Ignite : Easier, Smarter, Faster and Safer... and Beyoncé?

For anyone who doesn’t know Ignite is the biggest single IT conference in the world and is Microsoft's enterprise technology showcase.  One of Microsoft big four events, the others are:

• Convergence – for Business Leaders seeking to explore emerging trends, discover new solutions and realize the opportunity to achieve more.
• //Build – for Developers looking for the latest vision and direction from Microsoft.
• Worldwide Partner Conference (WPC) – for Partners focusing on how they can drive business growth with us and our partner channel to deliver solutions

Anyway, I thought I share my first impressions. It's going to take me weeks to consume and digest it all, but here's my first take on it all.

If I were to sum up all the content I’ve consumed in four words, I’d say:

Easier, Smarter, Faster and Safer

On a personal level, humans are busy and there’s lots of information. Microsoft will make the easier for us all by:

• Using AI and associated technologies to assist in filtering the firehose of data and making focusing on the important things easier.
• This will also enable us to make smarter decisions
• This will therefore allow us to get stuff done faster and make us more productive
• Because it's all in the MSFT cloud, out data will be secure and safer than ever before.

On the technology side it’s the same story:

• Using the MSFT tools and building blocks will make it easier for enterprises to build solutions
• Cortana, Machine Learning, Big Data etc. Will allows business to be more agile and smarter.
• Azure is faster, they improved the speed of everything! Also enterprises can be more agile because of the tooling and solution/platform flexibility.
• Again, because it's all in the MSFT cloud, out data will be secure and safer than ever before.

Microsoft are phrasing it differently of course, they call it Create, Build and Reinvent, but I prefer mine!

Microsoft are still talking Mobile first, Cloud First, a message we first heard back in 2015. The story is becoming clearer as Microsoft continue to expand on their vision of a truly connected enterprise.

The cloud story is pretty clear now, the mobile one is still emerging and is slightly more nuanced.

Mobile First?

MSFT seems to have moved away from worrying about supplying the devices themselves. Whether they are just tacitly giving up on it, or whether it is more strategic than that it's difficult to discern. Remember that the Nokia purchase didn't happen under Satya's watch. Regardless, now with Xamarin, Hockey App and the recent changes to VSTS, it's obvious that Microsoft is focusing on enabling cross platform mobile development.

In the productivity space it's a similar story. Microsoft are doing everything to make its productivity apps the preferred choice regardless of the device you are running. Want Word on a mac, Outlook on an iPad, Skype on an Android? Of course you can. You can even ditch Siri in favor of Cortana, though I don't know how she'll respond to the rejection.

From a security point of view, that's all change too. The consolidation of a number of cloud based technologies around Enterprise Mobility Suite (EMS) and the switch in focus from the traditional IT model of micromanaging devices to a more open user centric, secure digital asset centric model all starts to make sense.

They don't want your phone any more, they just want their software running on it, and that makes a hell of a lot of sense.

 Expo Hall

As well as the usual suspects (Dell, IBM, HP, Avanarde, etc..) there are always a number of smaller tech companies. Reviewing them is always a good opportunity to get a pulse on the general state of the MSFT ecosystem.

Last year the exhibitors seemed to be caught by surprise by how hard MSFT went at the cloud. A lot of them were touting on premise solutions that did not align with anything MSFT was saying in the sessions. This year it’s a lot more on message. Everything is cloud, even things that aren’t cloud are seemingly cloud. For example, last year there were a lot of on-prem Skype for business exhibitors. If they are here this year, I’ve not seen them. Governance\Compliance\Migration\Hybrid\Security seemed to be the focus for a lot of vendors.

 Things I’ve focused on

Azure, particularly Containerization, DevOps, Mobile, PaaS, and Analytics. Lots of great content, my brain is still melting from trying to consume it all! I can almost imagine my next project... A cloud first, mobile first solution, a fully automated delivery pipeline, integrated monitoring and feedback. A backend built on top of Azure PaaS... Probably unicorns and kittens too... I Think I may have sat through one too many presentations. 

Stuff I’ve Ignored so far.

Lots and lots of other things going on here, something like 200 sessions a day. I’ve not been able to attended sessions on:

• Any specific Windows 10 Deployment and Management sessions (there are lots)
• Azure Stack
• Dynamics AX, CRM
• O365
• Skype for business
• SP2016
• Exchange

All of those product lines are still relevant and very important to MSFT, but with the sheer number of sessions, it's impossible to cover them all.

Two things I’ve not seen yet

• Biztalk – I’m pretty sure MSFT is hoping we all forget about it; I’d love to forget about it too!
• Windows 10 Mobile – If it's here I’ve not seen it, the 3 Xamarin presentations only had Android and iOS. 

Lady Bey, Microsoft fan?

Finally, it got a little surreal on Monday afternoon when a bus loads of teenage girls seemingly started turning up at the conference. Now Microsoft may be cool again, but I didn’t think its 'teenage girl cool'. All became clear as I tried to leave only to be stuck on a bus for 20 mins. It turned out the Beyoncé was playing at the arena next to the conference venue.