Damir Tomicic - ein Tag in der community!

TechEd Developers is really giving us an opportunity to put everybody together – board members, volunteers, the speakers, users who would actually go to meetings, user group leaders – and to relate with Microsoft and vendors as well. Our booth is based next to the MVP and RD booths completing the "TechEd Community Lounge" and allowing us to network with a majority of MVP and RD representatives and program members.

Our booth (aka INETA POD) is the place where attendees can come and meet the current INETA Europe board members and talk to them about their specific development issues and problems. In this year ALL members of the board were attending the TechEd. It is also the place to meet members of INETA speakers bureau and negotiate some dates for a meeting.

One of the things we’re really trying to do now is coming back and emphasize the "I" in INETA which stands for International. So here at TechEd we’ve brought together user group leaders from all over the Europe. We currently serve 286 user groups representing 74968 users in more than 30 countries. Our European Silverlight Challenge and upcoming Community Launch Wave for Windows Server, Visual Studio and SQL Server 2008 will keep us quite busy in the future.

INETA Europe Board Members
Left to right: Jose Louis Millas (VP Sponsorship), Tomislav Bronzin (VP Community Activities), Damir Tomicic aka me (President), André Obelink (VP Speakers Bureau), Sander Gerz (VP Technology). Missing: Andrej Radinger (VP Membership), Miguel Jimenez (VP Marketing), Mathias Raacke (VP Academic)

Many thanks to all INETA volunteers who helped to provide this unforgetable experience. A special thanks to our spanish friends named above who did a great job to serve as a local hosts. Their friendly advices were always welcome.

For me personally it’s a lot of fun, I really enjoy getting the chance to meet people from all European countries and speak about topics of interests to all of us. Traditionally as every year we had a "Community Volunteer Dinner" for INETA volunteers from Spain, Italy, Greece, Romania, Germany and many other countries.

This dinner was sponsored by Microsoft - big thanks to Niklas Jardeby and George Kamarinos. Something between 30 and 40 volunteers joined us in Shoko Restaurant in Barcelona. Some of them missed the restaurant (Barca is too big...) and we were forced to wait for another 45 minutes. But as you may have heard - Barcelona never sleeps!

Speaker Idol contest was again the great success. I was discussing the insights with Debbie McMahon, the first lady of Speaker Idol, while André Obelink was trying to be the nice judge this time. Rich Costall and Dave McMahon did a great job as hosts of this years competition. Great fun indeed. And INETA volunteers everywhere.

Community Lounge is a quite cool place to meet a number of celebrities as well. Normally I always forget to use my digicam but this year I decided to take some shoots.

Celebrities: Damir meets Karen Young, MVP Regional Manager EMEA, and Gerd de Bruycker, Senior Event Manager and TechEd Owner.

Celebrities: Damir meets Pierre Couzy, Architect Evangelist, Microsoft France, Kevin Schuler, Manager Regional Director Program, Microsoft Corporation and Clare Parr, Community Marketing Manager, Microsoft UK.

Celebrities: Damir meets Peter Monadjemi, Chief Editor, dotnet-Magazin Germany, and Marino Posadas, Journalist, Dotnetmania, Spain.

Sure, there were much more celebrities but I missed to take my digicam with me. Sorry for that ... Next year you'll join my gallery!

What else? I was interviewed by Karen Young in a fishbowl (soon to be published, a very cool experience) and I noticed that even with 4.000 people around you there is no further problem to find a familiar face.

Some personal Trivia about Barcelona...

• Taxi drivers in Barcelona are crazy in the night - if there is nobody on a crossroad they will ignore red lights and drive you back home much faster than expected.
• Don't try to speak to drunken scottish fans. And stay at least 10m away.
• People over age of 25 are going out during the week, the others over the weekend. Justify your expectations.
• Clubs and pubs are crowdy after 01:00am but not before.
• There is a urban legend that young spanish people sleep for 2h per night. This is not true. They sleep at least for 3h.

At the end I enjoyed spanish sun for some hours before returning to cold rainy weather in Germany ... brrr ... I need some sleep badly. But ... what a great experience once again!!

As well as being rich in culture, Barcelona is also a very modern city, full of excitement, vitality, sophistication, elegance and romance. You'll find a buzz of activity and a constant stream of visitors enjoying the hundreds of cafés, bars and shopping areas.

If you ever thought about visiting Barcelona - don't wait any more minute, buy a flight ticket and go there!

[1] http://europe.ineta.org

Update: And the Speaker Idol 2007 winner is... Jeff Wharton from Australia!

Congratulations to all finalists - Jeff Wharton (Australia); Karl Davies-Barrett (Malta); Maciej Pilecki (Latvia) and Bill Ayers (UK). 

 

Jeff, welcome to the INETA International Speakers Bureau!

The success story [1] continues ... As you may remember I was judging the TechEd Speaker Idol competition last year in Barcelona. It was not only the great fun for all of us - we discovered an exceptional speaker Bart de Smet from Belgium who will rock the TechEd stage this year in Barcelona as a Speaker Idol winner and technical presenter.

photo (c) Sven Schneider

What is this Speaker Idol all about? Participating in this competition you'll become the opportunity to demonstrate your presentation skills within just 5 minutes on stage and jumpstart your career as an international speaker.

The top presenter will win a Speaker ticket for TechEd Developers 2008, with the opportunity of presenting a technical breakout session to an audience of developers attending the conference.  The first runner-up will win a delegate ticket for TechEd Developers 2008. The winner will also become a member of INETA Europe International Speakers Bureau.

Presentation submissions (short movie of your self presenting as WMV, MOV, AVI, MPG, FLV, MP4, 3GP) are to be emailed to SpeakerIdol-dev@mseventseurope.com, together with participant name, company name, job role, email address and contact telephone number. Deadline for submissions is 5 October. Go for it!

[1] http://tomicic.de/INETATechEdDevelopersSpeakerIdol.aspx
[2] http://www.mseventseurope.com/teched/07/Developers/Content/Pages/IdolContest.aspx

I would like to wish every reader a Happy New Year and I hope you all have a wonderful Holiday season! I look forward to another exciting year of technology and community news.

[1] http://blaugh.com/2006/12/21/i-blog-therefore-i-am/

Two members of INETA Europe board are representing two different positions: André Obelink, Vice President Speakers Bureau, felt in love with VB and now, he is even more excited with VB.NET. Sander Gerz, Vice President Technology, believes that the real developers need C#. Here are their thoughts in a nutshell ... erm, in two different books...

 

[1] http://www.vbcentral.nl/Home/Boeken/tabid/163/Default.aspx

[1] http://europe.ineta.org

German INETA Speakers on the road - Hannes Preishuber (RSS Lifecycle) and Rainer Becker (SOA Webservices with Visual FoxPro) are speaking at the event in the Netherlands called "SDE September 2006" next week. INETA is also sponsor for this event.

[1] http://www.sdn.nl/Default.aspx?tabid=247

Martin Kulov, INETA Leader and member of INETA Speakers Bureau, sent me some details about the premier developer conference on Microsoft technologies called DevReach from October 09-10 in Sofia, Bulgaria. INETA is one of the major sponsors with a number of high-level speakers like Goksin Bakir, Stephen Forte, Julia Lerman, Sahil Malik and Carl Franklin, who will be doing a DNR session.

[1] http://www.devreach.com
[2] http://europe.ineta.org

This year you will be able to take a look "behind the scenes" with short interviews and overviews of what is going in Barcelona during the TechEd. This initiative is called "Virtual TechEd" and INETA will be part of it. Our team discussion is scheduled for next week, so please stay tuned for more info.

Not only INETA will be covering TechEd with media content but also you will find Channel 9 video casts, Dot Net Rocks shows, TechNet radio, podcasts and Daily Tech Ed News from TechEd own camera and interview team.

[1] http://europe.ineta.org

INETA Country Leader for UK Richard Costall and his fellow Dave McMahon of the NxtGenUG are already preparing for TechEd: Developers. In their fifth show titled "The one with TechEd ..." they are talking about TechEd: Developers, Atlas, Powershell and LINQ.

[1] http://www.nxtgenug.net/Podcasts.aspx?PodcastID=5
[2] http://www.nxtgenug.net/downloads/005_NxtGenUg_JoshHolmes.mp3

In the beginning, there were Birds of Feather (BoF) sessions, a great opportunity to interact with your peers and TechEd attendees.

Everything evolves and INETA is proud to present in collaboration with TechEd Team this year's competition open to all developers and TechEd attendees: TechEd Developers Speaker Idol [1]. The top presenter will win a free ticket to attend TechEd: Developers 2007, plus the opportunity to present a technical breakout session. And to become more famous than any other speaker - there are many speakers slots, but only one Speaker Idol winner ... 

What is our role? You'll find us, INETA Europe volunteers, taking part in a Speaker Idol Jury. We look forward reviewing your submissions!

[1] http://www.mseventseurope.com/Teched/06/Pre/Static/Developers/SpeakerIdol.aspx

Very good friend of mine and certainly the sweetest Southern girl finally joined blogosphere - welcome Ravindra!

[1] http://geekswithblogs.net/tlacey/
[2] http://www.flickr.com/photos/61575848@N00/172819507/

Meeting <Ravindra> at Microsoft TechEd 2005 Orlando, Florida

Here are again some numbers (June 2006) for INETA Europe: 222 User Groups with aprox. 60.000 Developers in 32 Countries - 45 User Groups in Germany, 28 User Groups in Russia, 25 User Groups in the UK and 17 in Poland... 13.000 Developers and a biggest User Group in Italy (again UGiDotNet) and 15.000 Developers and a second largest User Group (VBUG) in the UK, followed by Germany and on the 4^th place the Netherlands (Greece is now 5^th).

INETA Europe has a new website: http://europe.ineta.org

If you missed one of the last "INETA Live Webcast Series", here is your next chance to some of our community stars: Kieran Lynam, User Group Leader IrishDev Community, Johann Grabner from Austria, Martin Woodward, best voted Team Foundation Community Speaker and Rob Burke, who can explain you a lot about the life of an Canadian in Ireland.

These guys are not only deeply involved with the Community, they are also a technology specialists who implement Microsoft products and technologies every day. Give them a try in following sessions:

• June 20th: A Lap around Atlas
• June 22nd: Source Control with Team Foundation Server
• June 27th: Raising the Stakes with Avalon, the Windows Presentation Foundation
• July 4th: Creating a Real World application with Visual Basic 2005

If you are interested in Atlas, TFS or WPF here is your chance to ask and learn. Go for it!

[1] http://www.microsoft.com/emea/msdn/visualstudio/webcasts.aspx

Julie Lerman (Vermont.NET), Dave Noderer and Jason Bares (Florida.NET) will be doing an INETA Live Webcast on May 31^st about Starting a User Group.

[1] http://live.ineta.org

Here are again some numbers (May 2006) for INETA Europe: 219 User Groups with 60.000 Developers in 32 Countries - 44 User Groups in Germany, 28 User Groups in Russia, 25 User Groups in the UK and 15 in Poland... 13.000 Developers and a biggest User Group in Italy (again UGiDotNet) and 15.000 Developers and a second largest User Group (VBUG) in the UK, followed by Germany and on the 4^th place (believe it or not) Greece.

Trivia: largest and one of the most vibrant INETA User Groups and Communities can be found in Korea. The numbers are amazing ...

When do I do it? May 25th. Where do I do it? Everywhere.  Why a towel? Read more [1] ... So long, and thanks for all the fish!

[1] http://www.towelday.kojv.net/

[1] http://www.ineta.org

As a follow-up to last year's hugely successful INETA User Group Leadership Summit, the New England INETA User Groups will host this year's event during the TechEd 2006 in Boston. The sessions are open to all leaders, both local and afar. If you are currently involved with a user group, in a leadership role or not, want to get involved, or even looking to start one then you will get powerful direction in the course of the sessions. Join the gang!

[1] http://www.wedevelop.net/leadershipsummit.aspx

Over the past few months a number of people (including myself) worked together with Korby Parnell [3], GotDotNet Guru, to create CodePlex, a new Web-based collaborative development application including Release Management, Work Item Tracking, Source Code Dissemination, Wiki-based Project Team Communications, Project Forums and News Feed Aggregation. Everything you need to successfully run your community project. Some of the projects listed already:

• Managed Stack Explorer is a lightweight tool that provides a quick and easy way to monitor .NET 2.0 managed processes and their stacks.
• Team Foundation Server Administration Tool allows a Team Foundation Server administrator to quickly add and modify user permissions to all three platforms utilized by TFS
• MSBuild Extras – Toolkit for .NET 1.1 “MSBee” is an addition to MSBuild that allows developers to build managed applications in Visual Studio 2005 that target .NET 1.1.
• NUnitLite is a lightweight version of NUnit suitable for embedding right in the test project. According to Charlie Pool [4] NUnit 3.0 will most probably be planned and developed on the platform as well. 

CodePlex is a place to create new projects to share with your fellow developers around the world, join others who have already started their own project, or simply use the applications on this site and provide feedback. I am more than happy to announce the first Public Beta!

Watch out for James Newkirk post [2] about CodePlex. Much more to come, stay tuned ...

[1] http://www.codeplex.com/
[2] http://blogs.msdn.com/jamesnewkirk
[3] http://blogs.msdn.com/korbyp
[4] http://nunit.com/blogs/?p=26

For all User Group Leaders who are attending TechEd 2006 in Boston: there is a invitation-only event for User Group Leaders, Influencers and Microsoft taking place on on Wednesday June 14 7:00 p.m. to 10 p.m. in Ned Devine’s Irish Pub/Parris Night Club. Meet your peers and enjoy the party.

[1] http://www.microsoft.com/events/teched2006
[2] http://www.parrisboston.com/parris/

My good friends Aaron Tan Dani (Director, IASA Asia, [2]) and William Tay (Microsoft Regional Director Singapore, [3]) are speaking at the Enterprise Architecture Summit [1] taking place in Singapore, 17-20 July 2006. There are some unique topics scheduled, e.g. "Enterprise Architecture Security".

"...This event will address the fundamental principles and core themes involved in developing and sustaining an Enterprise Architecture (EA) practice, key EA elements and best practices in implementation and integration..."

[1] http://www.flip-side.biz/eEAC06flyer.htm
[2] http://www.iasahome.org
[3] http://www.softwaremaker.net/blog/[...]

ASCII  

[1] http://www.asciimaps.com [via Torsten Weber]

Tech·Ed Europe team launched the official Tech·Ed Europe web site. And registrations are open! If you are interested in speaking, here are the Track Owners:

• Beat Schwegler (architecture, connected systems)
• Chad Hower (base framework)
• David Boschmans (web development track)
• Gerd De Bruycker (overall owner event)
• Gunther Beersaerts (SQL Server)
• Mario Szpuszta (2007 Office System)
• Niels Hilmar Madsen (tools and languages)

Where to find INETA & Co.?
Situated in the centre of the Exhibition Hall, the Community Lounge will feature focused, topic-driven interactive sessions throughout the conference. More details about this later on ...

INETA collaborated with Microsoft to deliver the first INETA conference in Korea with more than 800 attendees and great speakers (Community, MVPs etc). I don't have a clue what is written here [1] but it looks like a full-day event with interesting topics.

[1] http://www.microsoft.com/korea/events/2006_INETA/default.asp

INETA Europe with 205 User Groups (and ca. 56.000 Members) in April 2006... User Groups per Country: Germany 44, Russia 28, United Kingdom 24, Poland 13, Austria 12, Spain 9, France 8, Ireland 8 etc. Largest User Group is UGIdotnet (Milano, Italy) with 12274 Members.

[1] http://www.ineta.org
[2] http://www.ugidotnet.it

Damien McGivern (UG Leader, NIMTUG Ireland) asked me to provide the custom RSS feed so that he can aggregate only the English post from this blog. Great idea, perhaps also interesting for others ...

Et voilà, here it is:

[1] http://tomicic.de/SyndicationService.asmx/GetRssCategory?categoryName=English

It goes further with my INETA Country Leader Award Series (ICLAS). Gooood

https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile=4d1f135b-980e-4c1f-95ea-3df0fa206277

Jan-Erik Sandberg, INETA Country Leader Northern Countries, is awardeded as an MVP Visual Developer - ASP/ASP.NET. Gratulasjon Jan-Erik!

[1] http://tomicic.de/INETACountryLeaderAwardSeriesDutchEdition.aspx
[2] http://tomicic.de/INETACountryLeaderAwardSeriesGermanEdition.aspx
[3] http://tomicic.de/INETACountryLeaderAwardSeries.aspx
[4] http://tomicic.de/INETAPaulFallonGoesMVP.aspx
[5] http://tomicic.de/INETANeueCountryLeader.aspx
[6] http://tomicic.de/INETAGregoryRenardNewMicrosoftRegionalDirectorForBelgiumAndLuxembourg.aspx

Neither we can't stop the fire nor my INETA Country Leader Award Series (ICLAS).

https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/profile=69B76D4D-2495-4741-9BF5-11369120F097

André Obelink, the VB guru, dutch INETA country leader and INETA Europe Vice President Speakers Bureau is now awarded as an MVP. Gefeliciteerd André!!

[1] http://tomicic.de/INETACountryLeaderAwardSeriesGermanEdition.aspx 
[2] http://tomicic.de/INETACountryLeaderAwardSeries.aspx
[3] http://tomicic.de/INETAPaulFallonGoesMVP.aspx
[4] http://tomicic.de/INETANeueCountryLeader.aspx
[5] http://tomicic.de/INETAGregoryRenardNewMicrosoftRegionalDirectorForBelgiumAndLuxembourg.aspx

Version 2.1 Release Candidate [1] of the Web is now available, featuring significant improvements over the older Web 2.0 version.

[1] http://cheese.blartwendo.com/web21-demo.html

GC-RAMDISK (Rev 1.3)  i-RAM

• Specifically designed for massive storage access application
• Data protection after PC shutdown
• Supports backup and restore software utilities
• Ideal for video / audio capture & editing, 3D graphics design, file sharing, database exchange applications and Web/Email servers
• Power Interface support PCI 3V & 5V Slot
• 4-level LED battery capacity indicator
• One red battery capacity indicator button 

via Paul Fallon.

[1] http://www.giga-byte.com/Products/Storage/...

John Price, Dave McMahon and Richard Costall would like to announce the formation of a new User Group called The Next Generation User Group (known as NxtGenUG). The purpose of the User Group is to help its members discover and get excited about all the latest and new technologies coming out of Microsoft such as .NET 2.0, SQL Server 2005, WPF, WCF, WF, LINQ, Office 12 and .NET 3.0. Read more here [1] ... Their first meeting is on 8th May at the Coventry Flying Club. It’s going to be informative and fun, with great speakers from the community and Microsoft and competitions and prizes every month!

[1] http://www.nxtgenug.net

Live from Redmond! is a series presented to you directly by Microsoft product teams! No marketing hype -- just the technical details that you want to hear and need to know. Stay ahead of your peers by attending this exclusive series.

April 20th 17:30 CET

Essential Tips and Tricks for .NET Compact Framework Application Developers David Kline [more about ...] Developing applications for the .NET Compact Framework is very similar to developing for the .NET Framework. There are, however, some important differences and considerations to keep in mind. From best practices to debugging and diagnostics, this session presents the essential tips and tricks for .NET Compact Framework application development, direct from the .NET Compact Framework product team. Join Meeting Meeting URL: https://www.livemeeting.com/cc/microsoft/join Meeting ID: FJ2G8J Meeting Key: 3[6&;FSjX

April 26th 17:30 CET

Improving your web application’s user experience with Atlas Shawn Burke [more about ...] Atlas allows ASP.NET developers to add great client-side richness to their web application using server-side methodologies using Extender Controls. Learn how the Agility Team is launching a project to leverage the power of the community to build a library of Extenders for all developers to use. Join Meeting Meeting URL: https://www.livemeeting.com/cc/microsoft/join Meeting ID: 54ZNTW Meeting Key: fm:SM.6b7

[1] http://live.ineta.org

INETA Country Leader Award Series (ICLAS) [1] [2] [3] continues... Nicolas Sorel, Paris, France, is awarded as an MVP again [4]. Félicitations Nix!

[1] http://tomicic.de/INETAPaulFallonGoesMVP.aspx
[2] http://tomicic.de/INETANeueCountryLeader.aspx
[3] http://tomicic.de/INETAGregoryRenardNewMicrosoftRegionalDirectorForBelgiumAndLuxembourg.aspx
[4] http://blogs.developpeur.org/nix/archive/2006/04/10/APRES_3_IL_Y_A_4.aspx

Gerd De Bruycker, TechEd master, got today the final confirmation that Bill Gates will do a Friday morning keynote at Tech Ed: Developers Europe. It is the first time in more than 10 years Tech Ed Europe history that Bill will do a keynote. Nice job Gerd.

[1] http://www.mseventseurope.com/teched/05/pre/content/default.aspx

Great offering for INETA User Groups in Europe - DevConnections, 24-27 April 2006, Nice, France, with ScottGu, Dino Esposito, Michele Bustamante, Juwal Lowy, Prashant Sridharan, Hans Verbeeck and many more:

"...Hi Damir,  I would like your help getting the message out to INETA members in Europe that we are offering them a discount to the event in Nice and I will give you a discount code to offer..."

You are INETA UG leader or INETA UG member? You would like to attend the conference and get INETA discout? Contact me at: Damir.Tomicic@ineta.org 

[1] http://www.devconnectionseurope.com/

Now in its sixth successful year in the US, Developer Connections now makes it’s European debut on the French Riviera. Meet Microsoft developers and DBAs from around the world and build a network of peers to stay in touch with.  Unwind and relax with you colleagues in Europe on the French Riviera while obtaining the most relevant technical advice from Microsoft’s ASP.NET, Visual Studio and SQL Server teams and training with Microsoft architects and world-renowned developers and DBAs delivering over 80 in depth, no hype sessions!

 

It shows in a very humorous (!) style the differences between the italian behaviour and the european one. Well, some idealistic european one.

Scusi Andrea, Lorenzo, Daniele ...

[1] http://www.infonegocio.com/xeron/bruno/italy.html

Exklusiv für INETA User Groups stehen die Produktgruppen der Microsoft Corporation in Redmond (Erklärung: die Mitglieder der Produktgruppen sind die Entwickler der Microsoft Produkte und Systeme) Rede und Antwort via LiveMeeting bei unten genannten Terminen. In diversen Meetings können Fragen zu verschiedenen Themen gestellt werden. Die Zugangsdaten sind den User Groups vorbehalten. Ich stehe gerne für Fragen diesbezüglich zur Verfügung.

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Alle Zeiten sind PST (Pacific Standard Time - http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/full.html)

Die Termine:

The following table shows the core technology areas of the .NET Framework.

The System namespace is the root namespace for fundamental types in the .NET Framework. This namespace includes classes that represent the base data types used by all applications: Object (the root of the inheritance hierarchy), Byte, Char, Array, Int32, String, and so on. Many of these types correspond to the primitive data types that your programming language uses. When you write code using .NET Framework types, you can use your language's corresponding keyword when a .NET Framework base data type is expected.

The following table lists some of the value types the .NET Framework supplies, briefly describes each type, and indicates the corresponding type in Visual Basic, C#, and the Managed Extensions for C++. The table also includes entries for the Object and String classes, for which many languages have corresponding keywords.