Got home a little while ago from the largest attended MS DevDays event in the United States, with approximately 600 people.  Of course that's not too surprising considering it was in Seattle, and the Microsoft campus is just across the lake.  You'd expect there to be a couple of .Net developers around here.

Overall, I'd say it was a great one-day event.  I learned a few things, got a few ideas reinforced, and made several good contacts.  And best of all, I got a lot of ideas for new subjects to blog about (and hey, I even got at least one new reader for my blogs, right Jim?).  Rather than write one long essay here, I'll break it up into several posts in order to keep them shorter, and each one focused around a single primary idea.  I'll give them as meaningful of a Subject line as I can in order to make it easier for those of you just skimming over your RSS feeds.

Even though my specialty is SQL Server, I, and many of the readers of SQLTeam often play multiple roles, building not just the back-end database, but also parts of, or the entire client application as well.  The focus of this year's DevDays was on writing secure code.  There were two tracks available.  One was the Web Development Track, the other was the Smart Client track.  I would have liked to attend both because I work in both arenas, but I had to choose, so I went down the Web Development Track.  Thankfully all the slide decks are included on the conference DVD, and even better, the conference DVD contains videos of someone giving the presentation.  So, I'll be able to view the Smart Client Track on my own, later.  This is very cool!  Way to go, Microsoft!