Sun Tech Days in Atlanta

This was my 2nd Sun Tech Days in Atlanta on January 9-10 held at Cobb Galleria. Actually technically Jan 9th was Netbeans Day and Jan 10th was Tech Days. As usual Sun does a great job putting together an information packed day with plenty of sessions that go into some depth on new developments with both Netbeans and Java EE and Java SE. Netbeans is Sun's free open source IDE which has been dramatically improved in this latest release with version 6.0. Other new technologies hightlighted included JavaFx the Java equivilent of Microsoft's Silverlight and Adobe Flash and JRuby which is a pure-Java implementation of the Ruby programming language. Open Solaris is covered extensively as well but being a developer I tend to concentrate on Netbeans and Java technologies. One session I enjoyed was a basic intro to Ruby on Rails development. This year the highlight for me was hearing James Gosling (inventor of Java) speak and answer questions. Someone asked a question comparing Ruby and Python to Java and it was interesting from James response it seems to me he really likes both languages. Another interesting question was why .Net coders are so much more efficient than java coders. James answer was that many java coders don't use the new tools like Netbeans and so are unable to compete with developers using tools like Visual Studio. The most interesting question was "what is your favorite java application"? In response James described Brazil's national health care system which is written in Java. Amazing every citizen in Brazil is covered by this system including the indigent peoples living deep in the Amazon jungle. They all have bar coded ID cards and their medical records are all electronic available anytime anyplace. I thought about this as I visited my doctor this week and filled out the same piece of paper with the same information that I seem to do over and over again in the USA health care system. Maybe Java is the answer?

Force.com On Demand Platform

I attended a 1/2 day seminar by salesforce.com held at the Westin Peachtree Plaza in Buckhead to get an update on their new "platform as a service" product offering...force.com. I have to say I was impressed. Here's a quote directly from salesforce about Force.com. "With the Winter ’08 release, salesforce.com introduces Force.com, the world’s only platform as a service that lets you build any application, any database, any logic—and run it all on demand." I was impressed by the panels of customers who are using force.com to replace legacy client/server systems with hosted web applications thus eliminating the cost of maintaining local servers. It's always interesting to learn what salesforce.com is up to...they have to be one of the most innovative companies in the world today. As a bonus they always provide a great social at the end of their seminars...free drinks and great horderves. Hard to beat the combination of exciting new technology with free food and drink.

Microsoft Momentum - Building a Better Infrastructure

Seems like I attend a Microsoft event every month. This was a good one. I got a great overview of Microsoft Forefront(suite of security products), unified communications, and sharepoint 2007. Not to mention they served a great breakfast...scrambled eggs, bacon, sauage links, french toast, and waffles. You can visit the website for this event here.

Federal Consortium for Virtual Worlds

Friday, Nov 15, I attended this full day event held in Washington DC...without leaving my office at Georgia Tech as I attended entirely in Second Life as an avatar.

The event was put on by the Federal Consortium for Second Life (http://www.ndu.edu/irmc/fedconsortium.html) and consisted of presentations by a variety of government agencies and contractors who are exploring the use of virtual worlds in government.

The entire event was projected into second life and was free to attend in-world.

Some of the presenters were inside second life projecting to real life conference attendees on a big screen.

I've attended several conferences now from inside Second Life and continue to be amazed how real it feels...even down to the after event reception for mingling with other attendees.

Here's the event agenda:

8:00 – 9:00
Registration, Continental Breakfast, Networking
9:00 - 9:15
AnnouncementsPaulette Robinson, PhD, IRM College
Welcoming RemarksDr. Robert Childs, Director, IRM College
9:15 - 10:15
Using Virtual Worlds to Shape the FutureSusan Stucky, PhD, IBM
10:15 - 10:45
Coffee Break/Networking/Virtual Worlds Demos
10:45 - 11:15
Second Life 101Eric Hackathorn, NOAA
11:15 - 12:00
Second Life UpdateCollapsing Geography: Distance, Learning, and InnovationSue Singer, Program Manager East Coast, Linden Lab
12:00 - 1:30
Lunch/Networking/Virtual World Demos
1:30 - 2:30
Second Life Government User Panel (NOAA, NASA, CDC)Michael Piller, PhD, Moderator, IRM College
2:30 – 2:45
Break/Networking/Virtual World Demos
2:45 – 3:45
Virtual Worlds Panel (Forterra, Active Worlds, National Guard)Dwight Toavs, PhD, Moderator, IRM College
3:45 - 4:00
Closing RemarksPaulette Robinson, PhD, IRM College
4:30 - 7:00
Reception—Ft. Lesley J. McNair Officer Club


I'm looking forward to future events from this organization.

Salesforce.com Rocks

Yesterday (Thursday April 5th) I attended a nicely done seminar/reception at the Westin Buckhead by Salesforce.com. There must have been several hundred attendees at the 1:30pm keynote which provided a good overview of Salesforce, APEX, and AppExchange. After the keynote there were several breakout sessions; one for beginning/potential customers, one for experienced customers, and another for developers focused on the new on-demand (SaaS) APEX language. I attended the APEX seminar for 2.5 hours where I received a good introduction to Salesforce customization and programming techniques. Salesforce is like many of the new Web 2.0 companies offering a unique and innovative value proposition to customers and partners. It is more of a platform where many types of applications can be created by development partners and then offered to customers via AppExchange, an "eBay like" space for selling/exchanging applications. Of course most of the applications are functional extensions of Salesforce CRM or are complimentary to CRM in some fashion. But they don't have to be. Since Salesforce offers a free developer account I have signed up and plan on trying my hand at creating an APEX application. I predict Salesforce could potentially dominate the CRM market, and apparently so do many large corporations such as DuPont, Cisco, Panasonic, Avis, and United Way just to name a few Salesforce customers.

All attendees received two books, "Salesforce for Dummies" and "AppExchange for Dummies." And the reception with open bar and lots of munchies (butterfly shrimp, crab cakes, steak on a stick, etc.) was super nice.

Thanks Salesforce!

Integrated Innovation - a Microsoft Partner Event

Several times per year I try to attend local Microsoft partner events. Yesterday (Wednesday April 4th) I attended an event sponsored by Microsoft partners Thoughtbridge, Omnivue, and CustomerEffective called Integrated Innovation. It was basically a high level overview of Microsoft CRM, Great Plains, and MOSS (Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server) focused on integration of the three products. Highlights of the luncheon was the lunch itself, held at Ruth Chris Steakhouse in Buckhead. Even though I had the salmon not steak the meal was awesome with creamed spinach and au gratin potatoes and some kind of chocolate mousse desert that was out of this world (not to mention huge). I also met some interesting new people (technology executives) as the seating was very cozy (elbow to elbow). Attending the event was worth the time as there are always things to be learned. Even if the core material is high level I still gain value from seeing how these events are organized and presented. Good to know when I host my own events here at Georgia Tech.

Serious Games

Yesterday (Thursday, March 29th) I attended Living Game Worlds III, a symposium held at Georgia Tech. The event was sponsored by the College of Computing's GVU Center. This was all new information for me a total newbie to the gaming world. The keynote by Katie Salen, executive director for the Gamelab Institute of Play and associate professor at The New School for Design, was a fantastic introduction to the subject of game design which she described as a process of negotiation between the stakeholders; designer, publisher, content expert, and player. Throughout the event numerous websites and other resources were mentioned that will take me weeks to explore. Some of the more interesting includes Sugarscape, GamesForChange, and Social Impact Games. Katie discussed in some detail what she called the six layers of design; game engine, rules of the game, core mechanics, visual & audio, player, and context of play & dissemination.

The very best take away for me was an introduction to Second Life. The symposium was broadcast live to an audience inside Second Life, and at one point a presenter displayed the scene "in-world" where avatars were sitting in an amphitheater on benches watching the live presentations on a big screen. It was an amazing sight and at that moment the concept of these virtual worlds really hit home.

Joining Second Life has been on my "to do" list for a while now but seeing those avatars attending the symposium live pushed me over the edge. So yesterday at noon I signed up in Second Life, selected a name (Bubba Fride), and started learning the basics of moving, communicating, and generally getting along in the incredible virtual world of Second Life.

Mostly at this point I just stand around watching in amazement the richness of activities and interactions. I really want to understand the implications of this new technology and gain some insight into what it may mean for our future...from a social and business standpoint. The photo is of my avatar "Bubba Fride" watching the live symposium.

Back to the symposium...one thought that struck me as I listened to Katie Salen, the morning keynote...that game design has many similarities to business system design. Like games, business systems represent a negotiation between stakeholders; the developer, sponsor, end user, and sometimes domain expert. And like game designers the system developer attempts to constrain the end user so they move through a process of interacting with the system in a specific manner. Also much thought/effort is put into creating a good "experience" for the end user. And finally both games and business systems are highly abstracted versions of the actual system they are attempting to model.

So my two big "take aways" from the symposium were (1) finally getting involved in Second Life and (2) new insight into the relationships between game design and business systems design.

---Mike