I really enjoy speaking at NDC Techtown in Norway. The airport is pleasant and easy to navigate, the trains are reliable, and it's a quick walk from the train station to the hotel, which is right at the venue. Plus the other speakers are always amazing, so I have a jam-packed two days of sessions to attend. Many years ago I decided to only speak at conferences where I would want to watch sessions, and it improved my life tremendously!

This year I'll do The Aging Programmer. This is a new talk that should be helpful for even the youngest programmers amongst us, because when it comes to planning for a happy old age doing what you enjoy, it's never too late, and it's also never too soon.

See you there! You've got three more days to order Early Bird tickets!

Kate

I am really starting to look forward to CppNorth. We're in a new venue this year, the Microsoft Canada offices! They have a lovely suite of presentation rooms that they make available to community groups like ours. The program is chosen, and we're working on the schedule. In the meantime you can see the speakers and their talks. If you're ready, register now! You can also book a room at the conference hotel, the Royal York. It's an easy walk from Union Station to both the conference and the hotel as you can see from this map showing all three.

For those who would fly to Toronto, there's a train called the UP between Union Station and YYZ. You should plan to come a little early so you can do some sightseeing before the conference. There's a see-and-do channel on the conference discord that will give you some great ideas.

I'm honoured to do the opening keynote again. This year's topic: The Aging Programmer. Eyes, wrists, memory, stamina ... so many things we rely on can get weaker as we age. That doesn't mean you can't keep going if you want to. I'll talk about it.

See you there!

Kate

On January 8th, 2004, I got an email from the MVP Lead for Visual C++ at Microsoft, asking if I would like to be an MVP. After checking to see what that meant, I said yes, and was accepted into the program. I was renewed every year, and at some point after half a year, making just over 20 years coming up at the end of June. I'm still the only MVP called Kate.

I went out for MVP Summit that first year, and some RD stuff at the same time. Here's a production still from "Red Chair Green Wall" - the plan had been to greenscreen in some image related to where we each were from, but then in the end, we didn't. I'm including it to show how much younger I was then!

I've decided not to renew this year. Usually, people making this announcement do so because they're no longer doing the sorts of things MVPs do. But I'm still teaching, speaking, helping folks online, writing the occasional book, helping to run a conference, and all the technical things as well. What's changed isn't so much me, it's the program. I always valued my connection to the Visual C++ team very highly. These days, the team maintains those connections with developers whether they are MVPs or not. Events like Pure Virtual C++, among other things, can keep me informed as well or better than the program can. The MVP program is all Azure this and AI that and exciting details and announcements about conferences that just aren't relevant to me. I'm sure they are useful and exciting tools and events, for someone. I am focused on my little piece of the world and don't need more information on the stuff I've decided to ignore.

Joining the program was definitely life changing. I had some wonderful times, learned things I really needed to learn in as quick and enjoyable a way as you can imagine, met terrific people and raised my professional profile. I would do it all again in a heartbeat. I'm just not going to keep doing it, because for me personally the benefits are dwindling.

I'm truly grateful to John Perry, for bringing me into the program, to Karen Young for inspiration and funny stories, to Sasha Krsmanovic for everything, to Sim Chaudhry for cheer and support, and to Betsy Weber for being the last one standing. Most of all, I'm grateful to my fellow C++ MVPs, and the Canadian MVPs from all technologies, for being great people to spend time with and learn from. There are too many to mention -- I hope you all know you really made a difference.

Sure, I could have cropped it a little tighter, but then you wouldn't see the picture in the background of me with Bill Gates What a marvelous pair of decades!

Kate

During CppNorth, I took a few minutes away from the conference to do an interview for Pluralsight. The host was my dear friend Julie Lerman and we had a great time. We talked about my courses, #include <C++>, CppNorth, Carbon, and a lot more.

I thought you might like to see a few "production stills" of how I set up the space to do the recording. It's always a challenge in a hotel room to get good light, keep the bed out of frame, and be reasonably near an available power plug. I did it!

Yes, I have my ring light clipped to a lampshade. And I brought the light, my good mike, and my mike stand to Toronto with me in my suitcase. Getting the laptop up high enough and at the right angle involved a little foraging in the room

This was the view from my chair. (That desktop background is the view out of the Bridge of Sighs, in Venice.)

And here's the final video.It's about seventeen minutes; please do share the link with others.

Kate

The recordings from ACCU have been appearing over the last few weeks and now both of my talks are up:

• C++ And Beyond: Discussion is a panel discussion with Vittorio Romeo, Kevlin Henney, Nico Josuttis, and me, moderated by Bryce Lelbach. The fun starts just six minutes in when Nico declares C++ "fundamentally broken." Still, there is some positive and hopeful content. We should think about the languages we use and what we want from them. C++ is a language that changes, which has consequences, both good and bad.
• Become a Better Programmer by Using Words and Ideas From Casual Gaming is my closing keynote. Not a lot of syntax in here, but a new way of looking at some of the things you do at work, and how to approach those, that you may find helpful.

Going to conferences in person has many advantages, and I'm glad we're solidly back to doing that. But for the ones you can't attend, you can at least watch the sessions, and I highly recommend that you do.

Kate

The agenda for the Qt World Summit has now been released.

I'll be doing a half-hour version of a talk I've given only once before, "Am I a Good Programmer?" Many people have told me this is something they worry about pretty often.So at the end of November, we can discuss it together.

I've been lucky enough to speak in Berlin at several different conferences and I'm looking forward to being back there again. Would you like to join me? You can even get a discount of 10% if you use the code QtWS23_Kate -- register here.

Kate

Day 3 began with a terrific keynote from Jessica Kerr, I can write the code. But getting something done is another matter. I was so thrilled when she agreed to come and do a keynote, and this one didn't disappoint. I took pictures of several slides, always a good sign.

After a break it was time for Tony Van Eerd with Value Oriented Programming Part V: Return of the Values. There was plenty of pop culture here but also some darn good advice about making good abstractions, and what's good about them. Then out for lunch again ... I deliberately chose something different on my second trip to the market.

The afternoon started with Conor Hoekstra and New Algorithms in C++23. Conor makes these things look easy -- perhaps they actually are? Then the closing keynote, from Timur Doumler, called Contracts, Testing, and the Pursuit of Well Defined Behaviour. We sure have plenty of undefined behaviour to deal with: