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PASS Day 1

  • September 28, 2005 at 9:16 pm

    #363805

    Officially Day 1, despite the opening reception and the amazing SQLServerCentral.com reception on Tuesday night. It's been a long day, about 13 hours since I left the room this morning and I'm just getting back and writing this editorial.

    The casino party last night was great!! We were a little worried about how things would go over, but it was all for naught. Here we have Brian getting the prizes setup on our table. We had all the ones mentioned before plus a dozen or so games (DVD trivia games, electronic poker, etc), a digital picture frame, a computer PVR setup, a home security system, and more!! Below we have Andy and Simon from Red Gate software relaxing for a few minutes before things got going.

    Over 200 people showed up and there was quite the line to get in. Many, many thanks to the wonderful PASS staff for helping coordinate things, hand out gifts, and in general work very hard to make this event a success. We had 9 blackjack tables, one craps table (show below) and two poker tables. We ended up with a third Texas Hold-Em table later in the night with Brian and I handing out gifts at various tables.

    Everyone got $2000 in chips to play with and it seemed that most people had a great time. The winner, taking home the iPod Nano, had over $70,000 at the end. Apologies for not having a name, but I know Wes Brown took an iPod Shuffle home with over $30,000 in second place.

    I think poker was the most popular game with some serious competitors sitting around those tables. But the highlights for Andy, Brian, and myself were meeting many of the SQLServerCentral.com community and having a few minutes to chat. I met Jamie Thomson and Adam Machanic, two of the many experts on SQL Server 2005. SQLBill stopped by and I finally met Dale Corey, whom I have been in constant contact with on a project over the last few months. Haidong "Alex" Ji and Kathi Kellenberger were there, though Andy and I did happy hour with them on Monday. I know there were many others and apologies for not listing all the names, but the night was a whirlwind for me.

    Today was mostly walking around and talking for me. Andy and Brian each had a session and I sat in on a couple more. I met Grant Fritchey today as well, which was a treat as he's done some nice writing for us this past year. This has been another great start to the best SQL Server conference there is. Next year it's being held in November in Seattle (and Denver in '07) and SQLServerCentral.com will have another great party. So be sure to start planning, work on your boss, and register with the "SSC" source code to come to our party in Seattle!

    Steve Jones

  • October 3, 2005 at 8:00 am

    This was removed by the editor as SPAM

  • October 3, 2005 at 2:18 pm

    #594675

    I was lucky enough to catch Brian's talk on Wednesday afternoon.  The Hawaiian shirt and shorts were great.  And the presentation was pretty good, too.    I am impressed with anyone who responds to a technical question with "I don't know - but it sounds cool and I'll have to try it later."  He knew what he knew and didn't try to bull through areas with which he was not familiar.

     

    Perhaps the most impressive thing was the SSIS demo going live to the internet over the wireless lan set up in the resort.  Very gutsy, and it worked.  Thierry D'Hers from Microsoft ran into problems during his talk trying to do the same thing.

    Larry

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