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Hold on, I'm Coding

The Commitments rock, the coders roll. Just to prove that developers really know how to kick back and party, we attended the big bash on your behalf. No really, it was no problem...

July 9 - The keynote hall was closed most of Thursday and with good reason. When the covers went back and a few curious delegates peered inside the huge hanger-like hall, it had been transformed into the ultimate concert/party venue. Huge white drapes in the ceiling were coloured with lights and abstract shapes, and some 10 to 15 bars served beer and a mind boggling spread of food ranging from plain old fish and chips, hot dogs and burgers to local delights like Shoarma, which is like a kebab only edible and quite delicious.
    As well as the bars there were roving barpeople lugging huge drums of lager on their backs, who filled your glass as they passed. This meant that at no time throughout the evening did anyone go short of a drink or two. In fact it was almost impossible to note how many drinks you'd had because you could never get to the bottom of a glass.
    Suitably fed and watered, attention turned to the stage area. The achingly beautiful Bear van Beers introduced the acts, and Chris Sayer announced the lucky winner of ComponentSource's competition, who will be jetting off to New York for two days with $600 spending money and tickets to see Star Wars Episode I - The Phantom Menace.
      At first we wondered why the pictures on the massive screens were ever so slightly out of sync with the voices we heard on the sound system. Then, as we started to walk towards the stage, we realised. In the dark it was hard to tell, but the hall was about half a mile long. As we passed the big screens we saw the stage, tiny ant-like figures cavorting around in the lights in the distance. A short cab ride later we were at the stage.
    After a turn from the Massive Heads (made famous by British TV chat and music show TFI Friday) the main band for the evening was announced, The Committed. They are perhaps better known as the band which appeared in the Alan Parker film The Commitments, although the people who make up the current line-up include some other musicians in addition to the original cast members from the film. In any event they took to the stage for a gruelling 2 hour set which got just about everybody moving. If you've ever seen the film The Commitments, you'll know that they are an Irish band who play stonking huge R&B and soul hits, not unlike the kind of thing for which the Blues Brothers are famous. In fact The Committed have been known to play concerts with ex-members of the original Blues Brothers. So it's been an R&B week here at TechEd, and no mistake. As the heat in the huge arena rose, beer flowed, delegates flagged, and soon waiters carrying huge cool boxes were dispensing ice lollies and cones.
    After the party the nearly 6,500 delegates hopped many trams into town, most finding their way to Rembrandtplein (Rembrandt Plaza) in the centre of Amsterdam. The people sitting quietly at the kerbside cafes enjoying a beer and a chat looked on in dismay as the trams poured out hordes of inebriated males chanting and singing in drunken semi-unison. Under normal circumstances and in any other town this would be an unpleasant moment. It was a little tense until someone shouted, "it's okay, they're not hooligans, just software developers." I think people got the idea anyway, when the most threatening song the mob could come up with (that the various nationalities present understood) was "We all live in a Yellow submarine". It could only happen at TechEd.

Almost The Blues Brothers

The Conference Bag as fashion statement

The Lost T-shirts of TechEd

The closest we got to playing games at TechEd

Six reasons to be at TechEd!

Dinner's ready...

"...mine's the black rucksack with the TechEd logo..."

TechEd plays host to an impromptu Dr Who convention, or perhaps it's Glastonbury?