A year or so ago, a developer lamented to me about the lack of 4D learning opportunities. Over the last few months we have tasked a team led by Chris V and Carin T to develop and manage the roll out of various training sessions. I believe they have made a tremendous start, there is still a long way to go or to paraphrase Churchill, it is not the beginning of the end but rather the end of the beginning. So far they have rolled out seven new online sessions , announced this year’s 4D Summit and today announced a series of seven roadshows across the country. There’s that number seven again, I must check which of them is superstitious

While developing curriculum is one part of their role, their other role is to ensure that 4D is recognized for delivering quality and value for money learning opportunities. Of course we are the 4D vendor but we want to be seen to be delivering the highest quality of trainings whether they be for trainings where there is a lot of competition in the Javascript or Flex areas or topics where being the vendor gives us a credibility lead such as in depth training on the new ‘4D v11 SQL Indexing schemes.

Another challenge is to get the mixture of classroom and online trainings correct. In some cases this is an easy decision as some trainings lend themselves to a short format ideal for web based learning but for other trainings that take eight or so hours it will be interesting to see if 4D developers like the opportunity for learning on the web or prefer traditional classroom formats. So as in most things this will also be a learning opportunity for us on how to deliver training that developers value.

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A few months ago, I tried to speak about simplicity and one of the real challenges of building Web 2.0 Apps is how to simplify your applications .

Rudi showed me Erik Burke’s blog and in particular these images which say it much better than I could ever do.

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I am sitting here today, just hours before the launch of 4D v11 SQL, and my mind goes back to the many meetings we had internally about this project. It was a massive undertaking and I’m not too proud to admit that at times, in my weaker moments, doubt may have crept in as to our ability to execute. I am so proud today to say not only we have executed what we originally set out to do, but I feel very strongly that what the engineering team has pulled off is nothing short of an engineering miracle.

There’s an old Silicon Valley saying that the reason God could invent the world in six days was that he had no existing customer base to worry about. Here at 4D, we are famous for providing an easy upgrade path for our existing customers, so the six day option wasn’t available to us. Our engineers had to design a path from the existing database design to a new 21st Century database engine while still maintaining close to 100% compatibility with existing applications and code. It is no wonder that companies like Oracle have shied away from such an engineering effort, preferring to stay away from such a huge challenge and instead to add layer after layer to their existing database engine code, because it’s not even close to being easy to do. And yet, we at 4D have done it.

Today, you, the 4D developer, can look ahead, proud that you are working with the latest database engine technology, running on a clean, all-new 21st Century open SQL platform, designed from the ground up to tackle the challenges that 21st century business face. On top of this, you can also take advantage of your investment in your existing applications and frameworks knowing that the 4D Engineering team have delivered again. So my hat goes off to our team, and I salute their incredible abilities, their dedication, but most of all their constant commitment to an ideal, that 4D always provides a transparent path to the latest technologies!

It was a long wait for 4D v11 SQL, but I think you’ll find it was worth it. Try it out and let me know what you think.

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When I speak to people about the 4D Summit, many say they love going to meet the same people they’ve seen at past Summits. I’m as guilty as anyone. While I understand that we all love seeing people we know and are comfortable with, I can’t help but feel that when we do so, we’re missing the real business opportunity that the 4D Summit offers.

Whether you’re a consultant looking for your next gig, an in-house developer, or a vertical market developer, there are potentially major business opportunities sitting at the lunch table over from you — but you will never find them unless you step out of your comfort zone and meet up with new people.

As Summit organizers, we haven’t been doing enough to foster networking as well as we could in past years. The team was challenged this year to promote business opportunity networking, and so far they’ve come up with some ideas, but I am sure there are many more.

One of the first ideas was to organize “birds of a feather” lunches, where we organize lunch tables around business topics such as medical, education, etc. We hope this will foster communication over some of Memphis’ world famous food.

Another one of the major ideas is to ensure that attendees come prepared and know exactly who they will meet at the Summit before they even get there. Rachel and the rest of the marketing team set up a networking site to help people get acquainted before they meet face to face.

While we have some other ideas germinating, I’m sure we could be doing even more.

So this is what I’m asking: What else can we do to foster business networking at the Summit?

Perhaps you’ve been at another conference that had some great ideas on how to do this. Perhaps you have some original ideas of your own. Either way, we’d love to hear your thoughts. Let us know - we’re not too proud to borrow.

Don’t forget though, if you’re coming to the Summit (or even just thinking about coming) please visit our new site, register and get networking!

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Welcome to the first post in our new 4D business blog. In this blog we will focus on the business issues of being a 4D Developer. From time to time we may delve into the side streets, but for the most part we will stay with how 4D Developers can increase business in this fast changing world.

One of the obstacles facing 4D Developers as they move into the new world of Web 2.0 Applications is the fear of not covering every feature before releasing a Web 2.0 module for their application. However, the opposite is true for most successful Web 2.0 Applications. These developers focused on the core features and released minimal releases.

For example, I am drafting this in Basecamp, a very successful project management application, which has very limited features but has enough that it has signed up millions of users. I know you will say, “but my current users expects these hundreds of features and won’t accept anything less than what they have currently.” Now if you are the market leader in your segment and have a majority percentage then this argument makes more sense. However in all other cases there are huge market segments, read not your current users, waiting for something simpler which will make their lives easier and more productive.

Stripping away your application to the core is not an easy job, however. We have to leave our egos at the door. We need to forget why we added a feature, but investigate its relevance to the majority of the target segment. Once we have this list pared, go talk to users in the target segment and do further refinement of the lists. Set a benchmark, say of 80% and if 80% of these users don’t agree a feature is essential, strip it. I repeat this is painful, it is like tearing our lives’ work apart. However, this is a critical step if you are to build a real Web 2.0 application.

The great news for you as a 4D developer is you can still provide customers who demand the sophisticated feature-rich solution as part of your client/server solution. On top of this solution, using the same codebase, you can provide a focused, targeted web 2.0 Ajax application which can appeal to all of those potential customers you are not reaching today.

We at 4D are here to help. Please contact us if you wish to take the next step to creating a focused, targeted web 2.0 application. Our team here will work with you to help you target those users who you are missing today.

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