Sessions and Speakers are subject to change without notice
Scott Allen, Pluralsight Scott Allen is a founder of OdeToCode and a member of the Pluralsight technical staff. Scott has over 15 years of experience with commercial software development in areas ranging from 8-bit embedded systems to highly scalable web applications. Scott is also a Microsoft MVP and a columnist for MSDN Magazine.
Todd Anglin, Telerik Todd Anglin is an active .NET community member, President of the North Houston .NET User Group, an O’Reilly author, and Telerik''s Chief Evangelist. At Telerik, Todd is responsible for building Telerik''s global community of developers and helping ensure Telerik''s products serve the needs of .NET developers around the world. In the general .NET community, Todd is an active author and speaker, focusing primarily on ASP.NET and Silverlight. Before joining Telerik, Todd worked as a developer in a Fortune 200 financial services company supporting applications on a wide range of platforms and technologies. He also an avid entrepreneur with previous experience running a small .NET software studio.
Madhan Arumugam, Microsoft Bio not available.
Chris Bannon, ComponentOne Chris Bannon is familiar with many acronyms: UX, ASP.NET, AJAX, C#, SQL & jQuery. As the Lead Web Developer at ComponentOne, he has mastered techniques such as CSS layout, unobtrusive JavaScript, semantic markup, and progressive enhancement. Chris manages ComponentOne’s product lines for ASP.NET and iPhone Web development. He spends most of his time building or using the web and it is his passion. When he isn’t at a computer you can find him spending time with his family, trying to golf, or pretending that he can still play ice hockey.
Erika Baske, Data Inspirations
Erika Bakse is a consultant with Data Inspirations, a firm providing business intelligence consulting and education services. Erika specializes in the full Microsoft business intelligence stack, developing custom BI solutions for clients and creating educational materials. Erika is also a contributing author for Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Reporting Services Step by Step.
Itzik Ben-Gan, Solid Quality Mentors Itzik Ben-Gan is a Mentor and Founder of Solid Quality Learning. A SQL Server Microsoft MVP (Most Valuable Professional) since 1999, Itzik has delivered numerous training events around the world focused on T-SQL Querying, Query Tuning and Programming. Itzik is the author of Inside Microsoft SQL Server 2005: T-SQL Querying (MSPress), Inside Microsoft SQL Server 2005: T-SQL Programming (MSPress), and a co-author of Advanced Transact-SQL for SQL Server 2000 (APress). He has written many articles for SQL Server Magazine as well as articles and whitepapers for MSDN.
Lee Benjamin, ExchangeGuy/Wadeware With over 20 years experience in the messaging industry, Lee Benjamin (Exchange MVP) is an expert on Microsoft Exchange and has in-depth experience in a number of other messaging systems. Lee has delivered several Wadeware courses worldwide and is a highly regarded Exchange trainer. Lee is chairman of the largest Exchange user group in the world ExchangeServerBoston, and Vice President for BostonUserGroups, an umbrella organization of over 50 user groups in the New England Area. Lee has been an analyst at Ferris Research, and is a regular speaker at industry conferences such as Exchange Connections.
Joe Celko Joe Celko served 10 years on ANSI/ISO SQL Standards Committee and contributed to the SQL-89 and SQL-92 Standards. He has written over 800 columns in the computer trade and academic press, mostly dealing with data and databases. He is author of seven books on SQL for Morgan-Kaufmann: SQL FOR SMARTIES (1995, second edition 1999, third edition 2005), SQL PUZZLES & ANSWERS (1997), DATA & DATABASES (1999) and TREES & HIERARCHIES IN SQL (2004), SQL PROGRAMMING STYLE (2005) and ANALYTICS & OLAP IN SQL (2005) and THINKING IN SETS (2008).
Quentin Clark, Microsoft Quentin is currently the General Manager of the Database Engine group in Microsoft SQL Server. He joined Microsoft in ’94 in the Office group, and helped drive Office’s early Internet integration; products and features for Word 6, Word 95 and Office 97. He was then a Program Manager and Lead in the Internet Information Server (IIS) team working on IIS 4.0, then NT 4.0 Option Pack, and IIS 5.0 for Windows 2000 Server. In ’99 Quentin founded and shipped the web and application server scale-out product Application Center as its Product Unit Manager, then ran the Application Center and Operations Manager teams. In 2002, he joined the WinFS relational file system project in the SQL Server group as its Director of Program Management. He was Product Unit Manager of WinFS until Microsoft focused the integrated storage efforts on SQL Server and ADO.NET in 2006. Quentin then took a General Manager role overseeing the core database technology groups within SQL Server.
Andrew Connell, Critical Path Training, LLC Andrew Connell is an author, instructor and co-founder of Critical Path Training (www.CriticalPathTraining.com), a SharePoint education focused company. Andrew is a five-time recipient of Microsoft’s Most Valuable Professional (MVP) award for Microsoft Content Management Server (MCMS) & Microsoft Office SharePoint Server. He has contributed to numerous MCMS and SharePoint books over the years. In June 2008 he published the only book on the subject of developing Publishing / Web Content Management (WCM) sites using Office SharePoint Server 2007: Professional SharePoint 2007 Web Content Management Development by WROX. Andrew has spoken on the subject of SharePoint development and WCM at various events and national conferences such as TechEd North America & EMEA, SharePoint Connections, VSLive, Office Developer Conference and Microsoft SharePoint Conference in Sydney, Australia & Seattle, Washington. You can always find Andrew at his SharePoint development and WCM focused blog at http://www.andrewconnell.com/blog.
Randy De Meno, CommVault Chief Technologist–Windows Products and Microsoft Relationship: Randy De Meno joined CommVault in 1994 and initiated CommVault''s direction into the heterogeneous data management segment of the industry. Randy holds patents on a number of CommVault''s technologies including the Granular Application Integrated Backup and Recovery capabilities. He also spearheaded the partnership with Microsoft in 1999 and still manages the strategic relationship. Randy leads CommVault''s application efforts for their Exchange, Active Directory, SQL, SharePoint, Notes/Domino, as well as other Windows-based solutions. On a personal note, Randy is married with three children and leads the CommVault Ice Hockey team which has enabled CommVault and partners to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for various children’s charities over the years.
Clifford Dibble, Microsoft Clifford has been a program manager in SQL Server since 2002. Among other things, he was the active PM for “system views”, “synonyms”, “DDL triggers”, and “resource database” during the 9.0 release. During the 10.0 release, Clifford was off working on an incubation project. For the 10.5 release and beyond, he is now focused multi-instance manageability and SQL management packs.
Gert Drapers, SQLDEV.net Gert Drapers is a Software Architect in the SQL Server Development group at Microsoft. As a member of the SQL Server Customer Advisory Team, he is involved in providing architecture design guidance and performance tuning for the largest and most challenging SQL Server deployments in the world. Gert brings extensive experience in the areas of application development, database management, data loading, and performance tuning of VLDB environments. Prior to his current position, Gert was working as Software Architect in the .NET Developer Division, responsible for the design and development of the next generation transaction manager and programming model. He started working on SQL Server in 1988 while working for Ashton-Tate. He joined Microsoft in 1991 where he held various development positions within the Developer Relation Group and Microsoft Consulting Services before joining the SQL Server development team in 1996. Gert worked on both SQL Server 7.0 and 2000; first as Software Design Engineer in the SQL Server Storage Engine and later as the Product Unit Manager of the SQL Server Management Tools team and as Architect of SQL Server DTS.
Markus Egger, EPS Software Corporation Markus is the President and Chief Software Architect of EPS Software Corp., a custom software development and consulting firm located in Houston, Texas. He specializes in consulting for object-oriented development, Internet development, B2B, and Web services. Markus has written numerous articles for publications including CODE Magazine, asp.netPro Magazine, FoxPro Advisor, Fuchs, FoxTalk, and Microsoft Office & Database Journal. Markus is the publisher of Component Developer Magazine (CODE). He is the author of a book on advanced object-oriented programming. You can contact Markus via e-mail megger@eps-software.com or visit him online (http://www.epssoftware.com).
Grant Fritchey Grant Fritchey, Microsoft SQL Server MVP, works for an industry-leading engineering and insurance company as a principal DBA. He’s done development of large-scale applications in languages such as Visual Basic, C#, and Java, and has worked with SQL Server since version 6.0. Grant spends a lot of time involved in the SQL Server community, including speaking, blogging, and he is an active participant in the SQLServerCentral.Com forums. He is the author of SQL Server Execution Plans (Simple Talk Publishing, 2008) and SQL Server Query Performance Tuning Distilled (Apress, 2008).
Perry Fritz, Rockline Industries Bio not available.
David Goldberg, Mimecast David brings 15 years of product development and business leadership to Mimecast. Having worked as a software developer, a solution architect and within global sales organizations, David has been involved in all aspects of delivering software solutions. Experiencing software lifecycles from all angles has given him a unique perspective on using technology to solve real-world problems. Before joining Mimecast, David worked for messaging vendor Open-Xchange, helping grow its U.S. SaaS business. David is a graduate of Vanderbilt University, where he studied computer science and mathematics.
Scott Guthrie, Microsoft Scott Guthrie is corporate vice president of Microsoft’s .NET Developer Division, where he runs the development teams responsible for delivering Microsoft Visual Studio developer tools and Microsoft .NET Framework technologies for building client and Web applications. A founding member of the .NET project, Guthrie has played a key role in the design and development of Visual Studio and the .NET Framework since 1999. Guthrie is also responsible for Microsoft’s web server platform and development tools teams. He has also more recently driven the development of Silverlight – a cross browser, cross platform plug-in for delivering next generation media experiences and rich internet applications for the web.
Today, Guthrie directly manages the development teams that build the Common Language Runtime (CLR), ASP.NET, Silverlight, Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), IIS, Commerce Server and the Visual Studio Tools for Web, Client and Silverlight development.
Guthrie graduated with a degree in computer science from Duke University.
Chris Hammond, DotNetNuke Corp. Chris Hammond has spent a number of years as a DotNetNuke Core Team member, and recently became the Director of Training with DotNetNuke Corporation. Solidifying his role within the DotNetNuke community as a leading expert and evangelist on the platform Chris is a published author and has been a frequent presenter at conferences, user groups and companies around the world. Chris provides tips and tricks through his blogs at DotNetNuke.com and DNNDaily.com. He is also an active DotNetNuke Community member, providing support in the DotNetNuke Forums. You can read more about Chris on his personal blog at www.chrishammond.com.
Scot Hillier, Scot Hillier Technical Solutions, LLC Scot Hillier is an independent consultant and Microsoft Most Valuable Professional focused on creating solutions for Information Workers with SharePoint, Office, and related .NET technologies. He is the author of 10 books on Microsoft technologies including Microsoft SharePoint: Building Office 2007 Solutions in C# 2005. Scot splits his time between consulting on SharePoint projects and training for Critical Path Training (a joint venture of Ted Pattison and Andrew Connell). Scot is a former U. S. Navy submarine officer and graduate of the Virginia Military Institute. Scot can be reached at scot@shillier.com.
Dan Holme, Intelliem, Inc. A graduate of Yale University and Thunderbird, Dan has spent 15 years as a consultant and trainer, delivering solutions to tens of thousands of IT professionals from the most prestigious organizations and corporations around the world. Dan’s company, Intelliem, is a boutique consulting and training firm with a Fortune-caliber clientele and deep expertise and experience in Windows, Active Directory, and SharePoint. From his base in beautiful Maui, Dan travels around the globe supporting customers and delivering Microsoft technologies training. Dan is also a contributing editor for Windows IT Pro and SharePoint Pro Connections magazines, a Microsoft MVP (Windows Server Directory Services, 2007, and SharePoint Server, 2008-2010), and the community lead of SharePointProConnections.com. Dan most recent two books with Microsoft—the Windows Administration Resource Kit and the training kit for the 70-640 MCTS exam—are at the top of the bestseller list of Windows books. In early 2010, Dan was in Vancouver, British Columbia where he built SharePoint solutions to support the broadcast of the 2010 winter Olympics as the Microsoft Technologies Consultant for NBC Olympics, a role he also played in Beijing and previously in Torino.
Kevin Israel, Ironworks Consulting Kevin Israel is a Solutions Architect with Ironworks Consulting in Richmond, VA and has been developing solutions with Microsoft technologies for 10 years. He is a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional in Team System, President of the Innsbrook .Net User Group, serves on the Richmond Code Camp Committee, and is a member of the INETA Technical Team. In his spare time he enjoys working with the developer community, spending time with his family and pets, reading books (both technical and non-technical), practicing Aikido as well as hunting and fishing.
Rajesh Jha, Corporate Vice President for Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft Rajesh Jha is the corporate vice president for Microsoft Exchange. In this capacity, Jha leads the team responsible for worldwide development of Microsoft Exchange, one of the world’s most popular communications systems. The technologies Jha and his team deliver are used daily by tens of millions of people via PCs, the Web and mobile phones.
Jha has a long track record of positive contribution to Microsoft Corp. Joining the company right out of university in 1990, he began his career as a software design engineer, developing five product releases with the Microsoft Works team. He moved on to create multimedia technologies in the Consumer Division and as a director of development worked for several years developing Internet technologies. Continuing his path of success in the company, Jha then became the general manager of Microsoft Office InfoPath and oversaw the launch of InfoPath 2003, as well as the planning for and early execution of Office InfoPath 2007 and form technologies in the 2007 Microsoft Office system.
Jha most recently served as corporate vice president of award-winning Microsoft Office Live and guided his team through the early days of Microsoft’s software-plus-services strategy and product development.
Jha holds a master’s degree in computer science from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and a bachelor’s degree in computer science from Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (Chennai).
Steve Jones, SQLServerCentral.com Steve Jones, Microsoft SQL Server MVP, is the founder and editor of SQLServerCentral.Com. He has been working with SQL Server for 18 years as a DBA at a variety of large and small companies. He is a frequent speaker at user groups and SQL Server conferences and has written hundreds of articles on SQL Server. He is well known for his prolific blogging, editorials, and podcasts at SQLServerCentral.Com.
Andrew Kelly, Solid Quality Mentors Andrew J. Kelly is a Mentor and Partner with Solid Quality Mentors™ based out of Myrtle Beach SC. He has over 20 years experience with relational databases and application development on both Unix and Windows platforms. He has been a SQL Server MVP since 2001. In addition to general SQL Server training and mentoring he specializes in Performance, Scalability and Maintainability of large scale SQL Servers.
Christian Kleinerman, Microsoft Christian Kleinerman has close to 10 years of experience working with SQL Server - the last five as part of the SQL Server development team in Redmond, WA. He is currently a Program Manager in the relational engine team where he has worked on a variety of features and technologies. Before Microsoft he worked on eCommerce Web site development and previously was co-founder of a development company specializing on scheduling software.
Michele Leroux Bustamante, IDesign, Inc. Michèle Leroux Bustamante is Chief Architect of IDesign Inc., Microsoft Regional Director for San Diego, and a Microsoft MVP for Connected Systems. At IDesign Michele provides training, mentoring and high-end architecture consulting services focusing on scalable and secure architecture design for .NET, web services, interoperability, federated security scenarios, CardSpace, and globalization architecture. Michele participates in Software Design Reviews for products in the Microsoft roadmap, including WCF, CardSpace and other security-focused products. During the Beta 1 phase Michele participated in prototyping elements of the CardSpace technology for the product team. She is a member of the International .NET Speakers Association (INETA), a frequent conference presenter, conference chair for SD West, and is frequently published in several major technology journals. Michele is also on the board of directors for IASA (International Association of Software Architects), and a Program Advisor and instructor for UCSD Extension. Her latest book is Learning WCF (O’Reilly 2007) – see her book blog here: http://thatindigogirl.com. Reach her at mlb@idesign.net, or visit www.idesign.net and her main blog at www.dasblonde.net.
Juval Lowy, IDesign, Inc. Juval Lowy is a software architect and the principal of IDesign (www.idesign.net), specializing in .NET 3.0 architecture consulting and advanced .NET 3.0 training. Juval is Microsoft’s Regional Director for the Silicon Valley, working with Microsoft on helping the industry adopt .NET 3.5. His latest book is Programming WCF Services 2nd Edition (O’Reilly 2008). Juval participates in the Microsoft internal design reviews for future versions of .NET and related technologies. Juval published numerous articles regarding almost every aspect of .NET development, and is a frequent presenter at development conferences. Microsoft recognized Juval as a Software Legend as one of the world’s top .NET experts and industry leaders.
Adam Machanic, Data Manipulation Group, Inc. Adam Machanic is a Boston-based independent database consultant, writer, and speaker. He has been involved in dozens of SQL Server implementations for both high-availability OLTP and large-scale data warehouse applications, and has optimized data access layer performance for several data-intensive applications. Adam has written for numerous web sites and magazines, including SQLblog, Simple Talk, Search SQL Server, SQL Server Professional, CoDe, and VSJ. He has also contributed to several books on SQL Server, including Expert SQL Server 2005 Development (Apress, 2007) and Inside SQL Server 2005: Query Tuning and Optimization (Microsoft Press, 2007). Adam regularly speaks at user groups, community events, and conferences on a variety of SQL Server and .NET-related topics. He is a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP) for SQL Server and a Microsoft Certified IT Professional (MCITP).
Mary Leigh Mackie, AvePoint Mary Leigh works directly with AvePoint’s research and development team in the design and implementation of new SharePoint infrastructure management products and solutions. She has been actively engaged in the SharePoint space for several years, working with many Fortune 500 companies and government organizations to develop successful SharePoint management and protection strategies. Born and raised in Oxford, Mississippi, Mary Leigh received her engineering degree from The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, in New York City.
Olivier Matrat, Microsoft Bio not available.
Brad McGehee, Red Gate Software Brad is the Director of DBA Education for Red Gate Software, and is an accomplished Microsoft SQL Server MVP with over 15 years SQL Server experience. He is a frequent speaker at SQL PASS, European PASS, SQL Server Connections, SQLTeach, devLINK, SQLBits, SQL Saturdays, TechFests, Code Camps, and SQL Server user groups. Brad is the author or co-author of more than 15 technical books and over 250 published articles. His most recent books include How to Become an Exceptional DBA (2nd Edition), Mastering SQL Server Profiler, and Brad’s Sure Guide to SQL Server Maintenance Plans. He blogs at http://www.bradmcgehee.com.
Dave Mendlen, Senior Director, Developer Platform and Tools, Microsoft Dave Mendlen is the Senior Director, Developer Platform and Tools. Prior to this role, he served as the speech writer for Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer. In his time at Microsoft, he was the Director of Web Services strategy in the Developer Platform and Evangelism division at Microsoft responsible for driving Web Services excitement and standards across the industry. He has also served as the Director of Windows Product Management responsible for the marketing of Windows XP Home, Pro, Tablet PC and Windows XP Media Center Edition. He started at Microsoft in the developer division and served as the lead product planner on .NET and Visual Studio .NET driving a team to bring web services and .NET to millions of developers.
Danny Milrad, Symantec Currently a Sr. Manager for Symantec Enterprise Vault Product Marketing, Danny has been with Symantec for almost 8 years and has over fourteen years industry experience with numerous storage hardware and software companies. Danny joined Symantec by way of the Veritas Software merger and has held management positions in marketing and business development at Veritas Software, BlueArc Corp, Network Appliance, FullTime Software and NeTpower Systems. Mr. Milrad holds an MBA and Bachelor of Science degree from San Jose State University.
Stacia Misner, Data Inspirations Stacia Misner is a consultant, educator, author, mentor, and principal of Data Inspirations. Her career spans 23 years with a focus on improving business practices through technology. Since 2000, she has been providing consulting and education services for Microsoft’s business intelligence technologies. In addition, she has authored or co-authored six books, all published by Microsoft Press, covering different components of the Microsoft SQL Server database and business intelligence platform. Stacia has presented at the Professional Association for SQL Server (PASS), Microsoft’s TechEd, SQL Server Magazine Connections, and various Microsoft events.
Ross Mistry, Microsoft Ross Mistry is a Technical Architect at the Microsoft Technology Center (MTC) in Silicon Valley. He specializes in SQL Server, Active Directory Exchange and Hyper-V. Prior to joining Microsoft, Ross was a Principal Consultant responsible for designing and implementing technology solutions for organizations with a global presence. Ross is also an author, former SQL Server MVP, and frequently speaks at technology conferences around the world. His latest books include; Introducing SQL Server 2008 R2 (MSPress), Windows Server 2008 R2 Unleashed (SAMS) and SQL Server 2008 Management and Administration (SAMS). Ross has recently spoken at the North American PASS Community Summit, SQL Connections, European PASS, and SQL BITS. You can follow him on twitter @RossMistry.
Jeremy Moskowitz, Moskowitz, Inc. Jeremy Moskowitz a Group Policy MVP and is the Chief Propeller-Head for Moskowitz, inc. and GPanswers.com. He is one of less than a dozen Microsoft MVPs in Group Policy. Since becoming one of the world''''s first MCSEs in both NT and 2000, he has performed Windows NT, Active Directory, and Group Policy planning and implementations for some of the nation''''s largest organizations. His latest books are Group Policy Fundamentals, Security, and Troubleshooting and Creating the Secure Managed Desktop: Group Policy, SoftGrid, and Microsoft Deployment and Management Tools. Learn more about the books and download eChapters at www.GPanswers.com/books. GPanswers.com was ranked as one of "The 20 most useful Microsoft sites for IT professionals" by ComputerWorld magazine.
Jessica M. Moss, Solid Quality Mentors Jessica M. Moss, a Microsoft SQL Server MVP and business intelligence mentor with Solid Quality Mentors, is certified as an MCDBA, MCTS: SQL Server 2005 BI, and an MCITP: SQL Server 2005 BI. She has been working with SQL Server 2005 since its release and has participated in many warehousing and reporting solutions. Jessica enjoys working with the local community and is a regular speaker at user groups, code camps, and conferences. Jessica blogs at http://jessicammoss.blogspot.com/.
Errin O’Connor, EPC Group.net (sponsored by Idera) Errin O’Connor is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer for EPC Group.net. Errin focuses his efforts on implementing Microsoft Technologies in organizations throughout the country. Errin is the author of Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Inside Out by Microsoft Press and has completed more than 130 successful individual SharePoint implementations and has worked with some of the largest organizations in the United States. Errin is also the founder of WebPartGallery.com an online solutions provider showcasing EPC Group’s SharePoint Web parts and custom solutions and is a frequent speaker at Microsoft SharePoint events throughout the United States and Canada including this year’s Gartner Portals Content & Collaboration Conference 2009.
Peter ODowd, Blade/Wadeware Peter is a Windows Server MVP for Exchange Server. He is well known and respected worldwide and often utilized by Microsoft to train the trainers in Windows Server products. He was recently contracted by Wadeware LLC (http://wadeware.net) to develop labs for the internal Microsoft course "Exchange Server Support Best Practices" and has delivered the material to MCS Premier Support and selected customers on five continents.
Peter works for Blade (http://www.blade.net.nz), a New Zealand company, and is a regular presenter for events such as TechEd and Connections around the globe. Peter specializes in Exchange Server 2007, Security, and Active Directory. He has been heard to say “give me a wet piece of string, and I’ll get mail going across it!”. Peter has designed and installed all versions of Exchange Server since when it was called MS Mail.
Peter says, "The versions change, the products are updated, but the core essentials and best practices often remain the same." Enjoy the stories from an experienced professional and learn about Exchange Server 2010 the same time.
Mark Olsen, Symantec Mark Olsen is a Senior Regional Product Manager for Enterprise Vault. A veteran of 7 different industries, he brings 25 years of IT experience to Symantec including 13 years in Senior IT Management at the Director/VP/CIO level. Most recently, Mark was Director of Controls and Compliance at Mitel, where he managed the implementation of Enterprise Vault and Discovery Accelerator.
Susan Price, Microsoft Bio not available.
Paul Randal, SQLskills.com Paul Randal and Kimberly Tripp are a husband-and-wife team who own and run SQLskills.com, a world-renowned SQL Server consulting and training company. They are both SQL Server MVPs and Microsoft Regional Directors, with over 30 years of combined experience on SQL Server.
Paul worked on the SQL Server team for nine years in development and management roles, writing many of the DBCC commands, and ultimately with responsibility for core Storage Engine for SQL Server 2008. Paul writes extensively on his blog (SQLskills.com/blogs/Paul) and for TechNet Magazine, for which he is also a Contributing Editor.
Paul and Kimberly have written Microsoft whitepapers and books for SQL Server 2000, 2005 and 2008, and are regular, top-rated presenters worldwide on database maintenance, high availability, disaster recovery, performance tuning, and SQL Server internals. Together they teach the SQL MCM certification and throughout Microsoft.
In their spare time they like to find frogfish in remote corners of the world.
Paul D. Sheriff, PDSA, Inc. Paul D. Sheriff is the President of PDSA, Inc. (www.pdsa.com), a Microsoft Partner in Southern California. Paul acts as the Microsoft Regional Director for Southern California assisting the local Microsoft offices with Developer Days and several of their large events each year. Paul has authored several books, webcasts, and articles on .NET, SQL Server and SharePoint. You can reach Paul via e-mail at PSheriff@pdsa.com or at Paul Sheriff''’s Inner Circle (www.PaulSheriffInnerCircle.com).
Michael B. Smith, The Essential Exchange Michael owns and operates his own consulting company based in Central Virginia; with strong emphasis on Windows Server core technologies, Active Directory, Exchange and SharePoint. Along with his sons, Michael loves to sit in front of computers and answer questions. Michael was responsible for connecting ECU, in North Carolina, to the ARPANet in 1981 and published his first article in Byte Magazine in February 1984. While working for Burroughs Corporation in 1984-1988 helped design and implement a mail system that was turned into a product. Also at Burroughs, Michael taught an OS internals class and helped author an internal book on compiler design. Between 1990 and 1996, Michael was the primary maintainer of a freeware message transport and email system known as AmigaUUCP. Between 1995 and 1998, Michael was one of the primary developers of I-Net 225, a commercial TCP/IP stack and related utilities (including a full-fledged email system) for the Amiga Computer. In 1998, Michael switched to Windows and Exchange full-time. By 1999, Michael was deploying Exchange 2000 RC2 for a hosting company and he’s been doing Exchange and Windows hosting since. Beginning in 2001 Michael began regularly contributing to a number of mailing lists. Primarily on Exchange and SMTP, of which he knows a little bit. :-)
Bob Spurzem, Mimosa Systems Bob Spurzem has over 20 years experience in high technology product development and marketing with an emphasis in bringing new products to market in both the email archiving and storage industries. As director of international business for Mimosa Systems, he is responsible for all aspects of the product life cycle for Mimosa™ NearPoint™ including market requirements definition, competitive research, positioning, sales enablement, and product launch. Prior to Mimosa, Bob served in senior product management positions for Legato Systems and VERITAS Software. Bob has a Masters Degree in Biomedical Engineering from Northwestern University and an MBA from Santa Clara University.
Alan Sugano, ADS Consulting Group Alan Sugano writes the monthly Networking Perspectives commentary for Windows IT Pro UPDATE. He’s the president of ADS Consulting Group, Inc. (ADS), which specializes in networking, custom programming, Web development, SQL Server development, and ACCPAC Plus accounting implementations. Alan frequently delivers talks on network audits, server selection, network documentation, network management, network design and topologies, SQL databases, and disaster recovery.
Tobias Ternstrom, Microsoft Bio not available.
Kimberly L. Tripp, SQLskills.com Kimberly Tripp and Paul Randal are a husband-and-wife team who own and run SQLskills.com, a world-renowned SQL Server consulting and training company. They are both SQL Server MVPs and Microsoft Regional Directors, with over 30 years of combined experience on SQL Server.
Kimberly worked on the SQL Server team in the early 1990s as a tester and writer before leaving to found SQLskills and embrace her passion for teaching and consulting. Kimberly has been a staple at worldwide conferences since she first presented at TechEd in 1996, and she blogs at SQLskills.com/blogs/Kimberly.
Kimberly and Paul have written Microsoft whitepapers and books for SQL Server 2000, 2005 and 2008, and are regular, top-rated presenters worldwide on database maintenance, high availability, disaster recovery, performance tuning, and SQL Server internals. Together they teach the SQL MCM certification and throughout Microsoft.
In their spare time they like to find frogfish in remote corners of the world.
Craig Utley, Solid Quality Mentors Craig Utley is a Mentor with Solid Quality Mentors where he focuses on business intelligence using the Microsoft SQL Server BI platform. He has been working with Microsoft’s business intelligence products since their inception and has worked on BI and data warehousing solutions for companies throughout the world. Craig spent just over a year at Microsoft on the SQL Server Customer Advisory Team (SQLCAT), working with some of Microsoft’s largest BI customers worldwide. Craig’s experience with BI tools and techniques have led to a number of articles and speaking engagements on BI. He is the author of three books, numerous articles, courseware for various companies, and a number of white papers. He is a member of the INETA speaker’s bureau and is a Microsoft SQL Server MVP.
Luis Carlos Vargas Herring, Microsoft Luis Vargas is a Program Manager in the Enterprise Application Platform (EAP) division of SQL Server in Redmond, WA. He spends most of his time on Service Broker, a scalable, reliable, and secure messaging framework integrated with SQL Server, but enjoys helping with other areas related to distributed systems (e.g. replication). Before Microsoft, he worked on the development of electronic fund transfer systems.
Tomer Verona, Microsoft Tomer is a Principal Development Lead in the Microsoft SQL Server Engine team. Tomer heads the development team responsible for low-latency event data processing and continuous query processing within Microsoft SQL Server. Tomer has more than 10 years experience working on various Microsoft projects in the development role, more than 5 of them with the Microsoft SQL Server team. Tomer is a graduate of U.C. Berkeley where he studied computer science.
Dan Wahlin, Wahlin Consulting Dan Wahlin (Microsoft Most Valuable Professional for ASP.NET and XML Web Services) is the president of Wahlin Consulting which specializes in .NET and SharePoint consulting and training solutions. Dan founded the XML for ASP.NET Developers Web site (http://www.xmlforasp.net), which focuses on using ASP.NET, XML, AJAX, Silverlight and Web Services in Microsoft’s .NET platform. He’s also on the INETA Speaker’s Bureau, speaks at conferences and user groups around the world and is recognized as a leading authority on .NET technologies. Dan has written several books on .NET including Professional Silverlight 2 Development, Professional ASP.NET 3.5 AJAX, ASP.NET 2.0 MVP Hacks and Tips, and XML for ASP.NET Developers. Dan’s blog is located at http://weblogs.asp.net/dwahlin.
Troy Werelius, Lucid8 Troy Werelius is the President of Lucid8 a Microsoft Gold Certified ISV Partner. Troy’s 27-year career in IT includes extensive work in network & business process design and implementation, as well as Exchange Disaster Recovery since 1996. In 2001, Troy guided Lucid8 from an Exchange Consulting and Disaster Recovery practice into a full time commercial development organization. Lucid8 develops and sells next-generation Disaster Prevention‚ Data-Protection‚ e-Discovery and Recovery products for Microsoft Exchange.
Scott Allen is a founder of OdeToCode and a member of the Pluralsight technical staff. Scott has over 15 years of experience with commercial software development in areas ranging from 8-bit embedded systems to highly scalable web applications. Scott is also a Microsoft MVP and a columnist for MSDN Magazine.
Todd Anglin is an active .NET community member, President of the North Houston .NET User Group, an O’Reilly author, and Telerik''s Chief Evangelist. At Telerik, Todd is responsible for building Telerik''s global community of developers and helping ensure Telerik''s products serve the needs of .NET developers around the world. In the general .NET community, Todd is an active author and speaker, focusing primarily on ASP.NET and Silverlight. Before joining Telerik, Todd worked as a developer in a Fortune 200 financial services company supporting applications on a wide range of platforms and technologies. He also an avid entrepreneur with previous experience running a small .NET software studio.
Bio not available.
Chris Bannon is familiar with many acronyms: UX, ASP.NET, AJAX, C#, SQL & jQuery. As the Lead Web Developer at ComponentOne, he has mastered techniques such as CSS layout, unobtrusive JavaScript, semantic markup, and progressive enhancement. Chris manages ComponentOne’s product lines for ASP.NET and iPhone Web development. He spends most of his time building or using the web and it is his passion. When he isn’t at a computer you can find him spending time with his family, trying to golf, or pretending that he can still play ice hockey.
Itzik Ben-Gan is a Mentor and Founder of Solid Quality Learning. A SQL Server Microsoft MVP (Most Valuable Professional) since 1999, Itzik has delivered numerous training events around the world focused on T-SQL Querying, Query Tuning and Programming. Itzik is the author of Inside Microsoft SQL Server 2005: T-SQL Querying (MSPress), Inside Microsoft SQL Server 2005: T-SQL Programming (MSPress), and a co-author of Advanced Transact-SQL for SQL Server 2000 (APress). He has written many articles for SQL Server Magazine as well as articles and whitepapers for MSDN.
With over 20 years experience in the messaging industry, Lee Benjamin (Exchange MVP) is an expert on Microsoft Exchange and has in-depth experience in a number of other messaging systems. Lee has delivered several Wadeware courses worldwide and is a highly regarded Exchange trainer. Lee is chairman of the largest Exchange user group in the world ExchangeServerBoston, and Vice President for BostonUserGroups, an umbrella organization of over 50 user groups in the New England Area. Lee has been an analyst at Ferris Research, and is a regular speaker at industry conferences such as Exchange Connections.
Joe Celko served 10 years on ANSI/ISO SQL Standards Committee and contributed to the SQL-89 and SQL-92 Standards. He has written over 800 columns in the computer trade and academic press, mostly dealing with data and databases. He is author of seven books on SQL for Morgan-Kaufmann: SQL FOR SMARTIES (1995, second edition 1999, third edition 2005), SQL PUZZLES & ANSWERS (1997), DATA & DATABASES (1999) and TREES & HIERARCHIES IN SQL (2004), SQL PROGRAMMING STYLE (2005) and ANALYTICS & OLAP IN SQL (2005) and THINKING IN SETS (2008).
Quentin is currently the General Manager of the Database Engine group in Microsoft SQL Server. He joined Microsoft in ’94 in the Office group, and helped drive Office’s early Internet integration; products and features for Word 6, Word 95 and Office 97. He was then a Program Manager and Lead in the Internet Information Server (IIS) team working on IIS 4.0, then NT 4.0 Option Pack, and IIS 5.0 for Windows 2000 Server. In ’99 Quentin founded and shipped the web and application server scale-out product Application Center as its Product Unit Manager, then ran the Application Center and Operations Manager teams. In 2002, he joined the WinFS relational file system project in the SQL Server group as its Director of Program Management. He was Product Unit Manager of WinFS until Microsoft focused the integrated storage efforts on SQL Server and ADO.NET in 2006. Quentin then took a General Manager role overseeing the core database technology groups within SQL Server.
Andrew Connell is an author, instructor and co-founder of Critical Path Training (
Chief Technologist–Windows Products and Microsoft Relationship: Randy De Meno joined CommVault in 1994 and initiated CommVault''s direction into the heterogeneous data management segment of the industry. Randy holds patents on a number of CommVault''s technologies including the Granular Application Integrated Backup and Recovery capabilities. He also spearheaded the partnership with Microsoft in 1999 and still manages the strategic relationship. Randy leads CommVault''s application efforts for their Exchange, Active Directory, SQL, SharePoint, Notes/Domino, as well as other Windows-based solutions. On a personal note, Randy is married with three children and leads the CommVault Ice Hockey team which has enabled CommVault and partners to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for various children’s charities over the years.
Clifford has been a program manager in SQL Server since 2002. Among other things, he was the active PM for “system views”, “synonyms”, “DDL triggers”, and “resource database” during the 9.0 release. During the 10.0 release, Clifford was off working on an incubation project. For the 10.5 release and beyond, he is now focused multi-instance manageability and SQL management packs.
Gert Drapers is a Software Architect in the SQL Server Development group at Microsoft. As a member of the SQL Server Customer Advisory Team, he is involved in providing architecture design guidance and performance tuning for the largest and most challenging SQL Server deployments in the world. Gert brings extensive experience in the areas of application development, database management, data loading, and performance tuning of VLDB environments. Prior to his current position, Gert was working as Software Architect in the .NET Developer Division, responsible for the design and development of the next generation transaction manager and programming model. He started working on SQL Server in 1988 while working for Ashton-Tate. He joined Microsoft in 1991 where he held various development positions within the Developer Relation Group and Microsoft Consulting Services before joining the SQL Server development team in 1996. Gert worked on both SQL Server 7.0 and 2000; first as Software Design Engineer in the SQL Server Storage Engine and later as the Product Unit Manager of the SQL Server Management Tools team and as Architect of SQL Server DTS.
Markus is the President and Chief Software Architect of EPS Software Corp., a custom software development and consulting firm located in Houston, Texas. He specializes in consulting for object-oriented development, Internet development, B2B, and Web services. Markus has written numerous articles for publications including CODE Magazine, asp.netPro Magazine, FoxPro Advisor, Fuchs, FoxTalk, and Microsoft Office & Database Journal. Markus is the publisher of Component Developer Magazine (CODE). He is the author of a book on advanced object-oriented programming. You can contact Markus via e-mail 
Grant Fritchey, Microsoft SQL Server MVP, works for an industry-leading engineering and insurance company as a principal DBA. He’s done development of large-scale applications in languages such as Visual Basic, C#, and Java, and has worked with SQL Server since version 6.0. Grant spends a lot of time involved in the SQL Server community, including speaking, blogging, and he is an active participant in the SQLServerCentral.Com forums. He is the author of SQL Server Execution Plans (Simple Talk Publishing, 2008) and SQL Server Query Performance Tuning Distilled (Apress, 2008).
Scott Guthrie is corporate vice president of Microsoft’s .NET Developer Division, where he runs the development teams responsible for delivering Microsoft Visual Studio developer tools and Microsoft .NET Framework technologies for building client and Web applications. A founding member of the .NET project, Guthrie has played a key role in the design and development of Visual Studio and the .NET Framework since 1999. Guthrie is also responsible for Microsoft’s web server platform and development tools teams. He has also more recently driven the development of Silverlight – a cross browser, cross platform plug-in for delivering next generation media experiences and rich internet applications for the web. 
Chris Hammond has spent a number of years as a DotNetNuke Core Team member, and recently became the Director of Training with DotNetNuke Corporation. Solidifying his role within the DotNetNuke community as a leading expert and evangelist on the platform Chris is a published author and has been a frequent presenter at conferences, user groups and companies around the world. Chris provides tips and tricks through his blogs at DotNetNuke.com and 
Scot Hillier is an independent consultant and Microsoft Most Valuable Professional focused on creating solutions for Information Workers with SharePoint, Office, and related .NET technologies. He is the author of 10 books on Microsoft technologies including Microsoft SharePoint: Building Office 2007 Solutions in C# 2005. Scot splits his time between consulting on SharePoint projects and training for Critical Path Training (a joint venture of Ted Pattison and Andrew Connell). Scot is a former U. S. Navy submarine officer and graduate of the Virginia Military Institute. Scot can be reached at 
A graduate of Yale University and Thunderbird, Dan has spent 15 years as a consultant and trainer, delivering solutions to tens of thousands of IT professionals from the most prestigious organizations and corporations around the world. Dan’s company, Intelliem, is a boutique consulting and training firm with a Fortune-caliber clientele and deep expertise and experience in Windows, Active Directory, and SharePoint. From his base in beautiful Maui, Dan travels around the globe supporting customers and delivering Microsoft technologies training. Dan is also a contributing editor for Windows IT Pro and SharePoint Pro Connections magazines, a Microsoft MVP (Windows Server Directory Services, 2007, and SharePoint Server, 2008-2010), and the community lead of SharePointProConnections.com. Dan most recent two books with Microsoft—the Windows Administration Resource Kit and the training kit for the 70-640 MCTS exam—are at the top of the bestseller list of Windows books. In early 2010, Dan was in Vancouver, British Columbia where he built SharePoint solutions to support the broadcast of the 2010 winter Olympics as the Microsoft Technologies Consultant for NBC Olympics, a role he also played in Beijing and previously in Torino.
Kevin Israel is a Solutions Architect with Ironworks Consulting in Richmond, VA and has been developing solutions with Microsoft technologies for 10 years. He is a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional in Team System, President of the Innsbrook .Net User Group, serves on the Richmond Code Camp Committee, and is a member of the INETA Technical Team. In his spare time he enjoys working with the developer community, spending time with his family and pets, reading books (both technical and non-technical), practicing Aikido as well as hunting and fishing.
Rajesh Jha is the corporate vice president for Microsoft Exchange. In this capacity, Jha leads the team responsible for worldwide development of Microsoft Exchange, one of the world’s most popular communications systems. The technologies Jha and his team deliver are used daily by tens of millions of people via PCs, the Web and mobile phones.
Steve Jones, Microsoft SQL Server MVP, is the founder and editor of SQLServerCentral.Com. He has been working with SQL Server for 18 years as a DBA at a variety of large and small companies. He is a frequent speaker at user groups and SQL Server conferences and has written hundreds of articles on SQL Server. He is well known for his prolific blogging, editorials, and podcasts at SQLServerCentral.Com.
Andrew J. Kelly is a Mentor and Partner with Solid Quality Mentors™ based out of Myrtle Beach SC. He has over 20 years experience with relational databases and application development on both Unix and Windows platforms. He has been a SQL Server MVP since 2001. In addition to general SQL Server training and mentoring he specializes in Performance, Scalability and Maintainability of large scale SQL Servers.
Christian Kleinerman has close to 10 years of experience working with SQL Server - the last five as part of the SQL Server development team in Redmond, WA. He is currently a Program Manager in the relational engine team where he has worked on a variety of features and technologies. Before Microsoft he worked on eCommerce Web site development and previously was co-founder of a development company specializing on scheduling software.
Michèle Leroux Bustamante is Chief Architect of IDesign Inc., Microsoft Regional Director for San Diego, and a Microsoft MVP for Connected Systems. At IDesign Michele provides training, mentoring and high-end architecture consulting services focusing on scalable and secure architecture design for .NET, web services, interoperability, federated security scenarios, CardSpace, and globalization architecture. Michele participates in Software Design Reviews for products in the Microsoft roadmap, including WCF, CardSpace and other security-focused products. During the Beta 1 phase Michele participated in prototyping elements of the CardSpace technology for the product team. She is a member of the International .NET Speakers Association (INETA), a frequent conference presenter, conference chair for SD West, and is frequently published in several major technology journals. Michele is also on the board of directors for IASA (International Association of Software Architects), and a Program Advisor and instructor for UCSD Extension. Her latest book is Learning WCF (O’Reilly 2007) – see her book blog here: 
Juval Lowy is a software architect and the principal of IDesign (
Adam Machanic is a Boston-based independent database consultant, writer, and speaker. He has been involved in dozens of SQL Server implementations for both high-availability OLTP and large-scale data warehouse applications, and has optimized data access layer performance for several data-intensive applications. Adam has written for numerous web sites and magazines, including SQLblog, Simple Talk, Search SQL Server, SQL Server Professional, CoDe, and VSJ. He has also contributed to several books on SQL Server, including Expert SQL Server 2005 Development (Apress, 2007) and Inside SQL Server 2005: Query Tuning and Optimization (Microsoft Press, 2007). Adam regularly speaks at user groups, community events, and conferences on a variety of SQL Server and .NET-related topics. He is a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP) for SQL Server and a Microsoft Certified IT Professional (MCITP).
Mary Leigh works directly with AvePoint’s research and development team in the design and implementation of new SharePoint infrastructure management products and solutions. She has been actively engaged in the SharePoint space for several years, working with many Fortune 500 companies and government organizations to develop successful SharePoint management and protection strategies. Born and raised in Oxford, Mississippi, Mary Leigh received her engineering degree from The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, in New York City.
Brad is the Director of DBA Education for Red Gate Software, and is an accomplished Microsoft SQL Server MVP with over 15 years SQL Server experience. He is a frequent speaker at SQL PASS, European PASS, SQL Server Connections, SQLTeach, devLINK, SQLBits, SQL Saturdays, TechFests, Code Camps, and SQL Server user groups. Brad is the author or co-author of more than 15 technical books and over 250 published articles. His most recent books include How to Become an Exceptional DBA (2nd Edition), Mastering SQL Server Profiler, and Brad’s Sure Guide to SQL Server Maintenance Plans. He blogs at 
Dave Mendlen is the Senior Director, Developer Platform and Tools. Prior to this role, he served as the speech writer for Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer. In his time at Microsoft, he was the Director of Web Services strategy in the Developer Platform and Evangelism division at Microsoft responsible for driving Web Services excitement and standards across the industry. He has also served as the Director of Windows Product Management responsible for the marketing of Windows XP Home, Pro, Tablet PC and Windows XP Media Center Edition. He started at Microsoft in the developer division and served as the lead product planner on .NET and Visual Studio .NET driving a team to bring web services and .NET to millions of developers.
Stacia Misner is a consultant, educator, author, mentor, and principal of Data Inspirations. Her career spans 23 years with a focus on improving business practices through technology. Since 2000, she has been providing consulting and education services for Microsoft’s business intelligence technologies. In addition, she has authored or co-authored six books, all published by Microsoft Press, covering different components of the Microsoft SQL Server database and business intelligence platform. Stacia has presented at the Professional Association for SQL Server (PASS), Microsoft’s TechEd, SQL Server Magazine Connections, and various Microsoft events.
Ross Mistry is a Technical Architect at the Microsoft Technology Center (MTC) in Silicon Valley. He specializes in SQL Server, Active Directory Exchange and Hyper-V. Prior to joining Microsoft, Ross was a Principal Consultant responsible for designing and implementing technology solutions for organizations with a global presence. Ross is also an author, former SQL Server MVP, and frequently speaks at technology conferences around the world. His latest books include; Introducing SQL Server 2008 R2 (MSPress), Windows Server 2008 R2 Unleashed (SAMS) and SQL Server 2008 Management and Administration (SAMS). Ross has recently spoken at the North American PASS Community Summit, SQL Connections, European PASS, and SQL BITS. You can follow him on twitter @RossMistry.
Jeremy Moskowitz a Group Policy MVP and is the Chief Propeller-Head for Moskowitz, inc. and GPanswers.com. He is one of less than a dozen Microsoft MVPs in Group Policy. Since becoming one of the world''''s first MCSEs in both NT and 2000, he has performed Windows NT, Active Directory, and Group Policy planning and implementations for some of the nation''''s largest organizations. His latest books are Group Policy Fundamentals, Security, and Troubleshooting and Creating the Secure Managed Desktop: Group Policy, SoftGrid, and Microsoft Deployment and Management Tools. Learn more about the books and download eChapters at 
Jessica M. Moss, a Microsoft SQL Server MVP and business intelligence mentor with Solid Quality Mentors, is certified as an MCDBA, MCTS: SQL Server 2005 BI, and an MCITP: SQL Server 2005 BI. She has been working with SQL Server 2005 since its release and has participated in many warehousing and reporting solutions. Jessica enjoys working with the local community and is a regular speaker at user groups, code camps, and conferences. Jessica blogs at 
Errin O’Connor is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer for EPC Group.net. Errin focuses his efforts on implementing Microsoft Technologies in organizations throughout the country. Errin is the author of Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Inside Out by Microsoft Press and has completed more than 130 successful individual SharePoint implementations and has worked with some of the largest organizations in the United States. Errin is also the founder of WebPartGallery.com an online solutions provider showcasing EPC Group’s SharePoint Web parts and custom solutions and is a frequent speaker at Microsoft SharePoint events throughout the United States and Canada including this year’s Gartner Portals Content & Collaboration Conference 2009.
Peter is a Windows Server MVP for Exchange Server. He is well known and respected worldwide and often utilized by Microsoft to train the trainers in Windows Server products. He was recently contracted by Wadeware LLC (http://wadeware.net) to develop labs for the internal Microsoft course "Exchange Server Support Best Practices" and has delivered the material to MCS Premier Support and selected customers on five continents.
Mark Olsen is a Senior Regional Product Manager for Enterprise Vault. A veteran of 7 different industries, he brings 25 years of IT experience to Symantec including 13 years in Senior IT Management at the Director/VP/CIO level. Most recently, Mark was Director of Controls and Compliance at Mitel, where he managed the implementation of Enterprise Vault and Discovery Accelerator.
Paul Randal and Kimberly Tripp are a husband-and-wife team who own and run SQLskills.com, a world-renowned SQL Server consulting and training company. They are both SQL Server MVPs and Microsoft Regional Directors, with over 30 years of combined experience on SQL Server. 
Paul D. Sheriff is the President of PDSA, Inc. (
Michael owns and operates his own consulting company based in Central Virginia; with strong emphasis on Windows Server core technologies, Active Directory, Exchange and SharePoint. Along with his sons, Michael loves to sit in front of computers and answer questions. Michael was responsible for connecting ECU, in North Carolina, to the ARPANet in 1981 and published his first article in Byte Magazine in February 1984. While working for Burroughs Corporation in 1984-1988 helped design and implement a mail system that was turned into a product. Also at Burroughs, Michael taught an OS internals class and helped author an internal book on compiler design.
Bob Spurzem has over 20 years experience in high technology product development and marketing with an emphasis in bringing new products to market in both the email archiving and storage industries. As director of international business for Mimosa Systems, he is responsible for all aspects of the product life cycle for Mimosa™ NearPoint™ including market requirements definition, competitive research, positioning, sales enablement, and product launch. Prior to Mimosa, Bob served in senior product management positions for Legato Systems and VERITAS Software. Bob has a Masters Degree in Biomedical Engineering from Northwestern University and an MBA from Santa Clara University.
Alan Sugano writes the monthly Networking Perspectives commentary for Windows IT Pro UPDATE. He’s the president of ADS Consulting Group, Inc. (ADS), which specializes in networking, custom programming, Web development, SQL Server development, and ACCPAC Plus accounting implementations. Alan frequently delivers talks on network audits, server selection, network documentation, network management, network design and topologies, SQL databases, and disaster recovery.
Kimberly Tripp and Paul Randal are a husband-and-wife team who own and run SQLskills.com, a world-renowned SQL Server consulting and training company. They are both SQL Server MVPs and Microsoft Regional Directors, with over 30 years of combined experience on SQL Server. 
Craig Utley is a Mentor with Solid Quality Mentors where he focuses on business intelligence using the Microsoft SQL Server BI platform. He has been working with Microsoft’s business intelligence products since their inception and has worked on BI and data warehousing solutions for companies throughout the world. Craig spent just over a year at Microsoft on the SQL Server Customer Advisory Team (SQLCAT), working with some of Microsoft’s largest BI customers worldwide. Craig’s experience with BI tools and techniques have led to a number of articles and speaking engagements on BI. He is the author of three books, numerous articles, courseware for various companies, and a number of white papers. He is a member of the INETA speaker’s bureau and is a Microsoft SQL Server MVP.
Luis Vargas is a Program Manager in the Enterprise Application Platform (EAP) division of SQL Server in Redmond, WA. He spends most of his time on Service Broker, a scalable, reliable, and secure messaging framework integrated with SQL Server, but enjoys helping with other areas related to distributed systems (e.g. replication). Before Microsoft, he worked on the development of electronic fund transfer systems.
Tomer is a Principal Development Lead in the Microsoft SQL Server Engine team. Tomer heads the development team responsible for low-latency event data processing and continuous query processing within Microsoft SQL Server. Tomer has more than 10 years experience working on various Microsoft projects in the development role, more than 5 of them with the Microsoft SQL Server team. Tomer is a graduate of U.C. Berkeley where he studied computer science.
Dan Wahlin (Microsoft Most Valuable Professional for ASP.NET and XML Web Services) is the president of Wahlin Consulting which specializes in .NET and SharePoint consulting and training solutions. Dan founded the XML for ASP.NET Developers Web site (
Troy Werelius is the President of Lucid8 a Microsoft Gold Certified ISV Partner. Troy’s 27-year career in IT includes extensive work in network & business process design and implementation, as well as Exchange Disaster Recovery since 1996. In 2001, Troy guided Lucid8 from an Exchange Consulting and Disaster Recovery practice into a full time commercial development organization. Lucid8 develops and sells next-generation Disaster Prevention‚ Data-Protection‚ e-Discovery and Recovery products for Microsoft Exchange.