Rome's first international MODX meetup!

After years of talking to each other online, this year it was finally time to meet MODX creators, developers and users in real-life again at the MODX meetup in Rome! We got a taste of Italian culture this day, while learning even more about MODX and discovering how others are deploying it. Read all about the talks and more from this MODX meetup organised by Sterc and online marketing agency Relactions.

In three talks, we learned more about:

• How Sterc's developers deploy assistive AI and how we can implement this even further in MODX - Gauke Pieter
• How templating engine Fenom makes rendering pages a lot faster - Roel
• How Dimitri at Moving-In uses MODX and xPDO to turn web pages into printable PDFs -

When in Rome...

We got this afternoon off to a good start with traditional Italian aperitivos and the necessary introductions. Indeed, besides the familiar faces, a number of new faces could also be found at this meetup. Having met and spoken again after a long time, it was high time for another important part of the MODX meetup: the presentations!

Assistive AI in the MODX ecosystem.

Gauke Pieter got straight to the point and told us how our developers are using assistive AI to work more efficiently. By installing Github's Copilot in Visual Studio Code, you get code suggestions instantly, code is automatically completed and you are even presented with full lines of code based on context.

In addition to explaining the current use of assistive AI, Gauke Pieter also suggested some ideas on how we can further incorporate AI into MODX. For example, for creating images, to generate the perfect meta title and description or translate texts automatically (we hear a hackathon coming!). Finally, Gauke addressed questions about privacy and copyright when talking about AI-generated images, for example.

pdoTools and Fenom in MODX.

Next, Roel took the floor and presented templating engine Fenom. Sterc uses Fenom to reduce information processing overhead for better website performance. Fenom is a templating engine that allows you to use static files to build your web page. This means you no longer have to use 'chunks' to retrieve data from the database, but can put this information directly into the code. Now data is rendered, checked, and processed in one go, presenting it to the client at lightning speed.

MODX and xPDO as the basis from app to pdf.

Finally, it was Dimitri's turn. Dimitri has been working with MODX for years and showed us how he has implemented MODX in the company he works for and specifically in their website. In doing so, he uses within the app the user management system that MODX already has in the base, deploys the API to retrieve and update user data, and creates web pages in MODX to generate printable PDFs for their customers. As Dimitri puts it, 'the possibilities with MODX are endless' and we certainly concur with that!

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After this last talk, Roel and Fabian came forward to invite us to the upcoming MODX snow-up in February, where we will of course meet again at Fabian's own Gasthaus Grünenwald in Engelberg (Switzerland). The official invitation will follow! Annalisa Ballaira from Relactions closed the meetup by thanking everyone and telling how Relactions uses MODX CMS and their experience from the first MODX meetup.

After all the presentations, we ended our evening on the beautiful roof terrace with delicious wines, more Italian food and a great view of Rome and St Peter's Basilica in Vatican City.

Finally, we would like to use this opportunity to thank Dimitri Hilverda, Gauke Pieter Sietzema and Roel Zeilstra for their interesting presentations. Relactions and our own Bas Mentink for organising this enjoyable MODX meetup. And Andre van der Meulen for the beautiful photos!