TechEd 2007, Day 1

 

Finally arrived at the Orange County Convention Center.  If there are a bigger set of buildings in the world I have yet to find them.  Holy cow.  After walking nearly two miles (most of it indoors) I finally found Registration which, of course, was moved from the complete other side of the complex since this morning.  Just my luck.  And what do they give me as soon as I walk in?  A big bag full of stuff.  I guess the messenger I’m toting my Tablet PC in didn’t look heavy enough.  Now I look like a 6’5" pack mule. 

 

No SharePoint sessions at the moment so I’ll be wandering around the exhibit hall in an attempt to find the Office TLC.  My feet hurt and I just go here!  At least they’ve got free WiFi, proving that somebody, somewhere learned from all the grumbling at the European SharePoint conference.

 

Now, where are all those SharePointy people???

 

 

Now how did I know Bob Fox would be the first SharePointer I would run across?  Bob and the other MVP’s are doing a great job manning the WSS/MOSS stands in the Office TLC area.  There are a few SharePoint-specific vedors here – Colligo, Barracuda, Bamboo, MindSharp, all the usual suspects – and lots of vendors offering SharePoint solutions.  I only took a quick trip around the expo to get a feel for it – I’ll pick out some gems and post a paragraph on each.

 

Coming up this evening is a session on the VS Exntensions for SharePoint (are they ever gonna release those?).  Should be good stuff.  First thing tomorrow will be MS talking about how they deployed it internally.  Can’t wait to see that farm structure.

 

More to come but for now I need a break.  I’m gonna snag one of those Segway’s the security staff is riding around on and slap a BinaryWave logo on it.  Now that’s travelling in style!

 

 

After 5,000 "What is SharePoint?" questions we finally got a good development question regarding user controls vs. "pure" web parts.  This led to a spirited debate between myself, Adam Buenz (WSS MVP), and Brad Smith (also WSS MVP), with Adam religiously committed to the pure web part approach, Brad mostly on his side, and myself squarely in the middle.  I’ll save the content of the debate for another post but it was the liviliest discussion of the day by far.  Shortly thereafter the free drinks started – you can imagine how the debate subsequently degenerated into insults, curses and generally unrepeatably comments.  Collaboration at its finest!

 

 

The Ted Pattison Group booth became the gathering point for SharePoint MVP’s – Bob Fox, Adam Buenz, Shane Young, Heather Solomon, Patrick Tissegham, Andrew Connell, Brad Smith, Darrin Bishop, Dustin Miller…the list goes on.  And me, of course, Mr. non-MVP.  Once the beer started flowing the conversation went completely downhill.  Thanks go to Rachel Slowey from TechSherpas for providing the beer koozies.   

 

 

The night has now gone completely into the gutter.  Myself, Adam Buenz, Bob Fox, Darrin Bishop, Guayan (didn’t get his last name, great guy from Sri Lanka), Brad Smith, Rachel Slowey, and Polly from Ted Pattison Group took over the patio at Cooke’s Ragsdale Road (thanks for the correction, Mr. Fox) Irish Pub in Downtown Disney.  Booze, cigars and much juvenille behaviour ensued.  Fun was had by all.