WWDC 2005: Week in Review

2005 is a big year for WWDC. Not only did Apple announce it would build Macs that use Intel processors, but the format of the conference itself was rearranged a bit. Here are my thoughts on the week.


Labs

While the standard slide-based presentations were still the bulk of the material, the labs took a much more promominent role. It wasn't a given that this format would work, but I think the labs really became the star of the show. Most were packed around the clock with people working on their apps.

The concept is that each physical "lab" room has a rotating schedule, with Apple engineers for each techology present at set times. If, for example, you have questions about your Core Data application, you look up the Core Data lab on the guide and bring your laptop into the room at the appropriate time to talk to an engineer.

This is invaluable for advanced developers, because everyone is eventually interested in behavior that isn't documentated. I got some of my most important questions about Core Data and Cocoa Bindings answered by talking to the people that actually wrote the code.

The labs also change the flavor of WWDC, since you can't get at all the same experience by just staying home and waiting for the DVDs to arrive.


Lunchtime Talks

Last year's informal get-togethers blossomed into full-fledged lunchtime sessions in 2005. The talks covered a variety of topics that are tightly connected to the Mac OS X community but aren't directly about Apple technology.

The speakers were as diverse as the topics -- people you wouldn't normally think of speaking at an Apple developer's conference. I wish I could go into more detail here, but I'm not sure what's supposed to be confidential in this context.


People

Every year I meet more people that I previously only knew through email. It's also great to see friends that I met at earlier conferences and rarely talk to in person. This time around, I could barely walk fifty feet without seeing someone I knew.

It's also clear that WWDC is getting quite big. This wasn't really apparent until the main Apple quad was packed with attendees Thursday night for the campus bash.

Even more interesting was the diversity of the attendees. I ran into a number of people that are new to Mac OS X and are captivated by what Apple has brought to the market in the last few years. It's exciting to see such an influx of fresh, eager talent.


Final Word

Apple had a interesting challenge this year since there was no new version of Mac OS X to bait developers with. Despite that, people came in record numbers and were treated to a brand new hardware platform and the absolute best help you're going to gets. This conference was about writing great Tiger apps, and everyone (even consumers) will benefit.

Although there were a few exceptions (Dan found some bugs in Xcode 2.1), it almost became cliche to hear how beautifully Cocoa applications compiled and ran on Intel hardware.

Overall, it was a blast. Next year should be quite interesting.

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