Recap: Tech·Ed North America 2010 Day 3

By Mack D. Male · June 10, 2010 at 11:41am

Maybe it was because I was wearing shorts, but the convention centre seemed especially cold yesterday (and today). Still really hot outside for TechEd attendees however, with temperatures hovering around the 30 degrees C mark. The day seemed to go fairly smoothly, with the exception of lunch (there was a session that went through most of the lunch break, and they ran out of food, which meant incredibly long lineups right at the end).

The first session I went to yesterday was Windows Server AppFabric Caching: What It Is and When You Should Use It. I’m a fan of Memcached, and have been using it for a number of years now, so I really wanted to see how AppFabric compares (the codename for this was Velocity, which I wrote about here). I’d say that overall they are quite similar, though if you’re a .NET developer using AppFabric can give you some quick wins. One example is that with just a couple of lines in the Web.config, you can use AppFabric to store Session information, perfect for a web farm scenario. Another thing I like is that AppFabric Caching is managed through PowerShell. Here are some resources:

After lunch I attended one of the bigger sessions, Overview of the Microsoft ADO.NET Entity Framework 4, hosted by Julie Lerman and Chris Sells. I really enjoyed it, first and foremost because it consisted mainly of demos, and secondly because Julie and Chris were really entertaining and worked well together. Here again, I have been using an open source solution – SubSonic. I remember reading about EF really early on, but didn’t spend too much time on it because of all the criticism it received. If nothing else, the session yesterday made me want to look at EF again – it has really come a long way. I was impressed.

Another session I attended was Building RESTful Applications with the Open Data Protocol. Although labeled a 300-level session, it was very introductory, and didn’t contain anything I hadn’t already seen. It was great to see so many people in the session though – clearly there’s some interest.

I also took some time yesterday to explore the Exhibition Hall a bit more, stopping by the Spoon booth to talk with them. They have some really interesting virtualization and application streaming technology. I recorded a short video and wrote more at Techvibes.

There are lots of social events during TechEd, but last night in particular seemed like a busy night. John and I checked out the Springboard party at the House of Blues (where we saw some of the Hawks-Flyers game) as well as the Pluralsight mixer. Good times!

You can see more of my TechEd photos here, and also at the TechEd group on Flickr.

Recap: Tech·Ed North America 2010 Day 2

By Mack D. Male · June 9, 2010 at 11:48am

Full day of sessions at TechEd yesterday, though I did take some time in the morning to catch up on blogging, as I am doing today. Probably the most talked about topic at TechEd so far has been the breakfast! People are simply not happy with bagels, muffins, and scones. Either the breakfast or these mascots that everyone has been stopping to get a photo with:

The main feature of the day was the Business Intelligence keynote with Ted Kummert, Microsoft Senior Vice President, Business Platform Division. I missed it, so I’ll watch it online, which you can do here. You can also read a transcript here.

The first session I went to was Prototyping Rich Microsoft Silverlight 4 Applications with Microsoft Expression Blend + SketchFlow. It was really interesting to see how you could use SketchFlow to draw out some screens from your application, and then start to add behaviours and other improvements. We also saw the new feature that enables you to publish a SketchFlow document to SharePoint, making it easy to share a prototype/mockup with colleagues. For more information:

Another session I checked out was Intro to Workflow (WF) Services & Windows Server AppFabric. I’m getting increasingly interested in AppFabric. It seems like a no-brainer to use it if you’re on the Microsoft platform already. I probably should have brushed up on some WF before attending the session, but it was still useful to see how WCF, WF, and AppFabric work together. For more information:

My favorite session of the day was the final one, Open Data for the Open Web, presented by Douglas Purdy and Jonathan Carter. This session had two things going for it: open data, one of my favorite topics, and the hilarious tag team of Douglas and Jonathan. They were really quite entertaining, but still managed to do a great job of explaining what OData is, and what the vision is. And, bonus, the City of Edmonton logo was on screen briefly! Some resources from this session:

OData
URL for the Netflix OData feed: http://odata.netflix.com/Catalog/
URL for the TechEd OData feed: http://odata.msteched.com/Sessions.svc/
Facebook Insights OData Service

The Internet at TechEd was pretty reliable yesterday, which meant that everyone on Twitter was able to find out that it was raining outside:

Some other sights:

Microsoft Tag spotted at TechEd!

Developers don’t actually talk like that…

Top Secret! mPad!

You can see more of my TechEd photos here, and also at the TechEd group on Flickr.

Recap: Tech·Ed North America 2010 Day 1

By Mack D. Male · June 8, 2010 at 10:58am

TechEd kicked off here in New Orleans yesterday, with an opening keynote from Bob Muglia, President of the Server & Tools Business at Microsoft. There are more than 10,000 customers, partners, and staff on-site and I think all of them caught the keynote (they had to setup a few overflow rooms). John and I arrived early to register and quickly chow down some breakfast so that we could lineup for the keynote. Neither of us have sat in the front row before, but we managed to do so yesterday!

Here’s a quick video that John recorded:

The focus of the keynote, which you can watch here, was cloud computing. Some of the highlights for me included (more info here):

The public beta of Service Pack 1 for Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7 will start in July.
Windows Server AppFabric is now available.
The Pivot control for Silverlight 4 will be launched this summer. Pivot is such amazing technology (it utilizes Deep Zoom for some of its magic) and being able to embed it on a web page is going to be awesome.
We saw a quick demo of Windows Phone 7, specifically related to integration with SharePoint. The enterprise features look pretty slick, so I hope they can deliver on the consumer experience too. You can see some screencaps from the demo here.
It was really interesting to hear from Tony Scott, Microsoft’s CIO, about how they are fully adopting the cloud internally. He said that Microsoft IT is now officially “cloud first”.
Also very cool: a video talking about the digital asset management system that Microsoft built for James Cameron and his team for Avatar. Cameron talked about this at D8 too.

Next up for John and I was the Developer Foundations keynote with Jason Zander. He announced quite a few interesting things for developers, including a new Feature Pack for Visual Studio 2010. Microsoft is going to release Feature Packs in between major releases to continually add functionality to the product. Some of the new stuff that excites me:

HTML clipboard support (copy code and paste it into your blog and its ready to go)
Search functionality for the Add Reference dialog
Tons of code editor improvements, such as entire-line-highlighting, and “tabify/untabify”

Jason also has a great post with links to new platform bits here. In particular, I’m very happy to see that Microsoft is working on Scrum Process Template for TFS 2010.

Throughout the day I explored the TechEd site. I visited the Community Lounge, which is where all the Hands-On Labs take place. I couldn’t resist taking a photo with the Channel9 guy:

Channel9 was livestreaming all day yesterday, and are doing the same today.

I also visited the Exhibition Hall, full of Microsoft product team representatives, as well as dozens of partners. One of the more interesting things to see was one of the Azure server containers:

After the day’s sessions were finished, there was a reception in the Exhibition Hall. I made sure to stop by the Windows Phone 7 booth, to check out the prototype:

I didn’t learn any new details, of course, but it was neat to see the phone in action.

Other thoughts on day 1:

As expected, not everything went smoothly. The Internet was down for most of the day, which was really annoying. I always wonder why some innovative company hasn’t come along to revolutionize Internet access for conferences, because it is such a common problem.
There were far more unhealthy options available for snacks than healthy options (I saw only a few bananas and oranges, but lots of popcorn, cookies, and Goldfish crackers).

In between sessions

You can see more of my TechEd photos here, and also at the TechEd group on Flickr.

I’m going to Tech·Ed North America!

By Mack D. Male · May 28, 2010 at 2:00pm

Tech·Ed is one of Microsoft’s most important annual conferences for developers and IT professionals, held in several places around the world. This year, Tech·Ed North America is in New Orleans in June, and I’m going to be there! I was invited by Microsoft Canada to attend, an opportunity I jumped at. I’ll be there with John Bristowe, taking in the sessions and labs, learning as much as I can, meeting other developers & IT pros, and generally having a good time. And of course, I’ll be blogging, tweeting, photographing, and otherwise recording & sharing the whole experience.

The conference runs from June 7 to 10. There are literally hundreds of sessions during the week, as well as a couple of keynotes and other special presentations. There’ll be some awesome parties too! The sessions are organized into 21 technical tracks, everything from Architecture to Office & SharePoint. I’m particularly interested in sessions on:

Open Data (obviously)
WCF and WF in .NET Framework 4
Windows Phone 7
Azure (cloud computing)

If you’re going to Tech·Ed, what sessions are you planning to check out? If you’re not going to Tech·Ed, what do you think I should see? Let me know!

I’m going to blog about my experience a little here, but also at Techvibes and the Canadian Developers blog. I’ll be tweeting about it too, using the official hashtag #teched. Can’t wait!

MediaCamp Edmonton & Hacks and Flacks Night

By Mack D. Male · May 3, 2010 at 4:00pm

Today marks three months since our initial planning meeting for MediaCamp Edmonton, an event taking place this Saturday at the Shaw Conference Centre (on ShareEdmonton). There are more than 130 people registered already, from a broad range of organizations and disciplines. We’re going to have some great discussions on the future of media!

The day will start off with a panel discussion, moderated by MediaCamp Edmonton instigator and EdmontonJournal.com Editor Karen Unland. Our panelists are:

The panel loosely represents the various audiences we think will be at MediaCamp – mainstream media, social media, public relations, and technology. I think it’s going to be a great way to get everyone warmed up for some great discussions throughout the day!

After the panel, we’ll give everyone an opportunity to pitch topics and then we’ll build the grid for the day (MediaCamp is an unconference). Some of the topics we’ll likely cover include:

What’s a mash-up and how do I do one to tell a local story?
What can journalists do with open data, and how?
How is social media being used effectively by mainstream media?
Which journalism best practices need to be fostered in social media?

As with all unconferences though, you get out what you put in. If you’re passionate about a particular topic or idea or question, pitch it!

Right after lunch we’re going to do something called Lightning Talks, which are quick, five-minute presentations on a tool, idea, or trend. It’ll be a great way to find out about some interesting things that you can follow-up on later. If you’d like to lead a lightning talk at MediaCamp, let me know.

I’d like to thank all of the people who have helped to organize MediaCamp Edmonton, as well as our sponsors: EEDC & the Shaw Conference Centre, Guru Digital Arts College, ShareEdmonton, Athabasca University TEKRI, CTV, and Grovenor School. We’re looking for additional sponsors – if you’re interested, please let me know ASAP.

The City of Edmonton has organized a media mixer called Hacks & Flacks Night for Friday at Metropolitan Billiards downtown (on ShareEdmonton). It’ll be a great opportunity to meet some of the people that will be at MediaCamp the next day. If you’re interested, register here.

Stay tuned to the MediaCamp Edmonton website for updates (and streaming video of the panel) as well as #yegmediacamp on Twitter. Hope to see you at the event!

Help bring Tech Days Canada to Edmonton!

By Mack D. Male · February 22, 2010 at 10:00am

Microsoft is planning the 2010 edition of Tech Days Canada, and they’re considering a stop here in Edmonton. In previous years, local developers have had to make the trip down to Calgary. If you’ve never heard of Tech Days, here’s what it’s all about:

With forty 200+ level sessions, Tech Days is the learning conference on both current technologies and new products like Windows 7, Exchange 2010 and much more.

The idea is to bring technical training content from TechEd, Mix, PDC, and other Microsoft conferences to Canadian developers and IT pros. There are sessions on Silverlight, test driven development, virtualization, IIS7, SharePoint, refactoring, Visual Studio, and more. I have led three sessions at Tech Days Calgary in past years, on ADO.NET Data Services, Internet Explorer 8, and REST Services with WCF.

When Microsoft was planning Tech Days 2009, they considered stopping here, but we lost out to Halifax. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to see that happen again.

I think there are definitely enough local developers and IT professionals to host Tech Days here, so let’s make the decision for Microsoft an easy one! If you want to see Tech Days come to Edmonton this year, email damirb@microsoft.com, or tweet your interest!

FITC Edmonton 2009: October 17-18

By Mack D. Male · August 17, 2009 at 8:22pm

For the first time ever, FlasintheCan (FITC) is coming to Edmonton. Very successful FITC events have happened all over the world since 2002, bringing together Flash, Flex, and AIR designers, developers, artists, and students to to educate, challenge, and inspire. Here’s what to expect:

It starts with the presentations. Two solidly packed days of presentations, both technical and creative. Presenters from around the world have been hand-picked for their skill and talent, and all are eager to share and meet you. It’s also about the networking. Being able to meet and talk to people who share your passion for this industry. Meet them at the presentations, in the exhibitor hall, or at the evening party.

The Edmonton event takes place on October 17th and 18th at NAIT. Here are the full event details:

WHAT: FITC Edmonton 2009
WHEN: Saturday & Sunday, October 17-18, 2009
WHERE: Shaw Theatre, NAIT, 11726 – 106th Street (map)

Ticket prices range from $49 to $299, but if you sign up before September 1st using the discount code “backintime” you can get in for just $99 (or $49 for students).

Among the impressive list of presenters are well-known locals Grant Skinner, Randy Troppmann, Erik Johnson, and Victor Rubba. If you’re at all involved in Flash and/or related technologies, this is one event you don’t want to miss!

Northern Voice 2009: My Post-Mortem Post

By Mack D. Male · March 19, 2009 at 10:25pm

I’ve been meaning to write this for nearly a month now! Better late than never, I guess. For the fifth straight February in a row, I was in Vancouver for Northern Voice. While there are some similarities from year-to-year, each edition of Northern Voice is unique. Last year I was a little disappointed, but not enough to keep me away.

This year, I had a much better time.

I’m not sure why exactly, because some of my criticisms from last year are still relevant. The event still wasn’t downtown. The wireless was still spotty. But many of my criticisms were addressed. The website was completely revamped this year. The schedule was much more interesting and varied.

Most important of all, there were a lot of people new to blogging and social media in attendance this year. That surprised me, especially given that the conference sold out so quickly. I think that having so many new people brought some excitement back to the event!

Some other highlights for me:

Rob Cottingham’s keynote entitled Teh Funny. He was hilarious and completely entertaining, I loved it!
Like last year, lunch was included, and it was great! Very yummy.
Finally got to me Rob from Techvibes in person.
No surprise here, but Twitter was used heavily during the conference. It was great to be able to follow some of the other sessions I couldn’t get to.
Sun and grass. It was nice to get away from the snow for a weekend!

On Monday, the organizers sent out a post-conference survey. Due to the Olympics next year, Northern Voice isn’t going to be held in February. Combined with the desire to address the increasing demand for the event, I think it’s safe to say that NV 2010 is going to look quite a bit different than past years. That’ll be a good thing, in my opinion. It never hurts to change things up once in a while.

See you in 2010!

Northern Voice 2009: Passionately Local

By Mack D. Male · February 24, 2009 at 11:00pm

Of all the sessions at Northern Voice 2009, I was perhaps most looking forward to the one presented by Briana Tomkinson of Tenth to the Fraser titled Passionately local: blogging about your own backyard. As someone who is definitely passionate about my hometown, I was really curious to learn about the experiences of others.

Tenth to the Fraser is a hyperlocal blog focused on New Westminster, a city in the Vancouver area. Briana talked about some of the motivations behind the site, some of the challenges, and some of the rewards.

Here are some notes I took from Briana’s slides:

The Greek Chorus of New West
- Help the ‘audience’ follow the performance
- Comment on themes
- React to the drama
- Provide insight
Passion for community
- A desire to dig in to a place
- An itch to uncover more
- A calling to share the results
Everyone blogs from a place. The placeblogger blogs about a place.
Hyperlocal made interesting
- Reveal the character of a place
- Represent diverse perspectives
- Keep focus narrow
- Balanced mix of: aggregating local information, publishing original content, relationship-building
Finding your nice within the media ecosystem
- Befriend the local media
- Extend traditional news coverage
- Reveal opinions and perspectives that are missed in mainstream coverage
- Geek out: food, schools, politics, shopping
The Rewards
- Pride of place
- Local fame
- Community
- Knowledge
- Giving back
Be the change you seek in your community

I really liked Briana’s talk, even though the end was a bit rushed as everyone started asking questions and she ran out of time! There were definitely moments when I thought “I know exactly what she means” and others when I thought “that wouldn’t work in Edmonton”.

With a population of nearly 60,000, New Westminster is about 13 times smaller than the City of Edmonton, and almost 20 times smaller than the Edmonton metro area. So while a single, focused blog in New Westminster probably would work very well, I don’t think it would fly in Edmonton. There’s just too much to write about for a single blog. I think, more than ever, that aggregation is the way to go for a city of Edmonton’s size.

There are some similarities, however. Tenth to the Fraser has started the #NewWest hashtag on Twitter, similar to our beloved #yeg. They seem to write a lot about politics, which is perhaps the most popular topic here too. And they have a relatively small, but rapidly growing online community.

I think there are lots of things that hyperlocal bloggers can learn from Tenth to the Fraser. Check it out, and let me know what you think. The first thing you’ll notice is that the site is free of any advertising. Briana and her team do it because they love their city, not because they’re in it for the money. We could use more blogs like Tenth to the Fraser!

Northern Voice 2009: Teh Funny

By Mack D. Male · February 21, 2009 at 12:40pm

No, that’s not a typo! Rob Cottingham (@RobCottingham) was the second keynote speaker today, and he led us on “a lightning tour through both the intentionally and accidentally hilarious sides of social media.” I couldn’t really blog this keynote – it’s one of those things you needed to experience. I laughed a lot, as did everyone else in the room.

Which are funny?

Podcasting – Really funny.
End-User License Agreements – Yes, funny!
Beta – Not funny. Maybe kinda funny.
Memes – No, not funny.
Blogging – Funny!
Business – Rob thinks it’s hilarious, the audience isn’t so sure.
LOLcats – Audience is 50/50, Rob says it’s a matter of taste.

Some of the non-funny things Rob said:

At the heart of social media is creative self-expression and the need to connect.
The first Northern Voice was a techier crowd than it is today.
Teh funny is a big part of the way we connect on the social web. Shared laughter is something primal.
If you’re already doing teh funny, please, keep it up!

Two other interesting things about Rob’s keynote – first he attempted to become the first comic in history to heckle himself. He setup some scheduled tweets using HootSuite, very funny. Second, Nancy White drew an “illustrative interpretation” of Rob’s talk on the board behind him. It actually turned out quite well!

Fantastic keynote. I hope someone has some video to share!