Summit Time and the Living Is Easy

If the DDoE seems a little slow this week, it may be because I’m at the Microsoft MVP Global Summit. What could be better than tipping back a few with Walkenbach, Bullen, Phillips, Devonshire, Peltier, Colo, ZachZack (sorry Zach), Damon, Puls, Tushar, Otten, Hodge, and Andrew? (I think that’s everyone who was at the bar last night.) Answer: Nothing.

Posted in Uncategorized

20 thoughts on “Summit Time and the Living Is Easy

  1. Dick is it safe to have such a brain trust as that mentioned above all in one spot at the same time? What if a crazed XL hating open source loving fanatic goes postal? Who would update the Daily Dose?

    Have a good time and don’t get cramps in your arms doing the 12 oz. curls.

  2. What could be better than tipping back a few with Walkenbach, Bullen, Phillips, …
    Appologies to the above, but tipping a few back with Diaz, Barrymore, Liu, etc

  3. “Appologies to the above, but tipping a few back with Diaz, Barrymore, Liu, etc “

    I used to think it was Mahan, Lyne, Ferguson, Alexander, LeDoux, Ford, Brown, Lefew, Quintanna & Gay (and many, many more). Now it’s been thirty years since I have had a drink and would love to be a fly on the wall in a room full of those mentioned by Dick.

    It is highly doubtful any of the names I mentioned here from circa 1966 – 1974 will be recognized by anyone frequenting this site. But my how times have changed…. :-D

  4. Hui – I like the way you think…. I’m not (yet!) enough of a geek to prefer the company of those gentlemen, fine as they are, to the finer (and FAR less intellectually intimidating!) company of such a bevy of ladies!

  5. I see you have an excellent time there… enjoy!

    Dont forget to talk to MS and give us feedback:
    Ribbon/reinstate some floating bars in xl14?

    With all brains together: vba is dead. But we need to know a logical way to go forward.
    I’m having a hard time coming to grips with VSTO… and I cant postpone decisions on a few large and important apps much longer.. and I dread a 100% rewrite. I must support xl2000 – xl2007+.. and I just dont have the resources to maintain several codebases.

    Cheerz! Jurgen

  6. And…he hasn’t paid for one yet! (Only kidding). I concur with those above, the girls would be better, although we do have Debra’s company!

  7. I dont think VBA is dead yet, but its definitely late middle-aged. Probably got another 10 years, maybe 15, before retirement. And that assumes that Office 14 starts to deliver a convincing replacement, which of course is by no means certain.

    I agree VSTO does not look like the answer (although it may be part of the answer).

    It probably needs something like VSTA embedded in the same way as VBA, with interfacing to XL objects giving performance preferably at the XLM level and at worst comparable to VBA, with continued upgrading for the XLL/C interface where ultimate performance is required. And to drag the marketplace along I would guess needs the macro recorder spitting out VSTA/VBNET/C# code etc.

    But doing this is a large and difficult task that may not make economic sense for MSoft, in which case I think they would have to keep VBA/VBE on life support until Office itself dies or morphs completely into web services.

  8. Enjoy the great company, Dick and crew. I, too, would like to be a fly on the wall.

    doco wrote: “I used to think it was Mahan, Lyne, Ferguson, Alexander, LeDoux, Ford, Brown, Lefew, Quintanna & Gay (and many, many more).”

    Ah, I was going to put Carol Baker, Yvette Mimieux, Audrey Hepburn, etc. But I figured if people couldn’t remember your list, then mine would show up only in the ancient history books. LOL

  9. Dick – it took me 5 views of this topic/comments to realize the song title reference (great song, BTW). Hope you’re all enjoying the Summit!

  10. I have to tread lightly due to non-disclosure issues. However, I can say that I’m not the least bit worried about the future of VBA. I’m pretty excited about starting to write managed add-ins, but if I wasn’t I still wouldn’t be worried about VBA.

    No one knows what changes the ribbon will undergo – not even MS. But they have some really bright people working in that area and they definitely know what the MVPs want because we told them.

  11. Ah, I love Sublime.

    I won’t hold it against you Dick that you spelled my name wrong. You can finally pay for a beer for me, we’ll call that an even trade.

    It’s been a fun few days that is for sure. Some of the dialog that has been traded here has been interesting to say the least. VSTO is definitely no replacement for VBA. Two words sum that up pretty well: price and portability. Need I say more? It will be interesting to see what Microsoft does with this technology in the coming years.

    I’ve had a great time here in Seattle this last week. The days have been great and the nights have been better. Truly an experience to remember. Can’t wait to see some of those pictures up on the net.

    -Zack


Posting code? Use <pre> tags for VBA and <code> tags for inline.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.