PDC 2008

I was at PDC 2008 last week.  There’s been a lot of coverage of the keynotes – I really got the sense that these keynotes were marking an important point in all things computer-related.  If you missed the keynotes, you can watch them online (day 1, day 2 and day 3.)  Beyond the keynotes, I was impressed by the number of delegates and the required logistics.  There was some great content outside the keynotes, too.  There were three sessions that stood out for me:

Dynamic Languages and .NET – If you have any interest in .NET, you must watch this session.  The evolution of the .NET platform to accommodate dynamic languages has some unexpected bonus side-effects.

.NET Services – Clemens Vasters explains the .NET Service bus, which solves a bunch of otherwise difficult problems.

Contract Checking and Automated Test Generation with Pex – I’ve always been interested in design by contract because it makes the intent of your code clearer and should reduce the need for a lot of grunt tests.  This session shows how this functionality is coming to .NET and how Pex can help.  Eye-opening.

I heard and learned a lot last week.  I think we’ll be hearing echoes of this conference for quite some time.