Image:UKLUG’s over, and it was greatManchester is a great city, and luckily we've seen a bit of it. On top of that, if you organize a LUG in the Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI), then there is no other option for us nerds, then to be there.
Warren, Kitty and the rest of the team did a great job, as ever: smooth organizations, top-quality speakers, excellent sponsors, casual atmosphere, lots of attendees. Thanks guys!

As I've started to 'know' quite a lot of people, it's always bliss to see so many old (and young) friends, and have a chance to make new ones.
Sure we had a lot of social events and dinners, and they were memorable, but in the end you come for the sessions, right ?
I did go to quite a few, and did learn a lot:

  • Ted Stanton did a great job in the keynote, and doing good demos too. I was impressed with the analytics stuff.
  • John Head explained the competitive advantage we have in Notes/Domino development. His knowledge about both the IBM and Microsoft world made it absolutely worthwhile.
  • Paul Calhoun showed of the latest version of GBS's Transformer. A cool product to convert existing Notes applications into XPages apps.
  • Peter May gave us some background about how he struggled to became a XPages developer, having a 'classic' Notes development background. Very useful insights indeed!
  • Tim Tripcony did the same session as he did at BLUG, but this time I had the time to attend. And it sure was interesting. Themes make XPages so much more powerful.
  • Another session by Paul Calhoun. XPages Extensions seem to be a must have, but at the same time a 'work in progress'. Having it decently documented and included in a next release, will make it so much more appealing.
  • The speed-sponsoring session, hosted by Bill and Steve is always a blast, and there are always surprise topics (and cool give-aways/prizes).
  • The Introduction to XPages was a 2 hour hands-on, and proved to be highly successful. All XPages gurus where available. Cool.
  • Carl Tyler presented my most favorite session of the event: His personal 23-year experience at IBM and Lotus. Seeing Lotus Notes version 1 (yes 1.0), LIVE, is just mind-blowing. Going into memory lane is always fun, but Carl was sometimes hilarious. Thanks Carl.
  • Paul Mooney's session 'AdminBlast 2011' is not up my alley, but I did learn some useful do's and don'ts in the admin world. Besides, Paul is a great speaker and always fun to go to.
UKLUG is finished as an event, but it will live on for quite a while. Most sessions are available for download too.
Here's some of the picture (and vids) I took. Check out the (long) one where Carl tells the story of his 'Superman' gig.

Hope to see a lot of you (again), and one of the LUGs or Lotusphere/SocialSphere/SoftSphere/...

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