Shedding Some Light

Today is one of those big days here at Geek Gatherings because we officially announce the speakers and sessions for Southwest Fox 2013 and Southwest Xbase++ 2013. All the details can be found on the Speakers page.

Combined with the two conferences is 45 sessions (white papers for all), 6 pre-conference sessions, a keynote and lots of the usual networking opportunities with tons of fun thrown in too.

Registration opens later this month

White Light Computing is a platinum sponsor again this year.

You can stay up to date on announcements via Twitter too: @swfox and @swxbase

I hope to see everyone in October. Only 169 days until we gather in Gilbert!

The Ceil Silver Ambassador Fund brings a developer to the Southwest Fox conference as an ambassador for the developers in his or her country. This gives the recipient the opportunity to meet and share experiences with developers attending Southwest Fox and gives other attendees the opportunity to learn about VFP development in the recipient’s country. The trip is paid for by the VFP community’s donations to the Fund.

Nominations

We are looking for nominations from the VFP community for the 2013 recipient. The Ambassador selection committee consists of Southwest Fox organizers Rick Schummer, Tamar Granor, and Doug Hennig, former Ambassadors Emerson Santon Reed, Cesar Chalom, Bernard Bout, Borislav Borissov, and Jun Tangunan, and VFP community members Christof Wollenhaupt and Rick Bean. To nominate someone you think deserves to be selected, please email their name and a brief list of their contributions to the VFP community to ambassadorfund@swfox.net. Names must be submitted no later than May 31, 2013.

Donations

In addition, we are looking for donations to allow us to pay for the travel costs for the ambassador. We urge you to consider donating any amount you see fit, small or large, to this fund. See the Ceil Silver Ambassador Fund page for details. 100% of donated money goes to the travel costs for the ambassador. Not a single penny is used to cover administrative costs. All time managing the fund and working through the selection process is donated. No one is paid for their time.

Thank you for any donation you make.

Note: if you want to send in a donation via PayPal, please mark it as a “gift” so we do not incur transaction fees.

Southwest Fox and Southwest Xbase++ 2013 announcement!

Save the dates of October 17-20, 2013.

We’ve issued the Call for Speakers for both conferences. If you are interested in presenting at either conference, please check out our Call for Speakers Doc and consider submitting sessions via our new Web-based submission application developed by the White Light Computing team.

White Light Computing is a Platinum sponsor for the seventh consecutive year, and a conference sponsor all ten years!

Here are a few last-minute things about this year’s conferences:

• Due to unforeseen circumstances, the Kokopelli scheduling application will not be available this year.
• We are streaming the keynote presentation again this year, Thursday at 7:00 p.m. Mountain Standard Time (Arizona does not observe Daylight Savings Time): http://www.ustream.tv/channel/swfoxtv
• The conference guide (http://www.swfox.net/ConferenceGuide.pdf) is now available for download. Please download and read it because there are important details about the conference you need to know. This is the only copy of the guide you are getting; in our continuing efforts to make our conference greener, we are not printing them this year.

And yes, there is still some time to register.

Yet another reason to attend Southwest Fox and Southwest Xbase++ 2012! All registered attendees at Southwest Fox and Southwest Xbase++ are eligible to win one of two one-year subscriptions for Visual Studio Professional with MSDN. Register today: http://www.swfox.net/register.aspx

Over on the Southwest Fox blog someone asked the following question in the comments for our post announcing the Windows 8 keynote:

Why have MS promote their products when they don’t care about developers? MS discontinued VFP.

Comments often get lost, and sometimes people read the posts without looking at the comments, so I am going to post my answer here.

It is a good question. This is not about promoting Windows 8, this is about educating Visual FoxPro and Xbase++ developers on a new operating system their customers are eventually going to consider and use in their businesses. You need knowledge to help guide your customers and users. This session is going to help you learn the advantages and pitfalls of Windows 8 and how it is going to affect your customers’ business.

Jennifer is not a marketing person, she is a developer and has lots of good information to share with other developers. This keynote is about helping developers get past the pundits and press, and down to the nuts and bolts of the next OS developers have to consider when deploying applications. Plain and simple.

What is one of the most common concerns about the future for VFP developers? Answer: will my applications continue to run on the next Windows?  Xbase++ developers want to know new features their applications can work with too.

Someone on the ProFox listserver asked the question:

For many years, I have wanted to attend a conference such as the SW Fox 2012. For me, this is a very long trip, and airfares alone as substantial.  In your opinion, are these conferences worth while.

So I responded…

As you might know, I am one of the organizers and speakers of Southwest Fox so my opinion is a twisted and biased one. Buyer beware.

It is my belief that conferences are for a lot of people, but not for everyone. Those who do not learn from listening to others speak might not benefit from the conference. If you don’t learn things by reading a white paper you might consider skipping the conference. Those who do not benefit from networking should not come, after all it is like a forum or listserver or Twitter, but live and in HD. That bothers some people. If you prefer learning about vendor products by reviewing a Web site instead of talking to a sales person in person, then a conference might not be for you. If you prefer to eat alone, and not talk shop at every meal, then a conference is not really a good idea.

On the other hand, if you want to learn more about your craft, hear of tools that integrate with your favorite development platform, expand your mind past your normal comfort zone, and meet like-minded people, there is a good chance Southwest Fox might be a perfect fit for you.

Early-bird deadline has been extended until September 5th, so we can save you $50 for use on your bar/food bill when you are out networking with some of the finest people in our community. If you are going to sign up, I’d suggest learning to the FoxShow teaser interview with the SWFox organizers for a special offer.

I hope to see many of you in Gilbert in 45 days!

One last quick reminder: you can save $50 by registering with the early-bird registration discount. The deadline is this Friday, August 31st. Every registered attendee gets admission to all regular conference sessions, whether part of Southwest Fox or Southwest Xbase++, and white papers for all Southwest Fox sessions. http://www.swfox.net

As a personal favor, if you have not already, please register now!