ILUG

Back from three days at the ILUG (Irish Lotus User Group) in Belfast and what a great three days it was. I'm always amazed at the amount I take away from events like these, not only in material I have learned but  in ideas that form in my head on things we should be doing differently.


Paul Mooney and his "green-shirts" did an absolutely outstanding job of organising all of this, giving both their time and their efforts for free. Everything (well most things) ran smoothly and the only sore point I had was my bottom from sitting too much. The team had managed to get a fantastic selection of speakers and software suppliers to participate in the event and I was amazed at how approachable everyone was. The only complaint I had was there wasn't as many coffee breaks as I needed :)


Had to stay in a city centre hotel (Jury's Inn) and taxi it back and forth to the event hotel but that just added to it all. If you ever go to Belfast the traffic is OK every day except Thursday, late night shopping kicks in and everyone seems to go mad. The weather wasn't brilliant but it was November after all. I'd thoroughly recommend Belfast to anyone thinking of going there, a lovely city full of friendly people.


Happy to be back sleeping in my own bed again though, not that the bed in the hotel was uncomfortable, it was just unfamiliar. Back to work on Monday though and looking forward to submitting some change requests for improvements to the system.

Lotus Yellow Day approaching

With Lotus Yellow Day only five days away (11th August 2010 as I write) I think I should have a personal motto to commemorate the day (slightly toungue in cheek though).  I'll let you work out what it says (bear in mind that my Latin is not good and it is approximate).

Superstes in moral altus humus tribuo meus finxi ut Microsoft

Salve Loti!

And so it starts

Today marks the start of the rollout of some new software at work. I've been itching to get going for months now but have been delayed waiting on approval of policies. Keen to get in and start the whole process. Inform staff of what's coming and what they need to do - activate IM in their existing clients and then push out the new client to them. Will take a few weeks to complete but will be a valuable exercise in ensuring the full roll-out to the rest of the company goes smoothly.

Boggle eyed 2

Woke up this morning at 6.30ish and picked up my work laptop to start coding and have only just put it down (excluding comfort breaks). Feeling really boggle eyed now! ;-D

Probably find it difficult to get to sleep tonight what with my brain going 200mph. Up early too as I'm off to Dalkeith for one of my twice weekly visits. If the weather stays good I may go for a walk in the park at lunchtime.

Boggle eyed

Just finished a long stint on my laptop coding a Lotus Notes application for work, about 8 hours worth (minus distractions from SWMBO). Still a way to go yet but it'll be a slicker, quicker application this time round. Previous years were a bit clunky due to the complexity of the process we were following but this time it's so much simpler so the code will be nice and simple too. :)

Going to bed now but will no doubt pick up again in the morning. Yawn!

LCTY09

Spent yesterday in Edinburgh at the "Lotusphere Comes To You" event which was held in the Caledonian Hotel.  Well done IBM for hosting such a great event.

Turned up unfashionably early (08:20) as traffic coming through from Glasgow was unusually light and the threatened traffic chaos due to the Edinburgh City tram project failed to materialise so was able to have a short walk and grab a Costa coffee to get the day started.

Thought I was the only person from work attending, with one of my colleagues from software development meant to be attending but I hadn't had that confirmed when I spot two of them not long after arriving at the hotel.  Then my boss turned up- turns out he was a guest speaker but hadn't mentioned it!

Ed Brill kicked things off with yet another excellent turn (his blog is good too!) and then we listened to two customer cases (one of them my boss) which were illuminating.  It's good to hear what others are doing, especially when their company throws some resources behind the support team!

We then split into two streams, which normally means that my company miss out on tons of information as I am the only attendee, but this time we had it well covered.  Presentations were of good length, so there was a lot of information presented, and as usual were very interesting.  Took lots of notes and will be trying some stuff out today when I get into work.  If I get time (and am allowed) I'll tweet about it as I go along but will definitely post something on my work blog.

Looking forward now to the UK Lotus User Group meeting.