Las Vegas is many things to many people. For some, it's the entertainment capital of the world. For others, it's the place they can turn one dollar into a million. For the hungry, it's the home of the $3.99 steak and eggs special. For Computer Associates Development Buddies, on September 16th and 17th, Las Vegas became the place to gather in-depth information on CA's Unicenter Brand products. This information was provided first hand by the development teams responsible for the products.
In the last year and a half, Computer Associates has re-emphasized the Development Buddy Program. The mission of CA's Development Buddy program is to foster an ongoing dialogue between CA's development organization and our key clients. This will assist in developing effective strategies and produce world-class solutions and services for the benefit of our clients, CA, and the overall IT community. The program offers early access to technology, strategy, on-site assistance from development software action teams (SWAT), regularly scheduled Webcasts, and development briefings to keep you up-to-date with industry trends and the latest technology.
The Las Vegas Unicenter Development Conference 2002 brought together more than 250 attendees from all over the world (some guests were from as far away as Australia) to Bally's Hotel and Casino. Wai Wong, Computer Associate's brand unit executive for Unicenter, delivered the keynote, which underscored CA's commitment to quality and support, and to delivering solutions that allow management from a business, service, and operational perspective. The development owners for Unicenter Brand products -- spanning enterprise availability management, enterprise job management, desktop tools, and service desk tools -- gave complimentary strategy talks.
Although CA's strategies were an important element, the focal point of this conference centered on providing the most technical product information to our customers. The conference delivered more than 60 technical presentations across four tracks: Unicenter NSM, Unicenter Desktop Products, Unicenter Service Desk, and Unicenter Autosys. Each track offered sessions on product architecture, tips and tricks, how to's, and best practices. CA brought more than 50 developers from around the world to participate in the conference through presentations, informal round table discussions, and focused one-on-one meetings. Notable Unicenter NSM sessions included Tips and Tricks for Unicenter NSM 3.0, Architecture of Unicenter Management for .NET, Architecture of Advanced Event Correlation, and Tips and Tricks for Managing Mobile Devices. Popular desktop sessions included Best Practices for Deploying Desktop Agents Architecture of Unicenter Argis, and Unicenter Asset Management Integration.
Service Plus sessions included Migrating to Service Desk 5.5 and Using Mobile Devices with your service desk. For Autosys, everyone was interested in the Best Practices for Upgrading from AutoSys 3.x to 4.0 and the newly announced Unicenter Enterprise Job Manager. Two of CA's partners, HP and Sun, gave insight to their plans for the coming years by delivering strategy sessions. Last, but certainly not least, CA introduced a new product initiative, the Management Data Integrator, which ties together IT data to extend end-to-end management of your business.
As you know, technology doesn't thrive without some fun. The development summit included an event night, which started with a Hawaiian luau poolside at the Flamingo Hotel and Casino, complete with Hawaiian shirts and leis. After the luau, CA treated everyone to the sold-out Second City Improv Comedy show where technology and spontaneity mixed, providing a fun evening for all.
In the short time since the Las Vegas development summit, many attendees have given CA a "thumbs-up"on the overall value of the Unicenter Development Conference. We at CA have also gained valuable feedback that helps guide our overall priorities. and we're looking forward to the next opportunity to serve our valued clients.
Following in the footsteps of the successful CA Development Buddy conference in Las Vegas, CA also hosted an International summit for our European Development Buddies in London on October 3rd and 4th. This conference was extremely well-attended and again deemed a significant success.
If your company is interested in joining the free Development Buddy program, please visit http://www.ca.com/cadevelopmentbuddy and complete the application. If you have any questions, you can send an e-mail message to CADevelopmentBuddy@ca.com.
With CA's focus on our customers and the quality of our products, combined with great technical events like the conference in Vegas, CA's customers and CA are well positioned to hit the jackpot.