Virgin on the Ridiculous

Tonight I had to fly back to the UK. I'm a tall person. On the way out Virgin Atlantic were kind enough to swap my seat for one near the emergency exit so that I could sit with my legs in front of me. On a normal seat I just can't do this, so it is always nice when an airline makes an allowance for my particular shape. 

On the way back Virgin Atlantic were also happy to swap my seat. As long as I paid them 75 dollars. I thought that stank. I paid up though, since the prospect of nearly nine hours sat with my knees above my ears and no circulation in my feet did not appeal. Are they really so strapped for cash that they have to resort to ripping off people who have no choice in the matter? Up until that point I had been very impressed with the airline, who seem to have the most chirpy and upbeat cabin staff I've ever encountered.  Now I'm a bit less pleased. I've emailed customer relations (I'm reaching the age where I can dash off "Yours, disgusted" emails quite quickly) and we will see what happens.

Inside Orlando Airport. Big place.

.NET Micro Framework for Card Sharps

Today was the day that Roger and I hit the stage to present the Micro Framework. I did the easy bit (the slides) and Roger did the hard bit (the demos). This arrangement worked fine for me.

Getting set up

We had a good sized audience, and they were polite enough to laugh at most of my jokes (I've never had anyone actually laugh at all of my jokes - and this is probably just as well). I did my bit and then Roger took over for the demo.

I didn't know exactly what he was going to do. We had rehearsed the timings and I knew he would be using two Micro Framework boards which he had managed to connect using the Zigbee wireless protocol. The only other thing I knew was that we would be playing poker with the boards. What he did though just blew me away, literally and in a card playing context too.

He had a very pretty program in which two C# programs were running, passing card data and plays between the two devices. So we played poker. I'm not very good at poker. If the money isn't real I just bet huge amounts and try to bluff every time. If the money is real I just leave the game out of cowardice.

Anyhoo, we started playing and I kept raising. Towards the end Roger decided that it would be really nice for him if the next card that was dealt was a six. So he stopped the program running inside his embedded device, tweaked the deck so that the top card was the six of hearts, and then continued the program. He got the six, and I got the shaft. This was a fantastic demonstration of the power of the embedded environment that you get with the Micro Framework, and a lesson to me never to play poker by computer.

Then we went off and reprised the whole session for a webcast.

Prime Outlet Shopping

After a morning on the booth telling people they were now embedded developers as well (most people with C# and Visual Studio 2005 are, thanks to the .NET Micro Framework) it was time to head out for some shopping. I quite like strange watches, and I knew that at the Prime outlet there was a Fossil watch outlet store.

My plan was to catch a bus up to the top of International Drive, have a wander round and then catch another back. As I was leaving the conference hall I heard a strange sound, like a very long round of applause. It was the rain on the roof. Lots of rain. I carefully charted my route back to the hotel so that I was under cover for most of the way, except for the last 50 yards.

I got soaked. In Florida, when it rains it rains. Muchly. After a complete change of clothes I ventured out again, but standing at a bus stop was not a plan. So I was forced to spend a goodly chunk of cash on a taxi ride instead.

I much prefer buses to taxis. In a bus I reckon you have safety in numbers. Being alone in a taxi cab with a person I've never met always makes me nervous. In a bus, even if the driver does turn out to be an axe wielding maniac with a passion for driving off cliffs you have a few people with you to help take him on. In a taxi it is strictly one on one. Also, with a bus when it stops at the lights or in traffic there is no worry about the price going up. In a taxi I can always see that number steadily rising, and making me poorer. And I always think that the taxi driver will spot that I'm from out of town and take me to my destination via Brazil or something.  Having said all this the taxi drive was, like just about every one I've ever had, smooth and uneventful and within around 15 minutes I was at the Prime discount mall.

Which was a dump. I'd taken a camera so that I could snag some pictures, but there was nothing worth photographing. Everywhere had an air of decay and moving on, I suspect there must be other discount malls in Florida doing well, because this one was more than a bit quiet. Anyhoo, I found the watch shop and after a long and happy search through the display (I like looking at watches, OK?) I selected one for me and one for number one wife.

On the way back I was lucky to walk straight onto a bus which took me right back to the hotel.

View from a bus

The path to enlightenment

Have you ever thought that there is more to life than you know? That there some fundamental truths out there, just beyond your grasp? And that knowing these truths will empower you in ways that could change your life forever?

Well, I've no idea about that kind of stuff myself, but if you come along to our session at TechEd 2007 on Thursday at 11:30  (LNC16 room N210B) Roger Wolff and I will show you how to take your C# and Visual Studio 2005 skills and use them to power tiny embedded devices.

You will also be privy to what could be the worlds first Zigbee powered poker game, and learn my current favourite joke in all the world.

If you are not lucky enough to be in Orlando, you can always catch up on the session in the webcast. Sign up here.

Play poker with your fridge

Another day on the stand describing the Micro Framework. Half way through an explanation I mentioned to one chap that on Thursday in our lunchtime session Roger will be demonstrating his program that lets you play wireless poker using Zigbee devices connected to a Micro Framework board. The delegate thought about this for a moment. "You mean the .NET Micro Framework lets you play poker against your fridge?" he asked.

I can't think of a better way of putting it. You can easily add lots of intelligence to a tiny device, and then connect it to other things to make life interesting. Although in that situation a poor poker player might starve to death, or at least have to drink black coffee for the rest of their life.....

After stand duty it was time to head up to a demonstration of the framework. I had been invited to provide some closing remarks (nobody can close down an event better than me) and so I told everyone there about one of my major claims to fame - around 10 years or so I wrote some code which helps put datestamps on bottles of Budweiser beer. There was no .NET Micro Framework then, of course, so the application was forged in the hell of cross compiling, no debugging, and code that had to be strange "just so it would work". I made the point that if I was doing the job today it would take me a lot less time, and be much more fun to do. You can read one report of the event here - it is great to hear nice things about the platform.

On the way to the event I poked the camera out of the bus window and grabbed a few snaps.

Apparently "Inverted pimply pyramid" means "Titanic Museum" in Orlando

Believe it or not

Nirvana in a box?