As part of our commitment to being a transparent, community-owned organization, I wanted to share the basic budget for the upcoming Summit. Now that registration is cut off, we have most of our final numbers. Keep in mind that, at live events, things “on the ground” can change quickly - so these are, at present, only our expectations “going in.”
$113,833.51 in net registration fees. This is after paying credit card transaction fees.
-$398.00 for event insurance (already paid)
-$76,466.04 for the venue, which includes A/V, F&B, room rental, etc. (already paid)
-$9,335.01 for speaker lodging (hotel)
-$3,000 for professional event management (including travel for the event manager)
-$1,490 for our registration web site (already paid)
-$1,710.51 for deposit on the European Summit
-$7,500 for speaker reimbursement
That last number is presently the big question; we have some speakers who paid for their registration, and we need to reimburse them. That’s probably about $4,000. We have another $2,500 in promised travel offset fees to speakers doing 3 sessions. We’re trying to reimburse additional travel expenses for other speakers so they’re not totally out of pocket; the final number may be more than $7,500. Right now, that puts us at an event profit of roughly $13,933.95. Again, some of that may end up going to additional speaker reimbursement; the rest will help fund PowerShell.org ongoing activities (like Azure hosting and so forth; I’ll share a full annual operating budget in June, but it’s about $17,000 per year). We have about $20k in payments coming up for the European Summit. We have approximately $92,000 on-hand; much of that will go to the expenses above that are still pending. We should end April with around $65,000 on-hand - a lot of that comes from earning back a $40,000 pre-payment for the N.A. Summit that we made in fiscal 2013-2014. We’ll use some of that $65k to cover the remaining $20k fees on the European Summit; the rest of our cash-on-hand will help provide deposits for the 2015 N.A. Summit, and to fund ongoing operations for 2014-2015. We’re in good financial shape - we’re making a bit more than we need, but not very much - which is right where we want to be. The good news is that, between the Summits and our generous corporate sponsors, we’re on track to actually find the $17k wish-list budget we’ve put together (which we’re still researching and tweaking; as stated, I’ll share the full thing in June). That means we’ll be able to start spinning up services like the VERIFIED EFFECTIVE program, monthly TechSession webinars, and so on.
If you’re attending PowerShell Summit NA 2014 (or wish you were), we have some new logo items for purchase! Buy ’em now and wear ’em to the Summit, including a baseball jersey and a polo shirt. Visit our Zazzle store to buy (or the Canadian store, to save a bit on shipping if you live up there). Note that the items may take about 24 hours to become visible, so check on April 15th in the afternoon if you don’t see them immediately. See you at the Summit!
Paul Higinbotham’s session on threading in PowerShell has been changed, because his content would have overlapped with other sessions. Instead, Paul will be presenting: PowerShell Debugging Enhancements A number of script debugging enhancements were added to PowerShell 4.0 and the WMF 5.0 preview release. In this talk I will discuss these new debugging features and demonstrate how they work. This will include the new support for remote debugging, debugging workflow scripts, debugging PowerShell jobs, ISE enhancements for remote debugging, and the new “Break All” command. We’ll update the schedule grid and abstract document.
PowerShell Summit North America Registration is in full swing, and we’ve got about 50 more spots to reach our break-even goal. Hopefully, those of you that have been holding off for budgetary reasons are now “weapons free” and can plan to join us in April 2014!
Confirmed PowerShell Product Team Presenters
We’ve confirmed a great set of speakers from the team itself, including Jason Shirk, Lee Holmes, Kenneth Hanson, and Hemant Manhawar. Of course, Shell Father Jeffrey Snover will also be presenting a couple of sessions! This helps really round out our agenda, along with several special events that we’ve got planned. You’ll participate in a large-scale Iron Scripter event, mix and mingle with team members in Microsoft’s “top of the world” cafe in downtown Bellevue, and rub elbows with PowerShell experts from all over the world during our pre-event mixer.
So, I got hold of one of the Summit planning spreadsheets and have the list of speaker names. Now, these folks haven’t yet confirmed, so there are obviously possible changes, but here’s who’ll be invited based on their proposals:
Augh, they caught me! The complete session list isn’t yet finalized, and there are a few on the “final cut list” that may not actually physically fit, so stay tuned…
Lotta Jasons in there. Hmm, maybe I shouldn’t put Helmick in charge of this again. He appears to be partial. There’s also several slots for PowerShell product team members that haven’t yet been sorted; they may come in a bit closer to the show, once the team has a better grip on their short-term work schedule. That’s about 63 sessions total. Wow. We’re planning to run continuous sessions from 9am to noon, and then from 1pm to 5pm every day, spread across three tracks. There’ll also be welcome address at 8:15am Monday morning. Please - tell a colleague. Help us get the word out, because this is going to be _amazing. _
I’m looking to hear from folks who attended the PowerShell Summit North America 2013. Specifically, I’d love to hear what you thought of it. What value did you get? If someone were considering attending in 2014, what advice would you offer them? How should they approach the boss? What did you, personally, “take home” from the Summit in the way of new information or skills? Drop a comment below. Some comments might be re-published as standalone posts as we try to help people understand what the Summit is all about, and why they might want to attend. Thanks!
I got a glance at the “short list” of speakers for the PowerShell Summit North America 2014. While none of these names are guaranteed - these guys haven’t even been contacted to confirm - they’ll definitely receive an invite in the next few days. First up, Mike Pfeiffer. This excites me because Mike’s a former MVP, and now a Premier Field Engineer (PFE) with Microsoft. He _literally _wrote the book on managing Exchange Server with PowerShell, and should be a great addition to our new Domain-Specific track. Next, Steven Murawski. I’m betting he’ll be asked to deliver talks on Desired State Configuration (DSC), something he’s been playing with intensely at his job. Yeah, production use of DSC. Ed Wilson’s going to be invited. What’s a Summit without the Scripting Guy?!?!? Ashley McGlone, too - another PFE, which gives us some awesome from-the-field experience, especially from large-scale environments where PFEs tend to work. Should be awesome stuff. I imagine I’ll be invited to speak , along with my often-co-author Jeffery Hicks and PowerShell In Depth co-author Richard Siddaway. Richard’s a WMI master, and his talks in 2013 were very well-received. Jeff, of course, is Jeff - it’ll be a fun talk or two, whatever they’re about. I saw Adam Driscoll’s name on the list (uber-developer with a ton of PowerShell experience), Jason Helmick (I’m hoping he’ll do a deeply in-depth talk on PowerShell Web Access, since he’s pretty much mastered all the not-documented intricacies of setting it up), and a few more. Early November should see the schedule finalized. Stay tuned.
I wanted to share a quick update on PowerShell.org, Inc. First, a couple of Web designer friends of mine have volunteered to do a visual re-theme of the site. Below is some of their early work, and you’re welcome to comment; I’ll just remind you that they’re volunteers and doing this _as a favor. _So be nice! You’ll notice that one of these reflects the layout a smartphone would use, which trims much of the “chrome” in favor of the content. They haven’t tackled the forums yet - that’s harder, and will probably come last.
PowerShell Summit North America 2014, April 28-30 (special precon on April 27) is open for registration to our 2013 alumni, shareholders, and to TechLetter subscribers. The alumni block will be released on August 15, and the subscriber block on September 15th; shortly after, sales will be open to the public. If you’re a shareholder, alumni, or subscriber, and you didn’t get your registration in e-mail, drop me a line (use the Contact link in the Site Info menu). Please only contact me if you’re anxious to register right now, so I don’t get swamped. North America will be in Bellevue, WA, adjacent to Microsoft offices up there; we will
investigate
a move East for the 2015 show, just to perhaps spread the love a bit. We know SEA isn’t the cheapest travel destination. North America’s call for topics should start fairly soon, and that information will be posted here, along with information on how to submit prospective sessions. I won’t be taking the lead on that process, but some of my fellow Board members will be, so watch for their posts. PowerShell Summit Europe 2014 is being tentatively scheduled for September or October 2014. Our city shortlist includes Munich, Milan, and Amsterdam; we’re too far out at this point to make inquiries with prospective venues (they usually work only 8-12 months out), but we’ve assembled a list to contact over the next couple of months. Venue pricing and availability (and suitability) will be a significant set of factors in the final city selection, and we’ll post details right here. You’ll notice a “PowerShell Summit” post category here on PowerShell.org; that’s your one and official source for news and info, with our Summit Page being your one and official source for more static information on both events. You can follow @PSHSummit on Twitter, which will be a good way to receive notifications of new posts here, but which will not contain any information not available on this site. We also try to hashtag #PSHSummit on Twitter, if you’d like to watch out for that.
As you may know, we’re in the process of putting together a PowerShell Summit Europe for Fall 2014. It’s a big task, with a lot of financial risks, so we try to get it right. Folks have been helpful on Twitter in offering city selection ideas… but there’s a bit more involved than just tossing out a city name. With that, here is the selection criteria! Given the information below… AND the fact that Germany/UK/Netherlands (in that order) have been getting the overwhelming majority of “in what cities would you attend the Summit” votes… what cities would YOU recommend we consider? (BTW, this is TOTALLY a chance to “sell” your suggestion - so do so! The criteria below are what’s really important to us, so help us understand how a given city helps meet all of that criteria! And, if you’re willing to help be our local ‘person on the scene’ to help organize, mention that also!) -– City Selection Criteria for PowerShell Summits This guide is intended to provide a framework for selecting an appropriate city and venue for a PowerShell Summit. Understand that a PowerShell Summit is meant to be a continent-level event, meaning the attendance of international speakers and attendees is a given. A PowerShell Summit is conducted primarily, if not entirely, in English, that being the “de facto” language of the technology industry, and the most-common language spoken by expert presenters in the field. A PowerShell Summit is open to everyone, and is not intended to fill the need for regional, culture- or language-specific events of any size. PowerShell.org recognizes the need for, and value of, those more-regional events, but the PowerShell Summit does not seek to full that need or provide that exact same value. Throughout this guide, note that “venue” does not refer to a city. While in casual discussions we may refer to a city name or metropolitan area name - like London or Munich - our venue may not in fact be within the legal limits of such a city or area. “Venue” refers to a specific facility, which may be a hotel or a conference center or other specific location. Our expectation is that most attendees will arrive at the event via common carrier - typically, train or airplane. Some may drive, but our focus is on providing good access for those who do not have their own personal transportation during the event. Criterion 1: Airport Access The first criterion is easy access to a major international airport. This is intended to accommodate the wide variety of attendees expected. In general, the venue should be either within a 15-20 minute drive from an airport by private car (including taxis and shuttle busses), or within a 30-minute ride via mass transit rail (specifically excluding public bus service, but including all levels of rail access). Exception: The airport service area may be widened in instances where a venue offers significant other advantages in other criteria, or where the venue offers specialized access to expert presenters - e.g., using Bellevue for its convenient access to the PowerShell team, despite the fact that it is a ~30 minute ride by private car from SEA-TAC airport and lacks public rail access to the airport. Criterion 2: Local Transit The venue must be well-connected to the local area by mass transit rail (tram, train, metro, etc.). Alternately, the area must offer a variety of amenities within walking distance. Our goal is to minimize the need for rental cars to travel to the event venue from local hotels, restaurants, and other amenities. A 15-minute walking radius is a good “maximum” guideline. Due to this criterion, local parking fees are explicitly not considered during venue selection, although the organization recognizes than some local attendees may be impacted by parking fees. Criterion 3: Evening Amenities The selected venue must be accessible (via local rail transit or short walks) to evening amenities, including hotels, restaurants, and so forth. While the PowerShell Summit will often include evening events, attendees must have independent access to these kinds of amenities. Criterion 4: Price, Quantity, and Quality of Lodging The selected venue must be accessible (via local rail transit or short walks) to hotels of at least 3-star quality (as listed on travel Web sites such as Expedia or Orbitz), with as reasonable a price as possible given the choices of venues under consideration. When possible, the organization will reserve a room block for at least 1/3 of the expected attendance number (with the understanding that room blocks carry significant financial risk, and the organization has a primary goal of mitigating such risk). Additional hotel capacity meeting this criterion must be available, but may not necessarily be reserved, for the event. Criterion 5: Language The selected venue must be in an area where English is commonly spoken, at least by hospitality workers. English need not be the dominant language in the area, but as it is the “common language” of PowerShell, English must at least be commonly understood as a “lingua franca” in order for a maximum number of attendees to be able to navigate the area. Venues that do not meet this criterion may still be viable locations for a regional, cultural-specific event, but might not be qualified for a PowerShell Summit. Criterion 6: Centrality Given all of the other criteria previously listed, it is desirable to have a venue that provides equitable travel access from the majority of the target area. However, the organization recognizes that central location is often the most difficult to achieve in combination with the other criteria listed. Criterion 7: Accessibility The venue must conform with a general international standard of access for disabled persons, and must provide at least basic ability to meet common dietary restrictions, such as vegetarianism. The organization accepts that extremely specific dietary needs, such as cultural or religious needs or allergy concerns, might incur extra costs that would be passed along to the concerned attendee(s). Criterion 8: Appropriateness The venue must provide appropriate meeting facilities. This means the venue must be able to accommodate the expected number of attendees in a comfortable and safe surrounding, and attendees must be able to access the venue without undue overhead (e.g., extensive security checks in an office building, etc.). In multi-track events, meeting rooms should be able to accommodate a 15-20% offset (e.g., in a 300-person event with 300 attendees, each room must be able to handle 120 attendees, to deal with the fact that some sessions will be more popular than others).
