Iwoke up this morning all ready to head out to catch my flight to L.A. I packedall the necessary items, including all the things I usually forget – likethe charger for my iPod, for example. What I *did* forget about was thattoday was the day we switch back to Standard Time. So now I’m enjoyingthe Bonus Hour that we get every fall…this might be the first time that I’mactually on time for a flight :)
Iguess now is as good of a time as any to set my own expectations to what I’mexpecting to get out of this conference. There’s so much information that’sgoing to be thrown at me – it’s definitely going to be likedrinking from a firehose. Fortunately, I love that sort of thing.
Likeeveryone else, I’m going to this conference with the full expectation ofbeing blown away Longhorn. I’m also aware that great expectation bringwith them the possibility of great disappointment. Frankly, I’m notexpecting to be blown away by the bits themselves as they currently stand –it’s still very early in the development lifecycle and I don’texpect the version that they’re going to show us to have a whole lot ofspit and polish associated with it. What I am expecting is the Microsoftleadership will communicate a solid, concrete vision for what Longhorn will andwill not do for me. I want to see a clear roadmap to the future, and I expectMS to have a concrete plan for executing on their vision. I want to be able tocome away from this PDC knowing what I need to do to position myself at thehead of pack when Longhorn does eventually ship.
Withrespect to specific technologies, I’m expecting a lot out of the Indigosessions. I’ve been privy to some information already, so I know quite abit about what Indigo will do. I’m looking to come away from the Indigosessions with some good ideas about how to incorporate the functionality thatIndigo will provide into a large-scale solution. While I’m really excitedto get down into the nuts and bolts of Indigo, I’m hoping that they’llspend some time elucidating the business case for Indigo – if onlybecause that’s something that I, as a code geek, sometimes have a hardtime communicating to customers.
I’malso looking to meet some members of the community – both inside the BigHouse and out. The Blogger BOF will be a riot, I’m sure. I can’twait to meet the people behind the blogs I read on a daily basis. I’malso planning on attending some of the Patterns and Practices sessions. My dayjob is developing framework application blocks that often find themselves bothcomplementing and competing with the MS blocks. I’m very interested inseeing what the community has to say about MS P&P – are theyrelevant, or too ivory-tower to be of any real use?
Finally, I’m fully expecting this week to be a hell of a lot of fun. Italmost pains me to say this, but this really is my idea of a good time. Travelingto a sunny new city, learning a whole lot about things I’m reallypassionate about, meeting new people, and seeing cool new toys – what morecould you ask for?
