For those of you in the Oklahoma City area, I’ll be presenting the opening Keynote at the upcoming Visual Studio 2010 Community Launch put on by the Oklahoma City Developers Group on August 2nd.  More information can be found at their website:

Visual Studio 2010 Community Launch

Come join us for all the fun!

I just received a note from the okcCoCo about an upcoming OpenBeta BarCamp in Oklahoma City.  Here’s the details from the email

BarCamp is back and will even bigger and better this year!

A BarCamp is an intensely participant-driven conference where attendees share and learn in an open environment. The primary goal of BarCamp is education of attendees. As compared to a traditional conference, the large majority of the talks, panels and other sessions are organized organically the day of the event. People propose presentations and it all gets sorted out at the beginning. Trust us, it just works. BarCamp is an event format that has been successfully applied across the country, including Oklahoma City.

We held the first BarCamp in Oklahoma City in July of 2009. We had approximately 60 attendees participate in 20 sessions divided into two simultaneous tracks. Session topics included HTML, Javascript, JQuery, Cloud computing, NoSQL, Python, PHP, Web 2.0 Business Models, Online Startups, and Growing Online Businesses. The theme of this year’s BarCamp is web development and entrepreneurship. The target audience is web development professionals and entrepreneurs.

Details
9am – 4pm (Main event), 5-8pm (Barbecue)
Date: Saturday, July 24th, 2010
Location: Oklahoma City Coworking Collaborative
Cost: $15

More Details Online

We’re looking for a few volunteers to help organize the event! If you are interested, email derrick@okccoco.com. Volunteers receive free registration!

If you’re interested in participating, feel free to reach out to Derrick as I’m sure he’d love to have your help!  I’m planning on attending, and I hope you can too!

My friend and teammate John Weston (a.k.a. @technetguy) just told me about a new SharePoint user group in OKC.

Their first meeting is Thursday, March 11th at the Dell facility in OKC:

3501 SW 15th
Bldg A, Hudson Hall
Oklahoma City, OK 73108

Map to Dell Campus in OKC

Eric Shupps, the SharePoint Cowboy, will be presenting at this first meeting, giving an overview of MOSS 2010.  For more information see the OKC SharePoint User Group website (coming soon!).

Do you want to be? 

I just heard about a FREE SQL Server 2008 Certification Boot Camp coming to OKC.  Full details are at the registration site, but here�s a teaser:

Course: Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Certification Boot Camp 70-433 (31.5 hours)

Time: 6:00 p.m. – 9:30 p.m.

Session Dates: Monday, February, 8th, Tuesday, February 9th, Wednesday, February 10th, Monday, February 15th, Tuesday, February 16th, Wednesday, February 17th, Monday, February 22nd, Tuesday, February 23rd, and Wednesday, February 24th

Given the expertise and time commitment being provided by Michael Hotek for free, we ask that all registrants be able to attend at least 6 of the 9 sessions of this course.

Location:  1100 N Lindsay, Service Center Bldg, Room SCB-111, Oklahoma City, OK 73104. You can see the campus map and look for Service Center Bldg by going to this link (http://www.ouhsc.edu/about/findus.asp). Surrounding buildings are the Dean McGee Eye institute and the Oklahoma City Clinic.

The primary author and primary instructor of this course, Michael Hotek, brings about 2 decades of SQL Server experience in some of the largest and most complicated environments in the world. Mike is an accomplished speaker and trainer having delivered hundreds training sessions across dozens of training events spanning a decade or more with thousands of people having attended training from him.

Course Modules

• Module 1 – Database Design
• Module 2 – Indexes
• Module 3 – Data retrieval
• Module 4 – Data Modification 
• Module 5 – Programmable Objects
• Module 6 – Partitioning
• Module 7 – Full-text Indexes 
• Module 8 – Service Broker
• Module 9 – Performance Analysis and Tuning

If you have any questions about this event, please e-mail BOTH president@okcsql.org and vp@okcsql.org.