home_opened event to welcome first-time users, along with slash commands and buttons to track engagement.
• Halp used Block Kit components to create an easy-to-use onboarding experience that increased activation by 400%.
• You can build your own onboarding experience with Bolt (our new JavaScript framework) and tools from our friends at Glitch.

Check out the full Spec 2019 agenda to learn more about our tracks, sessions and speakers. To reserve your spot, visit the registration page. And don’t forget to watch this space for keynote-speaker announcements. We’re looking forward to jamming with you and the Slack developer community this October.