PASS Summit 2011 underway…I didn’t get to attend again this year

I’ve been thinking about PASS a lot this year…mostly because I didn’t get to go. If you’re not knowledgeable of PASS, it’s the conference of conferences for SQL Server practitioners, DBAs, developers and anyone who writes a SELECT statement that’s held in Seattle, WA (most years), and put together by the Professional Association for SQL Server. My employer didn’t budget any money for either of the three of us on our team to go, apparently, so we get to miss out on a really great learning experience and get-together of anyone that’s anyone in the SQL world. I’ve been before, had a great time, and learned a ton. Hate to have missed it this year, and this was not a good year to miss, considering that SQL Server 2012 (formerly Denali) will be released soon.

I wanted to make a list of reasons why a SQL guy should attend, or some other writing to maybe go convince your boss to send you or whatever; no reason to, though. Just go out and google up reasons to attend PASS. They’re well documented and all over the internet. So, I decided to do a little different search. I dialed up “Is SQL Pass a waste of time?”, “Is PASS worth the money?”, “Is PASS worth it?” quickly…I may very well have missed one, but I didn’t see one post that indicated anything such. PASS is no doubt a great learning experience, and not many complaints exist out there. Attendees truly enjoy PASS – going to courses all week from top SQL Server guys, Microsoft employees, and vendors is a great learning experience. The camaraderie of making friends with other SQL Server geeks is also very enjoyable.

Fact is, PASS is worth it.  I see on their site that PASS Summit 2011 Opens with Record 5000+ Registrations this year. 5000! Wow, that’s huge! Damn, do they have enough hotel rooms out there? Apparently someone thinks it’s worth the bucks, right? Some folks even pay their own way to PASS – maybe I need to do this next year. I figure that if you get a cheap flight and make 10 stops if necessary, stay at a Holiday Inn Express, and eat bugs for supper, it would cost a person maybe 3K depending on where they live. I’ve actually offered to pay for 1/2 of the cost to a previous employer, but companies seem to get funny and act weird when you offer this. Maybe because it makes the company look like a bunch of cheap b@stards. I’ve thought of making a family vacation out of it or SQL Server Connections since it’s in Las Vegas, with PASS Summit the better of the two by far, but haven’t yet.

I’ve also often thought of submitting a session – I have enough topics in this blog site to scrape up something together that’s of interest. Or I could hack up some cool project maybe and submit it, and with almost 10 years speaking in front of students, I’d really enjoy the teaching experience. Maybe I will next year. It might be the only way I get a trip to PASS paid for.

Lee

----------------------

http://www.made2mentor.com/2010/10/why-im-paying-my-own-way-to-pass-summit-2010-and-you-should-too/

http://sqlpass.org/

http://www.sqlpass.org/summit/2011/Live/News/Partner25.aspx