Lotusphere 2006 Wrap Up
Category LS 2006This Lotusphere was, for me at least, the busiest one I've yet attended. From the time I signed in and picked up my backpack at the speaker's registration area on Saturday until I actually got to the gate at the airport on Friday, I was constantly "going". Except for the few hours sleep I managed to squeeze in each night, I was always doing something.
Mind you, I'm not complaining a bit. This was a great Lotusphere. To be honest, I don't think I would have enjoyed it as much if I had had any "free time". The quality (and quantity) of the sessions was by far the best it has ever been. There were quite a few, due to scheduling conflicts, that I didn't get the opportunity to see (particularly Warren Elsemore's BP408: Lock Up your Servers! session -which I heard as absolutely awesome). However, of the others that I did get to see, it seemed my mind was turned to paste with the amount of content I was getting. Which is a good thing.
So, Here are some of the highlights of Lotusphere 2006 for me. These are in the order that they com into my mind only, there is no "ranking" of importance here. Also, I'm pretty sure I'll remember something else later. Here goes:
- Lotus Notes 7 client for Macintosh: Well that's just ducky. Had I known this a little earlier, I would have considered purchasing a Powerbook. In particular, one of these.
- Mike Rhodin's announcement of native Lotus Sametime connectivity for IM accounts for AOL, Yahoo, & Google: Beat that, Microsoft.
- Maureen Leland's live demo of Workplace Designer generating a runtime error: Maureen, it's OK. Popping the error proves you're working live, not memorex, and only raises my esteem for you. Oh, and I think the problem was that when you pasted the @Formula into the code area, you left the code type set as "JavaScript".
- Best T-Shirt Ever: Workflow Studios' Lance Spellman came up with the "Take your Exchange Server and SHOVE IT design; which fits in very nicely with the new "not gonna take it any more" attitude on the part of IBM Lotus. Good job Lance.
- Finally getting to meet Matt "White Chocolate" Stratton (of mattandjess.net): A totally cool guy. Matt & Jess, you two have standing invites to stay at our place next time you are in Phoenix.
- BP106: Worst Practices -Learning from the Mistakes of Others: This was the absolute best session I attended. Bill Buchan and Paul Mooney presented 12 real life examples of gigantic screw-ups they have faced. The one thing all of them had in common was that they could have been prevented with nothing more than education, planning, and patience.
- Speaking of Paul Mooney: Thank you for the gloves. They are absolutely awesome, and you are one hell of a hoopy frood. Keep in touch mate.
- My Scotch Ale and Russian Imperial Stout were both big hits. Everybody who sampled seemed to enjoy them. Of course, they could have been just feeding me a line, but I honestly think they really enjoyed them.
- Racing Swan boats across the lagoon with "Wild" Bill Buchan, Warren Elsemore, & Paul Mooney. This was an absolute blast, and one of those "memory moments". Good times guys.
- highlight of the week: Having some VIPs from the IBM Accessibility Center not only show up at my session, but thank me afterwards and tell me I did a great job.
- Surjit Chana announcing that we aren't going to take the Microsoft FUD BULLSHIT anymore: Surjit, thank you. (Incidentally, Surjit later showed up at Jellyrolls and a great time was had by all).
- Speaking of home brews, Ray (the Lion King) and I are working on some ideas for next year.
- Getting to hang out with my friends. Dan, Melissa, Matt, Jess, John, Paul, Bill, Ben, Ray, Andrew, Aoeffe (I know I probably misspelled it again), Bruce, The Bob, Scott (Turtle), John, Deb, Libby, Julian, Tom, Chuck, Joe, ... I know I have probably forgotten someone, I'm sorry. Anyway, I love all of you guys, and I'm already looking forward to Lotusphere 2007.
The Pridelands
Chris Byrne
Show n' Tell Thursdays
Maddox
Comments
I am impressed!
Posted by Andrew Kelly At 02:01:38 AM On 01/31/2006 | - Website - |
I haven't heard back from Paul, I'm wondering how he handled the Kennedy Space Center tour on Friday. I'll bet that was rough for him.
-Devin.
Posted by Devin At 11:23:14 AM On 01/31/2006 | - Website - |
That night = I was a car wreck! Still dying!
Posted by Paul Mooney At 05:43:27 PM On 01/31/2006 | - Website - |
Posted by Ben Poole At 06:39:09 PM On 01/31/2006 | - Website - |
Posted by Paul Mooney At 05:42:43 PM On 02/05/2006 | - Website - |
Let's keep in touch!!!
Posted by Ray (The Lion King) Bilyk At 09:06:08 AM On 02/06/2006 | - Website - |