//Build/ 2013 Announced

Yesterday, Steve Guggenheimer announced //Build/ 2013.  Here are the details known so far:

Date and Location

San Francisco, CA
June 26th (09:00 PDT) – June 28th (14:30 PDT)
The Moscone Center – Game Developers Conference 2013 is being held there as I write this.

Registration opens at 09:00am PDT, April 2, 2013
Early bird (first 500): $1,595 // Full: $2,095

If you happened to attend //Build/ 2012 (last November) then you no doubt recall the endless joy of being bussed from one side of the campus to the other (depending on which sessions you wanted to attend).  You might also fondly recall the walk back from the initial keynote in the rain and the mud :-)  This year promises to be a much better experience by hosting the conference within the much larger Moscone Center.  If you’re curious about the size of the Moscone Center, check out these stats.  You can also get some great insight from these reviews on yelp.

(At Least) 5 Things I Hope to Learn at //Build/ 2012

Now that //Build/ 2012 is finally upon us, there are a few things I’ve been wondering about that I hope to finally learn more about this week.  These items include:

1. What's new in the Windows Phone 8 SDK.  Although there have been leaked versions of the Windows Phone 8 SDK, I have not given it much thought because a) It is unlikely the SDK is incomplete, b) You are trusting the SDK has not been tampered with (i.e. I don't want to introduce any malware), and c) I'd simply just rather wait for the official SDK.
   
2. What's new in Windows Phone 8.  Many new features have been announced for Windows Phone 8.  However, it has been stated that there are unannounced features as well.  In fact, this has been rumored as the main reason behind not releasing the Windows Phone 8 SDK up until now.  With all the hush, hush around Windows Phone 8, I really hope there is at least one surprise left for us :-)
   
3. Which Windows Phone 8 devices will carriers offer?  There has been plenty of speculation and rumor but I’d like to know what my options truly are.  Hopefully we’ll get more solid details this week.
   
4. Integration.  It is apparent that Microsoft has a desire to provide a certain level of integration across their various products and services such as Windows 8, Windows Phone 8, Xbox, Office 365, etc.  I hope to gain a better understanding of their "grand vision" through the various sessions at //Build/.
   
5. Line of Business Apps for Windows 8.  I would like to learn more about how Microsoft envisions line of business (LOB) apps being creating as Windows Store apps.  I have mixed emotions about “fully immersive” LOB apps but I’d like to see Microsoft’s perspective on this subject.

I have no doubt I’ll learn a great deal about these items during //Build/ this week.  I also expect to learn about many topics that I haven’t listed.  I am looking forward to what this week brings and am very excited about the new technologies, both software and hardware, that Microsoft will be presenting.  It promises to be a great week in technology!

Introduction to Windows 8 Development–Go Metro!

Last week I had the pleasure of speaking at this year’s Heartland Developers Conference (HDC).  I gave an introductory talk on developing “Metro” applications for Windows 8.  The goal of the talk was to cover some of the basic features that every developer writing Windows 8 apps would have to face when first getting started.  Some of these features include:

• Obtaining Windows 8
• Obtaining the developers tools – e.g. Visual Studio 2012
• Understanding the Windows Runtime framework
• Specific application features such as:
• Roaming data (e.g. app settings) to the cloud
• Contracts and extensions
• Using the File Picker
• Implementing application settings (via the charms bar)
• Create app bars
• Understanding the application lifecycle
• Windows Store
• Registration
• Packaging
• Publishing

The talk went very well and I was pleased with the turnout of my session as well as the conference overall.  As always, HDC has turned out to be a great developer resource.  I look forward to returning next year.

The slides for my session have been uploaded here.  I have also published the corresponding demos (Windows 8, C#/XAML) on SkyDrive, here.  There are some great resource links in the last few slides so be sure to check them out.

HDC-Connect Format for Events

Overview

We are currently working on a set of mobile applications (Windows Phone, iOS, and Android) that will be used to scan QR Codes for conference attendee badges.  We want the information contained within the QR code to be basic contact information that is useful to both a conference vendor as well as other conference attendees.  When looking at the various standard QR Code formats, a couple of them stood out: vCard and meCard.

The vCard format contains fields for everything we wanted to store but also included fields we didn’t care about (e.g. address, city, zip, country, and URL).  We could just ignore those fields however this format also produces a more tightly filled QR Code which can be a bit more challenging for some mobile devices to read (especially on conference badges that may have glossy covers, be slightly bent, etc.).

The meCard format is basically a more compact version of the vCard format.  However, it doesn’t have the organization and title fields we desire and still has most of the extra fields listed above.

Another down side to the above formats is that, by default, most QR Code scanners will attempt to add information scanned in these formats as stored contacts.  This isn’t always a bad thing but, in our case, we simply want to store the information within our application for later retrieval as well as have the ability for the scanned information to be displayed in an easy-to-read format – without first storing it as a contact.

Based on these discoveries and our needs, we decided to create a simple, text-based QR Code format that fits our needs.  We have called this format HDC-Connect for QR Codes.

HDC-Connect is a specially formatted QR Code containing a small amount of contact information. The information provided by an HDC-Connect code typically provides just enough information to get in touch with a contact after the initial encounter.

HDC-Connect Format

A QR Code that utilizes the HDC-Connect format contains the following five pieces of information, each on a single line (followed by a carriage return/line feed):

1. Full Name - this is typically the contact's first and last name
2. Job Title - the contact's job title - e.g. Enterprise Architect
3. Company - the name of the company the contact works for
4. E-mail Address - the contact's e-mail address
5. Phone Number - the contact's phone number

If any of the above information is to be omitted, there should be an empty line with a carriage return/line feed combination in its place.  In other words, there should always be five lines of data contained within the QR Code, even if some of the information is excluded.

Here is a sample QR Code encoded using the HDC-Connect format:

If you scan the above QR Code, it will be decoded as the following text:

Joe Architect
Enterprise Architect
Super Systems Design
Joe.Architect@SuperSystemDesigns.com
(800) 555-1212

Each of the five lines of data in this QR Code correspond to the five fields described above.

Uses

The HDC-Connect format was designed for badges printed for conference attendees. The HDC-Connect code would typically appear on the back of the badge. The badge can be quickly scanned to obtain a conference attendee's contact information. Typical scenarios include conference vendors scanning attendee information as they visit vendor booths. Attendees may also elect to scan another attendee's badge as a quick way to gather contact information as they network during the event.  Depending upon the application being used to scan the QR Code, you may be able to quickly add the information directly as a contact on the mobile device.

Applications

Most applications that can scan a QR Code can interpret the HDC-Connect format. For example, Bing Vision on Windows Phone is capable of scanning the HDC-Connect format and displaying it in a typical contact card format. As mentioned above, we are also working on a set of mobile applications to scan QR Codes encoded using the HDC-Connect format.

License

The use of the HDC-Connect format is free of any license.

Summary

The HDC-Connect format as described above was really built for our own needs.  However, it is easy to see that the format may be useful to other applications and uses outside of what we intend to use it for (e.g. conference badges).  If you end up using the QR-Code format in your applications, please let us know.  We’d love to hear about it.

Useful Tools from MVP2MVP Day

Although the 2012 MVP Global Summit officially kicks off tomorrow, there were still plenty of Microsoft MVPs around today for various pre-sessions.  In my case, I joined the other Visual Studio ALM MVPs present for this year’s MVP2MVP day – a day where Visual Studio ALM MVPs are given 20 minutes to get up and present on various tips, tricks, neat projects, etc. to the rest of the group with the goal of sharing knowledge and learning new things.  There was a lot of useful information at this year’s MVP2MVP day so I thought I’d share a few of the tools that were brought up today (in no particular order).

• DemoMate – this is a neat utility that allows you to build automated presentations (so to speak).  For example, you can build click-through demos, guided tutorials, etc.  The final results can be published in varying formats (including the web).  You can find out more here or watch a demo here.
  
  
• Snoop – Snoop is a WPF spy utility that allows you to “spy/browse the visual tree and change properties... amongst other things.”  Snoop was utilized during one of today’s demos to provide enhanced features for Coded UI Tests (i.e. provide the ability to inspect properties of objects not normally exposed).
  
  
• TFS Event Workflows – TFS Event Workflows allow you to define workflows based on Microsoft’s Workflow foundation which then will be executed on specific events triggered by your Team Foundation Server.  This is very helpful to implement scenarios like:
  • Aggregate status and/or efforts over your work item hierarchy
  • Trigger deployment when you change the Build Quality of a build
  • Implement advanced notification scenarios which cannot be achieved by TFS Alerts
  • Change status of a work item based on different rules (e.g. set to “In Progress” if the Assigned To field is filled)
  • Fill work item fields based on calculations or other complex operations you cannot build with work item rules
  • Trigger synchronization with external systems if a work item has been changed
  • Etc.
    
    
• TFS Tools Suite – Fellow MVP, Neno Loje, demonstrated a suite of command-line utilities developed to aid in all sorts of situations for TFS.  Some of the utilities include:
  • PingTFS – used to ping a TFS server to determine if it is up and running
  • TfsExport – downloads files from TFS version control and sets the file’s last access timestamp to the file's last check-in date/time
  • TfsRefreshWarehouse – used to refresh the TFS Warehouse, Cube and Reports on demand
  • TfsSyncIdentities – forces TFS to sync with Active Directory
  • TfsWarehouseController – used to change the update frequency of the TFS warehouse/cube
  • Lots of others… to see the full list of utilities, check out this post
    
    
• git-tfs - git-tfs is a two-way bridge between TFS and git, similar to git-svn.  If you prefer using a “git-like” command-line interface or are looking for a DVCS solution that will work with Team Foundation Server, then you will want to check this tool out.  Take a look at this blog post to get some great information on how to get started.
  
  
• TeamCompanion – this is a commercial (i.e. non-free) utility that provides the ability to interact with Team Foundation Server from within Microsoft Outlook.  TeamCompanion “…empowers various project stakeholders, particularly business ones, to work on TFS based projects, using the one tool they use for the most of their daily tasks.”

There was a lot more information covered today than is listed here but these are some of the highlights.  If you have a favorite TFS-related utility feel free to list it in the comments section.

Even More of Getting Started with the TFS 2010 Object Model

Back in October, I presented on Getting Started with the TFS Object Model (as well as a look at what’s coming in Visual Studio 11) at the Tulsa TechFest.  I had intended to post the source code for the demos I ran through during my talk but I never got around to it and it completely slipped my mind.  A few days ago, I was gently reminded by one of the attendees (thanks Sean!) that I had not posted the source code so, here I am!

Below is a screen shot of the main window displayed by the demos.  This application has 10 basic types of functionality that can be demonstrated.  The first two are demonstrated by clicking on the ellipses buttons in the upper right of the window which will display a dialog allowing you to select a TFS Server/TPC and Team Project.

The remaining eight features are demonstrated by clicking on the remaining buttons, which include:

• Get Version – demonstrates the ability to determine which version of TFS you’re communicating with – assuming you’re running on a client that has the TFS 2010 Team Explorer Client installed on it.
• Get TPCs – lists all TPCs associated with the selected TFS server.
• Get Team Projects – lists all Team Projects associated with the selected TPC.
• Get Latest Build Info – displays a list of basic build information for all builds associated with the selected Team Project (an example of this is shown in the screenshot below).
• Queue Build – queues a new build using the specified Build Name.
• Get Work Item Count – displays the number of work items returned based on the WIQL query defined within the source code.
• Create Work Item – creates a new, basic work item (in this case, a “Bug”).
• Get Latest – demonstrates the ability to “Get Latest” source code from TFS.

If you’re curious about the source code, you can download it from here.

Tulsa TechFest 2011

It’s that time of the year again… Time for Tulsa Tech Fest 2011!  I’ve had the pleasure of speaking at this conference for the past several years and it has always been a well-planned and orchestrated event.  If you are going to be around the Tulsa area next week (Friday, October 7th) then take the time to register (it’s FREE! although a food donation is requested – see the web site for details) and enjoy some great content throughout the day.

This year I will be presenting on the following topics:

• Getting Started with the TFS Object Model - Microsoft's Team Foundation Server (TFS) is a very capable platform for integrating all aspects of the software development lifecycle (SDLC). There is a great deal of functionality provided out of the box that will handle the majority of a development team's needs. However, there are times when you need to extend the functionality of TFS to handle scenarios not anticipated by Microsoft (or they just didn’t have the time to get them built into the product). This session will cover the common APIs provided by the TFS Object Model and provide the knowledge needed to get started developing with TFS right away.
  
  
• Visual Studio v.Next: A Look at What's Coming - Visual Studio 2010 was released a year and a half ago but Microsoft has been hard at work on the next release. This talk will take a look at the myriad features that are being incorporated into the next version of Visual Studio and Team Foundation Server. Some of these features are even available today for use within Visual Studio 2010. If you want to get a peek at what's coming in Visual Studio v.Next (a.k.a. "Dev11"), then check out this session.

When: Friday, October 7th with check in starting at 08:00.
Where: OSU-Tulsa, 700 North Greenwood Ave, Tulsa, OK 74106
Details: http://techfests.com/Tulsa/2011/default.aspx

Hope to see you there!

//build/ Observations from the Outside–Day 1

Like so many others, I was not able to attend the //build/ conference (formerly known as the Professional Developers Conference or PDC).  However, I did have the opportunity to watch the streaming keynote live and I’ve also spent a good portion of the day watching various twitter, Facebook, and blog posts from those who are attending.  With so much coming out of Microsoft in one day it’s hard to keep up with everything being announced and talked about so I thought I’d put a few notes together around today’s event.

The word of the day is BOLD

I didn’t actually count the number of times the word “bold” was used during the keynote session earlier today but I can safely say it was used a lot.  In general, it was used in reference to Microsoft making a “bold, no compromises move”.  I have to admit, after seeing the various demonstrations from the keynote, I agree that Microsoft is making a bold move and rethinking Windows as a platform.  A quick (non-complete) list of some of the things demonstrated include:

• The new Windows 8 Metro-style UI
• Windows 8 running on multiple form factors including desktop PCs and various tablet PCs (running ARM-based processors)
• Internet Explorer 10 Platform Preview 3
• Visual Studio “11” (v.Next) Express
• A new framework for developing software for Windows
• Windows Application Store
• Windows 8 using less memory with fewer (default) processes than Windows 7
• Picture-based login
• Support for inter-application integration provided directly within Windows 8
• Spell checking at the OS level (i.e. spell checking everywhere)
• Fast boot

Developing for Windows 8

With Windows 8 Microsoft introduce a new programming platform known as the Windows Runtime – or WinRT.  Developers can now utilize their language of choice when building applications targeted against Windows 8.  Regardless of which language you choose, which now includes JavaScript, the WinRT APIs will be reflected into your language of choice and made available for use.

One thing to note is that Silverlight (or WPF for that matter) was only mentioned during the keynote as a “legacy” technology (in not so many words).  They did demonstrate running a Silverlight application running on Windows 8 and was able to “Metro-fy” it with a minimal amount of code modification.  It seems that the rumors of HTML5/CSS + JavaScript being the preferred approach for developing Metro-style applications rather than Silverlight have been verified.

A pre-release version of Visual Studio “11” was also demonstrated and used for the various coding examples.  The keynote did not go into the details of what’s new in Visual Studio so I will post more details on Visual Studio as they are made clear.

A new (pre-release) version of Expression Blend 5 was demonstrated now with support for HTML and CSS!  That is an awesome addition to the Microsoft development tools suite.

Head in the Cloud

Windows Live integration is front and center in Windows 8.  Modifying your applications to interact with SkyDrive, for example, requires minimal coding and is supported directly by Windows 8.  Windows Live integration is present throughout Windows 8 with my favorite feature (although it wasn’t directly demonstrated) being the ability to synchronize your various settings (e.g. history, passwords, themes, etc.) via the cloud so they follow you around from device-to-device.

The “Giveaway”

If you’ve followed the PDC for the last couple of years you know that Microsoft has given some type of hardware to each of the (paying) attendees to help gain developer support.  A couple of years ago, at PDC10, it was an Acer Table PC.  Last year, it was a Windows Phone 7 device (I happened to be there and received an LG-900 Windows Phone 7 device).  Once again, this year Microsoft did not disappoint and provided each of the attendees with a Samsung Windows 8 Developer Tablet (or PC as Microsoft calls it).  To add to the already great gift, AT&T threw in a year of free 3G service (2GB/month)!  Not a bad deal for the attendees!

That’s Awesome!  When Can I Have It?

In typical Microsoft fashion, no release dates were announced.  However, they did provide the “Path to ‘RTM’” as shown in the slide below:

Although we don’t know yet when the final bits will be made available for download, you can download the Windows 8 Developer Preview now.  There are three flavors of Windows 8 downloads available:

• Windows Developer Preview with Developer Tools – English, 64-bit (x64) – 4.8GB
• Windows Developer Preview – English, 64-bit (x64) – 3.6GB
• Windows Developer Preview – English, 32-bit (x86) – 2.8GB

You can download any or all of the above releases here.

More to Come!

Keep in mind that my observations below are a small part of what was seen and demonstrated today.  I’m looking forward to the next few days of the //build/ conference and probably a few nights of little sleep :-)  I have the preview version of Windows 8 downloaded and am preparing to install it as I type this post (I’m currently creating a bootable USB drive for the image).  I have no doubt that I, along with thousands of others, will be blogging their experiences over the next days, weeks, and months ahead.  It is going to be a fun ride!

Nebraska Code Camp

Are you looking to get your geek on this weekend?  Are you in the general neighborhood of Lincoln, NE?  If so, then you will want to attend the Nebraska Code Camp this Saturday, April 9th at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln.

As always, the Code Camp is free and there a lots of great sessions scheduled covering a wide variety of topics.

Date: Saturday, April 9th
Start Time: 08:45 (registration opens at 08:00)
Location: University of Nebraska-Lincoln in Avery Hall

Check out the links below for more information.

• Nebraska Code Camp
• Schedule
• Sessions
• Speakers

MVP Global Summit 2011 Comes to a Close

This year marks my third consecutive Microsoft MVP Global Summit.  Each year seems to be a little bit better than the last.  However, this year was a lot better than last year’s summit – mainly due to the timing of products and content of the sessions.  Although there was lots to see and discuss, the content is under NDA so not much can be discussed.

However, one thing is certain, working with the Visual Studio/ALM product groups is nothing short of amazing.  Having been an MVP for close to three years now (first a Team Foundation Server MVP and now a Visual Studio ALM MVP) I can’t imagine being grouped with a better bunch of people (including my fellow MVPs and the Microsoft Product Group members).

Here’s the group of Visual Studio ALM MVPs that made it to the summit this year:

I look forward to seeing everyone again next year!

ALM Summit Videos Available On-line

If you were not able to attend the ALM Summit this year, the session videos are now available on-line.  You can view the session video links here as well as in the table below.  Currently, the videos are available only in streaming format for on-line viewing.  It is hoped that off-line (i.e. downloadable) versions will be made available in the near future.

Speaker	Session Title	Downloads
Day 1
Ken Schwaber (scrum.org)	Keynote: Scrum: The 3rd Decade The inventor of Scrum describes his collaboration with Microsoft to create the Professional Scrum Developer training for VS 2010 customers.	Watch video
David West (Forrester)	The State of ALM: An Industry View Dave is full of insights and data about the state of agile adoption in the industry and Microsoft’s emerging leadership.  He is hilariously entertaining.   This is a must watch.	Watch video
Jamie Cool	Heterogeneous ALM Environments Any customer who questions whether we are serious about 1st-class Java support in TFS should watch Jamie demo Team Explorer Everywhere.  He flips between Linux and Windows and demonstrates gated check-in catching errors in Java development on a mixed technology project.	Watch video
Tony Scott	Keynote: CIO Perspectives on Innovation	Watch video
John Szurek (Clear Channel)	Using Failure to Pave the Path for Success	Watch video
Drew Fletcher	Managing Change: Scenario-Focused Engineering	Watch video
Cameron Skinner	Agile Transformation of a Microsoft Product Team This no-demo, almost slide-free talk will remove any doubts that Microsoft is serious about applying agile practices internally.  Cameron describes his experiences running three product teams and leading them through agile transformation.  As you can see below, he got the top scores of any speaker.	Watch video
Day 2
Brian Harry	Keynote: From Individual to Team to Organization Brian describes the evolution of Microsoft into from non-player into ALM leader and hints at our future roadmap.	Watch video
Amit Chopra	Making Continuous Delivery a Reality From Product Backlog to Virtual Environments	Watch video
Stephanie Cuthbertson	Successful Software Project Management Styles Steph does a great talk on the top ten lessons learned in our own development and use of TFS.	Watch video
Karel Deman (Avanade)	Increasing Revenue Opportunities With Automated Development Tools	Watch video
Mario Cardinal (Urban Turtle)	Extending the ALM Platform	Watch video
Grant Holliday	Synchronizing and Migrating ALM Environments This talk is for customers who are looking for TFS to interoperate with their other ALM servers.  Grant is very clear about the decisions to make, their rationale and possibilities.	Watch video
Jim Newkirk	Values: Exploring the Why Behind What We Do	Watch video
Mary Czerwinski	Toward the Future of Collaborative Development	Watch video
Day 3
Sam Guckenheimer	Keynote: The Agile Consensus I contrast the beliefs of the 20th Century with the Consensus emerging in the ‘10’s around modern engineering practices.  I jump over the transitional decade to show how far we’ve come.  This is a talk for “Hybrid Agile” customers wondering about how to make agile practices work in their contexts.	Watch video
Ido Eshed (IDF)	Requirements Management: A Smooth Transition	Watch video
Vinod Malhotra	Testing in an Agile World	Watch video
Jon Bach (Quardev)	The Marriage of Exploratory Testing and Agile Development	Watch video
David Starr (Pluralsight)	Professional Scrum Developer Practices	Watch video
David Green (TaskTop)	Connecting Developer Workflow: Mylyn and the Task-Focused Interface	Watch video
Ken Schwaber, David Starr, Sam Guckenheimer, Peter Provost, Eric Willeke	ALM Summit Panel Discussion	Watch video

Talks and Slides

Over the past few weeks, I’ve given six talks (on three subjects) at three different conferences.  Although the slide decks are pretty much the same between conferences, I thought I’d go ahead and post links to them all here in case anyone is looking for them.

Tulsa TechFest, November 2010

• What’s New in TFS 2010?
• Migrating to TFS 2010 – Lessons Learned
• Creating Quality Software: A Look at Visual Studio 2010 Testing Tools

Tyson Development Conference, October 2010

• VS2010 ALM – What’s In It for Me?
• Migrating to TFS 2010 – Lessons Learned

Heartland Developer Conference, September 2010

• Creating Quality Software: A Look at Visual Studio 2010 Testing Tools

HDC 2010–In the Books

For the past three days, the Heartland Developers Conference has been in full swing.  The first day was comprised entirely of hands-on classes (eight choices all together) while the remaining two days consisted of 45 sessions, 4 keynotes, and 2 receptions/after parties.  All this for a steal at $250 (plus a little extra if you signed up for any of the 1st day classes)!  Needless to say, Joe Olsen has once again put on a great conference.

I attended several sessions over the past couple of days and there was some great information to be consumed presented by some great speakers.  My personal favorite, other than my own session of course , was the Windows Phone 7 “Deep Dive” session by Jeff Brand.

Russ Wagner and I had the privilege to present on “Generating Quality Software: A Look at Visual Studio 2010 Testing Tools”.  Overall, the session seemed to go very well – especially since we were in the final time slot for the conference (just prior to the closing keynote and giveaways!).  We were constrained to 45 minutes so we had to pack a lot of information into a short amount of time.  Due to the time constraints, we decided to try something a little different… We utilized a second projector to display the PowerPoint slides on while we demonstrated various features on the main screen.  This allowed us to focus on the demonstrations while still allowing the audience to review the various feature highlights contained within the slide deck.

If you missed our session and would like a chance to see it, we will be presenting an extended version of today’s session at the next Omaha Team System User Group meeting (where we’re not constrained to 45 minutes).  You can also view the session’s slide deck here.

For all those who traveled for the conference, have a safe trip home and we hope to see you again next year!

PDC 2010

Just announced, there will be a Professional Developers Conference (PDC) this year after all.  And, for the first time, it will be on Microsoft’s campus in Redmond.

The PDC has always provided direct access to the people behind the technologies, but this year we’re upping the ante by providing access to the places, too. For the first time ever, our most influential customers will converge on the Microsoft Campus in Redmond for the PDC, this October 28 – 29, 2010. We’re opening the doors to our buildings and labs, and providing unprecedented access to Microsoft’s leaders and engineering teams on their home turf.

Registration for the conference is now open.

• Learn more about PDC10 at http://www.microsoftpdc.com/
  
• Join the PDC email newsletter for the latest information about PDC10

TechEd 2010 Birds-of-a-Feather Proposals Being Accepted

The Birds-of-a-Feather (BOF) volunteer organizing team is now accepting proposals from discussion leaders for BOF sessions at Tech-Ed 2010 in New Orleans June 7-10.  BOF sessions are community-led open discussions on any technology related topic.  No code, no slides, just discussion. You don't have to be an expert on the topic, just passionate or knowledgeable enough to lead a discussion. There will also be a session moderator to help keep the discussion flowing smoothly.

To submit a proposal visit http://northamerica.msteched.com/Birds-of-a-Feather.  The deadline for proposal is Monday, April 5th. (Note: proposals are reviewed in the order submitted so the sooner the better.)

Presentation Slides

Today concludes my run of talks (at least for the next few weeks :-) that I’ve been giving over the past few weeks so I thought I’d post the PowerPoint decks in case anyone might find some use from them.  With that said…

• An Introduction to Silverlight 3 – presented at the Farm Credit Services of America internal User Group.
• VSTS – What’s in it for me? – presented at the Omaha Team System User Group,  Dubuque, IA .NET User Group, and Tulsa TechFest.
• Team Foundation Build 2008 – Automating the Build Process – presented at Tulsa TechFest.
• Using Team Foundation Build 2008 in the Real World – presented at Tulsa TechFest and the Tyson Developer Conference.
• Keeping Up with C# – presented at the Tyson Developer Conference.

Heartland Developer’s Conference – Day 2

Today was the second and final day of the 2009 Heartland Developers Conference.  I was able to stick around through all the sessions today so I was able to take in a lot more content than yesterday.  Much like yesterday, I found the non-technical sessions the most interesting – which seems to be a little counter-intuitive for a developers conference.

Here’s a quick run down on some of the sessions I attended today:

Smithying in the 21st Century - Neal Ford – This keynote was a discussion about predicting the future and how to ensure you don’t go the way of the dinosaurs.  Although you may not be able to predict the next “big thing”, you should at least pay attention to technological trends and needs.  This was not a technical keynote address but it did invoke a lot of thought which makes for an enjoyable talk.

The Natural User Interface: Multi-Touch and Beyond – Nathan Moody – this was a great overview of natural user interface (NUI) design in a multi-touch form factor.  Nathan discussed various multi-touch technologies as well as common issues that need to be addressed when designing for multi-touch interfaces.

How to Kill a Project and Deflate a Team – Surviving a software death march – Mike Benkovich – in this talk, Mike covered various aspects of successful projects and teams.

An Introduction to .NET RIA Services – Adam Grocholski – in this talk, Adam introduced us to the .NET RIA Services framework.  The main purpose of the .NET RIA Services is to streamline the development of n-tier applications in Silverlight by simplifying many of the common tasks that are required when writing software partitioned across multiple tiers.  This was my favorite technical session of the day.

How NOT to give a talk! – Kent Tegels – a self-proclaimed “bad presenter”, Kent gave a great session on the habits of bad presenters as well as tips for correcting them.  Tidbits such as interacting with the audience; not relying on PowerPoint slides; practicing, but not over-practicing the talk, and others.  Overall, a useful session for anyone aspiring to present for their first time or anyone looking for tips on improving their presentation skills.

There were a couple of other sessions intermixed throughout the day but I don’t recall what they were off the top of my head.

This year’s conference was without a doubt a great use of my time.  I picked up a few technical tips that I will take back to the office with me next week for further investigation (e.g. .NET RIA Services, jQuery, etc.).  However, like I mentioned above, it’s the non-technical sessions that will give me the most food for thought (and debate fodder with co-workers) for the next few weeks.  I will look forward to next year’s event!

Heartland Developers Conference – Day 1

This year marks the sixth year for the Heartland Developers Conference.  This is a great technology conference that has only gotten better with each year (Joe always does a great job!).  In previous years, the HDC has been primarily focused on Microsoft-related technologies.  This year, that focus is gone in favor of a more platform-neutral event.  For example, this year’s conference includes not only .NET-based technologies, but also topics covering Adobe, Ruby, Apple (e.g. iPhone), etc.  As always, the event is backed up with a great representation of top-quality speakers from all across the country.

Although I had to leave the conference early today, I was still able to attend a few great sessions, including:

VS 2010 for the Code Warrior – Scott Guthrie – this was the first keynote address for the conference where the “Gu” spent most of his time (and about 15 minutes of the next set of presenter’s time :-)) showing off demos of the up-coming version of Visual Studio 2010.  Some of the highlights include:

• Multiple monitor support – great for those of us lucky enough to have more than one monitor attached to our developer machine
• Historical Debugging – another great feature that will help with the debugging of complex scenarios.
• Miscellaneous Refactoring Features – block-selection-replace, Highlighting References, Call Hierarchy navigation, etc.
• Consume-First IntelliSense – allows you to tweak IntelliSense in Visual Studio to help support development processes like Test Driven Development (TDD).  Using this feature, along with the ability to generate class and method stubs based on usage, you can practice TDD much more effectively in Visual Studio 2010.
• TFS 2010 - “Basic” – Team Foundation Server for SourceSafe (and other) users.  You will now be able to acquire TFS 2010 Basic “at least as easy and cost effective to get as SourceSafe has been” and even install it on your Windows Client PC (e.g. Vista or Windows 7).
• Improved JavaScript IntelliSense
• More…

jQuery 101 – Rod Paddock – Before today, I had only heard of jQuery but had no idea as to what it was.  Based on the name alone, I had assumed it was a JavaScript library for querying data (in some form or another).  Attending Rod’s session, I learned that it’s more for querying the DOM and acting upon the results of those queries (i.e. “selectors”).  This looks to be a very useful library for manipulating not only the look and feel of web pages on-the-fly but also on how they behave (e.g. by manipulating events).  This is a library that I will be spending a little more time with in the near future.  Another great feature is the on-line documentation.  It’s actually useful!

Rethinking “Enterprise” – Ted Neward – although the other presentations were great, this was easily my favorite presentation of the day.  The interesting part is that it wasn’t even technical.  There was no code, no IDEs, just some seemingly difficult math problems, some not-so-well-known facts about Woodrow Wilson, and various other historical tidbits about things like J2EE, etc.  Oh, and the incessant Windows Update dialog that seemed to consume most of Ted’s CPU cycles.  The gist of his presentation is that we are all wired from the time we start school as a child to think in a certain way.  This brings along with it certain presumptions that affect how we might approach a given problem.  The point of the presentation is to make us aware of this condition and to step outside the box and question assumptions and explore multiple possibilities.  Although this session was only an hour long, It will provide me with food for thought for weeks to come :-)

With any luck, I will be able to attend the entire day tomorrow and finish off the conference with a day full of great sessions.  See you there!

Speaking Schedule

One of my favorite things about technology is having the opportunity to speak about technology.  For whatever reason, it always seems like this time of year always keeps me busy.  Here is a list of speaking engagements I’m scheduled for over the next few months:

• October 21st – presenting on Silverlight 3 at an internal user group within Farm Credit Services of America (my employer)
• November 3rd – presenting on VSTS 2010 – What’s in it for me? at the Dubuque, IA .NET User Group.  I gave this presentation for the Omaha Team System User Group last month and am looking forward to giving it again.
• November 7th – presenting at Tulsa TechFest on TBD (something related to VSTS, I’m sure :-)
• November 13th – presenting on C# and Team Build at an internal .NET Developer’s Conference for Tyson Foods in Springdale, AR.

The last two events in November are all within about an hour of my sisters and parents so I’m really looking forward to the trips.

Microsoft MVP Global Summit

Microsoft MVPs from all around the world have began their descent on Seattle.  Tomorrow starts the 2009 Microsoft MVP Global Summit which will run from March 1st thru March 4th. 

Having been a Microsoft MVP (for Team System) for only a few months, this is my first Summit and I am happy that I am able to attend.  I am not completely sure what to expect but what I hope to get out of it is the opportunity to meet a lot of other software professionals with a passion for technology and learning.  Based on my conversation with the first MVP I’ve met so far on this trip, Jay Smith, it doesn’t appear that it is going to be a problem :-)

I also look forward to meeting some of the people that helped develop the technologies that I make use of on a daily basis – e.g. Visual Studio Team System and Team Foundation Server.  I have no doubt that I, along with the other attendees, will have plenty of questions to ask.  This is a great opportunity to gain knowledge of what’s currently being used today as well as what’s coming down the road.  As always, I look forward to sharing this information (barring any NDA’s, of course :-) with fellow co-workers and acquaintances.