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Tag Archives: NNUG
5 minutes interview #28 – Roger Gullhaug
Posted by on March 14, 2011
Roger is one of the board members in NNUG Haugesund. He’s active both in the user group and on twitter, which I really like. In addition to being an active community member, Roger works at Hatteland Computer as one of the technical dudes, creating their new framework in Silverlight. Since he’s a Silverlight-guru, I’ve exploited his knowledge when I was testing out developing in Silverlight. Very helpful guy, and might I add; VERY patient with me 🙂
Can you give us a little insight on what you do at Hatteland Computer?
I’m working as a developer in Hatteland Computer. For the last 2 years I have mainly worked with Silverlight. I have been technical responsible for our Silverlight client framework which will be used for all Silverlight development in Hatteland Computer in the future.The framework is focusing on solving the challenges of writing a large system in Silverlight. We have a plugin-based architecture which makes it easy to split a large system up into small maintainable pieces which can be deployed independently. Other main areas of the framework are to make it easy to connect to the backend, make it easy to develop multi lingual applications and take care of everything which has to do with navigation. The framework also includes a Widget framework which makes us able to easy develop customizable dashboards. In addition to writing the framework I have also worked on developing a new user interface for our Rambase ERP system. Our framework is built according to the needs for this new user interface. It has been a very interesting project, and we now have released the first beta version to some selected customers.
[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyVDMp2bL9c%5DHatteland is famous for RamBase. Could you tell us a bit about it?
Rambase is an ERP system developed by Hatteland Computer. It is a complete business system made up of modules for sales, customers (CRM), purchasing, warehousing, production, auctions, economics, specialized trade (retail), human resources and web shops. In addition to being an ERP system, Rambase is also the name of the database used by the Rambase ERP system. It’s a database system developed by Hatteland Computer where all data is stored in RAM.Hatteland Computer also has another product called Autostore. Before starting working with the Silverlight framework I worked on Autostore. I’m still a little involved in this, but not much anymore. It’s a very cool product. Take a look at this video.
What do you think about the community here in Haugesund?
The community in Haugesund is small, but good. When I was asked if I was interested in being part of NNUG Haugesund I didn’t hesitated. I hope the developer community will grow in the future. It’s really great to have someone like you Vidar in NNUG Haugesund, and I hope you will keep up the good work to bring NNUG Haugesund forward.
When are you going to have a session for us?
Hmm…. Suddenly it happens… but I’m a little shy when it comes to talking in front of many people. If I would hold a NNUG session it has to be on something I know really well.
What do you do when you’re not playing with Silverlight?
I have a wife and two children (3 and 6 years old) and I try to spend much time with them. I also got a new hobby – floor ball. I play together with some people from my neighborhood. Last summer I started cycling, and now that the spring is near I look forward to get on the bike again.
Links:
Blog
@RGullhaug
5 minutes interview #27 – Jan Ove Halvorsen
Posted by on March 7, 2011
This is one of the most active guys in the community here in Haugesund. When I was thinking about starting a Microsoft-related User Group in the district, he had the same plans. He sent me an email asking if I was interested in starting it with him. That is now 3 years ago, and the UG is still up and running. Now I’m the chapter lead, and he’s the one responsible for communication with the other chapters in Norway etc. We might switch on these roles. He’s held several sessions both for NNUG and Omega AS, and we hope he’ll continue with this! Lately he joined a new company called Appex AS together with another board member of NNUG Haugesund; Tore Fremmersvik.
What’s your role in Appex?
My official title is “Technology Director”. However, short-term I am first and foremost a fulltime consultant delivering system development services to pretty much the same customers I was already involved with before joining Appex. Longer term it is our plan that my role will be gradually more and more in line with my title. I will be responsible for the quality of our strategic decisions on technology and methodology. It means I will not necessarily take the decisions, but will be responsible for the quality of the process leading up to a decision, and the implementation of decisions in these areas. This also includes being responsible for our plans related to continuous improvement of our competence and knowledge. Having said that, I anyway guess I will continue to do consulting in parallel for some years still.
What did you do before you joined Appex?
My education is actually within the areas (micro-)electronics, physics and mathematics. However, all my professional life (20+ years) has been mostly about software. I worked at Hatteland pretty much all through the 90’s, where I was involved in building the famous RamBase system. In 2000 I joined Hydro Aluminium’s Rolled Products sector as a senior systems consultant. During those years I was heavily involved in a major project called MACH2. MACH2 is a production management system used by the two Norwegian rolling mills, at Karmøy and in Holmestrand. In 2005 I took on the challenge as IS/IT-Director for these two plants, with full responsibility for the whole IS/IT domain. But the geek in me conquered in the end. I really enjoyed that position, but felt I drifted farther and farther away from what I love the most: programming. So, in 2007 I left Hydro and set up my own consultancy, Halvorsen Consulting AS. I had three nice years doing various software development tasks for a small number of clients, before I decided to join Appex less than half a year ago.
Why do you like being active in our community?
I have always been focused on and interested in knowledge sharing. And the fact is that the process of diving deep into a new subject, build up insight on that subject and then share that insight with others is a remarkably giving thing to do. I actually feel I get more back from doing something like that than I’m giving away. This may sound like something I’m obliged to say, but it’s actually true. However, I realize this takes some confidence to do. I would never even consider doing that unless I feel the subject is something I could master. If you asked me to learn to play the piano and have a NNUG session about it, I would shake my head wildly. But ask me to have a NNUG session about LINQ (in C# !!), and you will see a big smile…
Are you planning any new sessions for NNUG?
Since I’m these days involved in a deep romance with a beauty called Silverlight, I can see something related to that on the horizon… I’m also very excited about what is happening on the parallel programming area with .Net/C#, both in .Net/C# 4 and even more so in .Net/C# 5, so something related to that could also be coming up…
What do you do when you’re not in front of your computer?
I have a family, who by the way is quite forgiving when it comes to romances like the one mentioned above, so most of the not-in-front-of-the-computer time takes place in the family domain. I am also an online gamer (hmmm… that I guess in fact counts as in-front-of-the-computer time…). Lord of the Rings Online (LOTRO) it is. I have been playing the same elf character, a so-called “tank”, actually for 2-3 years now. I love the social dimension of online gaming, although it in periods sadly has to get very low priority. As a long-term admirer of J. R. R. Tolkien’s fantasy world I just had to try when the game was launched, and I have since then been lost. Quite interesting to be questing through Middle-Earth, fighting hordes of nasty orcs, goblins and worse creatures, at the age of 40+, together with people of all ages from all around Europe, and even beyond.
NNUG and MTUG Haugesund User Group Meeting in English
Posted by on September 3, 2010
The countdown to AppEd has started. ARE YOU READY TO RUMBLE?!
Thursday evening, September 30, we’ll start off with NNUG (.NET) and MTUG (Microsoft Technology) Haugesund user group meeting. First, Fredrik Kalseth, which is a well known speaker in Norway, will talk about ASP.NET MVC 2 and the news in MVC 3. After his talk we’ll have some pizza, and then Morgan Simonsen, which is also a very well known speaker, will talk about Windows 7 SP1 and System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 R2. And the best of all, all sessions are in English, so everyone’s welcome! Please sign up for this at http://www.nnug.no/Avdelinger/Haugesund/Moter/NNUG-and-MTUG-Haugesund—September-2010/
5 minutes interview #24 – Anders Borchsenius (Microsoft)
Posted by on May 26, 2010
Anders is MTUG’s contact in Microsoft. June 10th he and Børge Hansen are coming to town (Haugesund) to visit both NNUG and MTUG, and talk about the Windows Azure Platform. Register here for the event.
When did you start in Microsoft and what do you do?
I started in Microsoft January 2010, so I’m quite fresh, but have already found Microsoft a very exciting place to work. I currently in the Server & Tools department and I’m responsible for the day-to-day contact with Norwegian IT-professionals. Everything that Microsoft does towards IT-pro’s in Norway is my responsibility. So, shortly said, I’m working with letting you guys know what we are up to that concerns us geeks. Let me give you some examples. Many of you know MSDN& TechNet Live. This is a joint conference between MSDN and TechNet. I am responsible for the TechNet part. That is, making sure we have the right speakers, and of course making sure guys like you visit and enjoy the seminar. More, I am the contact for any IT-Pro community in Microsoft. It’s my job to help communities focused on Microsoft technology grow and prosper. I am also responsible for the Norwegian TechNet site and TechNet flash. Short said, I’m employed in Microsoft to talk to you, so if there are any questions just email me! If it’s to technical it’s not sure I’m able to answer, but I’ll surely find the answer for you 🙂
What are your goals for MTUG and the community in general?
Make friends! That is my personal goal. As the Community Manager in Microsoft it is my goal to make sure that MTUG reaches its own goals. It is many positive effects for Microsoft of having a large IT-pro community. First of all, it enables Microsoft to communicate directly to our users. And hopefully achieve a good two-way-dialogue. That was cheesy, I know, but it’s sort of the truth. It’s also my job to make sure other Microsoft employees see the value, competence and importance of having good relation with the community.
Other than computers, do you have any hobbies?
I really like to Scuba dive! I got my scuba license in 2004 and have loved it ever since. But it’s the recent 3 years that I have gotten some gear of my own and started diving here in Norway. Even though Oslo is limited in terms of dive locations, I still get to dive other places in Norway. Other than that, I love to spend time at my summer house in Bamble, Telemark. I have this small place by the sea, which my grandfather built. No summer without that place. Other than that, I’ve found myself involved in a conspiracy to steal all my spear time. Yupp, gotten a girlfriend, so not much spare time, but it has its charm 🙂
Links:
v-andbo@microsoft.com
http://blogs.technet.com/anders
@/anders_borch
5 minutes interview #23 – Børge Hansen (Microsoft)
Posted by on May 20, 2010
Børge Hansen has been working as a developer on Microsoft technology since 1996. The last few years he’s been working as a technology adviser for Microsoft. He’s also been a speaker at several MSDN and NNUG events. He is also the speaker at our next NNUG and MTUG Haugesund meeting!
What have you worked on before you started in Microsoft?
I have previously worked in companies with in-house development for telecom and logistics solutions, as a general dev consultant and I have also been involved in several startups. Being able to work in different industries has led me into many different project types. I have done projects with GIS enabled data warehouses for analyzing mobile networks, I have tried to compete with Amazon.com with Bokkilden and created several types of data entry/reporting solutions. The last few years before I joined Microsoft worked with developing a new supply chain/ERP solution for health care sector. We were early adopters of DDD and TDD on the Microsoft platform. We wrote a complete platform for an ASP.Net 2.0 based MVP architecture. This is still one of my proudest moments. Especially now when I see that the rest of the industry has also taken on a focus on the established design patterns. Even today I would point to our framework as more productive than most of the frameworks out there. I would love to create a new open sourced version of this I could find the time.
What have you been working on in Microsoft?
I have been working in several roles. I started out as an Architect advisor, or evangelist as the Microsoft term is. Advising the big consulting companies and customers was a major part of my work. We also helped TV2 establish TV2 Sumo on a Silverlight based smooth streaming platform. Later on I have worked with SQL Server stuff, mostly working on problem solving for customers and helping with Oracle compete situations. These days I am on my last few days as Product Manager for SQL Server and BizTalk. During this summer I will go back to the Architect role and shift my focus to new “early adopter” technologies and cloud development stuff.
What’s your favorite topic when it comes to being a speaker?
While I think of myself as a fairly competent techie or geek, I love mostly to speak of the soft skills of development projects. I believe these are the ones that make out great developers. You can be world’s greatest coder, but you only become a superhero if you master the soft skills. Building your skills and pride as an architect has been one of the favorite talks. I am in the board of IASA Norway and this is a recurring theme within that group.
Do you have any hobbies, except computer stuff?
Does family and home maintenance stuff count? He, he, seems that is all I can manage with these days.
But I do love the great outdoors. I go hunting/fishing for a couple of weeks every year. Often we go to locations without cellphone coverage with just a tent and a backpack. I love the feeling of being disconnected from the world a few days and only focus on being present in the wilderness. I also have a cabin in the mountains, just beside a lake. I try to get up there as often as I can. Either alone or with family and friends. This is a classic Norwegian style “hytte” with no electricity and water. It is back to basics. The really cool thing is that the kids love it as much as I do 🙂
Blog: http://www.borge3000.no
Twitter: @borge3000
News from Ølen about stuff that matters
Posted by on April 6, 2010
You might have noticed there was just a holiday. Something about Jesus eating some bad chicken, so everyone thought he died, but then he woke up a couple of days later feeling much better. Anyways, because of this bad chicken, I’ve been VERY busy the last week, playing Modern Warfare 2 on Xbox. Ai can has vacation 2!
AppFrame as a product!
Since I started in Omega I’ve been fighting for releasing AppFrame as a framework for developers outside Omega. Now that’s almost a reality. We’re soon going to offer AppFrame as a product, along side PIMS and our other products. There haven’t been any final decision on pricing and stuff, but I can guarantee it will be affordable. This means that all developers out there that want to use AppFrame as their Framework to make applications can soon start doing this! They MIGHT even get the source code! After releasing CR3 I’m now confident that this is an AWESOME product. If you’ve met me, you know I’m not a sales person. I always say what I mean, and I can say with my full heart that AppFrame is without a doubt a VERY good product to develop applications for customers! Contact me if you want a presentation (from a developer, or a sales person. Your choice!). I’ll probably post a blog about the details when there’s been a decision on price etc.
NNUG and MTUG Haugesund 
I’m the chapter of NNUG (Norwegian .NET User Group) Haugesund. We had a meeting at Rica Maritim Hotel in Haugesund March 22nd. The speaker was Einar 
Ingebrigtsen, and he talked about creating games with managed code. That means, using Silverlight, XNA, DirectX and similar. We had a new record of attendees: 27! That’s really high, at least if you compare us to Bergen which is a MUCH bigger city, but they’ve got about an average of about 20 people every meeting.
Since I’m both interested in programming and hosting-related stuff, I thought it would be cool to start a user group that could concentrate about the IT Pro’s out there, just like NNUG is concentrating on MSDN-people. Timing perfect, as always, I read on twitter that a guy called Jan Egil Ring was about to start MTUG (Microsoft Technology User Group). I’ve offered myself as the contact person in Haugesund, and I’m now working on gathering people so we can get a committee to manage this group. I’ll keep all of you updated when we’ll start having meetings etc.
VB.NET 10
Except playing Xbox, what have I been doing lately? I’ve played a lot with Visual Studio 2010 RC. A hot tip for those of you thinking you’ll play with Silverlight 4 in the RC. Don’t even think about it. It doesn’t work. I didn’t know this, so after 6-7 hours of swearing, kicking, screaming etc. Erik (coworker and friend) told me that’s not possible. Well, thanks! After that I started playing with WPF, since it’s basically the same except that Silverlight is a wossy-version of WPF /me hides under the table, waiting for the Silverlight-folks to start screaming. I’ve already managed to create a simple twitter client, trying out LINQ to XML, LINQ to Entities and a couple of new minor changes to VB. The fact that you now can create a Property on a class with ONE line of code is awesome. And, yes, before you C#-fanatics say “we’ve had this for ages”, you now got optional parameters, which VB have had for about 1000 years. We now also got something that’s got a fancy name. “Implicit Line Continuation”, which basically means that you don’t have to end all lines with _ if you want to continue this line on the next. This was very annoying in for example LINQ, where you’ve got something like:
Dim v = From a In AppDomain.CurrentDomain.GetAssemblies _ Where a.ToString.Length > 0 Select a.ToString()
Here is a great example. On the first line you need to specify the _ at the end, if not you’re not “allowed” to continue, but you don’t need it on the Where-line. Pretty confusing. Well, now you don’t need it at all.
One other thing that I find really nice is the improved IntelliSense. Now you can start typing “To”, and you’ll get:
CompareTo, CopyTo, ToString etc
Before, you only got ToString, since that’s the only thing starting with To. You can also search for AD, and get AppDomain, since .NET uses Pascal Casing.
Blogs
We’ve been working a bit on the blogs site. Or, to be honest, I’ve been making tasks and Stian has been
doing them. The new (some of them are old, but you might not have noticed them before) features are: Tags. This works the same ways as Categories, except that you can tag an article with more than one Tag. We’ve then got Tag Clouds, to show which Tags are the most mentioned, and which are rarer.
If you’re using TeamDocuments, you will be auto-logged in which gives you the possibility of rating all posts, and commenting on them! You can even comment as an anonym user.
Johnny said today that he’ll start blogging more. Peter also had this statement a couple of weeks ago. Guess it’s just like X-files, “Du tror det ikke før du får se det!” (something like You won’t believe it before you see it!). But I would be very happy to see some posts from them too!
Build 5
The technology department released Build 5 of AppFrame a couple of weeks ago. Peter was our “speaker” at our last cake-meeting where he went through most of the changes done in this build. I’m really excited to start upgrading our clients to this release!
Issue Tracker
To report bugs (yes, we as everyone else, including Microsoft!, produce bugs), the technology department released a new “issue tracker”. This makes it SOOO much easier for me, since I now don’t have to read 10-15 TeamDocs every day to check if the bugs I’ve reported have been fixed. Most of the things I’m reporting is even getting fixed within a couple of hours (sometimes days), depending on the severity of the bug/suggestion. I’m strongly recommending you all to report everything you find, so we’ll get an even better product! Just today I’ve reported two things; resizing issues with the calendar in chrome and the distribution lists not working. They haven’t been fixed yet, but the distribution lists-thing is “in process”.
If you’ve got any suggestions on what you want me to blog about, or you’ve got comments, please send them to me! And remember to rate the posts! Good or bad. I won’t bite… Changed my mind. I will bite 🙂
NNUG Haugesund – Update
Posted by on February 1, 2010
The Windows Azure presentation and demo application is uploaded now http://www.nnug.no/Avdelinger/Haugesund/Moter/NNUG-Haugesund—Januar-2010/ . I can also announce that we’re going to get several distinguished visitors this year to speak for us. I don’t want to mention names or topics yet, but we’re getting MVPs (Most Valuable Professional) and RDs (Regional Director), so be prepared for an awesome year!
Holiday times
Posted by on December 7, 2009
Instead of taking vacation in the summer I’ve chosen to do it now since it’s so close to Christmas. So, what does Vidar do when he’s on vacation? Travel, work in the garden, renovate the apartment? No no no. I just ordered a new phone, HTC Touch HD2 as well as 8 GB RAM and 4TB disk etc for my server. I’m going to set up a Hyper-V server with 7 virtual servers. I’m going to run my own AD controller, SQL Server (with 6 instances, for testing purposes), Exchange, BizTalk and SharePoint. And last but not least, home server. I’ve been running this before, but now they’ve finally got real support for windows 7, so I’m going to run it again. So, why am I doing this? Well, now that I’m not in the technology department anymore, I’m “limited” to do research on my spare time. I still haven’t touched SharePoint or BizTalk. I’ve installed Exchange before, but never played with it. Will it be useful? Probably not, but I’ll definitely learn much and maybe get some great ideas on how to improve our systems.
In addition to my new server, I’m playing around in Visual Studio 2010 Beta2. I’ve now learned to LOVE XAML. I’ve played a bit with Silverlight, but mostly with WPF. I hope we’ll soon get over to this. Maybe CR4? 🙂 So, this blog post is just a notice that “be aware of a series of blog posts!”.
Oh, I almost forgot. Get ready for some cool sessions at NNUG next year. First of will be how to create an application running Azure, SQL Azure, Silverlight and WCF RIA Services.
NNUG Haugesund – September 2009
Posted by on September 9, 2009
September 29th at 18:00 there will be an NNUG Haugesund meeting at Hemmingstad Kultursenter in Haugesund. Arild Røksund will talk about SQL Tuning. Some of you might have listened to me talk about this topic, but wait till you hear Arild! He’s like the über guru! Jan Ove Halvorsen will also have a 15 minutes zip-talk about .NET RIA Services. I’ve ordered pizza, soda and coffee (nice mix?) to 19:00. Remember to sign up. Oh, did I mention it’s free?!
Sign up here: http://www.nnug.no/Avdelinger/Haugesund/Moter/NNUG-Haugesund—September-2009/
Norwegian Podcast
Posted by on January 15, 2009
Einar Ingebrigtsen (Chapter Lead of NNUG Vestfold) have just started a Norwegian podcast. You can find it at http://www.ingebrigtsen.info/ . His first podcast is a intervju with Jon Arild Tørresdal about Agile development. Jon Arild is by the way the Chapter Lead of NNUG Bergen. You might notice his accent. He’s from Haugesund but have lived in Bergen for quite some time.
NB! I might have to start podcasting soon 😉 In English though..
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