IDF First-timer: Guest Blogger Charlene Zvolanek

posted by Charlene Zvolanek on September 21, 2009

I feel really fortunate that I get to attend the tech event of the year—even though initially I was a little concerned that I wouldn’t be quite geeky enough to run with this crowd. After all, I’m no hardcore programmer or hardware engineer. In fact, spending time with Fortran in college convinced me that I should design interfaces.

But as I really started digging into the technical sessions for IDF, I was pleasantly surprised to see such a broad mix, including the Q&A session: “How Do You Innovate? The Design School Perspective”—a far less tech-heavy session than I expected. Like a lot of the IDF sessions, this one seemed to blend art and science. Then the scheduling dilemma emerged. That Q&A overlaps by 15 minutes with “Enterprise Research and Usage Exploration for Cloud Computing.”

Is anyone else having a hard time prioritizing their schedules? Are there any tools or techniques that are making it easier for you to identify your must-see sessions? I’m just getting started with the IDF schedule builder.

Over the course of the next few days, I’ll be posting about the sessions I attend, the people I meet, and undoubtedly some really interesting projects. There’s a strong possibility that I’ll get the chance to sit down with an Intel Fellow or two and live blog their answers to questions that are tweeted in as DMs to IDFFellow on Twitter, posted on our discussion board, or submitted in the Upload Lounge. Keep an eye on these posts to learn which Intel Fellows will be doing a special live-blogged Q&A, and follow our updates for answers to the questions you are asking. It’s such a treat to talk with people who are passionate about their work, particularly when they share insights they’ve gathered from working on some of the most cutting-edge technology advancements and enhancements.

The roster of speakers represents an incredibly wide variety of specializations and perspectives, reflecting the far-reaching touch of Intel technology solutions. I’m especially looking forward to Wednesday’s keynote from Dadi Perlmutter, entitled “Mobile Computing: The Definition of Cool,” followed by the technology insight session, “Moorestown: Intel’s Next Generation Platform for MIDs and Smartphones.” I’ll be getting more of my UX on later in the day, particularly relating to natural interfaces (voice, gesture, touch), in “Innovation for the Living Rooms of the Future”—that is, if I can tear myself away from the Industry Insight session: “Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century—We Need Your Collaborative Innovations.”

Some of the Intel research and emerging technologies have made science fiction science fact, and have made me such a fangirl. Soon to be fanless? I’ll find out in the Nettop session on how the next generation of the Intel® Atom™ processor will provide an affordable fanless solution. I’m enthralled with the wireless power work being done in the Seattle lab, and I’m bummed that I missed last year’s talk from Justin Rattner on the Wireless Resonant Energy Link project, or WREL (pronounced “whirl”). Luckily, his Thursday keynote—“Convergence Is So Yesterday: The Future of Television”—sounds enticing.

I’m certain that I will learn a lot over the course of three days, but I know that I am not going to be able to see everything I would like to. It’s nice to know that the videos of the keynotes will be available from the IDF site for me to refer back to and send along to colleagues who can’t make it to the conference. As I continue reading through the schedule, I just keep finding more and more fascinating topics. It’s possible that by Friday I’ll even understand how Intel’s Unified Extensible Firmware Interface will extend firmware beyond the BIOS.

Charlene Zvolanek, Senior User Experience Planner, MRM Worldwide

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tagged: Dadi Perlmutter, first-timer, IDF, keynote, MIDs, Mobile, noobie, SmartPhones, UEFI, WREL