Friday, May 4, 2012

Informix on Campus at IIUG 2012 Conference

Last week I had the pleasure to be a part of IIUG 2012 conference in (almost) sunny San Diego. The wonderful organizers of the conference did it again! In fact they outdid themselves in several ways. With a sold out hotel, a record number of sessions, and an increased number of users as well as total attendees, it was a great atmosphere. You can read more about the conference in the current edition of IIUG Insider newsletter (Issue #142).


The conference organizers once again welcomed IBM to invite and host faculty members from the regional universities on April 24th, the second day of the conference. We had two faculty members  from two universities at the conference: California State University at Long Beach, and University of Redlands. In addition, we had a representative who is also an Informix user from The University of Iowa. The faculty members were given a one day pass to the conference which included an invitation to Tuesday's keynote, conference sessions, demos, and a round table discussion with the IBM Informix and the IIUG leaders. At the round table, the attendees learnt about the latest Informix technologies, the role of Informix in the database market, and its role in the IBM Smarter Planet initiative.


This year another great thing happened on the academic front. For the first time, the IIUG Directors Award was bestowed upon a faculty member. Dr. Mirta Baranovic from the University of Zagreb, who has been teaching Informix to her students since the 1980s, won the IIUG Directors Award for 2012. You can read more about her passion and contributions to the Informix community here.


All the faculty members that attended the conference and the round table session found it very valuable and are looking forward to collaborating with IBM this Summer/Fall. A big thanks to everyone at IBM and IIUG who made this event a grand success!!

Monday, April 9, 2012

Informix was at CCSC Central Plains Conference

Hello everyone! It's been a while since we had any significant updates. It may appear like Informix on Campus activities pick up during the first half of every year and then slow down during the latter. The truth is that our efforts during the second half of the year usually sets up the stage for our activities during the first half.


On March 30th and 31st, representing IBM Informix, I attended the 18th annual Consortium for Computing Sciences in Colleges (CCSC) Central Plains conference. It was held at the Ozarks Technical Community College in Springfield, MO. There were about 150 participants including students and faculty. Most of the faculty were from universities in Missouri, Kansas, Iowa, Arkansas, and Nebraska. However there were a few from as far away as California, Lousiana, and Michigan.


At the conference, Informix participated as a vendor and I was given an one hour session to present what we have to offer. About half the audience were faculty who were primarily focused on teaching and the rest were students. Below is a glimpse of the room starting to fill up well before the session.


I presented the session titled "IBM Informix TimeSeries Revolution". True to the title, I spent the majority of the time talking about Informix TimeSeries, how it is uniquely positioned in the market, and why the faculty and students should start adopting it. The attendees were impressed with the technology. In addition,  I talked about IBM academic initiative and how faculty can take advantage of the Informix in a Box program. The attendees also received a DVD that contains the Informix lecture series and the Virtual Appliance. During the conference, I also had the opportunity to talk to several faculty members and tell them about Informix and our campus activities across many universities.


IIUG2012 conference is only two weeks away! Hope to see a lot of the Informix community in San Diego. If you want to get involved or have any questions about "Informix on Campus" activities, contact us at idsoncampus at us.ibm.com