Monday 23rd April 2007 saw the first ever meeting of the .NET Developer Network. 36 people from Bristol, the South West and South Wales congregated at BAWA in Filton (North Bristol) for An Evening Of LINQ with Mike Taulty. I would have to say that I was delighted with the evening. As usual Mike Taulty was excellent. He took us on a journey of LINQ through the motivation behind LINQ, the language enhancements that make LINQ possible and on to LINQ To XML and LINQ To SQL illustrating LINQ’s actual behaviour with the SQL Profiler. LINQ is a fascinating subject and Mike did it justice.

(It took many takes before we could get Mike to be so bored he had to look at the clock).
From left to right: Steve Hallam, Adam Towler, Chris Myhill, Mike Taulty, Alex Davidson, Will Holley, Benjamin Arroyo.

As for the user group itself everyone seemed interested and pleased with the first steps and the feedback was enthusiastic and encouraging. If you missed the meeting you can get some of the flavour here:-

DotNetDevNet Intro Slides
Mike Taulty’s LINQ Slides
Mike Taulty’s LINQ Demos

Here’s what’s coming up in the next few months:-

• Enterprise Library And The Policy Injection Application Block with Alex Homer


• Windows Communication Foundation and Windows CardSpace with Martin Parry


• July’s meeting will be on Tuesday 10th July. Details will be in the .NET Developer Network sent to registered members and also on the website.

Thanks to everyone who came on Monday and helped give the group a great start.

See you in May.