TVUG News and Events

Where: New Horizions, Albany NY
When: Tuesday, April 10th, 2012, 6:30-8:30PM
Who: Jim O'Neil, Microsoft

IMPORTANT: Please note that we will be meeting at New Horizons Albany for this event.  Also note that ideally you will bring a laptop (see details below) for a hands-on opportunity.

Jim O'Neil presents:

Playing Games in the Cloud

By now you’ve heard about Windows Azure, Microsoft’s Cloud Computing platform, but perhaps you haven’t yet kicked the tires and tried it out yourself. Well, here’s your chance. With this session on the RockPaperAzure Challenge, you’ll get an overview of the Windows Azure Platform and have a chance to try it out in a fun (and potentially profitable) way – by playing a variation of the playground favorite - Rock, Paper, Scissors - in the cloud!

For the session, bring your laptop (Windows Vista or Windows 7)* and

1. Install Visual Studio 2010 Pro (or higher) or Visual Web Developer Express 2010 (a free download)
2. Install the Windows Azure SDK http://bit.ly/xP56oP
3. Provision a no-risk, free 90-day Windows Azure trial account (http://bit.ly/xrUXU2) – here’s a screencast walkthrough: (http://bit.ly/yaboao)

And we’ll cover the rest at the meeting. There’s a Kinect, Visual Studio 2010 license, and a $50 Best Buy gift card up for grabs – so get ready to Rock (PaperAzure)!

*If you don’t have Windows Vista or Windows 7, don’t let that stop you from coming! You’ll still be able to participate, we just may buddy you up with someone!

Presenter Bio

This will be a joint session with the Capital Area SQL Server User Group.  CASSUG meets on the 3rd Monday of every month at New Horizons in Albany.

Startup Weekend is an intense 54 hour event which focuses on building a web or mobile application which could form the basis of a credible business over the course of a weekend. The weekend brings together people with different skillsets - primarily software developers, graphics designers and business people - to build applications and develop a commercial case around them.

March 2-4, 2012

Grand Slam Alley Accelerator
500 Federal Street
4th Floor Troy NY 12180

More information at http://techvalley.startupweekend.org/ .

Where: Tyler Technologies, Latham, NY
When: Wednesday February 15th, 2012, 6:30-8:30PM
Who: Joseph Payette, Jr.

Please note we are meeting on Wednesday the 15th instead of Tuesday the 14th!

Topic: ASP.NET MVC 3

ASP.NET MVC gives you a powerful, patterns-based way to build dynamic websites that enables a clean separation of concerns and that gives you full control over markup for enjoyable, agile development. ASP.NET MVC includes many features that enable fast, TDD-friendly development for creating sophisticated applications that use the latest web standards.

Presenter Bio

As co-founder and Chief Technology Officer of Greane Tree Technology, Joseph Payette, Jr., leads his team of Agile software developers to create custom, standards-based, web, database, mobile and enterprise software. Joe and his team have enjoyed applying their ingenuity and skill to systems as diverse as a statistical tool for an international drywall manufacturer, a player-ranking system for a leading online gaming platform, a community-building database for technology companies, and a reservations system for New York City nightlife. Joe earned a B.S. in Computer Science from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and has many years of experience in all phases of software development, including analysis, architecture, coding and quality control. Joe is expert in technologies such as Ruby on Rails, .NET, PHP, Java, C++, AJAX, MySQL, and MSSQL, but he is always on the lookout for new tools to help Greane Tree Technology communicate more clearly, work more efficiently, and meet customer specifications more elegantly. Joe is an active contributor to area user groups, including the Tech Valley Ruby Brigade, the Tech Valley .NET User Group, the Capital District Linux User Group, and the Capital District Java Developers Network. 

Where: Tyler Technologies, Latham, NY
When: Tuesday, December 13th, 2011, 6:30-8:30PM
Who: Brian Peek

Join us as Brian Peek demonstrates the basics of using the Kinect for Windows SDK including:  how Kinect works, installing and setting up the Kinect sensor, setting up the development environment, reading camera, depth and skeleton data, understanding what depth data is and how it works, skeletal tracking and working with the Kinect microphone array to record audio and use speech recognition.

Before our presentation, we will be holding our officer elections and soliciting feedback on last month's Q&A session.

Presenter Bio

Brian Peek is an internationally respected cricket player, gourmet chef, and the house DJ for the State Department.  His crocheted masks of Steve Buscemi sold out on Etsy in a mere 2 hours.  When he is not on tour, he works on stuff for a boutique software company located on the left coast.  His recipe for Blue Waffle was highest downloaded recipe on the FoodTV website during all of 2010. He once made Criss Angel cry.  This is what happens when he lets someone else post his bio.

Where: Tyler Technologies, Latham, NY
When: Tuesday, October 4th, 2011, 6:30-8:30PM
Who: Victor Castro

Due to some scheduling conflicts, we will be holding our October meeting one week early.  We hope you can attend!

OData, Open Data Protocol, is a web protocol for querying and updating data over HTTP using open web standards. In this session we will go over the details of how OData facilitates the consumption and publication of data. We will explain OData syntax and definitions. In the end we'll go over how to get started writing your OData service and how to consume open services in your own applications.

Presenter Bio

Victor has 10+ years of experience as software architect and developing web applications across multiple industries; from customer facing applications to B2B system integration and data warehousing. In the last few years Victor has focused his energy in the e-Commerce domain and has been recognized in the Microsoft Commerce Server community with a Microsoft MVP award. Victor is an early adopter of technologies and is always looking for innovation while improving business efficiency through software. Victor is currently the Director of E-Commerce at The Vermont Teddy Bear Company (www.vermontteddybear.com) and its sister companies (www.pajamagram.com and www.calyxflowers.com). Prior to that, Victor was the VP of Development at a boutique consulting firm focused in providing E-Commerce services to Internet Retailer's top 500 companies.  His blog can be found at www.victorocastro.com and he welcomes comments/questions at vcastro@gmail.com or through his twitter account @vcastro (twitter.com/vcastro).