One of my clients rolled out the Beta version of their big project this week – a public website with brilliant plumbing that allows end users to build their own interactive floorplans and maps. Drop your map or plan onto the site, upload pictures that represent views of different locations on the map/plan (a bedroom, a vista on a trail map), link them up, type in some descriptions and voila – you have a beautiful end product that any user can easily navigate. There are no refreshes to bring the various pictures up and I’m not talking AJAX style partial post backs. The photos just transparently change on the page.

It was a major undertaking and is all done in asp.net 2.0. I did not do the site, but mentored them through a good chunk of the process. It was wonderful to work with folks who were not only software smart, but their level of attention to the user experience was hugely impressive to me.

It’s called MapsAlive.

Go check it out and it’s a beta – so feedback is appreciated!

Here’s a screenshot of the home page.

In “blogtime” this is old news, but I just caught that John Lam is joining Microsoft to work on the CLR team, “to help bring the love of dynamic languages out to the statically typed heathens :-)”. Great news!

Noah Coad was a  student ambassador and an MVP when I first met him a few years ago. You could easily describe him as a young, eager, bright and clean-cut kid.

So was Ian Ceicys!

I see both of them occasionally at Microsoft events such as the MVP Summit or TechEds, 

Both of these young men got sucked up by Microsoft when they graduated from college.

(I am feeling older with every sentence – egad!)

I don’t think I have ever seen them together which is the likely reason that somehow they had blended into the same person in my mind.

When I saw Ian at the New England Code Camp last weekend and asked him why he was in Boston and how his Microsoft job was going, he gave all the right responses – it could have just as easily been Noah – which is the mistake I made. I even blogged about it. Oops.

So here I am putting their pics side by side and now the difference is a little more obvious! Sorry guys!

I know very few people who can write sentences like this:

“I’ve been messing a lot with time zones lately, planning my trips to South Africa, Spain, and Denmark….” [http://www.gregcons.com/KateBlog/TimeZones.aspx]

This represents TechEd South Africa, TechEd Europe and then some more .NET love in Denmark. It also represents quite a lot of frequent flier miles! 🙂

At the hotel I am staying at in Sofia, a conference is now going on. It is a realtor conference. I talked with a realtor from Washington D.C. to find out what this conference is all about and was impressed with  the similarity of what we are both doing here.The conference is being held by FIABCI, which is an international real estate federation. The economy here in Bulgaria is really emerging, as we are discovering wrt the software industry here. Real Estate is the next wave, but the realtors here don’t have the organization and business tools that are common in the U.S. and other areas of the world. MLS is a big example. The conference is a two-way street, with the local realtors teaching the internationals about the market here and the internationals sharing their experience and ideas with the locals. It’s so familiar and the woman I talked with was clearly as excited about what she is doing here as I am about having come here to participate in DevReach. Here is a link to the actual conference.

I know that the software industry isn’t the only one that is going global and has people who are championing it, rather than fearing it. But my personal experience is only limited to that and it makes me happy to personally see this happening in other industries as well.

I hope that someday INETA (and I am referring to all of the INETA regions as a whole) can realize the level and effectiveness of an organization like FIABCI.

It was announced a few days ago that Bulgaria and Romania will become part of the European Union on Jan 1

So I’m sure there will be a big excitement when we arrive in Bulgaria next weekend.

Martin (who lives in Sofia) has links to more details.

By attending DevReach in Sofia Bulgaria Oct 9-10, you will be entered in the drawing.

Pretty amazing!

I wasn’t there to witness it but I have heard from DCC Susan Wisowaty that there were 110 people at the MSDN event in Burlington yesterday. Another attendee told me she had heard it was 117. This is pretty phenomenal for a city that got axed from the schedule due to poor attendance. This is pretty phenomenal for city with a population of 50,000. This would be a good number for an event in NYC or Boston!

So, for anyone who thinks that Vermont has nothing but farmers, hippies and ski bums as it’s population, think again!

Thanks to hard work by Chris Pels and his posse, you can now register for Code Camp 6 (as attendees and to submit sessions as a speaker).

www.thedevcommunity.org

It’s Saturday & Sunday, Oct 21 – Oct 22

My friends at Global Garage Sale outside of Burlington had an exciting day earlier this week when they sailed over the milestone of having sold over $1 million worth of other people’s stuff on eBay. They are one of the hottest drop-off stores in the country and are getting ready to start franchising because they have a business model that is not only successful, but very socially responsible as well and that is a great combination. The local news station did a big item on them. I was proud like I was their momma! 🙂