DevCon Wrapup

Well, for me atleast, DevCon is over. I hope I have been able to provide SOME insight through my blog on what has been going on. With my NDA, I have not been able to fully disclose what I have seen, heard and learned. I have over 1500 pages of presentation slides and documentation to wade through, which gives you a glimpse of how intense this conference was. Sorry I couldn't say more.

After reviewing my entries, I see that I truely can't give you a full understanding of just how much information has been provided by Microsoft to the kernelmode developers around the world. Maybe its a sign of the 'nicer, more open Microsoft' we hear about.

I know that I personally appreciate the efforts. I am one of those individuals that believes it is the right tool for the right job, and I have believed Microsoft wasn't doing enough to educate its kernelmode developers. After learning about the WHQL Test harnesses, tools like Driver Verifier, Prefast and SDV, and the amount of information disclosure being provided at this conference, I can say with certainty Microsoft is getting better.

Is it enough? I truely don't believe we will know until Longhorn. The amount of education that has been built into the foundation of thinking here on campus won't show the real results until they release a final product which has been architected with these fundamental principles in mind. We see a glimpse of it with the attitudes here, as well with the release of Windows Server 2003. If that is any indication, I look forward to Longhorn. The tools are progressing nicely, the security and QA training and education is up to date and the willingness to help developers is an asset. Hopefully that will translate into a safer, more secure computing experience for us all in the future.

I need to send a thank you to a few people:

• Robert Scoble: Thanks for letting me crash at your place and giving me the tour, WITHOUT making me drink any Koolaid. (Although the wine went well with the wireless)
  
• Michael Howard: Thanks for giving me some time in your busy schedule to talk to me about Microsoft's security posture, tools and experience (And for turning me onto the security tests in Prefast)
  
• Neil Christiansen: Thanks for EVERYTHING. I really enjoyed spending time talking with you about the new filter manager. And thanks for a great tutorial on prefast.
  
• Rajeev Nagar: Thanks for taking some time to discuss Microsoft's direction, and my company's plans to work with you. We didn't get to that beer, but we can do that in April!
  
• Darren: For entertaining my questions and pointing out the potential security hole in volume renaming issue in legacy drivers!
  

I have taken in sufficient enough Koolaid to believe Microsoft IS getting better. If you know me, you know that is saying a lot. I look forward to applying what I learned here to my own code base, and will use all the nice swag I got at the conference to do so. Lets just say I have every CD I will ever need from Microsoft when it comes to kernelmode development. Although I do think the stack of IA64 CDs will be coasters. (Just what WOULD I do with Windows Server 2003 on IA64... play Solitaire faster??) :)