TechEd NZ and CodeCamp 2008 wrap-up

Whew.  It was good to catch up with several folks I hadn't seen for ages, to finally put faces to some names, and especially to meet a whole bunch of new people, even though it means I will now spend the next twelve months being mocked by JD and James Newton-King for not recognising Scott Hanselman.  The best thing about speaking at this kind of event is that it breaks the ice and makes it easy to meet new people.

The high points were unexpected. The word "Silverlight" tends to make me tune out, but Jonas Follesoe's CodeCamp session had me pinned to my seat with my jaw hanging open.  Deep, wide-ranging stuff that went way beyond Silverlight and drew together a whole bunch of themes that were both insightful and immediately practical.  And I normally skip the lunchtime sessions because they're intended as light background while people digest their meals; but thankfully Corneliu I Tusnea didn't get the memo, and gave a virtuoso, demanding (but crystal clear), hardcore demonstration of production debugging that was easily the crunchiest session of the event and which revolutionised my view of the whole process.  If you get the chance to see either of these guys present, grab it!

The low points?  Worst keynote ever, and that includes the TechEd Europe 2001 one which consisted of a lecture on the case for Catalan autonomy in an impenetrable Spanish accent.  John Key was smug and sneering, and David Cunliffe was a charisma-free zone.  Both delivered utterly interchangeable speeches, which could have been addressed to any industry gathering in New Zealand just by substituting, say, "farmers" for "IT professionals" and "dairy products" for "dark fibre."  There was a Microsoft guy who droned on about LiveMesh in empty generalities for about a million years without explaining what it did (he made it sound like LapLink over the Internet instead of serial cables) or why I should care (sorry, but a bullet point saying "power of choice" does not count).  I understand that it's hard to pitch a single keynote to the diverse range of IT interests represented at TechEd, but next time, Microsoft, just skip the keynote and go straight to the breakouts.

TechFest was also pretty horrible: not enough space, so appallingly crowded and hot; loud music and flashing lights everywhere, so nowhere to talk; almost no food, which is not a good fit for free-flowing beer and wine.  Somewhat redeemed by the people -- it was particularly good to catch up with the New Zealand Post guys after all these years -- but would have been so much better if I could have talked to them rather than us having to shout at each other.

Sessions were, I thought, better than usual, though I was able to be more selective than usual because I had to practise my talks.  Apart from the high points mentioned above, Chris Auld's preview of Oslo was tremendous, JD and JB's C# grab bag was thoroughly entertaining (disclosure: they're my bosses), and of all the sessions I went to there was only one complete dud.  So a much better strike rate than last year and a successful close to Darryl Burling's tenure at NZ DPE.

As for my own contribution, I managed to freeze and then crash Visual Studio twice in a single demo by opening the simplest of XAML files, and then with a straight face put up a slide saying the WPF designer was now "less slow and buggy."  I'm all class, me.