Report from the January 2009 Windows 7 Partner Readiness Event

wdkblog — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 02:49:00 GMT

I recently had the opportunity to attend Day 2 of the Windows 7 Partner Readiness Event that has been going on this week. For those that aren’t familiar, it’s a 4-day, invitation-only event organized by the Microsoft Windows Logo team with the purpose of providing our hardware partners a chance to learn about the Windows 7 logo program and tests. It’s a great way for partners to work one-on-one with Microsoft developers and testers, and to test their devices using the new Windows Logo Kit 1.3 and Windows 7 Beta. It’s also a good opportunity for partners to hold detailed discussions with Microsoft staff on partner progress with overall Windows 7 readiness, as well as their development efforts for delivering exciting devices and systems for Windows 7.

There was a great turnout this year: over 20 companies (about 60 participants), who filled up virtually every open lab in the building. It was fun to see normal Microsoft offices transformed into “labs,” and I enjoyed walking around and recognizing all of the household names written on the doors: Dell, Intel, Toshiba, Logitech…

The day began with a meeting room packed to the gills with testers, program managers, and so on, listening attentively to presentations delivered by various Microsoft staff. Presentations for the week ranged from topics such as “Best Practices for Test Environment Setup” and “What’s new in the WLK,” to more technical topics like “Static Driver Tools.” These presentations were highly interactive, with the presenters often polling the audience about how they use the product, and any improvements they would like to see. Presenters seemed to really value the feedback from the partners, and were eager to bring it back to their respective teams for implementation.

When the morning presentations were done, one of the organizers made a special announcement for yours truly. He wanted to inform the partners that I would be walking around and knocking on doors to ask questions about the documentation, and he encouraged them to look for me if they had any documentation-related issues. Almost immediately after that announcement, I had a line of people come up to me that instantly started talking documentation. Several partners wanted to set time aside with me to discuss their feedback in detail. When the lead PM for the WLK came to pat me on the back and say “You’re brave!,” I wondered what I might have gotten myself into. But I ended up getting some really useful feedback about the documentation, and it turned out to be a great learning experience overall. In particular, I got to experience the following things first-hand:

Microsoft really cares about its partners. Easily recognizable by their royal blue Microsoft button-downs, countless employees wandered the halls, listening intently to customer issues, and eagerly offered their assistance.
We are writing for a global audience. Meeting with partners from Switzerland and China really solidified this for me, and I will keep this in mind when I aim to write help content that can be understood by an international audience.
Developers, especially who are new to the product, really do read and often depend on the documentation that I write. This has inspired me more than ever to create high-quality content that is both technically accurate and easy to read.

All in all, I’m glad I attended the event. A recent email sent to event staff sums it up nicely: “Well organized, well staffed. Best ever.” I’d encourage anyone that is interested to attend the event next time around, or any of the upcoming events in Asia and Europe. After this successful run, it can only get better.

— Amanda Epley [MSFT], WLK Technical Writer

Windows Driver Kit (WDK) Documentation Blog : WLK

Report from the January 2009 Windows 7 Partner Readiness Event