It can often take a long time to get events organised, finding the venue, choosing the date all take time and effort.
Well this is never the case with SharePint – it took a trifle over 21 minutes to arrange for this years Best Practices Conference in Washington DC.
Part 2 – What a day!
Cross sell component
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Requirements:
A client wants to be able to have a component on a page which can be used to drive traffic to other areas of their site.
The setting of the problem actually had a fairly big impact on the way the day went – we captured some some ideas in the feedback at the end of the day that I will cover in Part 3.
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We are proud to announce the world’s first SharePoint Retreat!
The first event is taking place in London on Saturday 10th July. Don’t delay places are filling up fast with a limit of 16 people.
The aim of SharePoint Retreat is to help developers practice the fundamentals of software development, but like all things in the SharePoint community we intend to keep this SharePoint focused, so developers practice the fundamentals of SharePoint development
The idea is not our own, more information can be found about the original Code Retreat at http://www.coderetreat.com/ – we have just given it a SharePoint flavour.
It has a simple objective: provide a day-long event that is focused on practicing the fundamentals of SharePoint development.
We want to bring SharePoint development to the fore, to make developers want to work with SharePoint and to show that doing SharePoint development does not mean you have forego any plans to become a software craftsman.
A group of SharePoint developers – That means you! - gather at the Retreat with laptop in hand ready to code.
session 1 and 2
The area of SharePoint may be unfamiliar to some people, others may have done something like it before. The aim of the first two sessions are to allow people to understand how they are going to approach the problem and what the final solution could look like. Some pairs may try and implement it, others will spike out ideas and try to solve specific challenges.
At the retrospectives each pair will have a few minutes to discuss what they did and any problems they could not solve.
Lunch
During lunch the coders get to sit back and relax whilst the facilitator demonstrate techniques or ideas in a couple of short brown bag sessions.
session 3, 4 and 5
continue with the problem and looking to refine some of the scenarios and techniques. The aim is to learn and practice techniques that will improve the knowledge and experience of the coders. If you don’t complete the problem it’s not an issue – if you complete the problem then look for new challenges or refine the techniques.
Any gathering of SharePoint people and you are likely to find a SharePint – the facilitator will find a suitable venue for people to unwind, drink beer and SharePint – hopefully more SharePoint people will be in the area so that they can brag about the new found talents.
If you can be in London on Saturday 10th July 2010, you’re a SharePoint developer and you fancy spending a day with other like-minded people honing you development skills. Sign up.
This first event is limited to 16 coders – so be quick.
If you fail to make the first 16, put your name down on the waiting list. We do ask that people who have signed up but for whatever reason can’t make it please make the space available to others.
How Much? – Its Free 
Best of all this is a community activity, we are funding this event through sponsorship in order that we can provide the places to coders F.O.C
The sponsors for this inaugural event are
providing the venue and internet access – and Ben Robb
providing the food – and Andrew Woodward
On Thursday, 28th Jan 2010, I made my way down to the London SUGUK event. I’ve been supporting the regional events and been unable to get down to London for a number of months. The number of attendees was amazing – I didn’t count be I guess we have over 150 people and filled the room at Microsoft.
I did know quite a few regulars to the event, but the great news again is the number of new faces. SharePoint is really growing fast and wide and the need for information and community is growing with it.
Big Kudos to Matt for organising the event, Matt has taken on the responsibilities for the South East and London, to Ben Robb for doing a SharePoint Designer 2010 session (although as he points out the whole Application Lifecycle Management is still not baked) and for Steve Smith for – umm not sure what Steve did
It was great to see Mike Fitzmaurice there (this man made SharePoint happen), and I suspect his presence on the panel was part of the reason the questions and discussion remained in the ITPro and User space. Myself, Chris O’Brien, Matt Smith and Ben Robb tried hard to put a dev take on any questions where we could.
What I think would go down really well is to take a lead from the Nottingham group and organise focused events, so we could have a Dev night, Design Night, End User night etc.
I have to apologies (thanks Alex Pearce for tweeting me this when we were in the Pub) – I did not advertise the #SharePint that took place afterwards, It was well attended and with more room than the pub we used to go to but not an ‘official’ #SharePint.
Hope to see you all at an event near you soon.
Yet again the Best Practices Conference was a success. But what do I mean by success?
If you read some of the other (definitely quicker off the mark posts) you will get a feel for the event.
Paul Culmsee – Segways Rock
Laura (@WondaLaura) Rogers – Part 1 – Brilliant Video Interviews
Laura Rogers – Part 2 – Who is that lucky guy
– (and not as rumour has it founder of #SharePint)
Zlatan Dzinic – Loud and enthusiastic South African << need to talk to about World Cup Tickets
and many others
So why was BPC such a great success?
I think what really makes the event so successful is the way that everyone just gets on with each other, there is none of the normal ITPro -v- Dev artificial separation, there is a great mix of people and skills – you could say a great diversity in the attendees and speakers, to quote the BPC site
Top experts put you ahead of the curve
This Conference gathers the leading authorities to define, describe and set methods that will become industry standard – insights you can gain now to avoid pitfalls, cut costs and gain a competitive edge. Speakers include:
- Microsoft MVPs
- Microsoft Product Team Members
- Top industry executives and authors
- Leading trainers, consultants and topic experts
- Industry colleagues
Valuable as the speakers are, a conference they do not make, it is the mix of people that really stand out for me at these conferences, the depth of conversation and debate that take place before during and after the sessions, how people are engaged in delivering real world projects and faced with real world challenges.
I think the reason the Best Practices Conferences are so successful is noted in a book I was told to read by Paul Culmsee, The Practice of Adaptive Leadership by Ronald Heifetz. Where Heifetz talks about how
it is specifically about change; builds on the past rather than repudiating it; achieves organizational adaptation through continuous experimentation; heavily relies on diversity (i.e. talents, skills, experience, and perspectives); ensures that new adaptations significantly displace, re-regulate, or rearrange whatever is defective, obsolete, or irrelevant; and usually requires both time, patience, and persistence
Although the book goes on into greater depth this statement sums up for me why the Best Practices Conferences are successful.
All of the qualities needed to be successful in deploying SharePoint and all active participants in the conference.
And on a lighter note, if there is one best practice I took away from BPC, one that you all can try at home today – Beer!
Yes that’s right Beer is THE best practice and I can safely say that there was a lot of this Best Practice undertaken during the conference.
Looks like I’ve been a little slack in my planning for SharePint at the Best Practices Conference in Washington DC – Andrew Connell has trumped me big time with what looks like the SharePint to end all SharePint’s at SPC in Vegas.
What’s the reason for my delay you may ask?
In part because I have been busy, but the main reason is that I will be in the Reston area a whole week before SharePint will take place and thought what better opportunity than to do a bit of a local tour to see which venue really stood out as a great SharePint venue.
Here is what I do know:
SharePint will on Tuesday 25th August – starting around 7pm till late
Here is what I want from you:
Help me to find the ideal location for the SharePint – Best Practices DC 2009 Edition.
Mapping potential venues, please add your recommendations.
Perhaps we can make this a tradition,
The pre-SharePint tour – In Search of the Venue
If you want to keep up with what’s happening and want to join the search follow me @andrewwoody, @sharepint or search for #sharepint on twitter. To help us get a feel for the numbers and to warn the bar please add a +1 comment to this post, include your twitter name if you want.
What better way to spend a Thursday evening, first a couple of great sessions by Steve Smith and Mark Macrae (his first time speaking at SUGUK).
Sessions:
Session 1 – Understanding the relationship between IIS/Web Applications , SQL, SSP’s and Site collections – Steve Smith
In this session I will explain the logical relationship in the SharePoint Architecture and show you some usefull tips when creatng and managing them.
Session 2 -
Business Information and MOSS 2007 – Creating Interactive Dashboards using PerformancePoint Server – Mark Macrae
Start time – 6.30
Finish – 9pm then to the pub down the road
Break in the middle with Pizza and drinks
Location:
ID-Live offices, Strelley Hall, Nottingham. NG8 6PE
For directions and and to sign up go to the SUGUK site.
And to round the evening off in great style, the first Nottingham SharePint.
The Broad Oak
Main St., Strelley, Nottingham, NG8 6PD
People are starting to arrive from around the globe to the Best Practices SharePoint Conference
in San Diego. As expected a number were to be found in the hotel bar. If you want to catch up will all of the buzz search for the twitter tag #SPBPC. For those travelling in the location is great, Sun is just rising and from the hotel room i’m overlooking the 18th hole of the Torrey Pines course, with views out over the sea. This really is going to be a great event, Ben Curry has done a brilliant job of getting top speakers. This is not an Introduction to SharePoint, this is for people who know it, have deployed and what to get the most from the platform.
On a less technical note it’s count down to the SharePoint by Day, SharePint by Night San Diego Best Practices Edition. Haven’t signed up yet, put your name down here so the La Jolla Brew House knows how much beer to get in
Count down to the SharePoint by Day, SharePint by Night San Diego Best Practices Edition I thought it only right to give you a look at the current beer list. There has been talk on twitter about which beers are the best, I’m looking forward to having the debate with the ale in my hand.
Haven’t signed up yet, put your name down here so the La Jolla Brew House knows how much beer to get in
Coming to the SharePoint by Day, SharePint by Night Best Practices Edition? Want to show you enjoy a SharePint?
Grab a copy of one of these great new logos that were designed by Sam Dolan of Pink Petrol
With black text 472 x 151
With white text 472 x 151
I promised to give Sam a bit of love for kindly doing the these great logos, if your looking for someone to do some customisation’s for your SharePoint branding I recommend you have a look at some of the great designs that Sam has in his portfolio.
