[spiffyman]

I don't think that's true. You might get disregarded as a "business guy" if you show up to a meetup in a suit. But it's just as likely that people will just assume you're in financials. One of the better Python speakers I know of shows up everywhere in a suit. But women consistently report not being taken seriously when wearing dresses.

[gaius]

The key takeaway is, as soon as she dressed as a member of "the tribe" everything was fine. So that tells me it's something other than a gender issue.

[andyroid]

Yeah, either that or "the tribe" is the gender issue.

[bhayden]

I don't think a woman in a dress is analogous to a man in a suit.

Here is a woman in a dress, something she might wear to convention about programming if she wanted to wear a dress: http://dressforweb.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Korean-ver...

It's fairly modest and not loudly styled. This is not the same style of dress as a man wearing a suit. The equivalent for a woman would be this:

http://www.acrdepos.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2013/06...

or this, if you wanted a dress:

http://juegoskizi2.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/skirt-suit...

I do not thing most women would have an issue about assuming they aren't a programmer (any more than a man in a suit) wearing either of those two last things I linked.

[stephenboyd]

This is the author at a programming conference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6071MRIzCA

You might say that it's loudly styled, but somehow this guy never has people doubting his programming cred: https://www.google.com/search?site=&tbm=isch&source=hp&biw=1...