Here are my key points from Techdays conference which was held in Helsinki on 5th - 6th of March:

1. Visual Studio 2010 and .NET framework 4.0 are almost here. Get ready.
   • Support for dynamic languages like Ruby and Python.
   • New functional language: F#
   • .NET 4.0 is a totally new stack and not built on .NET 2.0 like previous versions were
   • Download Visual Studio 2010 and .NET 4.0 CTP from Microsoft.
2. ASP.NET 4.0
   • One click deployment that creates a package file (uses MSDeploy). This can be compared to .jar packages of java.
   • Support for multiple web.config files without needing to copy-paste.
   • AJAX Client Templates will change the way we are writing JavaScript.
   • ASP.NET MVC- a new alternative to Web Forms
3. Azure Services Platform
   • Less worries about environment and scalability.
   • Note that SQL Data Services != MS SQL Server.
4. SharePoint 2007
   • Application lifecycle must be planned carefully because there are many challenges especially with upgrading the application.
   • See patterns & practices SharePoint Guidance. It contains plenty of useful information.
   • Check Prism V2 if you are planning to use Silverlight 2.0 with SharePoint. It contains patterns and practices to develop modular, rich applications.
5. Pex and Chess are really cool new tools which will help you to catch bugs.

TechDays videos will be available at codezone.fi.