NYC BACnet Meetings
January 28, 2008 – 8:54 pm
As part of the winter AHR Expo, the BACnet committee and the working groups met in New York City from January 18th though January 21st.
A good time was had by all in NYC! David and I stayed at Novotel on 52nd. It was a great place, and I highly recommend it. It’s close to everything, especially Times Square and only a few blocks from the MoMA. While we didn’t have a lot of free time, we were able to get to the MoMA store and I got to walk around Times Square for an afternoon. I was able to get a authentic NYC pizza at John’s Pizzeria on 44th (remember: no slices at John’s) and an incredible prime rib at Gallagher’s on 52nd. Gallagher’s was right next to our hotel, so it had the huge benefit of being easy to get to.
This was my 3rd trip to NYC, and it gets better every time. I’m looking forward to going back with my wife in the spring when it’s not so rushed. I’d like to see a show, and I definitely want to get back to the MoMA. Contrary to popular legend, everyone was very nice in NYC.
David and I made a trip to visit his brother, Tim and his lovely family. I got a great tour of the CP Communication offices and Tim’s fire house. And, sweet Jesus, we had some outstanding Italian food. Thanks again, Tim.
I have to admit, it was an absolute whirlwind of meetings as these events always are. But, the committee got a ton of work done. We meet again in the spring (April 21st – April 25th). To be honest, that’s almost too soon considering the amount of work we have ahead of us.
We (well, Carl) made some heavy modifications to Addendum G and prepared it for its 3rd (and hopefully final) public review. This addendum is a hefty change to the standard at a whopping 109 pages and nearly 6 years in the making. The XML working group made some progress as well. BACnet web services has been released for a while, and this group is moving forward with some the of other great uses for XML within BACnet.
I’m certainly no road warrior, but I do like to take along gadgets for the trip. In my bag, I have my Averatec laptop (of course, we couldn’t get through the meetings without laptops), my 16 GB iPod touch. As I was preparing to leave for the trip, Apple posted a firmware update (v1.1.3) for the touch. This update allows the use of applications like email and a fully functional calendar (yes, you can even add appointments, a feature lacking in v1 of the firmware). I downloaded the Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles pilot from the iTunes store and watched it on the flight from Pittsburgh to LaGuardia. That made the flight seem pretty short. I also have a PSP that I’d been taking on these types of trips, but it didn’t go this time. I figured I had enough entertainment in my iPod, and I never play games on the road anyway. The touch’s calendar feature held up pretty good. I used it to remind me of the working group meeting schedule. The only downside was waiting for it to boot, it would have been quicker to have the schedule on paper. Where’s the geek factor in that, though?
Would you like to see something really scary?
Coffee helps me clear the fog. If you've found any of the posts on this blog helpful, I could always use more coffee.
