Tuesday, June 28, 2005
Quo Vadis, ASP.NET?

We are getting closer and closer to the next release of ASP.NET (November 7th with VS2005). The new release certainly is exciting and a huge step forward once again. However, other things are happening in the world of HTML-based web development. Technologies and techniques like AJAX. Things you can already do today, but not as easily as it should be.

ScottGu (the "guy at Microsoft who owns ASP.NET") has just posted a rather comprehensive announcement on where they want to take ASP.NET, what the time frame is, where one can see first samples, and the like. Check out his post.

Monday, June 27, 2005
DevTeach Recap

DevTeach is over, and it was a blast! This was the "official Canadian CoDe Magazine conference", but unfortunately, I can not claim to be the main force behind the success of this show. My input was simply in picking speakers and sessions for the .NET track. But I have to say I am proud to be associated with this show, and I am looking forward to next year.

The value provided by this conference is great. It is relatively inexpensive (and the Canadian $ makes it even more affordable for US attendees), and it is packed with information. Sessions were presented on .NET, SQL Server, and VFP. Most sessions are in English (in fact, there are more English sessions than at comparable conferences in the US), but there are also sessions in French. As a result, the conference has a huge number of sessions. The conference is very relaxed, and one has a much better shot at talking to a speaker after the session than at conferences like TechEd or PDC. And the attendee demographics are awesome too. Lots of people from all around the world. I guess Canada is a more exciting destination these days than the US, when it comes to conferences. But then perhaps it's just Montreal that draws in the crowds. Personally, I always have a blast there (check out my Travel Blog for details).

I did 2 sessions in Montreal (I got off easy this time...): Real-Life Tablet PC Development, and Developing Interfaces in Avalon . The sessions were pretty well attended, and I am happy to report that my evals were pretty decent too (things are still in flux as people still turn in their evals online, but it looks like I will end up in the top-5... cool!).

The timing of this conference was very nice. Since TechEd was less than 2 weeks before DevTeach, all the TechEd news were spread at DevTeach as well. So in many ways, DevTeach was a cheaper and better TechEd for most attendees. The speakers were very similar between the two events, and I am proud to say that I was involved in picking the speakers for the .NET track. Many of the CoDe authors were there. Very cool. Thanks for coming to Montreal, guys!

Monday, June 20, 2005
DevTeach Tablet PC Session Notes Available

The samples and slide deck for my Tablet PC session at DevTeach in Montreal are now available for download.

This was a great session, btw. At least, I every much enjoyed presenting it. As usual, turnout was a bit on the moderate side, but not bad at all, and most of the people in the session were very interested.

Monday, June 20, 2005
My New TabletPC Blog

Those of you who are interested in Tablet PC development might also be interested in my new Tablet PC Blog: http://www.tabletpcblogs.com/blogs/markus/

www.TabletPCBlogs.com is an interesting site that provides lots of information posted by Tablet PC enthusiasts and professionals. Check it out, it is pretty cool!

For those of you who are interested in a wider range of development topics: I will still be most active and this blog, and post topics related to Tablet PC development on both blogs.

Monday, June 20, 2005
CircMan Show Slides Available

The slide deck I used at Circulation Management show last week is now available for download here.

Saturday, June 18, 2005
DevTeach 2005 Is Here!

It's time for another conference, and this time, things are special for us! I am posting this blog from DevTeach 2005 in Montreal (www.DevTeach.com), the official Canadian show of CoDe Magazine. Needless to say that as the owners of CoDe Magazine, this is extremely exciting for us! 4 days packed of in-depth information about Visual Studio .NET, SQL Server, and Visual FoxPro, both in English and in French languages.

Today is the pre-conference day, which features presentations on SQL Server, Visual Studio, and on how to adapt .NET technologies if you are a Visual FoxPro developer (for more details, see www.VFPConversion.com).

This conference is an excellent deal for developers. With TechEd just a matter of days in the past, this is the first major conference that incorporates news from TechEd, for a much lower rate. The list of speakers is extraordinary. If you are not able to attend DevTeach this year, make sure to mark your calendars for the next one!

Wednesday, June 15, 2005
Circulation Management Show

VFP DevCon is over (got back last night at 5am) and I am off to the next show: CircMan Show in New York (www.CircManShow.com). 

This is a somewhat unusual conference for me, since it is not a computer conference. Instead, it is a conference for magazine publishers, with a focus on the distribution aspects. I have been invited to speak at this conference, based on the system we use to manage all aspects of CoDe Magazine. It's an in-house system entirely developed on .NET and Milos (www.eps-cs.com/Milos), called "Olympus". You can see part of it in action at www.CoDe-Magazine.com, and in fact, even this very blog is managed and maintained by Olympus.

And without wanting to toot my own horn (well, maybe a little <s>), I am proud that a small publisher like EPS has been invited by one of the major industry events to tell people how to get their IT ducks in a row.

Sunday, June 12, 2005
Off to Advisor's DevCon in Las Vegas

I am off to Las Vegas to speak at Advisor Media's annual DevCon.

The focus of the event is quite broad. This time around, there are individual "sub conferences" for Access, VB, SQL, .NET, SharePoint, and Visual FoxPro. The Visual FoxPro part of this event is of course what used to be the "official MS DevCon", which has now been handled by Advisor for a number of years. After a few quiet years for the VFP conference (the event was used as the launch event for new versions of VFP on occasion), this year, the VFP part seems to be the most explosive, based on recent Microsoft announcements (check out the "VFP Roadmap on  http://msdn.microsoft.com/vfoxpro).

I speak on a number of different topics: Advanced UI Design, Building Tablet PC Applications, and Event Handling in VFP.

Other than myself, there are several pretty close associates speaking there, such as Claudio Lassala (one of our EPS guys), Rod Paddock (editor of our Magazine - www.code-magazine.com and owner of Dash Point Software - www.dashpoint.com), as well as Kevin McNeish (Oak Leaf Enterprises - www.OakLeafSD.com) and Rick Strahl (West Wind Technologies - www.west-wind.com), both close EPS associates and founding members of www.VFPConversion.com. Asides from these guys, there are a number of CoDe Magazine author's at the conference such as Ken Getz and Jim Duffy.

This is going to be interesting. Plus, it is Vegas, and Vegas is always fun (even though the event is held at a hotel outside Las Vegas). Unfortunately, I will have to leave a bit early (Tuesday night) due to my packed conference schedule this week. (Still to come: CircMan Show in New York, and DevTech in Montreal... www.DevTeach.com).

If you are planning to be at DevCon, stop by and say hi!

Friday, June 10, 2005
Welcome to my Blog!

OK, I finally broke down! After having had other ways to publish online (www.Code-Magazine.com, in particular my eColumn), and after having used blogs for internal communication and training at EPS and CoDe Magazine for quite some time, I have now launched my first public blog dedicated to software development. Welcome!

Expect to see topics related to various development tasks, as well as industry news, conference and event news, and much more.

Also, check out my other blogs at www.MarkusEgger.com/Blog and www.VFPConversion.com.
 

Markus Egger
President, and Chief Software Architect, EPS Software Corp. - www.eps-cs.com
Publisher, CoDe Magazine - www.code-magazine.com
www.eps-software.com - www.MarkusEgger.com