Dan was selected to speak at Selenium Conference 2012 in London about an entirely different topic. As part of his presentation, he showed off iOS Automation using Selenium syntax to demonstrate writing platform-agnostic tests that use separate platform-specific page objects with a common interface. To his surprise, the cool test architecture would take a backseat to the spectacle of iOS tests running like WebDriver tests. Several people suggested that he give a lightning talk later in the conference to explain exactly how it worked.

On the second day of the conference, Dan stepped up on stage to give the lightning talk. Jason Huggins, co-creator of Selenium, moderated the lightning talks. Dan experienced technical difficulties getting his presentation to load, and Jason nearly had to move on to the next lightning talk. At the last moment, the screen turned on and Dan jumped into his presentation. He explained the details of his implementation and how it worked, begged for contributors, and in five minutes it was over. The crowd applauded politely, and he left the stage.

If we look at how Appium came into existence, lightning talks are a very important part of this journey. Hence at Appium Conf, we would like to dedicate a full session with all attendees on Lightning talk.