Are you going (or planning) to be in the Springs on June 10th?  Of course you are, because you’re attending the HTML5 Web Camp!

Microsoft's Web Camps are events that allow you to learn and build websites using HTML5 technology and more. This event is a unique opportunity, partnering classroom learning and hands-on-labs, and leveraging experts to help you build new and exciting websites. No matter what your expertise in web development, these Web Camps are the perfect opportunity to get hands-on experience and 'unleash your coding genius'.

As developers, you keep hearing a lot about HTML5, but many don’t know what it actually means or is truly capable of. If you want to learn about it, your choices are limited; you can either pick up a book or attend an expensive conference that often only scratches the surface. The HTML5 Web Camp is an opportunity to connect with designers and developers and show you what’s possible, and how you can start using it today. HTML5 WebCamp is a completely free event, and will start with demos and presentations, and will end with hands-on lab sessions, that will allow you to walk through materials and get your questions answered! Space is limited.

Here are a few sample topics that will cover in the Web Camps:

• Introduction to HTML 5
• Web Development with HTML 5
• Adding Video, Sound, and Animations with HTML 5
• IE9 and HTML 5 – Your Site Never Looked So Good!
• Best Practices for HTML 5

Presenters:

• Dr. Doris Chen
• Michael Palermo 

Things to Bring:

• Notebook computer
• Sketchbook
• Identification
• Snacks
• Bottled Water

Particulars:

• Date: June 10, 2011
• Time: 9:00am - 5:30pm
• Location:
  Antlers Hilton
  4 South Cascade Avenue
  Colorado Springs, CO 80903 (map)

Are you ready to go camping?  REGISTER HERE

You’ve all be asking, “What’s next for Visual Studio?”  Well, today at TechEd in Atlanta, Jason Zander gave the first solid peek at Visual Studio “vNext”.

He also blogged in detail about this announcement.  Read his post in full for all the juicy details, including screenshots, but below are my personal highlights:

VS vNext will bring in two more role interactions: stakeholders and operations.  To do so, Visual Studio will include new and improved capabilities:

• Agile Planning Tools – New backlog and task board capabilities will further help provide development transparency.
• Lightweight Requirements – Use PowerPoint to communicate requirements and design in a comfortable manner.
• Stakeholder Feedback – Similar to Test Pro 2010, stakeholders can easily provide actionable feedback about the work in progress.
• Continuous Testing – Expanded unit test support by including MSTest, nUnit, and xUnit, targeting both .NET and native C++ code.
• Agile Quality Assurance – Among other things, a new exploratory testing tool allows application “spelunking” to identify additional product issues.
• Aligning Development with Operations – A new System Center / TFS connector CTP is on its way to help enable an operations team to assign application performance monitoring and diagnostic information gathered by System Center to TFS for immediate attention.

For more information, check out the “Visual Studio vNext: Application Lifecycle Management” whitepaper, now available. Also, be sure to take a look at the Visual Studio Roadmap.

Come join Microsoft and Notion Solutions on May 24th in our Lehi office as we present the latest tools and techniques for managing your software process to attain quality software using Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 and the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) tools provided with this release.  These new tools provide significant value beyond what is available with Microsoft Visual Studio Team System 2008.

The day will cover the following topics:

Overview of Visual Studio 2010 ALM Tools for Managing Your Software Lifecycle

(9:00-11:00am)

This is an overview of Visual Studio 2010 and ALM tools and highlights the difference between Visual Studio Team System 2005/2008 and the new Visual Studio 2010, including the new Team Foundation Server features, the new modeling and debugging tools, as well as the latest in capabilities for managing and performing testing.

Using Team Foundation Server 2010 for Non-Windows Development

(11:00-12:00pm)

This is an overview of the best practices for utilizing Team Foundation Server (TFS) 2010 and Microsoft Visual Studio Team Explorer Everywhere for development activities beyond Microsoft and the Windows platform. This presentation will shows development teams using mixed and non-Microsoft platforms how to effectively leverage TFS 2010 to adopt work item tracking, version control, and automated build and test technologies.

Improving Software Quality with Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Test & Lab Tools

(1:00-3:30pm)

This is an overview of the Visual Studio 2010 and the Visual Studio Test Professional 2010 testing tools, including using the new Microsoft Test Manager 2010 to manage your testing and using test automation to automate your UI testing. The use of Microsoft Visual Studio Lab Management 2010 will be discussed as a means of automating the creation of virtual environments for testing purposes. See how the Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 testing and lab tools can help streamlining your entire testing lifecycle.

Summary and Q&A

(3:30-4:00pm)

I hope to see you there!

I receive a lot of email each week from you asking very specific, and valuable questions. It’s my hope that a newsletter like this will help me communicate important announcements, tips/tricks, and other items to help you and your team ultimately be more successful! Whenever I post a new newsletter, I will send email notifications to those of you who would like to be contacted. If you don’t want to receive email notifications, just let me know!

Announcements

• The introduction of Code Metrics generation from the command line has made it much easier (i.e. not impossible) to create metrics as part of a build.  There’s a rich solution built as a custom build activity, and a “poor man’s” way to do it.
• Brian Keller blogged about two great uses for the new OData Service for Team Foundation Server 2010, including the market’s first WP7 app for TFS.
• There’s a terrific article in the MSDN Magazine - Visual Studio TFS Team Project and Collection Guidance, written by my peer ALM Rangers.  This article very helpfully describes how and why to subdivide TFS instances into Team Project Collections and Team Projects.

Events & Training

• Be sure to take advantage of our ALM Catalyst Live Workshops where you can learn all about Microsoft’s ALM solutions in an interactive, online forum. Topics include SharePoint ALM with TFS, migration planning for VSS-to-TFS conversions, and others.  Oh, and these workshops are free!
• Attention Utah! – Don’t miss out on this free seminar coming to Lehi on May 24th!  Using the Visual Studio 2010 ALM Tools to Improve Your Software Lifecycle Management
• Hey Denver! Be sure to come to the Windows Phone 7 Unleashed “Learn – Build – Win$” event on Saturday, May 14th! It’s an all-day workshop (BYOL – bring your own laptop) that will give you the skills needed to create the next killer app for WP7. Build the best one of the day and win cash!
• User Group Meetings
• Colorado
• Denver – “Blended SharePoint 2010 / ASP.NET Solutions” by Dave Milner
• Colorado Springs – “C# Async: Today and Tomorrow” by Joe Mayo
• Fort Collins – TBD
• Arizona
• Phoenix (SEVDNUG) – “iPhone/iPad Development with MonoTouch” by Donn Felker
• Tucson – “Developing an application around SQL Server Spatial data types” by David Rabb
• Utah
• Northern Utah – No May meeting (was moved into April to accommodate speaker)
• Utah – TBD
• Utah County – TBD
• May Webcasts
• 5/6 - Real World Business and Technical Benefits of ALM with TFS 2010
• 5/11 - Improving Developer and Tester Collaboration using Visual Studio 2010
• 5/20 - The Full Testing Experience – Professional Quality Assurance with Visual Studio 2010
• 5/18 -  Practicing Effective Test Management with Microsoft Test Manager and Team Foundation Server 2010
• 5/25 - Managing Requirements and Tracking Defects with Team Foundation Server 2010
• Tech Ed is this month in Atlanta!  Are you going?

Final Thoughts

Microsofties in my role predominantly cover specific geographies in order to load balance resources across a region. For example, my geography covers Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and southern Nevada. Beginning in a few weeks, I’ll be expanding my reach into certain parts on Southern California – my old stomping grounds where I worked from 2005 to 2007 – I look forward to re-connecting with my old customers and colleagues!