After years of pining to go to Microsoft’s Tech-Ed event, the time has come. In just a couple of weeks I’ll be going to my first one, and I am nervous and excited.
So many things going on, so much to do, and as always so little time. Between the Tech-Ed site, Twitter, and Linked in, I have to say I am impressed the the amount of support, information and tips for new Tech-Ed attendees. Even with all of that, I am still left with some questions which I will get into in a little bit.
When I convinced my office to send me to Tech-Ed I felt like I had just won the lottery. A chance to learn not only current technologies I use, but new technologies coming soon from Microsoft. then I started really looking and watching, especially on Twitter and LinkedIn. I started to panic. Did I have to sign up for sessions or was it first come, first serve? What about other things going on? What was the event hall going to have, or the Hands On Lab area? Luckily questions I posed about my anxiety were answered with good tips and links to blogs (Tech-Ed for Novices) that had guides for new Tech-Ed people.
As we are just over a week out, I still have questions though, the biggest is about the Certification Center. Can we sign up on site or do we have to buy the vouchers in advanced? I personally am planning on 2 exam-crams and 3 tests (the third exam doesn’t have a cram session at tech-ed although the official Tech-Ed twitter account dd point me to the video from last year when it was a session). I’ve been stalled on getting my Microsoft Certs for a while and a chance to knock out three exams and get my MCITP just makes me giddy.
Outside of that, I’m looking at a bunch of Security sessions, an IPV6 Bootcamp, a Crash Course in Powershell and a Session on Group Policy. Yeah its a full schedule, and I wind up flying out Thursday evening which means I’ll miss the closing party, but considering its taken me years to convince my place of business to send me to Tech-Ed, I can wait another year for the closing party.
I hope to meet a bunch of you there.