Award Winners

Kergosien, Gaines: 2009 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Gaines Kergosien works as Software Engineering Manager and Senior Developer for VitalChek, a LexisNexis company. In addition to being Founder of the Nashville Web Developer Group, he currently serves as President for the Nashville .NET User Group. Gaines has over 12 years in solutions development using Microsoft technologies for companies such as HCA, Gibson Guitars, and Cardinal Healthcare.

Eargle, Chris: 2009 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Chris Eargle began coding shareware in his teens for the Legend of the Red Dragon by Seth Able Robinson. From there, he developed a career unintentionally following the products of Anders Hejlsberg: from Turbo Pascal to Delphi to C#. Currently, he is an enterprise architect at South Carolina Farm Bureau Insurance in Columbia, SC.

Chris is a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional – Visual C# and an INETA Community Champion. He is the president of the Columbia Enterprise Developers Guild and enjoys speaking at code camps, conferences, and user group meetings

Dunagan, John : 2009 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

John Dunagan has run the SW Florida .Net Developers Group since March of 2006, and currently works in Software Development from his home in Naples for ESI International, a great company out of Arlington, VA. A frequent volunteer and presenter at user groups and code camps, his passions include participation in the .Net community, broadening and improving his technical skills, tuning up his time management and productivity, geography, and golf.

Each fall, SW Florida .Net Developers Group is proud to host the SW Florida .Net Code Camp while y'all are freezing. You should come down for that.

Wood, Michael: 2009 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Michael Wood is a Microsoft Practice Director for Strategic Data Systems in Centerville, OH, but lives across the river in Kentucky. He describes himself as a problem solving, outdoorsy, user group leading, dog-loving, blog writing, solution creating, event planning, married, technology speaking, father of one kind of guy. When he's not living up to that title he's an avid reader, (horrible) violinist and gamer. Michael is a Founding Director of the Cincinnati .NET User Group as well as the founder of the Cincinnati Software Architecture Special Interest Group. He is also a founding member of the software architecture web resource nPlus1 (http://nplus1.org), instigator of the informal code pairing Bitslinger events in Cincinnati and a Microsoft MVP in Client App Dev. You can catch up with Mike on his blog at http://mvwood.com/blog and on twitter under the handle @mikewo.

Kellner, Peter: 2009 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Peter Kellner, a Microsoft ASP.NET MVP since 2007, is founder and president of 73rd Street Associates and a seasoned software professional specializing in high quality, scalable and extensible .Net web applications. His experience includes building and leading engineering teams both on and off shore. When not working, Peter spends most his free time biking. He has ridden his bike across the globe. Most recently he and his wife, Tammy, rode across the U.S., from California to Georgia, in just 27 days. He is also an MVP since 2007.

Hockenberry, David: 2009 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

David Hockenberry is the Senior Programmer at AIX Group in Buffalo, NY. He is a graduate of Binghamton University with a degree in Computer Science. David has been working professionally with .NET since 2003 when he was a junior in college. In January 2008, he started to lead the Western New York .NET Users Group (WNY DNUG). The WNY DNUG has been very successful in the last year and a half, having between 40-75 developers at each monthly meeting, giving away a ton of swag, and bringing in speakers from all over the United States and Canada. In the coming months his main focus is to line up speakers, sponsors, and venues for the 2010 year of WNY DNUG meetings and organize the first Buffalo GiveCamp. Outside of work David is engaged to his beautiful fiancée Katie and is a volunteer wrestling coach at his graduating high school. On the weekends you may find him coaching his wrestlers, working on the UG, or watching his beloved Buffalo Bills.

Strohl, Will: 2009 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Will Strohl is an ASP.Net architect and developer based in the Orlando Area. Having been in the web development field for over 10 years, he began professionally in 2000. Currently, Will is the Technology Director for an exciting new online travel company called RezHub.com (www.RezHub.com). He is also an active member and President of the Orlando DotNetNuke® Users Group or ODUG (orlando.dotnetnukeug.net), and a member of the reformed DotNetNuke® Media Module Project Team. He was also just appointed the Vice President of the Orlando .Net User Group, or ONETUG (www.onetug.org).

Will regularly speaks at user groups and other community events about DotNetNuke® and the various ways it can be used and managed, including organizing the Day of DotNetNuke®. He also won the INETA Community Champions award for 2008 Q3 and 2009 Q3. Will publishes DNN videos on JumptStartTV, and is a Technical Editor for Professional DotNetNuke 5 and DotNetNuke 5 User's Guide by Wrox, as well as Wrox Blox, including DotNetNuke and Web Standards, and Building a Custom DotNetNuke Membership Provider. Most recently, Will has become a guest blogger at Applied Innovations, a popular web host.

Walling, Joe: 2009 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Joe Walling has been developing software for more than 20 years. He currently works as a Product Development Architect for Computer Software Innovations where he has worked for the past 5 years. Prior to that, he ran his own company for over 10 years where he wrote software, developed dynamic web sites, and provided consulting services. In his spare time, you will find him reading up on the latest software development topics, writing software, and running the Greenville Spartanburg Developers' Guild. He has been President of the GSP Developers' Guild for over 7 years.

Japikse, Philip: 2009 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Phil has been working with .Net since the first betas, and developing software for over 20 years. Phil is a Microsoft MVP and holds MCSD, MCDBA, and CSM certifications. Phil’s experience includes Smart Client/WPF, ASP.NET/MVC, and eCommerce as well as mentoring teams in .Net, SQL Server, and Agile. Phil is a contributing author to www.nPlus1.org, teaches custom classes, speaks at national and regional events, and is a passionate member of the developer community (serving as a director for the Cincinnati .Net User’s Group and Software Architecture SIG). Phil works as a Principal Consultant with Pinnacle Solutions Group, Inc. (www.pinnsg.com), is a Firefighter/Paramedic, and volunteers for the Ski Patrol. You can follow Phil on twitter via www.twitter.com/skimedic and read his blog at www.skimedic.com/blog.

Olsen, Joe: 2009 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Joe Olsen is the co-founder and CEO of Phenomblue, an internationally renown digital design and technology company based in Omaha, NE, USA. Phenomblue provides cutting edge interaction design, software development, and interactive branding strategies to some of the largest advertising agencies and corporate brands in the world. Phenomblue’s client list reads like a who’s who in the global market place across several industries including; health care, pharmaceutical, financial services, consumer package goods, communications, and technology. Phenomblue is widely regarded within the advertising industry as one of the top digital minds in the United States and since its inception in 2003, the company has won numerous industry awards for its work and business successes. In addition to driving the overall vision, growth strategy, and company culture, Joe’s day to day work touches all aspects of the business including technology, operations, marketing, strategy, financing, sales, etc.. In addition to Phenomblue, Joe founded and runs the Heartland Developer Conference, an annual pilgrimage to Omaha for 500 software designers/developers from across the United States to learn cutting edge techniques and best practices from industry leaders.

Grossnicklaus, Kevin: 2009 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Kevin Grossnicklaus is the president of a St. Louis, MO based consulting firm called ArchitectNow (www.architectnow.net) where he trains and mentors development teams in software architecture and best practices using leading-edge technologies and methodologies. Kevin previously spent 10 years as the .NET Practice Lead and Chief Architect at SSE (www.SSEinc.com), another St. Louis-based technology firm, where he oversaw the design, implementation, and delivery of mission critical software applications to dozens of local and national firms. In 2000, while at SSE, Kevin became involved as an early adopter of the Microsoft .NET platform (then called the Next Generation of Web Services or NGWS) and became active in the local development community to help share his knowledge and experience with these tools and technologies with any developers willing to learn. Since then, Kevin has worked with developers throughout the world on many projects around the newest .NET technologies. In 2004, Kevin became an instructor at Washington University’s Center for the Application of Information Technology (CAIT) program where he continues to teach all of the .NET related topics in both C# and VB.NET. During his time at CAIT, Kevin has helped to expand the Microsoft related curriculum through the development courses on new technologies such as LINQ, Threading, Enterprise Architecture, WPF, and WCF to name a few. Today, through ArchitectNow, Kevin is working to share his passion for and knowledge of these technologies with teams around the world.

Ziss, Marc: 2009 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Marc Ziss is an independent consultant specializing in the development of data driven business applications with a focus on Microsoft Technologies. Marc’s company Z Consulting is centered in the Philadelphia area and has been providing solid business solutions to clients spanning many industries for over 20 years. Being an early adopter of .NET Marc has gained extensive experience in both C# and VB.Net as well as Sql Server. Marc has been active in Philly.Net for many years and currently serves as a board member. Additionally he holds the office of Philly.Net “Pub Master”.

Schwam, Andy: 2009 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Andy Schwam is an Independent Software Consultant. Working with a variety of Microsoft Technologies focused on web based, data driven applications. He has experience with a variety of web platforms including ASP.Net MVC, Silverlight as well as traditional ASP.Net Web Forms.
Andy is a Board Member of Philly.Net (the Philadelphia .Net Users Group). With the role/nickname of "Swag Man", Andy builds and maintains relationships with corporate partners for Philly.Net's very successful semi annual Code Camp program. Andy is a regular presenter at Philly.Net and has spoken at various other groups in the Greater Philadelphia area.

Karcher, Andrew: 2009 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

As a consultant with Clarity Consulting (http://www.claritycon.com), for over 9 years, Andrew's duties include architecting and developing solutions, both client\server and web applications, for a variety of clients in diverse fields such as transportation, financial services, and hospitality. Andrew is a 2-Time Microsoft MVP for SQL Server and serves as the President of the San Diego .Net User Group, a Board Member of the San Diego SQL Server Users Group and is the INETA Membership Mentor for Southern California. He has presented to multiple user groups and Code Camps across the U.S. on topics such as SQL Server 2005, .Net Development, and SharePoint Server 2007. You can catch up with Andrew on his Blog (http://blogs.claritycon.com/blogs/andrew_karcher/default.aspx).

Steinberg, Michael: 2009 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

Michael has been a software developer, Project leader and DBA for over 20 years.

He is the Director and founder of the Houston TechFest. He is also past president and one of the founders of the Houston .Net users group.

He is part of a team implimenting development methodology based on EssUP on a global basis.at Sigma Aldrich and doing development in VB.net and Java.

Appel, Rachel: 2009 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

Rachel has been working as a mentor, instructor, software developer, architect and DBA for nearly 20 years. During her career, Rachel has worked with a variety of languages, technologies and systems and has contributed to projects of all sizes including large scale enterprise applications at some of the world’s leading companies.

Rachel is the Vice President of the .Net Valley user group, as well as a leader and regular speaker in the Philly.NET and Central Penn.NET user groups of Pennsylvania. She can also be found speaking at code camps, user groups, community events and conferences.

Rachel’s expertise lies within developing solutions that align business and technology using the Microsoft .NET family of products, particularly ASP.NET & SQL Server. She is also an ASP.NET MVP, ASPInsider and holds the Microsoft Certified Trainer, MCAD & MCSD certifications.

She is also a member of the INETA speakers bureau.

Stone, Todd: 2009 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

Todd Stone is a software developer at HBS Systems in Dallas, TX. He works with communicating and converting data from a variety of different platforms including Windows, UNIX, LINUX, and the IBM iSeries (AS/400).

He's active in the local .NET community as President of the DFW Connected Systems User Group, member of the South Central District Developer Guidance Council, and as a speaker at local user groups. He volunteered as a Business Analyst and Developer for the We Are Microsoft - Charity Challenge Weekend 2009 held back in January in Dallas.

He lives in Wylie, TX with his wife. Other activities involve restoring antique tractors and trucks with his Dad and assembling his own computers.

Mohundro, David: 2009 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

David Mohundro is a software developer at Data-Tronics, Corp. in Fort Smith, AR and is a co-founder/leader of the Fort Smith, AR .NET User Group. He has over 6 years of experience developing software using technologies ranging from classic ASP and JavaScript to Windows Forms and WPF. David is enthusiastic about building decoupled and maintainable applications using practices such as Test Driven Development and he strives to be a lifelong learner. You can contact David through his blog.

Young, Zachariah: 2009 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

Zach Young is a FileNet Solution Architect at JB Hunt Transportation in Lowell, Arkansas. His job includes researching existing technologies, assisting development teams with architecture designs, and integrating current enterprise systems. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from the Sam M. Walton College of Business Administration at The University of Arkansas, Fayetteville. Zach is the President of the Northwest Arkansas .Net User Group and co-founder of the Virtual Alt.Net (VAN) user group. In addition to working with these groups, Zach volunteers his time to assist his church with lighting and the sound board during services. In his spare time, he enjoys spending time with his wife and two daughters, reading technical books, and being outdoors. Zach regularly blogs at www.zachariahyoung.com.

Tyrrell, Tim: 2009 Q1 Champion Award (Annual)

Tim Tyrrell is a Senior Programmer Analyst in the Information Systems Division at Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. He works on the Sustainability and Reputation Management team building C# web applications for Wal-Mart's recycling, packaging reduction, and sustainable supplier/product efforts. He is a co-founder of the Wal-Mart .NET User Group and a Northwest Arkansas .NET User Group officer.

Tim is a Chicago native that now lives in Bentonville, Arkansas with his wife, Courtney, and 4 year old twins, Gavin and Ella. He has a Master of Information Systems Management (MISM) degree from DeVry University Keller Graduate School of Management (Oakbrook Terrace, IL) and a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science from Illinois College in Jacksonville, IL

Duclos, Ryan: 2009 Q1 Champion Award (Annual)

Ryan Duclos is a Technical Consultant for Perficient, Inc. (www.perficient.com) on Microsoft Technologies. He lives in LA (Lower Alabama)! He loves spending time with his family, as well as being a Community Influencer. Ryan can be found at regional events as a Speaker/Volunteer/Attendee. Ryan has been working with Microsoft Technologies since 2000. Ryan organizes and attends area User Groups events on a regular basis, and speaks primarily on SQL topics. Ryan currently helps run the Lower AL .Net User Group and the Pensacola SQL Server User Group along with promoting area events and communities in his region. Ryan can also be found blogging on http://rduclos.wordpress.com

King, Brandon: 2009 Q1 Champion Award (Annual)

Brandon King is the owner of Peleta Software, an Independent Software Vendor that builds custom software for its clients. Brandon has over 13 years experience in both software development and database administration. His specialties are C#, SQL Server and ASP.NET with a special interest in composite applications and smart clients. Brandon helped found the Ozarks .NET User Group in Harrison, Arkansas, and enjoys mentoring new developers and promoting technology in his local community

Scheirman, Ben: 2009 Q1 Champion Award (Annual)

Ben Scheirman is an agile software developer from Houston, TX. He is a Microsoft MVP, Microsoft ASP Insider, Certified ScrumMaster, and all-around nice-guy. Ben enjoys speaking at various user groups and conferences to connect with the developer community. He also enjoys writing on his blog at http://flux88.com. Ben is writing his first book, ASP.NET MVC in Action from Manning Press. Ben is a Principal Consultant with Sogeti

Isserman, Becky: 2009 Q1 Champion Award (Annual)

Becky Isserman has been a SharePoint Developer, since 2005 when she attended the Portal University with Levi, Ray, and Shoup in Springfield, IL. She runs the Kansas City Office Geeks in Leawood, KS. She organized the SharePoint Saturday Kansas City event. She is an active member of the Kansas City Development Community. She is a presenter at various SharePoint events and conferences throughout the United States. She is a Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) and a Microsoft Certified Application Developer (MCAD). She has been a web designer/developer since she was fifteen hand coding HTML 3.0 websites in NotePad. She enjoys working with SharePoint 2007, because she can perform the roles of administrator, developer, designer, and architect. She has presented at seven code camps, two conferences, and three user groups in the past two years. She currently lives in Olathe, Kansas where she works remotely for B&R Solutions. She lives with her cat, Gambit, and her boyfriend, Johnny. If you would like to contact her you can e-mail her at rebecca.isserman@gmail.com or fill out the contact form at her blog http://www.mosslover.com

Hoelting, Ben: 2009 Q1 Champion Award (Annual)

Ben Hoelting (http://www.benhblog.com) Senior Software Developer, Colorado Technology Consultants, Inc. Graduated from Colorado State University in 1997 with a BS in Computer Information Systems and a Minor in Computer Science. Ben joined the IT industry in 1996 as an intern and has worked with .NET since its inception back in 2002. Worked for the Gates Corporation (formally the Gates Rubber Company) from 2000 – 2005. He left Gates to pursue a consulting career. Currently he works for Colorado Technology Consultants, Inc. in Colorado Springs. His most recent projects include a Silverlight line of business application that uses the ADO.NET Entity Framework to access the backend data store. He also still supports and adds features to a Windows forms Smart Client that requires offline support, an ASP.NET tracking system for the floral industry and a Microsoft CRM customization using ASP.NET. Ben is also a MCP, certified in both CRM Customizations and .NET Framework Application Development. Finally, Ben is very involved in the local .NET community and is the leader of the South Colorado .NET User Group

Yack, Julie: 2009 Q1 Champion Award (Annual)

Julie Yack is one of the founding partners of Colorado Technology Consultants, Inc and currently serves as Chief Operations Officer. Julie has been named a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional for her efforts in the CRM professional community. Julie is a Microsoft CRM Certified Professional, Microsoft Small Business Specialist and a Certified Scrum Master. She was named one of 101 Women Bloggers to Watch in 2009 by WEmagazine.

Julie has been a vital part of three large scale publications in 2008 and is deep in progress on 2009’s Building Silverlight RIAs. She was a contributing Author for Voices for Change: Women's Words to Politicians. Julie was the Technical Editor for Wiley's The IT Girls Guide to Becoming an Excel Diva. She served as Editor and Publisher for (X)CRM as a Rapid Development Platform. All of these titles are available direct from their publishers or at www.amazon.com.

Julie's newest user group, XRMVirtual, is off to a great start and has several hundred members after its first meeting. Julie is also one of the founders of SouthColorado.NET, a user group focused on improving the knowledge base of .NET developers SouthColorado.NET is a member of INETA (www.ineta.org). Julie serves as the INETA membership mentor for a 4-state region as well as virtual groups globally and strives to help the developer community wherever possible. She was the Conference Chair for the inaugural .NET Developer vConference, reaching out globally to the .NET Developer community

Machanic, Adam: 2008 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Adam Machanic is a Boston-based independent database consultant, writer, and speaker. He has been involved in dozens of SQL Server implementations for both high-availability OLTP and large-scale data warehouse applications, and has optimized data access layer performance for several data-intensive applications. Adam has written for numerous web sites and magazines, including SQLblog, Simple Talk, Search SQL Server, SQL Server Professional, CoDe, and VSJ. He has also contributed to several books on SQL Server, including "Expert SQL Server 2005 Development" (Apress, 2007) and "Inside SQL Server 2005: Query Tuning and Optimization" (Microsoft Press, 2007). Adam regularly speaks at user groups, community events, and conferences on a variety of SQL Server and .NET-related topics. He is a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP) for SQL Server, a Microsoft Certified IT Professional (MCITP), and a member of the INETA North American Speakers Bureau.

Eargle, Chris: 2008 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Chris Eargle began coding shareware in his teens for the Legend of the Red Dragon by Seth Able Robinson. From there, he developed a career unintentionally following the products of Anders Hejlsberg: from Turbo Pascal to Delphi to C#. Currently, he is an enterprise architect at South Carolina Farm Bureau Insurance in Columbia, SC.

Chris is a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional – Visual C# and an INETA Community Champion. He is the president of the Columbia Enterprise Developers Guild and enjoys speaking at code camps, conferences, and user group meetings

Villa, Arthur: 2008 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Arthur P. Villa has been providing technical solutions for over twenty years to business clients in both the private and public sectors. Since October of 2000 Art’s main focus has been business development, project team build-out, high-level project conceptualization, and project management as President of Breakthrough Business Solutions, Inc. (www.breakthroughbiz.com). Art has been actively involved with the developer community through his entire development career. Highlights include organizing/running the LA C# Developer Group (2001-present) and the SoCal .NET Developer Group (2005-present), board member of LA Fox (2000 – 2008), and co-organizing the 2008 LA Code Camp event at USC

Cate, Scott: 2008 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Scott Cate is the President of myKB.com, Inc., in Scottsdale, Arizona. myKB.com is a technology company specializing in commercial ASP.NET applications. His product line includes CloudDB.com, myKB.com, KBAlertz.com, and a few others. Scott also runs the Arizona .NET User group, an Arizona based INETA User Group. Scott created AZGroups.com which is a simple calendar that is shared between many Arizona based user groups, to act as a single calendar to post and share local community events. Scott also works with INETA as a User Group Mentor for User Groups in the Desert region (AZ, NM, NV). INETA is also proud to include Scott Cate as an INETA Speaker to travel around North America and deliver .NET related content to other NorAm user groups.

Scott was a founding board member, and now a current member of ASPInsiders.com, a group devoted to giving early feedback to the Microsoft ASP.NET Team. Scott has also been awarded the ASP.NET MVP every year, since 2004. In the authoring category, Scott has co-authored an AJAX book titled "Beginning AJAX with ASP.NET", authored two full length ASP.NET AJAX (C# and Visual Basic) Video Training Courses for AppDev, as well as the non-fiction novel titled "Surveillance" ( http://surveillance-the-novel.com ).

Outside of community and work efforts, Scott enjoys the perfect family. It sounds to good to be true, but really it's true. Scott and Jamie have two perfect children, that are perfect in every way. Jamie, Cameron, and Courtney are what make all the hard work worth while. Finally, Scott has set a 2009 New Years Community Resolution, to repost Sara Ford's very famous ""Visual Studio Tip of the Day"" in video format. His goal is to create all 382 posts in video format before the end of 2009. The videos are posted in blog format on http://ScottCate.com/Tricks

Wright, Toi: 2008 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Toi B. Wright is an independent consultant who has been working as a software developer for over 25 years. She has a BS in Computer Science and Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University. She has been a Microsoft MVP in ASP/ASP.NET since 2005.

Ms Wright was the organizer of the original We Are Microsoft - Charity Challenge Weekend, www.wearemicrosoft.com. She is the Founder and President of the Dallas ASP.NET User Group, www.dallasasp.net. She has been involved with various user groups around Dallas since 1994 and has been running one or more user groups since 2000. She most recently helped organize the new Presenter Mentor User Group, www.presentermentor.org. This group is dedicated to developing local technical speakers. Toi B. Wright is an independent consultant who has been working as a software developer for over 25 years. She has a BS in Computer Science and Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University. She has been a Microsoft MVP in ASP/ASP.NET since 2005.

Ms Wright was the organizer of the original We Are Microsoft - Charity Challenge Weekend, www.wearemicrosoft.com. She is the Founder and President of the Dallas ASP.NET User Group, www.dallasasp.net. She has been involved with various user groups around Dallas since 1994 and has been running one or more user groups since 2000. She most recently helped organize the new Presenter Mentor User Group, www.presentermentor.org. This group is dedicated to developing local technical speakers

Hennig, Teresa: 2008 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Teresa Hennig is a business consultant, author and community leader, who loves project management and helping others. Her company, Data Dynamics Northwest, offers consulting and database solutions. Teresa’s acumen for quickly grasping a client’s industry, processes and needs, permits her rapid partnering in creating cost effective custom solutions. To match expertise and resources to needs, Teresa forges liaisons with developers and clients across the country, and she uses a similar approach with international projects and partnerships.

Motivated by new challenges, Teresa has enjoyed several “once-in-a-lifetime” triumphs; including creating and deploying a paperless patient tracking system for a teen clinic in Uganda, climbing Mt. Rainier, and raising money to cure paralysis. Teresa is also the president of two developer groups, a sponsor and mentor for user groups in three other states, a key player in several INETA initiatives, and a participant in several Microsoft projects. Her two monthly newsletters have an international audience. As the lead author of several technical books, Teresa is privileged to help her colleagues to become published authors; and as one stated, it was “a dream come true.” She has earned Microsoft’s Most Valuable Professional (MVP) award annually since 2006. Whether working with clients, partners, fellow developers or charitable causes, Teresa energizes and empowers people

Pugh, Greg: 2008 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Greg Pugh is a .NET developer / consultant in Durham, NC.

I started my technical career in the IT infrastructure world and switched from chips to salsa 5 years ago and never looked back - coding is a blast. Learning and teaching about design patterns and modular architectures is my constant interest and my current passion is exploring OO best practices and applying them using the ASP.NET MVC framework sprinkled with Ajax and jQuery for flavor.

I started hosting VB/Access user group meetings in the early 90's and switched to .NET as soon as it came out (www.TRINUG.org). We host a monthly meeting with big name presenters and a couple of code camps a year, and what I really enjoy is our ~6 per month Special Interest Group (SIG) meetings where local developers present and we can get our hands on the code and have some lively in depth discussions. I help keep the group alive with my weekly newsletter backed up with a Google calendar. We use a wiki (trinug.pbwiki.com) to make sharing content easy and Google groups to keep things interactive

Walker, Randy: 2008 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Randy Walker has been instrumental in helping the developer community as an INETA Mentor and Microsoft MVP. He is the founder of Harvest I.T., a small business ISV (Independant Software Vendor) that services Vendorville, the Walmart Consumer Package Goods Industry. In Randy’s blog, http://www.mysoftwarestartup.com, he tries to help other small technology startups. Randy has been an avid VB programmer for the past 12 years and encourages the use of Microsoft’s .Net platform for enterprise business use

Chatterjee, Supriyo: 2008 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Supriyo "SB" Chatterjee is an Architect/Tech-Lead based in Hartford CT. He has over 20 years experience in IT and has worked at various companies like Aetna, IBM, UNICEF and State of Connecticut. He was twice awarded the Microsoft MVP Award for Groove:Architecture - http://tinyurl.com/sbcmvp and is also an Acting Director of the Connecticut .NET Developers Group http://www.ctdotnet.org He moderates Microsoft Groove workspaces - http://ctdotnet.org/Groove.aspx He is active within Facebook & Twitter and blogs when he can at http://weblogs.asp.net/sbchatterjee When he is not computing, he is flyi

Hammond, Chris: 2008 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Chris Hammond is a Technical Evangelist with Engage Software (www.engagesoftware.com) in St. Louis, Missouri. Chris has worked with DotNetNuke (DNN) since its inception and been a DNN Core Team member for nearly five years. Solidifying his role within the DNN community as a leading expert and evangelist on the platform Chris has been a frequent presenter at conferences, user groups and companies around the world. Chris is a recently publish WROX Author coauthoring DotNetNuke 5 User's Guide, and provides tips and tricks through his blogs at DotNetNuke.com and EngageSoftware.com. He is also an active DNN Community member, providing support in the DNN Forums. You can read more about Chris on his personal blog at www.chrishammond.com

Smith, Jay: 2008 Q4 Champion Award (Annual)

Jay Smith is PMO Architect and Evangelist for Tyson Foods, Inc. where he works with teams to improve the development process and to learn new concepts and designs. Jay has help to develop several internal user groups that creates an environment where IT professionals can share best practices.

Jay is a founding member of the President for the Northwest Arkansas .Net User’s Group and has served on the NWA Dnug board 4 year, two years as president.

Jay currently serves on the INETA Technology Team and Speakers Committee where he continues to work to improve the community we all enjoy.

You can read more about Jay on his blog http://www.jaysmith.us or follow his tweets at http://twitter.com/jaysmith.

You can also check out Jay's community focused podcast User Group Radio at http://usergroupradio.com.

Chagoury, Antonio: 2008 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Antonio Chagoury is the CEO and Chief Software Architect of Inspector IT Inc (www.inspectorit.com), a .net and DotNetNuke solutions provider based in the Washington DC Metro Area. As a member of the DotNetNuke Core team and project lead of the Blog module as well as the Installer utility, he is an active contributor and supporter DotNetNuke and Open Source. Antonio Chagoury is the Co-Founder and President of the Capital DotNetNuke User Group (www.capitaldug.org) an effort intended to get DotNetNuke Enthusiasts in one room once a month to discuss a wide range of topics as well share ideas knowledge and experience on the platform. Antonio’s technical specialties range from Enterprise Software Architecture and Engineering, Business Systems Integrations, SOA, and of course all development based on the .net framework. He considers DotNetNuke Software Development and Consulting, Web 2.0, Office 2.0, and Enterprise 2.0 his hobbies. Antonio has lived and travelled extensively in Europe, Africa and the Middle-East and settled in the Washington DC area in 1999. He speaks English, Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese and Arabic. He blogs (in English) regularly at www.cto20.com.

Williams, Chris: 2008 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Chris Williams, is a Technology Evangelist for Magenic. He is the founder of several .NET User Groups on the east coast, and most recently the Twin Cities XNA User Group and Twin Cities Developers Guild, both in Minneapolis, MN. He is a rabid blogger at BlogusMaximus.net, author of the very popular NINE Questions series and owner of the VB Community site www.ILoveVB.net. His most recent project is the Charity Fragathon, a fundraiser event for Children's Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota. He's also a Visual Basic .NET MVP, MCT, MCSD (.NET) Early Adopter, MCAD, freelance game developer, occasional author, tech editor, conference speaker, vintage arcade game collector and most recently received the INETA Community Champion award. He also plays a pretty mean guitar in Rock Band. Lastly, yes, the rumors are true, he loves Visual Basic so much he even named his dog VB.

Rigsby, Dan: 2008 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Dan Rigsby is a Lead Software Engineer for Interactive Intelligence in Indianapolis, Indiana. Dan has been an avid .Net developer since late 2001 starting with ASP.Net, but today concentrates on SOA, WCF, Smart Client applications, and a host of other areas. Dan is very active in the community as a developer, speaker, blogger, officer at IndyNDA, and moderator on the MSDN forums. He is always eager to help out others when he can and has been awarded the Microsoft MVP award for his work with Connected Systems in Wcf. As a certified ScrumMaster, Dan has been involved in agile techniques and project management. Read more about Dan and development adventures at http://www.danrigsby.com/ or connect with him on Twitter or Facebook.

Hockenberry, David: 2008 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

David Hockenberry is the Senior Programmer at AIX Group in Buffalo, NY. He is a graduate of Binghamton University with a degree in Computer Science. David has been working professionally with .NET since 2003 when he was a junior in college. In January 2008, he started to lead the Western New York .NET Users Group (WNY DNUG). The WNY DNUG has been very successful in the last year and a half, having between 40-75 developers at each monthly meeting, giving away a ton of swag, and bringing in speakers from all over the United States and Canada. In the coming months his main focus is to line up speakers, sponsors, and venues for the 2010 year of WNY DNUG meetings and organize the first Buffalo GiveCamp. Outside of work David is engaged to his beautiful fiancée Katie and is a volunteer wrestling coach at his graduating high school. On the weekends you may find him coaching his wrestlers, working on the UG, or watching his beloved Buffalo Bills.

Townsend, Jason: 2008 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Jason Townsend has been developing professionally for over 10 years. He has a B.S. in Computer Science and a M.B.A with Specialty in Information Technology Management from the University of Tulsa. He currently works for ConocoPhillips as a Sr. Analyst in Global Web Application Services where he helps in mentoring junior developers as well as developing applications using the latest Microsoft software stack. Before joining ConocoPhillips, Jason led a team of developers in developing natural language speech applications using proprietary platforms and the Microsoft software stack. Jason is also the President of the Bartlesville .NET User Group (http://www.bdnug.com) and routinely accepts speaking engagements ranging from Windows Communication Foundation to Microsoft Speech Server 2007. When he isn’t busy mentoring budding developers, or learning the newest technology Jason is spending time with his wife and four kids. Jason routinely blogs at http://www.okcodemonkey.com and can be reached via email at okcodemonkey@gmail.com.

Baird, John: 2008 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

John Baird began his computer programming career while in the US Navy. In 1982, he helped form and direct the first PC-based computer processing department for training and manpower in the Department of Defense. After leaving the military in 1988, John began a varied career as a consultant developing business applications ranging from computer-based training to vertical market software for resellers. Today, John is working for the industry leader in financial software for fund administration. In response to a Microsoft proposal, John started the Northern Delaware .Net User Group (www.nodenug.org) in September 2007. For his community service and dedication to mobile technologies, John was recently awarded MVP status for device application development.

McKinney, Lori: 2008 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Lori McKinney, is a Software Consultant for Intergraph Corporation's Process, Power & Marine division where she works developing web applications. She has 22 years experience developing software. Before joining Intergraph, she worked as a research engineer at Amoco Research Center in Tulsa, OK, modeling cuttings distribution for various drilling fluid/bit/geology combinations for a engineering simulator for drilling. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemical Engineering and a Master of Science degree in Petroleum Engineering from the University of Tulsa.

Lori is a member of HUNTUG, Huntsville VS.NET User Group, and MOSSMOSIS Huntsville as well as INETA and Culminis. She served three years on the Board of Directors for HUNTUG and currently volunteers on the INETA technology team and as Director of Marketing. She was named a Microsoft MVP in 2007 for Windows Server Customer Experience.

Lori lives with her husband and son near Huntsville, AL.

Paladino, Michael: 2008 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Michael Paladino is a software developer for EagleOne in Fort Smith, AR. He has over 6 years of experience developing web and desktop applications based on mostly Microsoft technologies. He started his career using classic ASP and moved into Windows Forms and ASP.NET within the last 4 years. He has also been increasingly involved with creating and maintaining SQL Server databases and has experience with a number of open source toolsets and frameworks such as SubSonic, DotNetNuke, and Umbraco. Michael is passionate about building the .NET community and is one of the co-founders and current president of the Fort Smith .NET User Group. You can contact Michael through his blog at http://www.mpaladino.com, via email at paladinomichael@gmail.com or via Twitter at twitter.com/mpaladino.

Shukla, Vishal: 2008 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Vishal has been behind the keyboards for over 18 years and mainly exploring Microsoft technologies from GWBasics to .net 4.0. Vishal works as a System Architect for the Palm Beach County. He has been actively involved with local user group communities. He has given various presentaions at code camps, Teched Tweener and various user group events.
Winner of INETA Community Champions award for 2008 Q3.
Microsoft VB .Net MVP

Strohl, Will: 2008 Q3 Champion Award (Annual)

Will Strohl is an ASP.Net architect and developer based in the Orlando Area. Having been in the web development field for over 10 years, he began professionally in 2000. Currently, Will is the Technology Director for an exciting new online travel company called RezHub.com (www.RezHub.com). He is also an active member and President of the Orlando DotNetNuke® Users Group or ODUG (orlando.dotnetnukeug.net), and a member of the reformed DotNetNuke® Media Module Project Team. He was also just appointed the Vice President of the Orlando .Net User Group, or ONETUG (www.onetug.org).

Will regularly speaks at user groups and other community events about DotNetNuke® and the various ways it can be used and managed, including organizing the Day of DotNetNuke®. He also won the INETA Community Champions award for 2008 Q3 and 2009 Q3. Will publishes DNN videos on JumptStartTV, and is a Technical Editor for Professional DotNetNuke 5 and DotNetNuke 5 User's Guide by Wrox, as well as Wrox Blox, including DotNetNuke and Web Standards, and Building a Custom DotNetNuke Membership Provider. Most recently, Will has become a guest blogger at Applied Innovations, a popular web host.

McCarter, David: 2008 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

David McCarter is a Microsoft MVP and a principal software engineer in San Diego. He is the editor-in-chief of dotNetTips.com... a web site dedicated to helping programmers in all aspects of programming. David has written for magazines like the Visual Basic Programmers Journal and has published three books (the latest is David McCarter's .NET Coding Standards available at: www.cafepress.com/geekmusicart.165478704). He is one of the founders and directors of the 14 year old San Diego .NET Developers Group (www.sddotnetdg.org, formerly the San Diego Visual Basic User Group).

David gives lectures on programming at colleges, high schools, conferences such as Code Camp, VSLive, Microsoft DevDays and he teaches at the University of California San Diego. He also runs his own software/consulting company called NicheWare.

Competencies: VB.NET (since that is what I am an MVP in) and C# and pretty much all areas of .NET programming from ASP.NET, Windows & Mobile apps and back end services.

Speaking Engagements: I speak often at my user group and at the following Code Camps: Fullerton Ca, San Diego Ca, San Luis Obispo CA, Los Angeles Ca and Phoenix Az. I also teach the following classes throughout the year at the University of California San Diego: Building Rich & Interactive Web Applications with ASP.NET AJAX, Fundamentals of the .NET Framework. I'm proud to say that I got UCSD to teach .NET one year before it was official released! I developed one of the first classes and continue to develop course ware for our .NET classes at UCSD. I am also a member of the .NET Professional Certificate Review Board at UCSD.

Published Content: I have published three books under my own name and have written chapters for other publishers like MS Press. My latest book is "David McCarter's .NET Coding Standards". I am working on the third edition of that book currently. Also publish hundreds of tips, tricks and articles on my web site that has been around in one form or another since 1994, http://dotNetTips.com.

Web Discussion Boards: I mainly participate in the MSDN newsgroups on a regular basis. My display name in these newsgroups is: dotNetDave

User Group: Over 14 years ago I co-founded the San Diego Visual Basic Users Group and we are now called the San Diego .NET Developers Group (http://sddotnetdg.org). I am the only founder left and have been president of the group for the majority of the 14 years and still do about 80-90% of the work to keep the group going. We also participate in local southern California events. We provide job placement to our members via our web site and by having recruiting firms sponsor our meetings. I know that not only have I gotten jobs being part of this group but other members have too. We do mentor or members at the meeting, via the web site and emails. We also help new speakers by giving them helpful tips before or after their talk. We average 50-80 people each meeting and have 900+ people signed up on our web site.

You can also find out more about what I'm up to by going to my MVP profile at: https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile=FA3C6870-ADBC-404D-B826-9A4185B3F0E6

Quick Facts:

Microsoft MVP
Started the San Diego .NET Developers Group in 1994
Editor in Chief, dotNetTips.com
Speaker at colleges, high schools, Code Camps, VSLive! and Microsoft DevDays
Leader of San Diego .NET Developers Group User Group, sddotnetdg.org
Blog: DavidMcCarter.net

Masood, Adnan: 2008 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

Adnan Masood works as a Sr. Software Engineer / Tech. Lead in a Monrovia-based financial institution where he builds SOA-based enterprise applications using Microsoft .NET Framework. He is a regular speaker to technical conferences and code camps, is attributed and published in print media and on the web, and holds a Masters Degree in Computer Science. Adnan is actively pursuing his doctoral degree in Machine Learning and is highly involved in the .NET community as co-founder of the San Gabriel Valley .NET Developers group. He holds various technical certifications including MCPD.NET, MCSD.NET, and SCJP-II and is also a Microsoft Certified Trainer (MCT). His blog can be found at www.AdnanMasood.com and he can be reached via email at adnanmasood at gmail.com.

Chadwick, Jess: 2008 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

Jess Chadwick is the Lead Code Monkey on the Infragistics Website Team, responsible for keeping all their various web properties up and running. He has over 7 years experience with .NET technologies ranging from embedded devices in startups to enterprise-scale web farms at Fortune 500s. He is actively involved with the community, acting as Leader of the NJDOTNET Central New Jersey .NET user group, , founder of the “NJDOTNET Agile” and “NJDOTNET Dojo” spin-off groups, and actively contributing to various open source projects.

Ferrier, Kristin: 2008 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

Programmer and BI Developer Kristin Ferrier has nearly a decade of SQL Server experience and is President of the Oklahoma City Developers Group. She spent 8 years developing applications for diverse industries using PowerBuilder, VB6, and eventually .Net for the front-end languages. SQL Server always drove the back-end. During that time she obtained her MCAD, taking 2 of the exams in VB.Net and the third in C#.Net. In 2007, with her passion for database development, she jumped at the opportunity to join the Business Intelligence team at Sonic Drive-In where she works on anything from MS Analysis Services 2005 cube development, the latest enterprise database warehouse project, or any project where she can be a key problem solver.

Calla, Judy: 2008 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

Judy Calla assumed leadership of Central Penn .NET Users Group in December, 2003. Since her first meeting in January, 2004, the membership list has grown to over 400. From the beginning, it was her intent to share leadership of the group and form a Board of Directors. The Board has grown to nine members, all of who take an active part in the essential tasks of guiding and managing the group.

Judy has been a full-time programmer since 1989, and a Visual Studio developer since 2001. Besides leading Central Penn, she is a speaker at user group meetings and Philadelphia Code Camps, focusing on beginner topics in Visual Studio and SQL Server. She developed the Central Penn Boot Camp, a 4-week, 1-night-a-week series for programmers new to client server development, object oriented programming, Visual Studio, and SQL Server.

Hendrson, Brian: 2008 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

Brian Hendrson works at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center (http://www.fhcrc.org) in Seattle as a Software Engineer. He is passionate about software design and developing inspiring user experiences. Beyond the office he is involved in both the .NET and Agile developer communities as a contributor and a speaker. Brian's software expertise covers UI/UX, design, patterns and crafting software components. He enjoys playing with RIA (Rich Interactive Applications) and RESTful services. When not in front of a flat screen you can find Brian in the sky (flying), in the mountains (hiking), or on the water (kayaking).

Devraj, Sujata: 2008 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

Sujata Devraj is a software architect/technical lead currently working in the public safety software arena. With over a decade of experience in various environments/languages such as C, C++ (MFC/COM), VB 6.0, C#, ASP/ASP.NET/AJAX, mobile applications, XML, SQL etc. currently heavily focused on .NET 3.5 framework technologies such as WPF(XAML), Silverlight, WCF, LINQ, and BizTalk Server 2006.

Sujata is the current chairman of the .NET Users Group in Huntsville, AL and the group's liaison to INETA. She is actively involved in finding ways to get the user community more engaged and connected, by organizing events such as the first ever .NET code camp. As a testament to these efforts the membership of the user group has grown several fold in the last few years, and a bridge established with neighboring community leaders and groups.

Guadagno, Joseph: 2008 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

Joseph Guadagno has been very involved in his local development community. Joseph Guadagno started the Southeast Valley .NET User Group in December of 2007. This user group serves the Microsoft .NET developers of the Southeast Phoenix metropolitan area. He has organized a weekly lunch gathering of all technology people in the area. He handled the gathering of $45,000 worth of giveaways for the Phoenix hosted Scott Guthrie event and an average of $4,000 dollars a month for his user group giveaways.

Joseph is a Sitefinity CMS MVP. He has had articles published in Windows Developers Journal and CodeProject. Joseph heads up 3 open source projects for Sitefinity development and .NET plug in framework.

On a personal note, Joseph coaches his sons’ baseball team and volunteers for the Big Brother Big Sister program in Arizona.

Brandsma, Chris: 2008 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

My name is Chris Brandsma and I am a Senior Software Engineer located in Boise, Idaho. I have been programming professionally since graduating from Calvin College 1997 -- but like many, I started programming much earlier. Currently my interests are in effective C#, Design Patterns, JQuery, LINQ, NHibernate, SubSonic, Agile, and Test Driven Development. I blog at ElegantCode.com, and I am the president of the Boise Software Developers Group (bsdg.org), and on the board of directors of the Boise .Net Developers Group (netdug.com).

Vega, Lou: 2008 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

Lou Vega is a software engineer working for CSSI, Inc. He's been recognized as a Microsoft MVP for Device Application Development and is also an MCAD, and MCSD. He's both a founding member and current president of the Greater Charleston .NET User Group and is quite active in the developer community speaking at user groups and code camps as well as helping to organize and promote events. An avid old-school gamer, he occasionally finds time to pursue that hobby. When not connected to a computer he can usually be found home with his wife and children.

Wolfe, Philip: 2008 Q2 Champion Award (Annual)

Philip Wolfe is one of the top .NET leaders in the Midwest region. He has been the president of the Omaha .NET user group (http://www.OmahaMTG.com) off and on for the past six and a half years, assistant director of the Heartland Developers Conference (http://www.heartlandDC.com) for the last four years, and INETA Membership Mentor for Nebraska, Iowa, South Dakota, and Minnesota for the last two years. He is very involved in the community by speaking at MSDN events, conferences, teaching .NET courses at the post-secondary level, and helping to start three separate Microsoft technology-related user groups. Philip has also served as a community liaison to Microsoft.

Since 1997, Philip has been using the latest in Microsoft technology to develop key business solutions. As a leader in .NET technology, he helped start the .NET user group in Omaha in 2001 and was one of the first 100 people in the world certified in .NET by Microsoft. Since then he has helped organize the nation's largest professional user group conference, Heartland Developers Conference, for the last four years and he has helped start three new user groups in the Omaha area for SQL Server, BizTalk, and Team System. He specializes in Windows Workflow applications, web-based portal applications, and Microsoft Patterns & Practices. He has also been involved in developing four Microsoft certification exams.

Champion Award (Annual) Winners