Microsoft SharePoint Conference 2012 - Recap

by Tobias Zimmergren

Author: Tobias Zimmergren
http://www.zimmergren.net | http://www.tozit.com | @zimmergren

Introduction

Better late than never for the post-SPC article I suppose. I was in Las Vegas at the Microsoft SharePoint Conference this year (2012) attending some great (and some not so great) sessions about SharePoint 2013. During the week I’ve met many old friends, made some new friends and had a blast every single day.

This will be a fairly short story, mentioning the sessions I liked and talking about some of the events that happened during our stay in Vegas.

What happened at SPC12?

Well, everything happened:

  • We had a majorly awesome SharePint at EyeCandy.
  • I was on a panel in the SharePoint Conference TV.
  • AvePoint had their legendary RedParty.
  • Axceller had an awesome event where Pamela Anderson appeared. The geeks were thrilled, to say the least.
  • Bon Jovi made an appearance and gave us a great show at Mandalay Bay.
  • We saw a lot of great SharePoint SharePoint Sessions.
  • Networking with peers.

Recommended sessions

Instead of shouting about all the new fancy details in how SharePoint 2013 will make your everyday easier, I’d like to shout out to a few of my friends who also gave some of the (in my opinion, of the ones I attended) best performances at SPC12.

Scot Hillier’s JavaScript sessions

Scot did a total of three sessions, two of which I attended with great pleasure and the third one didn’t fit my schedule:

A primer in HTML5 and JavaScript (SPC005)

[blockquote]The Office and SharePoint new Cloud App Model that lights up HTML and JavaScript development. This session will be a primer into all that HTML5 and Javascript have to offer and the best practices for using them. You will learn about HTML5, JSON, jQuery and much more…[/blockquote]

JavaScript best practices for developing Apps (SPC136)

[blockquote]SharePoint 2013 introduces a new app model, which is heavily-reliant on client-side programming with JavaScript. While SharePoint developers often have strong server-side programming skills, their client-side programming skills are generally weaker. In this session, we will review the best practices for using JavaScript in SharePoint 2013 apps. We will start by presenting the various patterns for creating libraries in JavaScript that are reusable and maintainable. We will then cover the fundamentals of the REST and CSOM object models. Finally, we will show how to utilize key supporting libraries like jQuery and Knockout. The session will culminate with the presentation of a complete Model-View-ViewModel (MVVM) app demonstrating all of the best practices. Attendees will exit the session ready to start developing SharePoint 2013 apps.[/blockquote]

Kirk Evans’ Client Side Rendering session

Kirk is a personal friend of mine and an awesome guy overall. I expected a lot from him, but he blew the roof with this session. I think this is some great content and man is there a ton of awesome things to consider in the SharePoint 2013 box. If you can review one single session from the entire conference, go for this one. At least that’s what I’d do!

Client Side Rendering in SharePoint Server 2013 (SPC040)

[blockquote]SharePoint Server 2013 provides a new way of rendering content to the browser using client side rendering. This new way of rendering leverages web standard technologies like jQuery, JSON and REST to render data in a clearer and simpler way than before. In this session, you will learn these techniques for creating different types of views of data in SharePoint 2013.[/blockquote]

Eric Schupps’ Helpdesk App session

So if you’re curious about what Apps has to offer in SharePoint 2013, this is THE session you should review. Eric’s doing a great job of showing off some capabilities in a real-world application usage for SharePoint Apps in SharePoint 2013. Way to go Eric!

A Real-World Help Desk App: End-to-End (SPC006)

[blockquote]This session will go over the nuts and bolts of a real world app scenario that we all know and love… Help desk support. During the session, we will look at the overall architecture the app as well as review the code of key components of the app itself. Finally, the session will describe the learnings found that every SharePoint developer will want to know.[/blockquote]

Summary

There were tons of great sessions (and some not so great, but that’s a different story altogether) at the conference. Should someone ask me if I would go again the answer would obviously be "Of course, it was awesome. And I like awesomeness."

See you next time folks!