Star-Studded Northeast User Conference Set for April

Published: February 8, 2010

by Dan Burger

In theory, everyone can agree that training is crucial to ongoing employee development. It's a major factor in their success, professional development, and willingness to continue working for an employer. And organizations can see the benefits from developing their employees' skills relating to technological innovations that provide a company with competitive advantages. Yet somewhere between theory and reality there's a disconnect. Lately, it's the budget that gets the blame.

"The general feeling among the conference organizers is that training budgets are loosening up," says Paul Rogers, one of many volunteers who pour their efforts into the Northeast User Groups Conference (NEUGC), the largest IBM i (Power Systems, iSeries, AS/400) conference in the Northeast United States. "This is a very good training value considering our low registration fee, the variety of sessions available, and the lower travel expense--compared to airfare to Florida, for instance--for those living in the Northeast."

The annual NEUG Conference has a history of success. The event this year is its 20th. Its educational offerings remain i-centric, which means Power Systems hardware, IBM i/OS, and solutions and technology that are designed for i have exclusivity.

Educational session topics include RPG, programming tools, database advancements, systems management, security, system upgrades, performance tuning, backup and recovery, Web development, and a management and professional development track. An exposition area for vendors from the IBM i community is also part of the show.

The conference agenda includes three full-day sessions on Monday, April 12. That lineup features two "hands-on" labs--PHP database development and Web services for RPG programmers--and a seminar on SQL. These sessions are independent of the NEUG Conference and priced separately. The SQL seminar can be attended separate from the conference at a registration cost of $100. The two lab sessions are bundled with the conference. The conference registration alone is $500, if a lab is added, the registration fee is $700. The SQL seminar added to the conference registration is $550. These prices are in effect through March 19, to reward early decision makers. After that date there are $75 raises in every option except the standalone SQL seminar, which remains $100. The Sheraton Hotel in Framingham, Massachusetts, will provide the conference facilities. Room rates there are $150 per night for a single and $160 for a double.

There are 80 sessions during the two-day conference scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday, April 13 and 14. Times and dates can be found online at the conference agenda page.

The list of speakers includes IBM's George Farr, Dawn May, Tracy Smith, and Dave Taylor, and from the IBM i community John Earl, Jon Paris, Susan Gantner, Skip Marchesani, Scott Klement, Pete Massiello, Dennis McCarthy, and John Valance. Links to brief speaker biographies are also accessible online at the conference agenda page.

The eight user groups that participate in the Northeast User Groups Conference are: the Fairfield AS/400 Users Group; the Hartford User Of Midrange Systems; the Long Island System Users Group; the Maine Midrange Users Group; the New England Midrange Users Group; New England Systems; the New Hampshire Midrange User Group; and the Vermont Midrange User Group.

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