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Arik Fraimovich! Arik has answered the quiz question correctly and will receive a coupon for a free pizza at Pizza Hut with one free topping included.
Thank you Arik and thanks also to the many people who took part in the quiz. Better luck next time everybody ;).
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Tech-Ed Eilat 2008 is winding down with the last round of lectures ending in 20 minutes. It's too early for me to sum the event up, not to mention I have a backlog of lectures that I need to review, but I can tell you one thing - It's been fun and it's been educational!
Microsoft has done an excellent job in organizing this huge event - it is a huge success for all who took part, IMHO. There was a broad array of lectures properly divided into tracks. Lecture halls and equipment functioned very well and most lecturers gave terrific talks that well worth the time to listen to.
Again, I would like to thank Microsoft Israel, and specifically everyone in charge of the Microsoft Israel Blogging Community for getting me here and giving me the opportunity to learn and to give back by blogging the event.
It doesn't end here - I will write down my impressions in the following days and would also love to hear your feedback and how you experienced this year's Tech-Ed. Just leave your comments below.
For the next few hours I will be chilling at the Business Center, drinking beer and collecting freebies. See you at the XBOX station and have a safe trip home!
-- urig
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One conclusion that I can draw from Tech-Ed Eilat 2008 is that Microsoft is in the process of endorsing the MVC / MVP pattern for real.
At least three of the talks here touched upon the subject. Noam King's talk focused on the upcoming ASP.net MVC framework that is soon to RTM. Ohad Israeli and Glen Block's talk on the Web Client Software Factory 2.0 introduced me to that particular implementation of MVP for ASP.net. And this morning's talk by Ron Jacobs, titled "The Perfect Pattern Storm: TDD, UX and MVP" gave a "Presenter First" MVP implementation.
None of these examples is properly mainstream yet, but it is clear that Microsoft have realized the advantages of this design pattern: The separation of concerns between the UI, the business logic workflow/process and the data model makes for a modular, testable and therefor reliable model for software construction.
I am eager to find a good MVC (or MVP) recipe for our ASP.net applications. In the next few weeks, I intend to dig deeper into what's in store for us ASP.net developers and I will post what I learn here.
I am also aware that I've been assuming that whoever reads me is familiar with MVC and that that assumption is wrong. So I also intend to start at the beginning and post about the basics of MVC/MVP along with the pros and cons of embracing this design pattern. Stay tuned.
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Yes! Courtesy of Microsoft Israel's Blogging Community (http://blogs.microsoft.co.il/blogs), You too can win a free pizza from Pizza Hut (+1 free topping) here on the Tidbits from a .net life blog!
Just be the first commenter to answer this simple question correctly:
Name two new Microsoft technologies that I was excited to write about, here on this blog.
The one condition is, that you can't specifically mention any of the three flagship products that Microsoft launch at Tech-Ed Eilat 2008. Windows Server 2008, SQL Server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008 are out of the game, on account of being too obvious ;)
Good Luck! --urig
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Check out photos from last nights smashing rave at Eilat' port at http://www.flickr.com/photos/urig
Fortisaharof + Maor Cohen (+ Chaim Laroz) rock us:
Lior and Yosi are having a great evening (complete with electric T-shirts) after busting their asses all day:
More on flickr - http://www.flickr.com/photos/urig
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Having attended Leon Langleiben's 11:00 talk on IIS 7.0 for developers, I can't help but wonder why the adoption rate for the new technology is so low.
Depsite the impressive and extensible new pipeline, despite that it's modular, despite the powerful and easy configuration of it (that can be even shared across machines now), IIS 7.0 is hardly anywhere to be found in production environments.
It's understandable that upgrading from IIS 6.0 to IIS 7.0 is a daunting prospect. When I imagine trying to find out what is wrong, in real time, on an unfamiliar web server I, too, shudder. I think that's why most IT decision makers are hesitant to adopt the new version, despite all its sexy features.
However, the one hidden killer feature that could sell IIS 7.0 to whoever makes the decision has remained hidden. It is performance.
If Leon's numbers are to be believed, then IIS 7.0 outperforms both IIS 6.0 and Apache significantly. This is the one selling point that may break through the defenses of whoever sticks with IIS 6.0.
I would like to see MS give out specific and reliable performance indicators on IIS 7.0. If these are as good as I've heard, they're bound to make a change.
PS - for the record, I should state that Leon disagrees with me. He finds IIS 7.0 adoption rates to be satisfactory considering how new the product is and that it depends on the adoption of Windows Server 2008. He also thinks that the main selling points are those mentioned above, rather than the increased performance.
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Just a reminder - you can follow me *live* all through the Tech-Ed Eilat 2008 event on twitter. Just go to http://www.twitter.com/urig and take it from there!
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It's been a delightfully exciting day here at Microsoft's Tech-Ed Eilat 2008. Having left Tel Aviv on the 07:00am flight, I arrived at Eilat early and was able to quickly check into my room and prepare for the Bloggers' Briefing held by Microsoft.
The Bloggers' Briefing made it clear that Microsoft is taking its bloggers community very seriously and with great respect. Coordinated by Michal Nissenzweig, the logistics for bloggers included a sweet gift bag of schwag, a gift coupon that the bloggers can bestow on their readers (more on this tomorrow), a handful of flixwagon enabled 3G phones for some of us and a lot of much appreciated respect for all of us. Thank you MS.
The lectures that I focused on today were in the SOA and S+S track. The first, by Manu Cohen Yashar was an introductory overview of the relevant .net 3.5 technologies. Manu, as always, was inspired and driven to open our eyes to what we have to learn. Personally, I was disappointed by the brid's eye view in this lecture - but I should have known better as this was a 200 lecture.
This was followed up by David Chappell's discussion of "SOAP vs. RESTful" web services which showed us that it wasn't "vs" as much as "when to use which". Mr Chappell is a grade A speaker and listening to him was educational, fun and inspiring. I really need to give his talk a post all by itself and I look forward to hearing him again tomorrow.
I skipped the evening's meeting with partners party in favor of an excellent local French restaurant, and I don't regret it. I highly recommend Josephine's at 3 Eilot st. for your next dinner here in Eilat. The delicious entrecote accompanied by pistachio salad were a fit ending for an excellent day.
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I'm here at the awesome Business Center setup by Microsoft and its partners at the Herrods Hotel in Eilat.
Around me everyone is setting up stands, hooking up their display computers in preparation for the hordes of Tech-Ed attendants who will soon come here.
Having followed the Bloggers Meeting hosted by Microasoft's charming Michal Nisenzweig, to whom I owe my attendance this year, I rushed up here to see Lior Zoref and Yosi Taguri cast their charms on a visiting channel 10 TV crew.
It was inspiring to see Lior describe to the TV people about the bloggers covering the event and especially about the video bloggers, armed with Flixwagon enabled 3G phones who are broadcasting live directly to the internet.
This is a part of the future of TV. Ordinary people covering special events by themselves, live and open to everyone in the world. Imagine the impact this could have on our lives. On the lives of people fighting against government control of the media (consider the Tibetan monks rising up against Chinese rule right now). I am hopeful we are nearly there.
PS - Yosi, your Guitar Hero rocks!
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Still in the very early stages of the event - at Ben Gurion airport, actually - a few personal conclusions are already apparent here at Tech-Ed Eilat 2008:
- I need an Eye-Fi! I need one real bad. Uploading images the old way is so laborious. Oh, how I yearn to snap a photo on my Canon S5 IS and have it instantly and wirelessly uploaded to flickr.
- I need a more advanced cellphone for blogging/SMSing. Something I can easily type on. Something like... an iPhone!
- It's not wise to put all of Microsoft's bloggers on one plane. It consumes too much wi-fi bandwidth. And what if it crashes? There's be no one to report it, like a tree falling in the forest and there's nobody to hear...
- We bloggers *love* to take pictures of themselves. :)
Now, how do I get the money for all this???
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Just dropping you a note that I will be live blogging Tech-Ed Eilat 2008 on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/urig/ . Photos will go to http://www.flickr.com/photos/urig/*
Every few hours I will aggregate my twits into a (hopefully meaningful) blog post here.
I'm looking forward to sharing my experience with you and getting feedback here and on Twitter. What's more, it would be great to do the same in real life - If you see me at the event, by all means please come and talk to me. I would love to get to know you personally and professionally.
See you there!
Uri
* - (Ha ha! Uri Gotlieb - beat you to it!)
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Hooray! iPhone is coming to Israel!
In a official statement to ynet, Eran Tor (General Manager for iDigital, Apple's representatives in Israel) has stated that the first Apple Store in Israel is set to open in Tel Aviv's Dizengoff Center and hinted that the opening's highlight will be the launching of iPhone in Israel.
The ynet article has little details on how long it will take for Apple to adapt the iPhone's native applications to Hebrew with its Right-To-Left challenges and virtually no details on which of Israel's two GSM carriers will have exclusivity in servicing the iPhone. But, who cares about the fine details? It's finally here and it's official! Mazel Tov everybody!