PDC 2009

It's always great to be able to take a step back from the daily grind of the projects and take a look at the bigger picture. Microsoft PDC 2009 provided me that opportunity this year. The nutshell that I got out of it:

• User interfaces are starting to see a revolution. We are quickly moving beyond mouse and keyboard to touch and sensor (heat, movement, camera [for instance as a scanner], voice, location, etc.) enabled interfaces. The Microsoft Surface, for instance combined with medical applications or interactive business intelligence, is a great example. More intuitive interaction with complex data or processes is the final goal.
• Cloud computing will grow quickly. It provides a compelling on-demand environment that can integrate with your local data center. A service oriented architecture is a natural fit for scalable load-balanced cloud computing.
• REST-ful services are changing the service landscape due to the ease with which they can be consumed. The Microsoft Open Data Access services with query capabilities are being fully integrated with SharePoint 2010, making SharePoint increasingly a data integration platform. The goal is being able to create mash ups of any data on any client or device.
• Parallel computing, either at cloud level or processor core level, is finally becoming a common scenario. Tools and programming environments are increasingly supporting parallel processing.
• Silverlight is at the point that I am seriously considering it a an alternative for business web applications. Working with large amounts of data is increasingly supported out-of-the-box. Silverlight 4.0 will also provide the option of running the application out of the browser.
• AppFabric is the new service layer for applications, providing functionality like caching, workflow and service bus. I can see the AppFabric layer growing in the future with additional services that applications can utilize.