Live at WES 2007 Day 2

3:19am – Let me say that the night was a blast, first taking on the T-Mobile "Customer Appreciation Event" then heading on to Hard Rock Cafe, where Research In Motion was kind enough to host an entertaining night filled with music by local talent followed by Jim Belushi and the Sacred Hearts. I ended up meeting with Doug from BlackBerryCool and various members of Research In Motion, as well as IT staff and BES administrations from Coca-Cola, M.D. Anderson, British Telecom, and other companies with representatives lurking around the CityWalk enclosure.

One of the perks/schwag of the night was T-Mobile’s free giveway/takeaway of a new pair of sunglasses for anyone who was registered for the event, with the selection of taking the glasses with you for the night or having them delivered to the hotel. Obviously, for convenience purposes, I decided to have them delivered to my room. After one hour of battling with the front desk and bell hop, I received a package from T-Mobile…one problem – it wasn’t mine. What a scam.

The night ended up with a visit to Pat O’Briens, world famous Irish pub and bar, serving cold Hurricanes drinks. Needless to say, WES has been more than fun (to me but probably not Mr. Marketing, Boy Genius). Pictures are on their way, althought it’s pretty darn late.

8:40am – Just now getting to conference. I must say that this session coming up had me dreaming a bit sweeter last night. Titled "The New BlackBerry Enterprise Solution: What’s the Buzz?" and covering the upcoming release of BlackBerry Enterprise Server, codename ARGON.

8:55am – Well crap, I turn on the camera only to realize that the battery is completely drained and it’s not actually turning on. Oh well, pictures coming later than sooner, but I suppose that’s just one of the casualties of war. BG has decided to leave the conference for business in NY.

9:01am – Roadmap presented to the audience. BES 4.1 SP4 set for a May 2007 release. Web Desktop is also slated for May, with Enhanced Monitoring (NeedText) due out in June. BES 4.1 SP5 will be set for a November targeted release while BES 5.0 (ARGON), which introduces voice services (Ascendent) and high availability, is set for May 2008.

9:08am – BlackBerry Web Desktop presented. Mentioned that it went RTM (Released to Manufacturering) earlier this week. Will be available in the next few weeks from BlackBerry.com. Will allow for OS upgrades, etc. BES Montioring service (formerly NeedText) is slated for May/June release and will provide baseline monitoring. Will be compatible with BES 4.0 and above and will be a free download.

9:09am – BES 4.1 SP4 – OTASL will be introduced to allow over the air software loading, which will introduce wireless OS upgrades. OS is pushed to the device and user is then prompted to upgrade. Office 2007 file format support finally introduced. Slipstream browsing enhancements will be completely added into the solution. 9:11am – Introduction of ARGON.

9:12am – Beta program for ARGON will be 9 months rather than 3 months; this is set to be the longest beta period offered by RIM.

9:13am – Web-based interface and "WAN friendly". New services and modules will be developed within a plugin-based design concept.

9:15am – Custom roles for administration introduced. Custom roles will be applicable to newly designed groups. As mentioned, the concept of groups within ARGON will be completely redesigned and overhauled. Users can now belong to multiple groups, which can be dynamic in nature.

9:17am – Will contain a heirarchival view of the system topology, as well as the ability to group servers within a collection of servers that can be customized for certain IT policies or software configurations for those certain servers within your BlackBerry domain.

9:19am – Demo time. WOOT! These are static pages, as the product has not been completely designed, although these will be the final mock-ups we’ll see in the released product. This interface is slick – a HELL of a lot better than what we’re used to seeing within the current application-based management interface. Ten thumbs up for RIM!

9:23am – I’m really kicking myself in the ass right now for not having my camera charged. This interface is REALLY slick. I’ve been asking for web-based administration for almost 3 years now, and they’ve finally delivered my wish to me …except this is far exceeding my expectations.

9:29am – High availability being presented. Primary and Secondary BES running all services at all times and secondary server will have warm connections to messaging environment. When primary BES host fails, the dispatcher service on standby server will begin the failover process. Standby server will establish tentative connection to RIM network and become the primary server, validating it’s connection and services.

9:31am – Enhanced monitoring now the subject. Web-based interface, obviously. Will be able to archive data up to 52 weeks for trending purposes. PIN notifications can be configured for alarms.

9:34am – The high availability model will allow for limited downtime upgrading of servers. Failover configuration can be set to manual mode. The standby server can be upgraded with a manual failover following to allow the former primary server to be upgraded. Mentioned that engineering had worked very hard on this feature.

9:36am – Effortless PBX mobilization now being discussed. Direct menu integration within the Phone application on BlackBerry handhelds. Will allow core featureset for PBX systems support.

9:40am – Active directory (and other data sources) integration for management features. This can be designated for all or selected users. AD can then be used for management of these users and groups. No schema updates will be required for this functionality.

9:53am – Full complement of APIs and web services to allow for customization of the BlackBerry Administration Services to your own preferences. Examples would be adding a user to the BES, manual failover for BES, user filters for emails, etc.

9:55am – ARGON targeted for WES 2008. ARGON is designed to make life easier for all parties involved with the BES, from the end-user experience to management of the server.

9:56am – User question asking for dual calendar support, although there is no timeframe; going to be added to Top 10. On a related note, user questions public folder contact repository. Planned for ARGON release. This has been one of the major requests on BlackBerryForums over the past few years, so I’m glad to see this feature being added.

10:02am – User questions continue but I’m leaving this session. Let me reiterate that I’ve been VERY excited about this release of BES. If they can deliver all that they are talking about (these speakers are the project managers over ARGON), then BlackBerry will surpass anything being introduced to the market, both currently and in the next year. Awesome stuff!

2:05pm – Jim Basillie is introduced in the General Session room to hand out Wireless Leadership Awards to customers of RIM

2:07pm – Basillie introduces Ben Chau, representing the Calinfornia Transplant Donor Network as winner of the Innovation in the Private Sector award.

2:12pm – Basillie introduces Eric Ginsberg, representing HJ Heinz, as winner of the Business Impact award.

2:15pm – Basillie begins the introduction of Malcolm Gladwell, author of the Tipping Point and Blink. Basillie makes jokes surrounding the positives of BlackBerry rather than the typical negatives such as addiction to the device, looking forward to red lights and enjoying extended bathroom breaks. Jokes that when approached about the BlackBerry impacts on meetings, they are actually liberating users from boring meetings.

2:18pm – Introduction moves to Malcolm Gladwell and their long friendship dating back to being floormates in college in Toronto.

2:21pm – Malcolm Gladwell now speaking. Jokes that he tells people he knew Jim when he was still poor. Continues on to speak about critical thinking proceses, which highlights content from his book, Blink.