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 We recently
received this wonderful article from IEDOTNETUG.
This group was formed to fill a growing need in an
area over 60 miles east of Los Angeles. This is
grass roots at it's best! Welcome to our .NET
Community!
The Inland Empire
.NET User's Group (IEDOTNETUG)
was founded in the fall of 2003 by James Johnson,
an IS student at the University of Redlands, and
professional developer, Katherine Walters. The
group currently has 25 members (and growing!) was
formed in San Bernardino, CA. The region has a
growing population of .NET developers in many
different industries, such as banking, education,
entertainment, food and beverage services, GIS,
government, healthcare, and manufacturing. Meeting
in the Inland Empire also saves members from
having to commute to Orange County and Los Angeles
to participate in the .NET groups already
established in those areas.
This talented
group gets together on the first and third
Saturdays of each month to discuss and learn the
inner workings of the .NET Framework, Visual Basic
(VB).NET, C#, database development, development
life cycles, methodologies, and other programming
technologies. The membership represents broad
interests and experience, including programmers
with many years experience, professors of
information systems and technologies, and students
just getting started in programming. This is a
young group with a lot of enthusiasm for what they
do and how they do it. They are constantly
exploring better ways to master .NET challenges in
their professions and in their personal .NET
applications.
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From Top Left: Rochelle
Casolaro, James Johnson, Karen Brannen, Ken
Cowden, Ed Marquez, Les Matthews, Denise King,
Katherine Walters, Rich Manley, Joshua Angulo,
Nick D'Alessandro.
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Starting
in November of 2003, the group's initial meetings
featured IEDOTNETUG member Ken Cowden, programmer
for NAMM California in Ontario, presenting several
topics related to the .NET Framework, VB coding
techniques, Visual Studio Wizards, and database
connectivity with VB.NET . At subsequent meetings,
James Johnson XML and an introduction to the .NET
Framework focusing on Common Language Runtime
(CLR), the differences between managed and
unmanaged code, and the Garbage Collector (GC).
The group's meetings include similar presentations
and now also offer beginning and
intermediate-level .NET topics. This new forum
addresses all levels of .NET expertise and will
enable members to ask questions as well as to
provide information to others who may need
additional assistance. The meetings are very
informal; the team approach is working extremely
well and has been highly praised by those who
participate.
The IEDOTNETUG has an open
membership which is free--and so is the coffee!
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INETA Speaker, Stephen Walther, becomes a
Microsoft Software Legend
 Stephen
Walther, one of the speakers on the INETA Speaker
Bureau, was named a Software Legend by Microsoft
on March 18th, in recognition of his contribution
to the Microsoft developer community as an author,
trainer and developer. Microsoft selected Walther
to join the Legends because of his best selling
title, ASP.NET Unleashed, which many developers
cite as one of the most comprehensive and
accessible resources on ASP.NET
available.
With this honor, Walther joins
an impressive class of other Software Legends,
including Billy Hollis, Jeffrey Richter, David
Chappell, Rocky Lhotka, Alex Homer, Dave Sussman,
Juval Lowy, and David Platt. The Software Legends
program was created by Microsoft to recognize
authors who have significantly contributed to the
developer community and its understanding of the
Microsoft .NET Framework.
You can read
more about Steve here: link to : Sam's
Publishing or visit the Software
Legends website.
| Jason Bunting Interviews
INETA Speaker, Scott Hanselman |
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J: How long have you been using .NET
technologies?
S: I've been messing
with .NET since it was called COR and "Lightning."
Since the early days before the first PDC. I
started with C and VC1.51 and then did
VB3/SQL4.21b&and went from there! I also
architected a Java <GASP>application at Nike
in the mid-nineties with my buddy Shaun from
SoftSource (www.sftsrc.com) and Shaun really got
me into .NET (before it was .NET.) I remember the
conversation starting with something like "imagine
a world without IUnknownb&"
J:
What do you feel are the most compelling things
about NET?
S: Not to mean to sound
like a sycophant, but really, what's NOT
compelling? I believe in 5 to 10 years that 90% of
all significant business applications will be
written in managed code (be that Java, .NET or
Mono). I just don't see how Perl or PHP or the
like and compent when it comes to developer
productivity. Managed mode code is here, the only
question is what's next?
J: What
has your experience been in speaking to user
groups as part of the INETA Speakers
Bureau?
S: I've found that the Users
Groups are SO very appreciative of our visits. The
really make a speaker feel welcome. There are some
very kind and thoughtful folks going to Users
Groups. It's a GREAT deal of effort that the
organizers put into running a users Group. INETA
really provides a great service by shuttling us
around.
J: Don Box has written a
wonderful story about his first meeting with you
(read
that here). What do you remember from your
first meeting him?
S: That was a
LONG time ago. If I remember correctly I was
working at Incredible Universe and coding my way
through my Freshman year of college at night. I
met him the day the Apple Newton was out. He was
with a friend whose name escapes me, but we struck
up a conversation. He was starting or working with
a company called BrainTrust. This was
pre-Developmentor if I remember correctly. We all
went to a late night diner, wrote "C" code into
our Apple Newtons and talked about Bruce Lee. He
was clearly going places, and a darned nice
guy.
J: What do you think of code
generation in general and specifically, using
CodeSmith to get it done?
S: I very
much dig what Eric Smith has done with CodeSmith.
The new 2.5 version is even better. I've done code
generation with everything from XSLT to the
CodeDOM. CodeSmith really lowers the barrier to
entry for folks that are new to Code Generation.
From my point of view, if you have data in a nice
declarative format already, whether it is in XML,
XSD or just exists as your current SQL Server
schema, why not exploit it? Why do ANY more work
than you absolutely have to? I think that Code
Generation is really coming into vogue and that
will only continue.?
J: Your "Tips
for a Successful MSFT Presentation" is great - how
many presentations had you given by the time you
gathered all of the tips contained therein?
S: I counted them all once and
figured that I've talked to ~150,000 people over
the last 10 years. Might be more, but who knows,
eh? I've given probably 80 or so talks in front of
at least 500 people, and probably a few hundred in
front of crowds of 10 to 200, not counting
teaching which REALLY bumps up the numbers. I just
love to teach and chat and collaborate. I'm at
home at a Whiteboard or in Notepad. Some of my
best talks have been done totally from the Command
Prompt.
J: What type of jokes
were you telling at the stand-up comedy gigs you
once did?
S: Heh, I'm still
doing standup, just now with PowerPoint and Code.
Gosh, I had about a 30 minute where I talked about
everything from my Diabetes to my Family to being
a nerd. Silly stuff that doesn't quite translate
into text. I remember telling a crowd at the
Visual Studio.NET launch in Seattle that I saw
they were opening a Starbucks inside another
Starbucks. Good to see that anti-trust lawsuits
haven't hit the coffee industry.
To read more about what Scott is
working on, visit his very interesting and very
popular weblog at www.computerzen.com.
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