Looking through the Build 2016 Schedule

We have been waiting to get a look at the schedule of events for Microsoft's annual developers conference that is being held in San Francisco this week beginning on 30 March 2016.

Although Microsoft has not published this schedule to the main Build web portal yet they have laid it out on the Channel 9 Build Event Page so we can scan through there and see what are the common themes across the three days of sessions

Of course there are Day 1 and Day 2 keynotes that will feature Microsoft executives showing off the latest and greatest about the Microsoft ecosystem. Satya Nadella should kick things off then hand the stage over to leaders in the various product teams for demos.

In these keynotes I expect we will hear some of the latest momentum numbers for Windows 10, news about how the Xamarin integration is going since its acquisition, a focus on the iOS bridge and of course the Universal Windows Platform (UWP).  I think with HoloLens units already shipping that will also be a topic of discussion in one of the two keynotes.

Did I mention demos as well in these keynotes?

Each day following the keynotes attendees scatter into breakout sessions where the detail gets deep and plentiful and according to the list at Channel 9's Build Event Page there are hundreds of sessions being offered over the course of the three day event.

As I looked through the three days I noticed entire series of sessions that build upon each other for UWP, Web, Gaming, IoT, Office 365, Data and Cross-Platform development. Some of them repeat on subsequent days so there is more than one option to get into these sessions.

Here are a few others that caught my eye:

The Future of Visual Studio

Come to hear the future of Visual Studio. This session will illustrate how Visual Studio is evolving demo by demo. We’ll show you the latest capabilities to enable any developer to build any apps. We’ll provide a preview of the streamlined acquisition experience for the next release of Visual Studio. You will see the cutting edge features we are working on to bring your productivity to the next level. We’ll even provide a back stage peek into how we’re using your feedback to continuously improve Visual Studio.

What's New in TypeScript?

TypeScript has seen enormous growth in the past year. Today, it is used to build several key frameworks like AngularJS, Ionic etc. Several large applications such as Visual Studio Code and Office Web Applications are also built using the same, with more coming online every day. Are you curious why marquee frameworks and large scale apps choose TypeScript? In this talk, we'll go through how TypeScript enables you to leverage features from the current and future of JavaScript while increasing the productivity of JavaScript development across the board. We'll talk about some of the latest features of TypeScript, including future ECMAScript proposals such as Async Functions, support for Angular and React/JSX, the state of the art type system capabilities, and how it all comes together to make working and creating things in JavaScript more productive and fun with TypeScript.

Build a UWP App with the App You Already Wrote: Getting Started with the Windows Bridge for iOS

In this session, you’ll hear advice and best practices for bringing your iOS apps to Windows 10, using Islandwood, an open-source project that allows you to use Objective-C code and iOS APIs to build Universal Windows Platform (UWP) apps. We'll show some highlights from recent updates, discuss our development roadmap, and show off some apps that are already using the bridge tool. We’ll also take a deeper dive into the bridge's tool's runtime, compiler, APIs and tooling.

Give Your Apps a Human Side

As the head of Microsoft's Research division of over 1,000 scientist and engineers working on over 55 research areas in labs worldwide, Executive Vice President Dr. Harry Shum will share how the democratization of artificial intelligence and machine learning based research has resulted in the most comprehensive collection of intelligence-based developer services available today and is revolutionizing computing experiences in ways never before possible.

Creating Beautiful UX in a Real-World App with Visuals, Animations and Effects

Having the best idea for an app is only half the battle. Ensuring your app has an engaging and beautiful experience that is playful and entices users to evoke emotion when using it is critical to customer excitement. Beautiful experiences delight users and delighted users continue to use your apps, tell others about it and give positive store ratings. This session will focus on the UI/UX portions of a real app in the marketplace that has a solid UI foundation and will be enhanced with new capabilities around animations, effects and enabling new playful experiences that will delight the user. We will explore the spectrum of the developer platform that enables this from the low-level capabilities through some encapsulated features in XAML that make these experiences simpler to light up.

Microsoft Edge: What's Next for Microsoft's New Browser and Web Platform

In 2015, Microsoft launched its first new browser in 20 years: Microsoft Edge. After 8 months, it's on a great trajectory but we're just getting started. Join us to learn about the progress we've made, feedback we've heard, and a whirlwind tour of improvements coming soon. This will include extensions and other new end-user features, plus many new developer features across the HTML/CSS/JavaScript and web app platform, and new Enterprise-focused features for IT Pros.

Microsoft Identity: State of the Union and Future Direction

Microsoft identity technology has been powering consumers and business solutions for decades, anticipating and contributing to industry trends such as the move to the cloud. Come to this session to learn about today’s state of the art of identity management and Microsoft’s vision for identity.

The Future of Game Development on Windows

In 2015, Windows and Xbox shared how we were building the world's most accessible and powerful game development platform that spans across consoles, PC, tablets, phones, and more. Come join us in 2016 to see how we are delivering on our vision & are empowering game developers to reach billions of customers around the world, connected through the power of Xbox Live and our Windows Store, plus a host of new platform innovations for games in every genre.

Windows Store: Publishing Apps and Games to Desktop, Mobile, and Xbox

Learn about how Dev Center helps you reach customers on all Windows devices including Xbox. Discover new ways to engage your customers with bundles, add-ons, and pre-orders. Simplify your development lifecycle with APIs to automate the publishing process and new capabilities to test your app or game in production . Dev Center's easy-to-use, powerful tools will set your apps and games up for success in the Windows store.

Building Great Universal Windows Platform (UWP) Apps for Xbox

Learn more about building great Universal Windows Platform (UWP) apps for Xbox.

Note: We heard a few weeks ago that Xbox is expected to begin offering UWP apps sometime this summer.

Notification Futures: Action Center and the Windows Notification Platform

Note: No details yet but this is likely related to the recent survey conducted with Windows Insiders and could include some new functionality that may be announced in the keynote demos.

What’s New for Tiles and Toast Notifications

Notifications are an essential tool for engaging with your customers on Windows. We are building on the foundation of Action Center to give developers greatly increased flexibility in Adaptive Toasts. We will introduce a powerful API that enables a new class of apps to plug into the Notification pipeline and provide innovative experiences for users. Live Tiles are evolving with two highly-requested surprises that you won't want to miss.

Note: This could indicate the introduction of interactive Live Tiles and possibly Live Tiles on the desktop. I expect these to get announced during the keynote demos.

The keynotes and possibly some of the sessions will be live streamed over Channel 9. Keep in mind that all of them will eventually be available through Channel 9 for on-demand replay.

Be sure to follow our coverage here at DevPro Connections and also over on our sister sites Windows IT Pro and SuperSite for Windows. I will be onsite all week bringing you coverage so be sure to follow along with me on Twitter (@WinObs) to get the latest info.

But, wait...there's probably more so be sure to follow me on Twitter and Google+.

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