Wow. TechEd is finally here! The members of the IIS team have been arriving throughout the day, checking into their hotels and then getting into shuttles to check out the convention center. We have secured the IIS demo station in the TLC (Technical Learning Center) and brought in some fun giveaways for our customers - IIS7 pens and removable tatoos. Hopefully we will see some people this week walking around with IIS7 tat's on their arms (or foreheads!).
The demo station was pretty much ready when we arrived so we didn't have a lot of work to do setting up. We weren't free to slack off though. Oh no, there were already eager customers, approaching us with questions about IIS6 and curiosity about IIS7. I had the opportunity to explain the new integrated processing pipeline in IIS7 to a couple customers working in IT for the Washington State legislature. Program Manager, Chris Adams arrived at the booth just in time to answer some questions about diagnosing issues with your SPNs and protocol delegation. (Hint: download the AuthDiag tool, and watch this webcast).
After these guys took off, it was about time for the Bob Muglia keynote. The keynote held a couple of suprises. First, within the first 5 minutes of the big keynote, I hear Bob Muglia stating "and our server platform will deliver major upgrades to the web server as well." While he didn't mention IIS7 directly, it was great to see Microsoft's leadership calling out the great work our product team has put into IIS7 for its Vista and Longhorn Server releases. In keeping with the theme of the keynote, I feel this team has really ensured that IIS7 in these new OS will be completely "people ready." You guys, devs and IT Pros, are those people and I hope after seeing the new enhancements at TechEd, you will agree.
The other big suprise probably overshadowed Bob's brief call-out. "Chloe O'Brian" from 24, (actually the actress who plays Chloe) came on stage to help explain the Bob's four promises. Each promise was introduced by its own episode of "4," an IT-oriented parody of the hit TV show, "24," I know and love. made the keynote a lot of fun. After the keynote it will be time to prepare for tomorrow, the first day of the breakouts and the expo. Check out the Full IIS TechEd Agenda to see what sessions are coming up tomorrow and Tuesday. We hope to see you there at these presentations and in the expo hall at the IIS section of the TLC.
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