Chris Bowen's Blog

Summer Northeast Roadshow Resources and Wrapup

2009-07-06T03:18:51Z

Our Summer 2009 Northeast MSDN Roadshow is done and was an absolute blast! Bob, Jim, and I returned to many (oh so many) miles of open road to bring six sessions to five northeastern cities in June.

Thanks to everyone who took the time to attend in each city!

Roadshow Resources

As promised, we’ve posted the materials from each of the sessions on the Northeast Roadshow Code Gallery, but here are quick links to each:

We’re also working on recording screencasts for each of the sessions, which we’ll post to the Northeast Channel 9 Site in the coming weeks.

The Fall 2009 Series

We’re already hard at work on the next set of events! Things are shaping up for a September/October series, and we’re hoping to mix things up a bit this time (I’ll be purposefully vague here), so keep an eye on our blogs for news.

Thanks

This time, we had extra help with our (very large!) Waltham event. Thanks to both Sybase and Burntsand for providing the food for the show!

Special thanks to the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) and the State of Maine Office of the Fire Marshal for again generously donating use of their facilities for our stops in Rochester, NY and Augusta, ME respectively.

Sincere thanks to coffee and chocolate-covered espresso beans (which melt in a car surprisingly quickly) for keeping us (or at least Bob who was the driver) awake for our travels.

And again, thanks to you for attending and investing your time with us!

-Chris

Kodu (Game Programming Environment) Now Available

2009-07-02T21:11:18Z

On an earlier Roadshow (winter 2008), I gave a preview of a great environment from Microsoft Research for making game programming friendly and accessible to a wider audience, and especially children. At the time it was called “Boku”, but was since renamed “Kodu”.

As of yesterday, Kodu is now available on XBOX Live Marketplace as a free trial or purchase for 400 points (about $5) and lets you create games using only the XBOX controller (though the chatpad is useful, too.)

I’ll be downloading it soon and showing our daughters. I just might even let them have a turn!

-Chris

P.S. Other useful links:

Kodu Blog

http://community.research.microsoft.com/blogs/kodu

Kodu Research Home Page

http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/kodu/

IGN Coverage (with videos from CES and elsewhere)

http://xboxlive.ign.com/articles/100/1000340p1.html

New England Code Camp 12 – Save the Date!

2009-06-29T16:11:34Z

A quick post to let everyone know that the date has been set for New England Code Camp 12:

Saturday, October 17th, 2009!

As usual, the Microsoft offices in Waltham, MA have been reserved for this free, full day of knowledge sharing and networking, by the community, for the community. (What is a Code Camp?)

So mark your calendars, stay tuned for updates, and join hundreds of your fellow developers for this fantastic community event!

-Chris

P.S. There’s a team of volunteers working to make this event a great success who can always use extra hands and ideas. Want to help (even just a little)? Just send me a note!

Boston XNA Developers Group June 24 Meeting – XNA Game Studio 3.1

2009-06-24T13:06:42Z

Tonight’s meeting of the Boston XNA Developers Group (6:00 in Waltham) will feature Michael Cummings speaking on what’s in the newly-released XNA Game Studio 3.1. XNA Game Studio helps you create games that can run on PCs, XBox 360, and Zune, all on top of the .NET Framework.

Some of the new features in 3.1 include:

Avatar Support
Xbox LIVE Party Support
Video Playback
Audio API
Content Pipeline Enhancements
XACT3 Support

Resources:

Save the Date – Vermont’s First Code Camp on September 12th!

2009-06-15T13:29:07Z

I’m very happy to pass along word (via Rob Hale and Julie Lerman) that the first Vermont Code Camp will be on September 12th in Burlington!

The University of Vermont’s School of Business has generously offered to host this event – thank you!

More is coming soon, so for now, just save the date.

It’s going to be a great event (what is a Code Camp?), open to the entire technology community and, with the added bonus of being in Burlington with it’s fall beauty, it will be fantastic. I’m planning to make a weekend of it.

-Chris

P.S. Rob is happy to hear from anyone interested in speaking, but I’m not sure he intended his email to be published to the world, so until the “formal” Call for Speakers is posted, if you’re interested in helping, send me a note and I’ll connect you.

Greater Buffalo IT/Dev Day – July 21

2009-06-15T12:37:08Z

As Northeast Roadshow attendees know, our usual stop in western NY is Rochester (in fact we just returned from a great event there on Friday!) It’s always good to see the people who make the trip from Buffalo to attend, so I’m glad to say we have an event where Buffalo is the center of attention!

MSDN and TechNet, in partnership with the Western NY .NET Users Group, are running a free Greater Buffalo IT/Dev Day on July 21st at Daemen College in Amherst, NY.

Shamelessly copied from Jim’s post:

This IT/Dev Day comprises separate TechNet Unleashed and MSDN Unleashed events, with morning TechNet sessions focused on the IT Professional audience, and afternoon MSDN sessions geared toward the .NET developer audience. Attendees at either event (or both events!) are welcome to stay - or come early as the case may be - for a light lunch courtesy of our sponsor, PSI Professional Support Inc.

In addition to the great content outlined below, all attendees will receive a copy of the Windows 7 Release Candidate media!!

Greater Buffalo IT/Dev Day
Tuesday, July 21, 2009

107 Schenck Hall
Daemen College
4380 Main Street
Amherst, NY 14226

8:30am - 12pm
Lunch 12pm - 1pm

1pm - 4:30pm
Lunch 12pm - 1pm

Moving to the Modern OS Roadmap

In this welcome session, we will discuss some of the key challenges IT professionals face in today’s economy. We’ll talk about scenarios with Windows 2000 and Windows XP and the importance of moving to a modern OS. In addition, we will cover Windows Vista and improvements that have been made with SP2 as well as review guidance concerning Windows Vista deployments.

Developing Cloud Applications with Windows Azure

Cloud computing is one of more recent buzzwords in software development, and Microsoft has thrown its hat in the ring with Windows Azure and the Azure Services Platform. You’ll discover what makes Microsoft’s unique Software + Services approach tick through discussions and demonstrations of key components like Azure storage, the .NET Service Bus, Live Services, and SQL Data Services.

Windows Security and Application/Driver Compatibility

This session discusses security, data protection with the new “Bitlocker-To-Go”, rich support tools like Reliability Monitor, Resource Monitor, Windows Recovery Environment, and the new System Restore and Problem Steps Recorder. We will also cover application control using group policy and implement simple rule structures that include working with an application to Allow, Exception or Deny the installation. We’ll also discuss Group Policy Preferences and how users can change their own policy settings.

Developing Rich Internet Applications with Silverlight

Silverlight is the technology of choice for building applications with rich features and broad reach. Using Silverlight 2 today, we’ll show you what you can accomplish with .NET and XAML to deliver a great user experience. Then, we’ll up the ante with a preview of Silverlight 3 including out-of-browser support and productivity and performance enhancements. We’ll also take a look at some of the great features in Expression Blend 3, sure to please your designer side.

Windows 7 Release Candidate

The way Microsoft develops Windows has changed. We’ll discuss the changes we have made in Windows Vista that affect Windows 7, such as hardware, and new features that work with Windows Server 2008 R2 like DirectAccess™, which provides seamless remote access to corporate network resources. We also will cover BranchCache ™, which caches content downloaded from file and web servers; users in the branch can quickly open files stored in the cache, which frees up network bandwidth for other uses.

Developing applications with Windows Mobile

With worldwide mobile phone shipments predicted to grow at a 31% rate in 2009, there’s no time like the present to bring your applications to Windows Mobile. In this session we’ll discuss the components of the Windows Mobile Platform, notably the Compact Framework and SDK, and use familiar tools and constructs in Visual Studio to build and deploy a mobile application from the ground up. There’s also a look forward to some of the great features coming in Windows Mobile 6.5.

A very special thanks to the event sponsors below for making it possible to bring this event to the Buffalo area!

New Channel 9 Screencast on XNA Game Development

2009-06-08T15:04:32Z

I’ve created a new screencast on creating games with XNA and, thanks to my teammate Brian Johnson, it’s now available on our Northeast page on Channel 9!

Northeast Roadshow - XNA Game Development

Based on the Spring Roadshow session, this is an introduction to the world of XNA and game development. You’ll learn how XNA fits in with .NET and Visual Studio, see how the XNA Creators Club Online site will help you download what you need to create games and find resources to learn about your options.

The bulk of the screencast focuses on creating a very (oh, so very) basic 2D game with XNA Game Developer Studio 3.0. The code is available on the Northeast Code Gallery.

Just don’t forget to send me a note once you become a famous game developer!

-Chris

Session Schedule for Architect Factory on June 2nd

2009-05-27T21:40:47Z

An update to my earlier post, the schedule has been set for The Architect Factory event coming to NERD on June 2nd. IASA New England, {Code Right}, Microsoft, and O’Reilly are sponsoring this half day multi-track event for senior developers and aspiring architects. Hear from seasoned architects on what you need to know to become an architect.

There will be a keynote by Rob Daigneau followed by 9 sessions organized into 3 tracks (Architecture in Action, Leadership, and Head in the Clouds). Sessions will cover practical techniques, current methodologies, patterns, cloud computing, security, how to work with IT stakeholders.

Register at arcfactory.eventbrite.com

This event will be held at the Microsoft New England Research and Development (NERD) Center in Cambridge, MA from 1:00 - 7:15 PM with dinner afterward. So come join your peers and network with some of the most influential architects here in the northeast!

Event Agenda

1:00 – 1:30 - Arrive, Meet and Greet

1:30 - 2:45 - Keynote: “Becoming An Architect”, Rob Daigneau

2:45 – 3:00 - Break

3:30 - 4:15 – Sessions
”The Dangers of Over Architecting Solutions” - Bryan Tuttle
“The IT Architect and Technology Leadership – where are we and what next?” - David Leonard
“How the Cloud Pattern is Changing Enterprise Architecture” - Todd Bremner

4:15 - 4:30 - Break

4:30 - 5:45 – Sessions
“Establishing Developer Practices” - Dennis Perlot
“Working with Business Stakeholders” - Ian Dicker
“The Architect and the New Identity Paradigm” - Curt Devlin

5:45 – 6:00 - Break

6:00 - 7:15 – Sessions
“Architecture of Collaboration Systems” - SB Chatterjee
“Using LAAAM to Make Good Architectural Decisions, Fast!” - Jeromy Carriere
“Application Patterns for the Cloud” - Igor Moochnick

7:15 -8:30 - Evening Dinner Event

O’Reilly Media has generously donated copies of 97 Things Every Software Architect Should Know, and we’ll raffle off a copy or two in each session.

Special geekSpeak on Developing Silverlight Games on May 27th

2009-05-26T19:18:00Z

The Northeast’s very own Andy Beaulieu (Silverlight guru, MVP, CNY .NET UG Lead, etc.) is connecting with Jim O’Neil and Glen Gordon to share details about developing games with Silverlight!

This episode in the MSDN geekSpeak series is May, 27th (tomorrow) from 3:00-4:00 PM EST, and features an open “radio show” style, where you can ask whatever’s questions are on your mind.

Register for the webcast here

I’ve discussed Silverlight and game development with Andy before and had the pleasure of catching some of his presentations on the subject and can say he truly knows his stuff. This promises to be a worthwhile and interesting webcast!

-Chris

P.S. If you’re looking for a little stress relief, definitely check out Andy’s latest Silverlight game, called “Boss Launch”, that he recently unveiled!

Just one of the many Silverlight games that Andy has written and made available for you to try.

Publishers Offering Support for User Groups

2009-05-21T21:47:09Z

Run a user group? With funding and sponsors a constant challenge, you’re probably always on the lookout for things to give away at meetings.

Fortunately, many publishers have great relationships with the user group community and have established programs through which you can receive promotional copies of books and other items to use as giveaways or for book review programs.

Here’s a list to get you started:

O’Reilly User Group & Professional Association Program

http://ug.oreilly.com (and twitter @OReillyUG)

Wrox User Group Program

http://www.wrox.com/go/usergroups

Pearson Education User Group Program (Addison-Wesley, Sams, Que, etc.)

http://www.informit.com/user_groups

APress User Group Program

http://www.apress.com/community/usergroup

Manning Publications User Group Program

http://www.manning.com/ugprogram

Peachpit User Group Partners

http://www.peachpit.com/user_groups

(Know of any others? Please comment below or contact me. Thanks!)

It’s a symbiotic relationship - you get stuff to help the group, and they get visibility in your community. Be certain to take advantage of the opportunity.

-Chris

Free Online Training with Microsoft Ramp Up

2009-05-20T12:30:10Z

Ramp Up is a is a free online program to help you learn new development skills. Each subject has a variety of supporting slide/code casts, articles, and hands-on labs organized in steps to guide you through learning.

Three new tracks have just been launched, brining the total to 11:

Check out www.MyRampUp.com for more.

-Chris

XAMLFest Boston 5/27 – 5/28… and Online

2009-05-14T15:42:38Z

XAMLFest events are a great (and free) way to learn about Silverlight and WPF through a combination of presentations and instructor-led hands-on lab work.

XAMLFest Boston is coming to the NERD facility (One Memorial Drive, Cambridge, MA) on May 27th & 28th, and will be the last XAMLFest in the northeast this fiscal year.

John Pelak has the full details via the ISV Developer Community Blog:

http://blogs.msdn.com/usisvde/archive/2009/05/05/you-re-invited-to-xamlfest-boston-may-27-may-28.aspx

This event, like past ones, is already filling up and will reach capacity, so act quickly if you know you can attend!

XAMLFest Online

Because this event series has been so popular, filling up each time, the team is taking XAMLFests to the web to help reach more designers and developers.

XAMLFest Online will be held June 1-5, featuring a syllabus with two live sessions each day supplemented with recorded content.

Bruce Kyle has the details at:

http://blogs.msdn.com/usisvde/archive/2009/05/10/join-for-xamlfest-recorded-sessions-online-live-june-1-5.aspx

Enjoy becoming XAMLized!

-Chris

SQL Server 2008 Developer Training Kit Now Available

2009-05-14T14:51:18Z

The SQL Server 2008 Developer Training Kit, a useful collection of presentations, demos, and hands-on labs for learning about SQL Server 2008 from a developer’s perspective is now available.

The SQL Server 2008 Developer Training Kit will help you understand how to build web applications which deeply exploit the rich data types, programming models and new development paradigms in SQL Server 2008.

Overview and Benefits
The training kit offers the following benefits:

Learn how to build web applications that exploit the unique features and capabilities of SQL Server 2008.

Provides a comprehensive set of presentations, demos and hands-on labs

Designed for web developers who are already familiar with SQL Server application development.

Easy to download and install and works on free editions of SQL Server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008.

Contents
The training kit includes the following content:

Presentations (6)

Filestream

Spatial

T-SQL

Date and Time Types

SQLCLR

Reporting Services

Demos (12)

AdventureWorks Racing All-Up SQL Server 2008 Demo

SQL Server 2008 All-Up Spatial Demo

Spatial Types Demo

Intro to Filestream Demo

SQL CLR Nullable Types Demo

Programming with Filestream Demo

Reporting Services Web Application Integration Demo

Date and Time Support in SQL Server 2008 Demo

T-SQL Table-Valued Parameters Demo

T-SQL Row Constructors Demo

T-SQL Grouping Sets Demo

T-SQL Merge Demo

Hands-on Labs (3)

Using Spatial Data in TSQL

Using Spatial Data in Managed Code

Using SQL CLR in SQL Server 2008

An Event for Aspiring Architects: The Architect Factory on June 2nd

2009-05-12T22:12:10Z

Many experienced developers look to become architects as the next step in their careers, but it can be difficult to find opportunities to learn about the skills needed to make the transition. Aspiring architects need a way to learn what to learn to become effective architects.

The Architect Factory is designed to fill this need.

Coming to the Microsoft Cambridge, MA office (aka “NERD”) on June 2nd from 1-7 PM, The Architect Factory is a free event for all experienced developers to learn about the practices and processes that will help prepare them for roles as architects:

The Architect Factory event focuses on you, senior technologists interested in becoming software, solutions, enterprise, or design architects. This event helps bridge the knowledge gap between senior technical, design, enterprise, information, and solutions roles and real-world architecture roles, putting you on the path to becoming an architect in your field.

This is an opportunity to establish yourself as a visionary that architects the future, being able to design and create integrated systems that solve complex business problems. It can be challenging to find the right information and advice for taking steps toward becoming an architect, so join us for The Architect Factory and you’ll be well on your way!

The day will be feature a mix of content and social time, a great chance to learn and to make new connections.

Thanks to IASA (International Association of Software Architects) for helping to sponsor this event and fostering the growth of a new generation of architects!

Registration

Registration for this free event is now open, so reserve your spot at:

http://arcfactory.eventbrite.com

Please keep in mind that there’s a lot to cover at this event, so the sessions will assume that audience members have significant hands-on development experience.

The final schedule is coming in under two weeks, so keep an eye on this blog or the event registration page for details.

Call for Content and Speakers

There are a number of presenters already lined up, but we want to reach out to other architects interested in sharing knowledge and experience.

We’re looking for sessions to familiarize senior developers with the areas that all architects should understand to succeed. For example (but certainly not limited to!):

The Role of the Architect
Principles of Software Design
Methodology Comparisons (TOGAF, Zachman)
Design Patterns
Testing and Validation
Establishing Development Practices
Model Driven Architecture
Service Oriented Architecture
Performance
Interoperability
Patterns for Cloud Computing
Refactoring
Architecting for the User Experience
Working with Business Stakeholders and Development Teams

Interested in helping by sharing your perspective and experience? Contact me and let me know which areas you’re interested in covering.

The Call for Content and Speakers will close on Tuesday, May 19th.

Hope to see many of you there. I’m looking forward to a day of great interaction, knowledge sharing, and networking!

-Chris

Building Community at the Northeast User Group Leader Summit

2009-05-12T14:27:24Z

On Saturday, May 2^nd, O’Reilly Media and Microsoft partnered to host the first Northeast User Group Leader Summit (NEUGLS) at the Microsoft NERD campus in Cambridge, MA.

The event brought together about 100 community leaders, representing over 70 user groups (listed here) in the northeast, for a day to network and discuss community. A wide variety of tech areas were represented (.NET, PHP, Linux, Hacking, Ruby, and others), and leaders came from as far away as northern Vermont, Maine, New York City, and Philadelphia.

The Concept

Tech community groups face many of the same challenges – “Where can we meet?” “Who will speak?” “Are there legal concerns?” “How do we pay for this?” With so many shared concerns, it seemed there was a chance to strengthen the northeast community by getting together to talk about community (yes, very “meta”.)

By leaving behind the specific tools and technologies our groups represented, everyone found there was a great deal in common to discuss.

The diversity of groups was key, helping leaders forge new connections and exchange many new ideas.

David Christian (leader of the NYC Python group) captured the essence in his blog post:

I'd like to see these same connections form around the country. This type of event benefits particularly from having many local meetings as opposed to one national one, due to the benefits of simply getting tech leaders in the area to meet and exchange information in ways they might not do if when siloed into their particular communities.

The Event

The goals for the day were to share ideas and to make connections. The content was facilitated with an “unconference” approach, where the schedule had no fixed sessions and attendees created and scheduled sessions as conceived throughout the day. Ideas were posted off the schedule/grid, discussed, and popular ideas were moved to open slots.

All told, there were 24 sessions ranging from converting members to leaders, to finding venues, to dealing with finances.

Like many, I was sad not to have a clone who could attend every session, but “scribes” volunteered for each session to record notes to the event Wiki so people could benefit from the ideas in sessions they couldn’t attend (up to seven sessions were run concurrently). You can view the full list of sessions and notes.

There were three primarily social parts of the schedule. After some initial networking, everyone introduced themselves (name, group, and three descriptive words) in the opening session then adjourned for lunch and to create the schedule.

The afternoon break was a relaxed chance to break into smaller groups to make meeting others easier. The break featured technologist and “food hacker” Jeff Potter hosting an extreme ice cream making social, where teams made different flavors using liquid nitrogen to quickly freeze the mixtures. The event closed with an evening social with drinks and appetizers to relax, share a few more ideas, and make some final connections.

Buzz and Feedback

The hashtag for the event was #NEUGLS, and it was good to see the general buzz on Twitter.

Thanks to these attendees for their summary posts:

John Eckman
http://www.openparenthesis.org/2009/05/05/what-are-communities-made-of-northeast-user-group-leader-summit
Rob Hale
http://bigpigvt.blogspot.com/2009/05/notes-from-new-england-user-group.html
David Christian
http://communitiesintech.blogspot.com/2009/05/user-group-leadership-summit.html
Jason Robb
http://jasonrobb.com/2009/05/11/new-england-user-group-leaders-summit-2009/

Thanks!

Sincere thanks to the team who made this event possible:

O’Reilly – Marsee Henon, Laurel Ruma, Laurel Ackerman
Microsoft – Chris Bowen, Gus Weber, Jim O’Neil
Community – Jeff Potter, John Ross, Ron Thibeau, Jon Pierce, Shimon Rura

First, thanks to our fantastic event partner O’Reilly Media for their monumental efforts in making this event a success. They did a huge amount of work to help bring this together, and I can’t wait to work with them again on another event!

Special thanks to Jeff Potter for hosting the incredibly fun (and tasty) afternoon ice cream social break!

Thanks to Jon Pierce and Shimon Rura for sharing ideas on the event and for a great job reaching out to community leaders, and to John Ross and Ron Thibeau (of BostonUserGroups.org) for helping with planning and registration.

Thanks to O’Reilly’s own Rachel James for taking and sharing a wonderful set of pictures from the event.

Thanks to O'Reilly, Pragmatic Programmers, Sams, Que, Peachpit, Addison Wesley, Make, and APress for donating the many books used as giveaways.

And finally, thanks to everyone who took precious weekend time to attend and participate in the event!

Next Time?

Based on feedback from attendees, it’s clear there’s a need for this kind of event and an interest in holding another one of these next year, if not sooner.

It would be great to hear your feedback. When should this be done again? Would you change anything about the logistics? What would you like to see next time?

For more on the event, including participating groups and notes from each of the sessions, see the NEGULS wiki.

If you live elsewhere and are interested in hosting something like this in your area, feel free to contact me and I’ll share details on how the team organized this event.

-Chris

Chris Bowen's Blog

Summer Northeast Roadshow Resources and Wrapup

Roadshow Resources

The Fall 2009 Series

Thanks

Kodu (Game Programming Environment) Now Available

New England Code Camp 12 – Save the Date!

Boston XNA Developers Group June 24 Meeting – XNA Game Studio 3.1

Save the Date – Vermont’s First Code Camp on September 12th!

Greater Buffalo IT/Dev Day – July 21

New Channel 9 Screencast on XNA Game Development

Session Schedule for Architect Factory on June 2nd

Event Agenda

Sponsored By

Special geekSpeak on Developing Silverlight Games on May 27th

Publishers Offering Support for User Groups

Free Online Training with Microsoft Ramp Up

XAMLFest Boston 5/27 – 5/28… and Online

XAMLFest Online

SQL Server 2008 Developer Training Kit Now Available

An Event for Aspiring Architects: The Architect Factory on June 2nd

Registration

Call for Content and Speakers

Building Community at the Northeast User Group Leader Summit

The Concept

The Event

Buzz and Feedback

Thanks!

Next Time?