I attended IndyCodeCamp on April 26, 2008. This was another great event. I was able to see some of the speakers I missed at CODODN. I'll admit I had to dig down deep to find the courage to roll to Indy. I'm glad I did go. I was able to see the following presentations: 

ASP.NET Performance and Optimization by Jeff McWherter. I originally planned to see this session at the Central Ohio Day of .Net but changed my mind at the last minute. I'm really glad I was able to catch this in Indy. Performance and optimization are two things I need to learn more about in regards to my job. This was the perfect presentation. He discussed when to cache data and when not to cache data, when to go to a web farm, scalibility, performance, web tests just tons of good stuff. I learned a lot about performance but still have a lot to learn. This gave me a great foundation.

Zen and The Art of Website Maintenance by Michael Neel. I definitely wanted to see one of Michael Neel's presentations. I missed "the sermon" in Wilmington, OH. Again another perfect presentation for me. Most of my experience has been web related and I know I'll get back to it again so I'm trying to stay in the loop. I really liked the opening of the presentation. It really was intriguing. Even the interuptions didn't really distract me from following along. There's a lot to this. You wouldn't think there would be but that's why I'm here to learn. Sometimes you don't know what you don't know. I realize I need to really get to know the history of the framework.

Silverlight - Your LINQ To A Better Experience by Chad Campbell. I was able to see Silverlight in action. Chad gave a great demo. It was helpful to see a project from start to finish. After this presentation I actually feel comfortable with trying some Silverlight in my spare time. I used Macromedia products for years before we went to VS2005. I also got to learn about some of the features Silverlight has to offer. I'm may try some XML or SOAP using Silverlight too.

Intro Test Driven Development With the ASP.NET MVC Framework by Alan Stevens. I wanted to learn more about TDD and the MVC framework and was looking forward to this presentation. Alan gave some great reasons why TDD is important. I could really relate to some of the questions he was throwing at the audience. He gave us the resources to get started so I need to at least take the 30 (60, 90, 180) day challenge. I didn't stay for the deep dive. I'm just too new to this topic but I hope to catch it in the future.

Intro to Windows Communication Foundation by Dan Rigsby. I didn't know anything about WCF when I attended this session. This was a bonus. Not only did I learn about WCF I also found out I could possibly use this on my next EDI project. Could not have been a better surprise. There's a lot to this. There's so much WCF can do. One of the best features I heard was it's better than web services. Dan provided a lot of material for this presentation and gave some great code examples. There was also a second session on WCF but again, being a newbie, I know my limits.

Line of Business Applications in Silverlight by Josh Heyse. I wanted to attend this session to catch a few more tips on Silverlight since the first presentation cleared up a few things in my mind. It started out well. We got a little background on Silverlight and some of it's features. I'm guessing Josh is new to presenting because his session was quickly taken over by questions. Lots and lots of questions that didn't have a whole lot to do with Silverlight. I wish we could have seen more of the demo he had ready but perhaps I can catch him at another event.

I saw Mike Wood there and I did meet Joe Wirtley, Dan Hounshell, and Michael Eaton (some of my tweeps) in the flesh. I actually had like a 3-5 minute conversation with Joe. I was very nervous but tried not to let it show. I'm getting there though. I also introduced myself to the speakers so I'm making progress. I wanted to go to Champps for the geek talk but had a headache and knew I wouldn't be able to enjoy myself. It had been a long day.

I look forward to next year's code camp and other upcoming events. It's been a pleasant surprise to find out the .Net community is so active and open to newcomers.

I'm really considering going to Cleveland to attend their code camp. If I do go I hope to meet more of my tweeps and hang out for some "geek talk".

I attended the April CincySQL Meeting on April 22, 2008. I will be my last.

I made it! I saw some really great presentations yesterday. I really learned a lot from each speaker. I changed up the schedule a bit and ended up attending the following sessions:

Why Ruby? by Joe O'Brien. I had to know what all the hype was about in regards to Ruby. I had a friend trying to pull me towards Ruby on Rails about a year ago. I just didn't get it. Now I get it, this thing has a life of it's own. The language is simple, straight forward and can make you more productive. What more can you ask for? I also like the IRB, just straight forward. One of the best tips I picked up from Joe was to learn a new language a year. Priceless information. Looks like Ruby will be my language of choice for 2008.

A LINQ to Everything by Leon Gersing. This was a presentation I was really looking forward to attending. I really got a chance to see LINQ in action. The demo of the blog site was great. Even without the internet access I could see how cool LINQ really was and some of the ways you can incorporate it into your site. The XML info was an added bonus I want to incorporate at work too. The biggest thing I'll take away from the presentation is the fact that you can use it against more than just SQL. Opens so many possiblities.

Exploit the XML Capabilities of SQL Server 2008 by Jason Follas. I originally attended this session to see some of the ways to use XML in SQL Server 2008 hoping to take away enough information to apply to SQL Server 2005. Boy was I in luck! The presentation was directed towards 2005 because you could use the XML capabilities in both. This was an information packed session and just what I needed. Best tip of the session...know the questions that will be asked of the XML. Wow, does that save some time and headaches.

A Quick Tour of the Windows Mobile Development in Visual Studio 2008 by Nino Benvenuti. I attended this presentation because I really don't know much about mobile development. Learned a lot from the walkthrough but I wish there was more time for this one. There's a lot that's new in Visual Studio 2008 and I'm not familiar enough with mobile development overall to really dive right into this one but I still plan to follow this topic to stay informed.

The C# Variety Show by David Redding. This is one skill I'm really need to push myself to develop. I'm really new to C#. In college I took a course or two on VB but am no longer interested in focusing on that language (no offense to the VB lovers out there). The presentation had some good information about the advanced uses of C#, more where I want to be than where I am. That was one of the reasons for attending this session. I want to push myself. I plan to look further into yield return, overloading operators, and using delegates. 

SEO for ASP.NET Developers by Dan Hounshell. This presentation was right up my alley. I'll admit I used to share the "not my problem" attitude. I've been responsible for our affiliate program for years. I've been trained to place the burden of SEO on the affiliate. I'm starting to realize it's to my benefit to learn more about SEO as a developer. Dan gave so many great tips I couldn't take notes fast enough. On top of that my laptop battery died and I didn't have a spare. I quickly grapped my old school notebook and started jotting away. I've just purchased a few domains to experiment with so this was right-on-time information to get my sites established properly from the start.

This was my first event and I'm still new to the .Net community. After a twitter or two I received today, my thoughts on the way home were confirmed. In a way...I blew it. I really didn't meet as many people as I could/should have. This was my one moment in time. I'm just a bit shy until I get to know people. I know, how do you get to know people if you don't open up your month and speak? Well, in the past I've usually waited for people to speak to me. Need to change that, don't want to give people the wrong impression. 

I may still attend IndyCodeCamp on April 26, 2008 so if you're there and you see me, please, stop me and introduce yourself. Anyone that attended CODoDN can follow me on twitter.

See you next year!

P.S. I did a quick interview after the sessions so perhaps you'll see me on a blog near you!

Update: Andy Erickson created a great video that really captured the spirit of the day. I've finally gotten up the nerve to share the link so enjoy!

This meeting held on April 15, 2008 was the Hereos Happen Here Community Launch. I know I'm a bit late with this update however, I also attend the Central Ohio Day of .Net that same week.  Two great events. In regards to the local launch, this was one meeting you had to register for and the place was packed. There were three presentations that night.

The first presentation, by Kirk Wilson representative of MAX Technical Training, was on the new features in VS2008. Some of the new features include Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), Team Foundation Server (TFS), and Windows Workflow Foundation (WWF), and SharePoint Server. Even though this was a quick presentation I was able to learn about many of the new features.

The second presentation, by Stefan Kyntchev, was on LINQ. This was a great presentation. I really want to try a project or two using LINQ. It just looks fun. You need to think "what you want you want to search for, modify, etc. Stefan's approach to this presentation went over big with the audience. He shared his thoughts on the creation of LINQ in a very witty way. He also had some great code examples. 

The last presentation by Dan Hounshell was on the new features of ASP.NET 3.5. Most of the questions that I had about 3.5 were answered that night. Even though Dan had some technical difficulties the overall message was there. He gave a demo on the new features of CSS and I found the overall concept a great time saver. I used to have a heavy focus on CSS but after watching this presentation I see I can let that take a back seat and focus on LINQ a bit more. I also like the concept of the nested master pages and plan to check into that further.

I also wanted to mention that this meeting included a hands-on lab that we were able to use during the break. CINNUG is really a great user group that I found recently with some really great people. I can see they're serious about their group in regards to helping the community grow and I really appreciate all their time and efforts.

I know. I'm indecisive and it's killing you. How do you think I feel? I like to look at it as working well under pressure. When it's crunch time, that's when the best decisions are made for some. I'm one of those.

With that being said I think I'm going back to plan A as my tentative schedule.

Session: Why Ruby by Joe O'Brien

Session: Access to Your Data Anytime and Anywhere with the Microsoft Sync Framework by Nino Benvenuti

Session: Exploit the XML Capabilities of SQL Server 2008 by Jason Follas

Session: Looking out for IronPython by Darrell Hawley

Session: ASP.NET Performance and Optimization by Jeff McWherter

Session: SEO for ASP.NET Developers by Dan Hounshell

Being a woman, I of course, reserve the right to revise this revision.