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The 7th DevCon, given at Scottsdale, Arizona, is now finished. From all the feedbacks I've received, I would say that everyone seems to agree that this year's DevCon was a commercial one since most of it was contracted by an external corporation instead of the owner of the product which seems to have affected, in some ways, the overall spirit of the community related to past DevCons.
The number of attendees was still around 2000 and the quality of the speakers and sessions was very good although some world known outstanding speakers were not invited. The major changes, this year, were mostly related to the external part of the sessions like the trade show getting smaller, only one reception having been held, having a session room inside a giant tent in the parking lot and having the conference being held in an out of town resort.
Following the tradition, it all began on Saturday night with a dinner we organized on the Visual FoxPro Yellow Pages DevCon '96 Survival Kit dinner list. The conference officially started Sunday morning with the pre sessions that I've heard were pretty good as well.
The opening session, mostly a 2 hours keynote session, was given on Sunday night. We've seen only about 10 minutes of all the new stuff in Visual FoxPro 5 and a little oveview of Visual FoxPro 6.0 where the rest of the session was mainly focusing on the Internet, Internet and Internet. It was clearly obvious that Microsoft is pushing that technology and want us to use it as much as possible however they may have forgotten that this was primaly a Visual FoxPro conference.
After a full day of sessions, on Monday night, we had what I am calling the confrontation <g>. It first began with a trivia game where 20 of us received a ticket to participate. It was mostly related to questions about the history of Visual FoxPro. I was lucky enough to have an easy-like question about what was the reason SET SCOREBOARD was formely created <s>. That was followed by a Q & A period where we were able to ask Microsoft representative people some questions about the actual version of Visual FoxPro. Then the real Q & A begin, consisting of asking question about the future of Visual FoxPro. We all agree to say that they've made a good job by answering these tough questions about why Microsoft has not pushed the marketing of Visual FoxPro as they are doing for other products. On about 40 questions, 3/4 of them were related to the marketing about various aspects. The message from the community was clearly made and some changes have already been made about that. Since the beginning of the year, we've seen rumours, missing reviews of Visual FoxPro, bad comparaisons from magazines, etc. which didn't help the marketing of the product. Visual FoxPro 5.0 is a killer product and we expect, from the recent changes at the marketing level, it will appear on top of the competition, the place where it should be. A promoting video has also been released about the new version mainly focusing on making Visual FoxPro power known to representative and executive corporate people.
In the picture, people waiting in line to ask Microsoft questions about the future of Visual FoxPro.
We also have seen a special video about Tom Rettig, who died on February 15th. Tom was world known for his software development work, the books he has written and about all the sessions he gave at major conferences. He was contributing a lot to help the community on Compuserve and other technical resources. He was the author of Tom Rettig Office, a framework to built on for developers. The video was supposed to be shown on the opening session but due to a technical problem it was reported on Monday.
Tom is at the bottom left in the picture and the quote is saying "... it will be very long time before he is forgotten".
We also have seen a special video Tuesday morning, before the first session of the day, a meeting was held for the user groups leaders and Microsoft Mindshare representatives. It was mostly an open discussion where we discuss many subjects about how we can improve some aspects of user groups in relation with the Mindshare division. One of the interesting point was the fact the list of user groups on Microsoft site takes time to reflected some requested changes and some enhancements are going to be made there. There is also going to be a Mindshare tour in different cities in the next few months. Some user groups leaders are mentioned that it is not always easy to find speakers for their montly meetings. As far as I know or from what we have talk about, there is no resource like that avaibable. This is one section the Virtual FoxPro User Group is working on right now and we expect to have a new section dedicated for that in the next few days.
In the picture, two happy DevConers - Andy Neil and Paul Russell.
Tuesday night, I had the chance to go at the bar and see the jam session. On this first virtual jam session, it was interesting to see all those musicians playing such a good music where they are coming from different countries and only playing music together at each DevCon. Barry Lee, who compiled the jam session page in the DevCon '96 Survival Kit, already mentioned that he will be happy to contribute again to help organize another jam session for next DevCon.
The conference ended without a closing session. However, many of us went to dinner on Wednesday night and it was one of the coolest dinner I ever been to.
During that DevCon, we have seen many sessions dealing with the Internet and ActiveX Visual FoxPro related material. In fact, almost all of the sessions were dealing with Visual FoxPro and the Internet but the thing that surprised me was the fact that in was only focusing on the Web while the Internet is more than that. However, I do agree to say that the Web is the primaly used resource on the Internet.
We all hope that the next DevCon, probably for the next release of the product, will be setup by Microsoft instead of given almost all the control to an external corporation where the objectives are not necessary the same <g>. I am again satisfied of this DevCon and look forward for the next one.
Here's a few comments I've received from well known people from the community:
"Every session that I attended had something to offer."
Lee Chancey, Dublin OH
"The future of FoxPro might have been in question before but with the release of Visual FoxPro 5.0, I think Microsoft have shown its commitment to the FoxPro development community."
Douglas Yoder, Tallahassee FL
"It's been my first time and it's been good. I'll be back."
Rick Strahl, Hood River OR
"I'm very hapy to see Visual FoxPro to be in the developers suite and I hope it has a strong presence there."
Chris Jefferies, San Francisco CA
"Quality of presentations and speakers are outstanding with a new product being amazing."
Jean-Rene Roy, Montreal PQ
"It's been the deepiest technical content conference I've been to."
Will Tartak, Miami FL
"The application shown in Brian Jones session was the most compelling demonstration that I've seen of the power and flexibility of the components strategy that Microsoft is enabling Visual FoxPro to participating in."
Andy Neil, San Francisco CA
"This has been my first DevCon, so with that in mind, I will say that this has been quite good. The speakers and sessions, however, have been execptional."
Paul Russell, Darmouth NS
Picture archives
The community picture
Will Tartak, Leslie Koorhan, Whil Hentzen, Chaim Caron, Paul Maskens, Doug Henning, Andy Neil, Ted Roche, Tamar Granor, Yair Alan Griver, Dan Freeman, Malcolm Rubel, Juergen Wondzinski, Steve Dingle, David Frankenback, Kristyne McDaniel, Markus Egger and others..
3 happy DevConers
Willian Bird, David Bailey, Gary Cox
Internet, Internet, Internet...
Rick Strahl after a long Q & A period following his Internet session.
The Montreal deleguation
Michel Fournier, Bernard Dessureault, Jean-René Roy and others...
From the east coast
Mario DeMello from Halifax NS
Wednesday night dinner from table #1
Paul Maskens, Tamar Granor, Andy Neil, Ted Roche and others...
Wednesday night dinner from table #2
Ed Leafe, Steve Sawyer, Barbara Peish, Mike Toth, Whil Hentzen, Ken Levy and others...
Another community picture
In front, Paul Maskens preparing his portable camera.
A giant
Special video about Tom Rettig
Picture archives from Bernard Dessureault
The famous Montreal gang once again.
René, Michel Fournier, Jean-René Roy and Bernard Dessureault
It's dinner time
DevConers taking a break for a nice outside dinner
Picture archives from Paul Maskens
Photographers preparing their cameras for the famous DevCon gang picture
Wednesday night dinner
Mac Rubel, Doug Henning, Ceil Rosenfeld and others
Wednesday night dinner
Ted Roche, Whil Tartak, Sue Cunningham, Andy Neil, Tamar Granor and others
Wednesday night dinner
Relaxing with coffees and desserts
Wednesday night dinner
Now, is there something wrong with this picture?
The tradition continues
The group picture
In the hotel lobby
Sue Cunningham, Whil Tartak, Steve Sawyer and others
Do you recognize yourself on this picture?
Tuesday night party
Surprise, you're being pictured
Tuesday night party
Listening carefully about the new screen designer
Joke time!
Laughing time after Mac famous joke
Going to the circus!
Yes, these were conference rooms
Tuesday night party
Whil talking about the Developer's Guide
Tuesday night party
Live from England
Somewhere between two sessions
Doug Henning, Eldor Gemst and Steven Dingle
Wednesday night dinner
Ken Levy, Whil Hentzen and others waiting for dinner
Wednesday night dinner
Michel Fournier talking about the Universal Thread
Wednesday night dinner
Surprise, here's a picture
Wednesday night dinner
Eldor Gemst, Sue Cunningham, Whil Tartak and others waiting for dinner
Leaving DevCon
Happy DevConers returning home
62 Rue Doucet, Petit-Rocher, New Brunswick, E8J 1L3
Telephone: 1-506-783-9007 Email: mfournier@levelextreme.com
