Released on: September 19, 2008, 6:26 am

Press Release Author: Alex Khizhnyak

Industry: Software

Press Release Summary: At the latest meeting, which gathered the largest number of
attendees in the history of the Belarus .NET User Group, Sergiy Baydachnyy of
Microsoft Ukraine presented the new Internet Explorer and reviewed its technical
aspects.

Press Release Body: September 18, 2008, Minsk, Belarus – The latest Belarus .NET
User Group meeting, which was held on September 11, 2008, garnered the attendance of
more people than ever before in the two-year history of the user group. Almost one
hundred applications were received and 64 developers took part in the conference.
Sergiy Baydachnyy of Microsoft Ukraine delivered a technical review of the latest
additions to Internet Explorer 8, after which Andrei Varanovich (Microsoft MVP)
spoke on the key capacities of SharePoint 2007. The event was supported by the Minsk
Institute of Management and Altoros Systems, a global software delivery acceleration
specialist that provides focused outsourced software product engineering,
independent Quality Assurance, and testing services to software organizations and
information-driven enterprises.

Brief summary of the event

The event kicked off at 6.45 p.m. with Sergiy Baydachnyy covering the new
functionality in Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) and the opportunities it provides for
.NET developers. Mr. Baydachnyy also elaborated on the compatibility of IE8 with the
latest standards and spoke about the Accelerator feature, which allows users to
perform various activities with text extracts (e.g., translate, search, or mail
them) without leaving the current page. To wrap up the event, Sergiy Baydachnyy
answered a number of questions about Microsoft, developer certification, and the
future plans the company has regarding Belarus.

Andrei Varanovich, who was scheduled to speak about the new capabilities of
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 (MOSS 2007), quickly discovered that his
listeners were particularly interested in Microsoft Team Foundation Server. When
his talk touched on this topic, the audience flooded him with questions and the
conversation moved on to this product entirely (making it one of the possible topics
for future conferences). Mr. Varanovich was able to direct the discussion back to
MOSS 2007 and its new features, such as Enterprise Content Management and Enterprise
Search, and the benefits of the latter for ASP.NET developers.

Each presentation lasted for roughly an hour and a half, with a fifteen-minute break
in between, during which Sergiy Baydachnyy and Andrei Varanovich answered numerous
questions, while sipping tea and coffee. The meeting finished at 10 p.m., after
Sergiy Baydachnyy reminded the audience that he was about to be late for his plane.

A detailed photo report is available on the community website:

http://belarusdotnet.org/forums/p/73/86.aspx#86

Links to presentations and audio recordings
1. “Internet Explorer 8 for .NET developers”
Speaker: Sergiy Baydachnyy, Developer Evangelist, Microsoft Ukraine, Kyiv
PowerPoint: http://belarusdotnet.org/files/folders/92/download.aspx
Audio: http://belarusdotnet.org/files/folders/95/download.aspx

2. “New Features of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007”
Speaker: Andrei Varanovich, Leader of Belarus .NET User Group, Minsk

PowerPoint: http://belarusdotnet.org/files/folders/93/download.aspx
Audio: http://belarusdotnet.org/downloads/andrei_voronovich_sharepoint_2007.wav

3. “Q&A Session and Plans Discussion”
(Andrei Varanovich and Sergiy Baydachnyy)

Audio: http://belarusdotnet.org/files/folders/94/download.aspx

Featured quotes

“Themed meetings involving leading software development companies make it possible
not only to learn the news of the IT industry, but also to get a glimpse of what the
industry will be like tomorrow, as well as to make a contribution to forming it,”
noted Dr. Nikolay Susha, Rector of the Minsk Institute of Management. “I hope that
the past meeting of Belarus .NET User Group was our first, but not last, step in
this direction.”
“It was great to hear positive reviews of the meeting,” said Alex Khizhnyak, press
coordinator of the event. “We are glad that a lot of participants were able to get
their questions answered and found communication with the speakers so useful. We
would like to thank the Minsk Institute of Management for the excellent organization
and to personally thank Alexander Gedranovich, Deputy Holder of the Chair of IT and
Higher Mathematics, for his active involvement.”
About the sponsors and organizers

The Minsk Institute of Management, founded in 1991, is one of the leading institutes
of higher education in the Republic of Belarus. It provides all facilities for
training highly competent specialists in economics, law, psychology, foreign
languages, and information technologies. Today, the resource base and the fully
qualified faculty ensure teaching on a highly qualified level with the use of the
latest achievements in science and technology. Please visit www.miu.by for more
information.

Altoros Systems, Inc. is a global software delivery acceleration specialist that
provides focused outsourced software product engineering, independent Quality
Assurance, and testing services to software organizations and information-driven
enterprises. Founded in 1999 and headquartered in Western Massachusetts, Altoros has
representative offices in Tampa, Florida. It manages a software development center
in Eastern Europe out of its offices in Minsk, Belarus. For more information, please
visit www.altoros.com.

About Microsoft Ukraine

In 2003, Microsoft opened a regional office in Ukraine aimed at developing the
software market, promoting Microsoft products, and providing partner and customer
support, as well as introducing and localizing the newest technologies and
implementing social initiatives in Ukraine and Belarus. For more:
www.microsoft.com/ukraine.

About the Belarus .NET User Group

The Belarus .NET User Group strives to unite developers, IT companies, and everyone
else interested in .NET technologies. The community plans regular meetings where the
participants are able to communicate, attend presentations from the leading
specialists, and swap notes. During the two years of its existence, the community
has gathered more than a hundred Belarusian .NET specialists. To learn more about
Belarus .NET User Group, please visit www.belarusdotnet.org.

# # #

Press Contact:
Alex Khizhnyak
Press Coordinator
+375 (33) 636-8119
+375 (29) 367-0849
info@belarusdotnet.org
http://belarusdotnet.org


Web Site: http://belarusdotnet.org

Contact Details: Press Contact:
Alex Khizhnyak
Press Coordinator
+375 (33) 636-8119
+375 (29) 367-0849
info@belarusdotnet.org
http://belarusdotnet.org