Greetings!
Welcome to the first of my many ramblings on my BE Community blog! Here I will discuss many a thing related to Bentley's products (especially MicroStation), the work we do, tips & tricks, rants, and so on. I might even mention that "other", competing product from time to time. I won't name names, but its initials are AutoCAD.
I must warn you, though - I am a geek and an engineer (silly you thought they were one and the same). That means I really like technology but I am not allowed to have a sense of humor. But I'll speak on computer/hardware stuff around here too.
Which reminds me - one thing at BE 2008 that caught me somewhat off guard was Keith Bentley's hardware talk and the whole "gamer card" thing. I asked a question on the Bentley newsgroups about this, but to hear his response in that context was something I did not expect. It's good to know we can be ordering smokin' video cards for a heck of a lot less money.
Speaking of BE 2008, if you didn't get to go - you missed a good conference. Lots of networking, best practices, BE Awards, the chance to meet a lot of folks from the discussion groups in person... and of course, the chance to hear Voodoo Deville. (Rock on, Guys!) I missed hands-on training, though. I'm still deciding if I like the new format. The focus on practices rather than training works in my opinion....but I'd really rather have had both available; it would have made for a better conference (in my humble or sorta-humble opinion). Due to the lack of training, a lot of users (say, non-decision makers) may not have found the conference as exciting as they'd have liked.
It also seemed too short - I think the one extra day would have been useful to allow more time for actual hands-on training and/or time on the exhibit hall floor. I did appreciate the fact the exhibit hall was open a lot more this time around compared to previous years. Some of the vendors I talked to didn't see as much traffic this go around, though. Probably because most folks - me included - had only a day and a half to hit their solution tracks, visit the vendors, and see the Conference (not to mention Baltimore itself).
Oh well... enough for a First Post. Thanks for reading... and I'll be waiting right here until you get back.
Keep on posting your thoughts on Be. That's what sites like this are for. While I didn't attend this year my bosses did. But what I want to know is what people think about what they saw and heard. That is just as important (if not more so) than attending. So keep on posting... As for Be post there are surprisingly few...
>All these BE posts feel like rubbing our noses in it.
That was definitely *not* my intent... :-( I think that there are lots of BE posts now since 1) BE just wrapped and 2) a lot of folks found about about BE Communities at BE itself, including Yours Truly.
>Speaking of BE 2008, if you didn't get to go - you missed a good conference.
Yeah well, perhaps a few thousand miles, a week off work and loads of expense may have had something to do with me not going. All these BE posts feel like rubbing our noses in it.