Sun Tech Days 2009 - Day 1

As I have posted earlier, today is the first day of Sun Tech Days 2009. My curiosity made me reach there at 7:45 Am for the event which was scheduled to start at 8:15 AM. It was organized in a very very grand manner. We (Rajesh and me) were eagerly waiting for the events to get started. After we were done with our registration, we were looking around to see what's happening in the stalls kept by the sponsors (Infact, eyeing for a chance to grab some goodies).

Welcome
The event started around 9:00 AM with a 'Namaste' and a warm up exercise from Sun fella. Arrangements were very grand. Podium setup was eye-catching. Four giant screens were setup there for the convenience of 3500+ techies who gathered there. Next to follow was a drums performance by a 11 year old boy. Saying it awesome is an understatement. That guy simply stole the show. Then, there were some demos on Open Solaris, JavaFx and Java TV.

Father's talk about his baby

Much awaited one for the day was the key note session by James Gosling. It was the first one to start after the welcome note. I was quite impressed with his simplicity and message delivery style. His talk was about "Java: Where we're heading". Check out more on his talk here.

Apart from the keynote sessions, all the other sessions were held in parallel with some other sessions. Sessions were categorized into five different tracks (Enterprise Computing track, Client Technology track, Tools and Best Practices track, OpenSolaris track, Enterprise Software Architeture track) and two hands-on labs. Enterprise Computing track is focussed on the various enterprise solutions that Sun provides. Client Technology track covers JavaFx, Ajax Frameworks, Java Tv, etc. NetBeans and best practices in using it were the part of Tools and Best Practices track. SOA and other architecture related stuff were moved to Enterprise Software Architecture track.

Morning Sessions

• WSIT: Reliability, Security and Transactions in Web Services - This session gave an overview of acheiving Reliability, Security and Transactions in Web Services using Metro project which is an implementation of SOAP and other related standards. Metro's main objective is to provide interoperability support with .Net. To know more, visit this page.
• OpenESB and Common Services Framework - The main objective was this talk to explain the benefits of OpenESB (Enterprise Service Bus) over other traditional ESB. I could not get much out this session as I was looking forward for the lunch break to follow.
  

Afternoon Sessions

• JavaFx: The New Platform for Rich Internet Applications - JavaFx is Sun's relatively new product for building rich internet applications. Its a scripting language which supports lots of options for rich UI. I can visualize it as a competitor for Adobe Flex / Air. The declarative syntax of the scripting language was took over from variuos other languages. Need to explore more on it to make a review. To know more, click here.
• Building Social Applications using Zembly - Zembly is a new item in the Sun's product stack. Its main objective is to develop social applications using OpenSocial API. Shall give a good review after developing an application using it. To know more, click here.
• JPA Best practices - A Session on Dos and Donts in Java Persistance API.
• Connecting the world with REST - This session briefs about What is REST? The architecture behind it? RESTful webservices in comparison with SOAP based services. I was impressed with the content of the presentation.
  

Welcome Reception

After the evening sessions, some goodies were distributed and an evening show was organized to delegates. I missed out that show due to the fact that I was very tired and I wanted to pen down my first day experience for you.

--Varun