Today marks my 9th year at Microsoft. Next year, I’ll collect my second Final Fantasy crystal.

I thought it would be fun to share a few blogging statistics:

• This is my 980th post on blogs.msdn.com/saraford
• As of this writing, ya’ll have left 5504 comments on this blog
• I have been blogging as a Microsoft employee for nearly 1/4 of my life
• My most commented blog post (where I wasn’t asking for feedback) is on Guidelines – a hidden feature for Visual Studio
• My most commented blog post that was not software-related is <spoilers>My thoughts on Stephen King’s The Dark Tower VII – This article contains Spoilers!</spoilers>
• My most viewed blog post of all time is Automation Testing versus Manual Testing Guidelines
• And last but not least, my very first blog post 7 years ago was Testing for Accessibility: Keyboard, High Contrast, and Assistive Technology Compatibility.

It’s tradition to recap the teams you’ve worked on over the years…

• QA on the Environment SDK (also known as VSIP, VS SDK, VS Extensions). The first feature I ever tested was “devenv.eve /safemode”
• Learned how to do Accessibility Testing – worked without a monitor for 3 months (seriously, I listened to a screen reader) when i first joined Microsoft
• QA on the Profiles feature (Tools – Import / Export Settings) – my first feature I worked on from design to launch
• QA on the Extensibility team (add-ins, macros, recording macro).
• QA on the Core IDE team (Window Management)
• Started blogging here in October of 2003 (content was moved a few months later here)
• Drove the Accessibility Effort for Visual Studio 2005
• Assisted driving the User Experience Consistency Effort for Visual Studio 2005
• QA on the Editor team (core Editor functionality)
• QA on the Project / Solutions team, completing a tour of all the Visual Studio feature areas (okay, okay, i didn’t own Help, but i helped analyze test case failures when those owners were out of office)
• Program Manager on the Developer Solutions (aka Power Toys) team, releasing 3 of the first 28 projects on CodePlex.com when the site went public back in 2006.
• Kicked off the Visual Studio Tip of the Day series
• As a hobby, I assisted teams within Visual Studio in releasing to CodePlex by authoring a framework for what sorts of releases go where and how to get them to the outside world.  Even received a ThinkWeek review by Bill Gates.
• Program Manager for CodePlex.com. First got my CodePlex.com account back in early 2006. Joined as PM when site had 2800 projects.
• Achieved 4 of my childhood dreams: Rode on a Mardi Gras float, Held a Koala, Got To Be In That Number When the Saints Went Marching In!, and got my 2nd degree black belt. Only 2 dreams left to go: Buy a DeLorean and Do an Ironman.
• Achieved 2 of my professional dreams; Wrote my first book and started a college scholarship for folks back home; Got to be in a TechEd Keynote (in Australia)
• Overcame 1 of my biggest nightmares: Jumping from a Tall Building
• Left CodePlex.com after watching 10,000 Open Source Projects get created as the Program Manager
• Finally moved to California after 81 months without seeing the Sun. No joke! 9 months of gray * 9 years = 81 months.
• Now a Developer Evangelist for Silicon Valley who can demo 101 Visual Studio features in exactly 55 minutes ;-)

It’s also tradition to bring in a pound of M&Ms for each year at MSFT. Since my team is scattered across the west coast, I’ll bring my 9 pounds of M&Ms to SuperHappyDevHouse on Saturday.

Thanks everyone for a fantastic 9 years!