MiniMage Never Stops Talking Tech: TechEd 2007 Day 4 (June 7th)

I had a little trouble dragging myself out of bed. I had zero energy. In fact, I couldn't even make the first session. When I finally dragged myself in, I headed to an IE session.

When the IE session turned out to be one that was more for developers (newbie mistake!), I snuck out while the speakers' backs were turned and found an IE talk that desktop support techs like me could understand (Deploying Internet Explorer 7 in a Business Environment). Thanks to another attendee's question, I learned something I hadn't observed working in Vista: running IE as admin is not going to be nearly as productive in Vista as it is in XP. Microsoft has managed to separate Internet Explorer from Windows Explorer itself, I was told, so browsing to the hard drive (or network drives) and running apps isn't going to happen. I can understand the need to tighten security, but I can't help observing that this is going to make remote software installs harder for this road warrior. When I asked for clarification, the answer turned out to be with the folks I'd run out on! One of them let me know that they had ended up fielding a lot of usage questions, especially about tabbed browsing.

I had another session, not really useful for me, but the best option for that time slot, but I opted not to go. Instead, after I realized I had left myself pretty much no time for the Hands-on Labs, I headed in that direction and started learning about making Windows Vista images with BDD. (Like my hat? I sure do; I wore it 7 days in a row...five of them because I'd hoped to win something; truly, though, just being there was a HUGE win for the Mage)

Other sessions I attended:

Working the Microsoft Windows Recovery Environment
Best Practices and Lessons Learned in Activating Windows Vista in Enterprise Environment

Between those last two sessions, I headed to the tail end of Frank La Vigne's session on writing apps for Tablet PCs. The break after was the time Craig Pringle had set aside for Tablet lovers to meet and greet. There was a fellow at Frank's session I thought looked suspiciously like Dr. Neil Roodyn, whose face I'd seen on Hugo Ortega's blog. I tried a surreptitious peek at his badge (you can guess how well that worked, given the man was seated in the row in front of me), but then I decided there was not much chance Dr. Neil would have come all the way over to Orlando. Yeah, I was wrong, and I learned that when I attended a session he was leading the next day...but that's another post. At any rate, I saw Craig again, was introduced to Frank, and also met Andy Gray, among a couple of others. I might have followed Frank and Craig around for a few minutes like a lost puppy; it was only a few minutes, though! No, really, it was!

I hit the floor for a bit (I'm pretty sure I went by that poor User Productivity booth again), then it was time to go to the party at Universal Studios' Islands of Adventure. My typical luck affected everyone; just as it was time to go, the rain started pouring. The rides were shut down for some time; even when the rides were opened, the Incredible Hulk stayed down with technical difficulties. I did get to ride The Dueling Dragons (fire) and The Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man ride (that was mind-blowingly cool!). Yes, they served beer, and I don't think I've ever had a finer funnel cake.

The Green Goblin really is quite kind. When my PPC-6700 couldn't get a shot of him in the street, he got up in the window, so that I'd have adequate light. Thanks, GG! You look a heck of a lot better than Willem Dafoe did (no offense, Mr. Dafoe).