As developers, we should never lose sight of the fact that we are writing software for our end-users, not ourselves. It is our end-users who are paying our salaries, either literally, by paying our invoices or buying the product, or figuratively, by employing us as staff.

Oftentimes, we get lost in the sheer awesomeness of the code we're writing or the technology we're using and forget that our end-users don't really care. They want a great user experience that helps them do their job; as simple as possible but no more. They want performant software (or software that gives the illusion of performance) so that they feel productive. They don't want their work to vanish into thin air because of a power or network outage. They want to do their work anywhere they may happen to be.

It is our jobs as developers to act as the middleman between the cool tech and these needs. Sometimes that may mean we have to put aside the former in order to satisfy the latter and have a happy user. However, if the user is happy enough, they'll be back asking for more and we'll have another chance at the cool tech.

So, put your users first and the tech is sure to follow.

TechEd 2009 is a week away and once again we are excited to be platinum sponsors of a major conference. If you're going to attend, make sure to stop by our booth to see some of our new technologies in action or just to say hi and grab some swag.

As always, we are planning some interesting things, so make sure to visit booth #201... Even if you aren't planning on being there, stay tuned to our blogs and the DevExpress Channel for detailed coverage of the event.

Mark Miller's Marketing Plan for TechEd 2009

The power and features of DevExpress controls can be best seen in real world applications (RWAs). That's why we've announced the "DX Airways" project which demonstrates DevExpress technologies in the development of an end-to-end administration system for a fictional airline company.

The RWA will utilize DevExpress ASP.NET and WinForms controls to drive the presentation layer. The data access layer will be powered by our ORM tool, the eXpress Persistent Objects framework. The video walkthrough series first introduces you to the architecture of the project, then takes a step-by-step approach to help you build the application.

Look for more videos and updates on this exciting project in the future!

Watch Videos about the DX Airways Project

The DevExpress search engine helps you find answers to all sorts of questions. Code Samples, support issues, documentation, forums, and a ton of other DevExpress resources are indexed so you'll get instant results.

You can easily integrate the DevExpress search engine into your Visual Studio IDE and find answers in one click. Check out the corresponding video to improve your Visual Studio experience.

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