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26 July 2016

Kscope16 in snaps, part 3

The days go by in a blur

Yes, this is almost a month out from Kscope16 and so, Gentle Reader, you may be wondering what took me so long.

Laziness is one of the reasons but I think I can make a case for mental and physical exhaustion.  I love Kscope but as I’ve documented over the last two posts and hope to with this one, I exercise very poor geek impulse control when it comes to this conference and the attempt to pour in 5 lbs. of coffee into a 1 lb. sack (that’s 2.26796 kg into a 0.453592 kg sack for those who live in countries that haven’t travelled to the Moon).

Don’t believe me?  Check out the geeky-cool dashboards of Yr. Obt. Svt.’s declining energy levels.

Not nearly enough sleep

Who Cameron, who, does this to you?  Ah, I do.  Bummer.
C:\Tempdir\Blog\IMG_2414.PNG

Trying to do too much, too quickly, all at the same time

Does my body respond to The Madness?  Why yes it does.  My resting pulse really is around 60.  That’s a function of good cardiovascular fitness, exercise, and sleep.  The latter two elements were not in play at Kscope.  My body responded accordingly.  And that took time to recover from.

I’m not whining (okay, yes, I am) about what I do to myself, I’m just showing you why it’s taken me so long to get back to form.

With that excuse , let’s dive into Tuesday through Thursday.

Day 3, Tuesday

I was in meetings almost all of Tuesday, so you’re going to see just a few pictures.  Meeting rooms full of geeks really aren’t all that interesting.

And the Tuesday night events that would have been interesting evince my absolutely awful photography skills.  

I can tell you I went to John Booth’s  Metavero party here:

And then Tim Tow’s AppliedOLAP party here:
Leo Gonzalez’ tweet with:  Leo, Yr. Obt. Svt., and Jason Jones at the top of the John Hancock building.  OMG what a view that unfortunately my photography skills adequately reflect.

Why were my photo’s so awful?  This might be germane.

Yes, I am jumping around a bit (I’ve jumped forward to Wednesday) but I wanted you to see why I looked like I was going to fall over on my face during meetings, presentations, etc.

I do not work well on less than four hours of sleep a day.  Not. At. All.

Here we are at Wednesday

Harry Gates and Philip Hulsebosch

Llamas?  Cameron Llamapour?  Tim Twotoes?  Oh, the puns.  I think maybe but am not sure I should be flattered by Harry Gates’ and Philip Hulesbosch’s skit.  The thought of a Dutchman playing an Uraguayan named “Phillipo” simply has to be experienced in person.  Oh yes, Harry’s cubeSavvy utilities are really cool.  I’m actually using the ASO export parser right now – it is really good -- and will have (sometime this summer) a post about it.


Btw, if you’re not keeping up, we have now reached Wednesday.  Kscope is like that – over in a snap of the fingers.

Tim and I on EssCS

Note that Tim looks animated and I look asleep.

We’ve had several requests for this session, the demos, etc. and unfortunately that just isn’t possible because of our agreement with Oracle.  Given how fast the product is moving, I wouldn’t overworry about what we showed.  Hopefully we’ll be able to show EssCS in it’s final GA iteration at Kscope17.

Waiting for Godot

Here is your board of directors and conference committee from Natalie Delemar.

And here are anxiously awaiting special event attendees:

Yves Perrot’s take on Tim and I.  He’s quite the snazzy dresser and took a bit more care than I did.  Next year I won’t have to do the fancy dress costumes as no more board.  :) or perhaps :(  

Brothers?  My Man In California is doing his best not to laugh.  When I first met him he had a real ‘tash, now it’s just as fake as mine.  I think we both look better clean shaven.

Tim Faitch catching me droop a bit.  Perhaps I should grow one as it seems to make irresistible?  Probably not.

Dance crew in action.  I was, unsurprisingly, not asked to participate.  Thanks really, truly, and sincerely Natalie as I would have said “no”.  Really, my dancing skills are best left to the imagination.

Supermarine Spitfire

The Battle of Britain Memorial Trust is well worth your support.

And one of the best scenes in one of the best movies ever about planes, Spitfire or no.

If you can’t tell, Spits are my favorite plane ever, anywhere, always.

eSSbase 2.1

What, you want me to return to the real world?  How about Ron Moore’s vintage copies of eSSbase 2.1.  I came into the Essbase world in 3.1 or 3.5 – I no longer remember.

We argued about whether this ran on OS/2 or Windows NT.  It was OS/2 as I remember well Essbase (eSSbase?) crashing hard and corrupting the OS.  Fun times rebuilding OS/2 2.0 from floppies.  

The last day

Tim and I officially put out to pasture


Natalie very nicely thanked Tim Tow and I for our six years on the board.  We aren’t quite done yet but the time for others to take our place will soon be upon us.  I know that those who follow us will take ODTUG to new heights.  It was an honor to serve.

The standing ovation (I think mostly for Tim but I’ll bask in the reflected glory) was just amazing.  I’m sure I haven’t done anything to deserve it but I thank you all for your sentiment.

One note – it was MMIC GlennS who led the applause.  Glenn, I owe you once again.


One last note:  we’re both term limited and have to wait two years before we run for the board.  I can guarantee you that won’t be either of us.  It’s time for new people to have their place in the sun.

Tanned, rested, and ready

Proof?

I’m already thinking about Kscope17’s abstracts and if I will get in.  This will be the first time in six years that I don’t get a guaranteed hotel room or conference pass.  Wish me luck.

Be seeing you.

06 July 2016

Kscope16 in snaps, part 2

Trying to do this in a different fashion, part 2 of I don’t know

This is Monday, 27th June, aka Day 2 of the conference.  The madness was just beginning…

The photographers will snap us, and you'll find that you're in the rotogravure

PBCS session filling up


My woefully deluded because he presents with me wonderful co-presenter Jason Jones’ view from our PBCS session dais

1st slide

Carnival time with Gary Adashek, Jessica Cordova, and Chris Rothermel

I’ve gone to community night events since Kaleidoscope 2008 and this was by far the best ever right down to the unbelievably expensive but actually quite tasty popcorn.  The scavenger hunt was a brilliant idea (it surely wasn’t mine) that acted as an effective ice breaker.  Many thanks to subject experts Chris Barbieri (financial close), Gary Crisci (business content), Steve Davis (infrastructure), Al Marciante (reporting), and Glenn Schwartzberg (Essbase) who graciously quizzed attendees.  

The prize was this:  

Pretty cool, eh?

The success of the night was of course yours, Gentle Kscope16 Attendee, but the vision and hard operational work was a team effort that wouldn’t have happened without:
  • Jill Colsh from ODTUG’s management company Your Conference Connection (YCC)
  • EPM community volunteers Jennifer Anderson, Janice D'Aloia, Jessica Cordova (shanghaied into this at the last minute), Chris Rothermel, and the EPM community leader Gary Adashek
  • Greg Beaton, Alex Leung, and Valantus Philip (as well as a few others whose names flew by me at 160 kph, sorry but I least I metricated the speed) from The Goal Getters

Sometimes a group of disparate people come together for a project and it’s magic.  This was one of those times and I was privileged to be on the sidelines cheering our volunteers on.

My time with ODTUG is coming rapidly to a close.  Jennifer, Janice, Jessica, Chris, and Gary are the future.  Mark their names for one day they will be our board of directors.

The crowd, very early, and honestly there were over 100 there

Oh my goodness

No one gets credit (or blame) for this but me.  Perhaps it’s my Easter Bonnet?  Perhaps the >100 community night attendees went to my head?  Perhaps both?  Who can tell.

OMG #2

OMG #3, with Jennifer Anderson, Natalie Delemar, Gabby Rubin, and Richard Philipson


I’m not totally sure what the theme is wrt the lit up headpiece, only that it exists and that’s enough for me.

Not even halfway there

I’ve brought you so far through Monday night.  It got late.  It’ll get later.  My sleep patterns will become more erratic.  Fun, I think.

Be seeing you.

04 July 2016

Kscope16 in snaps, part 1

Trying to do this in a different fashion, part 1 of I don’t know

I promised, and failed, to update my live blogging of Kscope16 but it’s not hard to see that didn’t happen.  Sorry.  Having said that, if you follow me on Twitter on @CameronLackpour you will have had a geekseye view of just the most amazing conference.  It’s not that I don’t love blogging, because I do, but I’ve moved towards Twitter because it’s so immediate and thus gives you, Best & Brightest, a chance to almost be there.  I’ve taken picture after picture and even livestreamed via Periscope. I am like a Tweener with a social media addiction.  Except I’m older.

With that in mind, and because I am soooo tired, I’m going to try to tell my story via snapshots.  I hope you’re on a fast connection because there a many, many, many pictures.  As I wrote above, a social media junkie.

As noted in the title, I’m not going to know just now how many posts this is going to take.  I have a lot of pictures.

NB -- Some, but only some, of these pictures are repeats from my previous posts.  As I wrote, I'm trying to give you a comprehensive feel for the conference.  I've also stolen conference pictures off of Twitter.  I'll do my very best to give attribution.

If one picture is worth a thousand words, then this post is valued at 10,000

Boarding at beautiful PHL

  

A room with a view

Tim German rehearsing our EssCS presentation on Saturday, o’dark 30

My partner Jessica Cordova at the Kscope16 volunteer day breakfast

Jennifer Anderson and Opal Alapat laughing at Yet Another Dan Pressman Joke

Moderately Completely insane fellow volunteer gardeners

Tim German and Opal Alapat kicking off the Sunday Symposium

My heart rate at the beginning of the conference

It’s already started its uptick and will get far, far, far worse.  Stress or fun?  When I get enough sleep and am not too tightly wound up (65 heart rate = major project deliverable) my resting rate is around 60.  See, working out is good for you.  Kscope on the other hand...

Jason Jones rehearsing our PBCS presentation Saturday afternoon

Sunday night Chicago meetup

The end for now

I’ve taken you through Sunday night.  Are you tired yet?  I was.