Don Xml's Grok This

I'm you are a member of the social network site LinkedIn and will be attending TechEd Orlando 2007, you might want to check out TechEd's social networking site, TechEd Connect.  I'm guessing that the very same people that use LinkedIn would be interested in using TechEd Connect, so I went and created a LinkedIn group on the TechEd ...

What's a Microsoft event with Palermo Party?  The MVP Summit event was way, way, way over the top.  I'll be at TechEd 2007, and wouldn't miss this.  Here are the details: Party with Palermo: Tech Ed 2007 edition June 3rd, 2007 @ 7PM - 11PMGlo Lounge: http://www.gloloungeorlando.com/8967 International Dr, Orlando, FL Cover ...

In case you haven’t heard (either thru James Lau's blog or Josh Holmes' blog) I’ll be doing a webcast on Visual Studio Extensibility at 9AM Pacific time (12PM Eastern), May 3, 2007 titled: Do-It-Yourself Tools Inside Visual Studio. For those of you going to TechEd, I’ll be doing a similar session there, but that ...

Robert Scoble has a nice write up on why tech conferences are expensive to run, but leaves out one of the most successful “nouveaux” conferences around, Code Camps, which happen to be totally free.  Thom Robbins (a Microsoft Developer Evangelist) is the man behind the idea, and has his Code Camp Manifesto.  Code Camps ...

I recently told this story to M. David, who got a kick out of it and just had to blog some of it.  One of my favorite parts of conferences is hanging out with my ‘net friends, and getting into some deep conversations about topics that make normal folks just wonder what planet we are from (I call them the “scaring the ...

It’s the Sunday after TechEd 2005, and I finally recovered enough to sit down and write up the DonXml TechEd 2005 Hits and Misses. Hit – The Cabanas.  Hands down, my favorite part of TechEd is the cabanas.  The sessions are good, but I’d rather sit down with the presenter for 5 minutes and get all the details, then ...

Sessions by Don Box, Kimberly Tripp, and Scott Hansleman, and the like, are always guaranteed to draw a crowd (and rock), but lesser know people can have great sessions too.  So, I’d like to take some time and point out what I refer to as “hidden gems”.  The names behind the sessions may not be instantly recognizable, ...

3rd Place - ''Social condensers'' -- the place where citizens of a community or neighborhood meet to develop friendships, discuss issues, and interact with others -- have always been an important way in which the community developed and retained cohesion and a sense of identity. My 3rd place does not exist in the normal sense.  I do not ...

I was checking in with some of the usual suspect (Christoph, Kirk, Kent, Jeff Julian, kzu, Christian Weyer, etc.) and it seems as though the XML crew will be spread out amongst the other Cabanas at TechEd.  I’m in the DBA Cabana, Kent and Kirk are in the DAT Cabana, and Christoph is in the CSI (connected systems) Cabana.  ...

One of the things that were discussed between Stan and some of the presenters at the Philly Code Camp was the task of getting more people from the local community, and focusing less on “well known” speakers.  Someone (and I can’t remember who) suggested that the problem with getting people new to presenting to volunteer is ...