VMWare at TechEd Europe 2005 Day 1

OK, so kind of an interesting topic for a Microsoft employee presenting at TechEd about Virtual Server and Virtual PC. However, if you're over at TechEd this week, drop into booth B29. They're a great bunch of guys - we had some interesting discussions comparing Virtual PC to VMWare Workstartion 5, Virtual Server to GSX, and finding out more about ESX and just a general chat. I gave one of them a keyboard brush with Virtual Server 2005 stamped on it which sits on top of your monitor, and was trying to persuade them to pop it on their monitor in the booth. Unfortunately, they bottled it once the stand opened this morning to the public, although I'm assured it will work its way back to their offices. I have another one, so I'll post up a photo of it when I can - however I only have the phone camera at the moment and don't think I have my USB lead to hook it up to my laptop over here. Maybe I should start something like the Channel 9 guy on his travels, but have the Virtual Server Keyboard Cleaner man instead. Maybe I could start his very own blog :-)

I haven't had much opportunity to attend sessions today as I've been busy manning the "Ask the Experts" stand and working on my presentations for Thursday and Friday. I did go through an interesting instructor-led hands-on-lab about VSTO - you can now write Managed Code to write add-ins for Outlook. This is way cool for me having a significant number of years dev background with Outlook and Exchange. If only it had have been around a couple of years ago.....