Office Developer Conference a huge success!!!
I must say I was quite impressed with the show the MSFT put on here in Redmond this week for the Office Developer Conference. Now, I had been saying for a long time that Office developers and the platform itself haven't gotten the attention from MSFT that they should. But its clear that change is in the air here, and it was really nice to see. So first off... I would like to congratulate Adam LeVasseur, Joe Andreshak and the rest of the 'Softies for thinking this show up and then putting in the long effort to put this on. Well done guys!
There was such a positive vibe coming out of this show it was hard not to be optimistic about the direction of the Office System as a platform. First of all, it was sold out. Since the MS campus conference center is only so big they had to limit it to 800 invitees. But the fact it was sold out confirms the hunger for this type of event for this type of information. As usual, the Office crowd draws from an array of backgrounds and is very international. But one thing that was quite clear was that just as we have seen the Office System evolve and become more technically sophisticated, so has the “Office Developer”. The breadth and depth of the questions they were asking and the conversations they were having established that these were real pro dev's and not “hobbyists” (as some of those comp sci types like to refer to Office devs) . I did a demo in one of the talks on VSTO 2005 and the first question after it was someone concerned with Web service security issues when attempting to bind data within Office UI and the reality of securing the data exchange. Not exactly your “should I use late binding or early binding” discussion. These folks were deep, broad and rounded...
I think a couple of things about this show really made it notable even beyond my expectations. First having it Redmond was a clear advantage. Not that I am starting to see Western Washington as some sort of prime resort location for conferences (especially not in February!), but having so many MSFT team members around was awesome - the real difference to the show. MSFT conferences are typically in warmer, dare I say, more desirable locations. But then MSFT can only really justify sending “essential” personnel. Here, attendees had exposure to more MSFT folks then typically normal and since of course these guys know the products and future direction better then anybody, the payoff is greater for attendees. (Also on a sidebar, I think its equally beneficial for MSFT folks to have greater firsthand access to “customers” as well!). Being local also enabled MSFT to offer up time with three notable MSFT exces as well (Bill Gates, Steven Sinofsky, Richard McAniff) - and simply with Bill spending two hours (with just a bunch of Office hacks ;) adds such credibility and commitment from the MS side.
Another thing that stood out (specifically for me because I sat thru this track) was the buzz around VSTO 2005. I have been working with it a lot lately and I am quite impressed. But while I sat in the audience and saw the reaction to others seeing it for the first time, you could just see the desire to have it and have it now! I think it blew a lot of people away... I also think it motivated a lot of attendees to get ready to go back home and get ready to fight to 'push' to get it in their organizations. They heard the hurdles but they saw the benefits - the light bulbs went off. I think VSTO 2005 really resonated well. Kudos to KD and whole VSTO team!
Anyway... special thanks to Reza Chitsaz for allowing me on stage during his time and to Janet Robinson for saving us with a working image of my demo! If you saw the demo and asked for the source code as soooo many of you did, stay tuned... Chris and I are looking into clearing it with the 'necessary' parties to make it available.