Tag: Microsoft (Page 3 of 4)

SQL Saturday Recap: #410 – Chattanooga, TN

June 29, 2015 / jpries

SQL Saturday Roundup: #410 – Chattanooga, TN

This past weekend, I had the privilege of volunteering to help Chattanooga, TN execute their first SQL Saturday — SQL Saturday 410! Being only about a two hour drive from where I live, I was very happy to see another nearby city launch a new SQL Saturday event. For a first-run event, the event went very smoothly and I witnessed no show-stopping glitches. While there were small things that could be improved here and there (there always are), I felt the event was executed very well and everybody seemed to enjoy themselves. All told, there were about six full sponsor tables setup in the registration area and a couple of the typical raffle-only sponsors. I assisted with event photos and room proctoring. And, of course, Micron was present again with their always popular bacon-scented t-shirt!

Despite being a new event, the organizers managed to recruit a good number of speakers and managed to fill out 6 different tracks of 5 time slots. A great feat! I’ve seen longer running events with fewer sessions available. A good number of sessions helps to increase the diversity and ensures that there is “something for everybody.” The venue itself worked out great with ample parking, ample rooms, and ample space in rooms. Only the first session I attended was near capacity, which was great (since nobody wants to miss a session due to not enough seats).

All told, I had a great time at the first SQL Saturday Chattanooga and I felt the event was very well done and I look forward to future events from the Chattanooga crew!

Registration and sponsor area

SQL Saturday Recap: #392 – Atlanta, GA

May 19, 2015 / jpries

SQL Saturday Roundup: #392 – Atlanta, GA

This past Saturday a time-honored event was held in Alpharetta, GA. That tradition, straight out of past — or is it future? was SQL Saturday Atlanta. Called by some the “PASS Summit of the South,” SQL Saturday Atlanta was the 392nd event in the SQL Saturday series and continues the yearly streak in Atlanta since SQL Saturday #13 in 2009.

It seems each year, the stakes are raised higher and higher as far as size, quality, and theme — and this year was no exception. With this summer marking the 30th anniversary of Back to the Future, it seems appropriate that the event was called Back to SQL Saturday and given a full, over-the-top Back to the Future theme. But, before we talk about Saturday, we first have to travel back in time — to Friday…

SQL Saturday Recap: #391 – Jacksonville, FL

May 11, 2015 / jpries

SQL Saturday Roundup: #391 – Jacksonville, FL

Being only about a 5 hour drive away, when I saw the session schedule for SQL Saturday Jacksonville publish this year, I couldn’t resist signing up for a road trip down. A session list rich with professional development and data visualization topics, both of which I tend to really enjoy. So, on Friday, I hopped into the car and had a nice drive down to Jacksonville for SQL Saturday 391, and it didn’t disappoint!

As per usual, the event was very smoothly run. Check-in was quick and painless (thanks, SpeedPass), and the sponsor area was easy to navigate with many familiar faces. Always good to see repeat sponsors! With a jam packed day of sessions, it was time to get started.

The first session I attended for the day was Mike Davis’s (B | T) presentation on Handling Interview Puzzles. Being someone who conducts a fair number of interviews myself, I was interested in hearing some opinions on those strange and sometimes difficult puzzle questions sometimes asked in interviews. The session did not disappoint with a number of great examples, many of which has been used at some point by Google.

Mike Davis presenting “Interview Puzzles and How to Handle Them”

SQL Saturday Recap: #363 – Nashville, TN

January 19, 2015 / jpries

SQL Saturday Roundup: #363 – Nashville, TN

This past weekend, I made the trek to Nashville, TN to visit Lipscomb University for SQL Saturday #363: Nashville and it proved to be a fantastic event. It’d been a couple of years since I’d had a chance to visit Nashville for a SQL Saturday — my last was SQL Saturday #145 in 2012, so I was excited to return!

I arrived on Thursday evening to allow me time to attend a precon being presented by by Stacia Misner (B | T) and Joseph D’Antoni (B | T) — Finding Your Balance: BI in the Cloud, On Premises, or Both since the Cloud is already such a hot topic and most migration efforts typically begin with some form of hybrid effort. It doesn’t hurt that they wrote Microsoft’s official white paper on the topic, either.

The precon was given at the Second Harvest Food Bank of Middle Tennessee which I thought was a pretty interesting venue. At first, when I saw that listed on the event page, I figured that had to be a mistake. But sure enough, that’s exactly where it was. While the Food Bank is a large warehouse full of food, they also have conference rooms on the second floor where events such as this can take place. All in all, it turned out to be a great venue — certainly better than the hotel meeting room venues I’ve been in.

Stacia Misner and Joseph D’Antoni presenting Finding Your Balance: BI in the Cloud, On Premises, or Both

SQL Saturday Recap: #330 – Charlotte, NC

October 5, 2014 / jpries

SQL Saturday Roundup: #330 – Charlotte, NC

Fall is definitely conference season. With SQL Saturday Orlando last weekend and PASS Summit 2014 the first week of November, what could be more fun that squeezing in another SQL Saturday in between?

With Charlotte being nearby, as well as a BI-focused event that I’d intended in the past, it seemed like a no-brainer to make the drive up to check it up for its 3rd year running. So, Friday after work, I hopped in the car and made the drive up to beautiful Charlotte, NC to attend my 13th SQL Saturday!

Unfortunately, with October being a very busy month as is, I didn’t have time to attend anything but the main event itself, but such is the way of the busiest month of the year!

I arrived at the site of the 3rd SQL Saturday Charlotte, Central Piedmont Community College, bright and early Saturday morning. As per usual, signage to parking was very clear and check-in with a pre-printed speedpass was a breeze.

Sponsors were arranged in a long row throughout the center of the building and were very easily accessible while moving between sessions. Seemed like a good representation of sponsors with a few I hadn’t seen before and excellent raffle prizes.

The morning kicked off with a short presentation in the auditorium to introduce the organizers and sponsors as well as logistics for the day. With the conclusion of the opening remarks, we were off to start the day of sessions!

Opening remarks at SQL Saturday #330

SQL Saturday Recap: #318 – Orlando, FL

September 28, 2014 / jpries

SQL Saturday Roundup: #318 – Orlando, FL

This past Saturday, I made my annual trek down to Orlando, FL for SQL Saturday #318 at Seminole State College. I’ve learned you can always count on the Orlando team to put on a great event, and this one was no exception. With over 600 registrations and over 450 in attendance, this was one of the larger SQL Saturdays in the region and in my opinion, it went off without a hitch!

On Friday morning, I left Atlanta and began the drive down to Orlando. I would’ve liked to have been able to attend Jason Horner’s (B | T) “Zero to Dimensional Modeling Hero” pre-con session, but that would’ve required an extra day and with how busy things currently are, that just wasn’t in the cards this time.

I’d been following Andy Warren’s (B | T) blog posts regarding marketing for the even leading up to it and was pretty happy to see that they were able to exceed both their registration goal of 500 and their attendance goal of 350 by 640 and 450 respectively. Well done! He really worked hard getting the message out there and it worked.

Saturday morning, I got up bright and early and headed over from the hotel to the campus. Signage was great and convenient parking was easily found. Having printed my SpeedPASS in advance, check-in was a breeze. Additionally, I got to pick up my SQL Saturday Orlando polo at check-in, which came out really nice!

SQL Saturday Orlando polo shirt, sold online prior to the event. Came out great!

SQL Saturday Recap: #328 – Birmingham, AL

August 30, 2014 / jpries

SQL Saturday Roundup: #328 – Birmingham, AL

This past Saturday, I had the pleasure of trekking to nearby Birmingham, AL for SQL Saturday #328. Seeing as Birmingham is so close to Atlanta and I hadn’t been to a SQL Saturday event since the Atlanta event in May, I figured this would be a great opportunity to make a short road trip to a venue I’d not yet attended.

The first SQL Saturday I attended was in Columbus, GA in September of 2012. Since then, I’ve attended 12 events of varying sizes. I found Birmingham to be very similar to the Columbus event — a small attendee base, but great speakers and a huge Atlanta presence. It looked like quite a few of us made the trek out to Birmingham!

I arrived at the registration desk and check-in was very smooth. As always, I had my SpeedPASS pre-printed and cut out…always make sure to do this, it saves a ton of time!

Being a smaller event, the venue was a tad confusing — a single 1-hall building with sessions and sponsors on both the first and second floors. Despite the initial confusion of finding all of the rooms and sponsors, it was pretty smooth after that.

Samford University campus at SQL Saturday 328

SQL Saturday Recap: #285 – Atlanta, GA

May 8, 2014 / jpries

SQL Saturday Roundup: #285 – Atlanta, GA

It’s that time of year again! This past Saturday, I had the pleasure of attending the annual SQL Saturday event here in Atlanta (well, Alpharetta, really) and, as always, it was a great time.

SQL Saturday Atlanta is always a pleasure since being local means no travel necessary (hooray) and it’s always a top-notch production. This year was no exception as the event had a great line-up of pre-cons and speakers and was very well executed.

I started off my SQL Saturday weekend by attending Teo Lachev’s (B | T) pre-con session, Deep Dive into the Microsoft BI Semantic Model (BISM). Check-in for the pre-con was a very smooth process and we were each given a giant packet of all of the printed slides for the session. Additionally, the pre-con sessions had what I’d call the best breakfast I’ve seen at a SQL Saturday event, which included a buffet of hot food items such as eggs, etc.

Teo Lachev presenting his BISM deep dive pre-con session at SQL Saturday Atlanta

The pre-con session itself had a great turnout and Teo did an excellent job presenting a very large amount of material in the given time. All in all, it was a great day and time well spent!

SQL Saturday Recap: #237 – Charlotte, NC

October 24, 2013 / jpries

SQL Saturday Roundup: #237 – Charlotte, NC

Following the incredible PASS Summit 2013 in Charlotte, the Charlotte BI Group was gracious to host another edition of SQL Saturday – BI Edition.

As I was already in Charlotte for Summit (and would’ve drive to Charlotte for this event anyway if I hadn’t been at Summit) I took advantage of the opportunity to keep the week of connecting, learning, and sharing with the community for one last day.

This is the second year that CBIG has hosted a SQL Saturday BI Edition and it actually marks the first SQL Saturday that I’ve attended twice in a row (as I really started getting into SQL Saturday last year with Columbus, GA).

As the first SQL Saturday that I’ve attended two years in a row, I thought the event went very well. There seemed to be a good number of attendees and a lot of big name speakers. Many of the speakers from Summit stayed the extra day to present at SQL Saturday, though I was surprised that it didn’t seem there were as many attendees from Summit at SQL Saturday that I would have thought. There were some though and it was fun to identify each other. Lunch was an excellent BBQ with a number of sides and various lunch time presentations. I’ve had a lot of BBQ these past couple days, but it was still great!

PASS Summit 2013 Roundup — The Adventures of a First Timer

October 23, 2013 / jpries

PASS Summit 2013 Roundup — The Adventures of a First Timer

Wow, what a ride. For the past year, attending various SQL Saturday and other events, I’ve heard the whisperings of PASS Summit in sessions and hallways. This past week, it finally arrived and at last I had the opportunity to attend my first PASS Summit.

The whispers couldn’t possibly prepare me for what a truly amazing and motivational experience it was! Summit was a non-stop week of connecting, learning, and sharing combined with a lot of fun and #sqlfamily that can only be rivaled by future summits (since all of my fellow first timers which I spoke to are now also completely hooked on the event)

I registered for PASS Summit 2013 all the way back in December of 2012. It’s a bit of a gamble that something won’t come up when you register nearly a year in advance, but by registering that early, you can get some pretty deep discounts on Early Bird registration. Plus, since you’re now invested, you can build anticipation and look forward to the event for almost an entire year! Early Bird Registration for 2014 goes until December 6th this year, so I’ll probably do the same again.

Monday– Prep! I took the day off from work to get things done before heading out of town for the week. I’d heard from multiple people that you don’t sleep during Summit, so I planned to head to bed early so I’d start the week well rested. I finished packing and went to bed a little after 1 am. Whoops, so much for that.

Tuesday – I got up bright and early to begin my drive from Duluth, GA to Charlotte. My goal was to arrive in Charlotte just early enough to get parked and checked in in time for the First Timer’s “Get to Know Your Community” meeting. I planned to hit a couple of notable geocaches along the way, making for a longer but leisurely drive.

Ultimately, I took a bit too long on the drive up and I missed the First Timers “Get to Know Your Community” session, but I made it just in time for the First Timers Orientation session. The orientation session was great and I was very happy to see so many well-known vets (sporting their stylish propeller beanies) in the crowd supporting us first timers.