Day 2 from Devconnections

Another day done in Vegas, and I would tell you all about it except, I am told "What happens in Vegas, Stays in Vegas"

Oh what the heck.

A LONG day on booth duty and the crowds were great. I got into several great discussions with people on SharePoint, SQL, BizTalk and even some about blackpearl. J

Today's questions as typical of these shows were very different from the day before. Today we had a plethora of other SI's and ISV's asking about ways to use blackpearl in their offering as a value add. I also talked to several people who were here to learn more about ASP.net, SQL, and SharePoint and are using this as more of a training exercise. I must say that this surprises me a great deal. I have never thought of these conferences as training. Sure there is some aspect of learning to it. But if you want real training you are better off spending your dollars on focused training. I have gotten a good deal of learning from some conferences such as TechED and others but that was mainly from the hands on labs, and on best practices. Well to each his own. I also talked to some of the folks over at

http://www.sswug.org/ They are expanding pretty rapidly and going to be doing more than just SQL. I am really starting to see the MOSS community TAKE OFF, you can see it in the number of people consulting on it, you can see it in the number of ISV's building on it, and highlighting their use of it. I really am amazed at all the buzz. Just take a look at some of the new cool stuff here

http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/pedia/Pages/Home.aspx

Keep your eye on this area I think some cool stuff is going to be happening.

So after the booth duty I had the chance to attend Andrew's event SharePoint-by-Day-SharePint-by-Night hosted by the Smart and generous Andrew Connell.

http://www.andrewconnell.com/blog/archive/2007/10/15/SharePoint-by-Day-SharePint-by-Night--SharePoint-Connections-in.aspx

This was a great opportunity to meet some of the stars of the community

Jay from http://www.tedpattison.net/

Rebecca from http://www.gttit.com/ who apparently knows everyone and knows all the real MOSS talent out there

Also several folks from www.fpoint.com who are doing some cool stuff, and to show what a small world IT is, they are also good partners of Neudesic who is also a good partner of ours.

Also got to meet and talk to Ben Curry from www.mindsharp.com These guys know their stuff.

Christopher Regan www.Bandrsolutions.com who is active in the NYC area in SPUG's and the like. Who is also familiar with K2 and has even used it.

Also met http://bobfox.net/spblog/default.aspx

And http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/blogs/lliu/default.aspx (someone i have wanted to meet after reading all his blogs and good info on MOSS.)

Also got to hear about the SharePoint Beagle. If you have not heard about it check out the following

http://bobfox.net/spblog/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=86

and Signup

http://visitor.constantcontact.com/email.jsp?&m=1101794988042

Sounds like great stuff, and not just because Bob Mixon (Insider extraordinaire is involved either)