DEVintersection Conference 2024 (Las Vegas) + next GenAI Conference

The Age of AI is bringing about a transformative change, but what does this mean for you, specifically? With the advent of Copilots and other novel user interface and interaction paradigms, every system, application, and user will be impacted. As Markus, the presenter, Microsoft Regional Director, and founder of CODE, has emphasized, “Applications without Copilot capabilities are now legacy!” Microsoft has already integrated Copilot capabilities in every application or is in the process of doing so. The question is, can you provide Copilot features in your own applications?

This workshop, delivered in a lecture-style format, introduces the core concepts and capabilities behind OpenAI's features, with a special focus on GPT and large language models (LLMs) - which serve as the basis for many current AI topics - and DALL-E AI image generation. The workshop will cover both direct integration of OpenAI's APIs, as well as the enterprise-focused Azure OpenAI cognitive service implementation provided by Microsoft.

Markus will provide insights into what to expect from the current generation of AI, including its capabilities and limitations, and the potential dangers of AI. Additionally, he will explain how AI can make organizations more productive and competitive in the modern world. Markus will demonstrate how to integrate modern AI capabilities in applications, regardless of their type or system. You’ll learn how to call OpenAI APIs in various ways and impart important skills, such as prompt engineering. Markus will show real-world implementations of Copilot systems in custom applications.

While a one-day workshop cannot replace the thousands of hours required to master AI, the goal of this class is to equip attendees with the fundamental capabilities needed to start developing AI-driven applications productively.

Attendees will leave the training with an understanding of AI development, enabling them to approach such projects independently. They will also gain sufficient insight to make intelligent decisions that will help their organizations succeed in the future.

This workshop is programming-language agnostic, although most samples will be in C# and Python. Prior knowledge of AI is not required. This is not a hand-on workshop.

Navigating the world of software development in 2024 means adapting to significant shifts in how we understand and interact with technology. As we transition from conventional procedural processes to a more dynamic realm driven by artificial intelligence (AI), we're greeted with astounding, often unpredictable, possibilities that mere months ago seemed straight from the pages of a science fiction novel. Join us in this insightful session as we take a deep dive into the heart of this transformation: OpenAI's Large Language Models, or “ChatGPT”. You’ll learn how to employ this ground-breaking tool effectively; demystify the capabilities and help you choose the right models to suit your unique needs. In this session, you’ll learn how to get started with this new approach, specifically using OpenAI's Large Language Models as the foundation for a new software development approach. Attendees will learn what capabilities are available and what models to use to unlock this potential, and how to do it.

Join Tim Locke, Director of Business Development and Data Architect at CODE GROUP for a compelling 60-minute session designed for senior leaders an developers alike. Discover the top reasons AI projects fail—from unclear objectives and poor data quality to inadequate stakeholder engagement and scalability issues. With real-world examples and actionable strategies, Tim will guide you through avoiding these common pitfalls, helping you steer your AI initiatives toward success.

Nobody wants to miss out on the AI bandwagon, but effective leaders must ensure that AI projects are impactful and provide a good value for the time and money invested. AI has the potential to make truly meaningful improvements in most businesses, but only if projects are well directed and monitored. In this session, Mike Yeager, CEO of CODE Consulting and experienced AI implementer, is going to share strategies for focusing on AI initiatives that will succeed, pay off with business value, and align with your strategic initiatives.

Attendees are given tickets to redeem in the expo hall to pick up their conference t-shirts, they'll move through the expo hall to get stamps on their “bingo” cards from each booth, and they'll have 1-2 tickets for beer or wine or soda.

.NET Aspire just shipped on May 21st at the Microsoft Build conference. Come learn how this new framework transforms .NET into a modern cloud native framework adding support for Observability, Resiliency, Scalability and Manageability. We will show how to transform an existing application, show the new telemetry dashboard, show to do create local resources and resources in the cloud and how to run and deploy multi-part apps from the command line, VS Code and Visual Studio. Come learn about our most exciting release in years!

Special guest: Tim Huckaby, long-time friend of CODE and developer

This panel session brings together seasoned experts who have led AI projects in real-world scenarios. Panelists have faced the complexities, pitfalls, and triumphs of implementing AI within their organization or in consulting engagements. Join us as they share their experiences, strategies, and hard-won insights on how to navigate the AI landscape successfully. Whether you’re grappling with project failures, scaling issues, fears of releasing confidential data or ethical dilemmas, this session promises real answers from the field for your next AI endeavor.

Panel discussion questions:

• “What are the key factors that contribute to the success or failure of AI projects?”
• “How do you strike the right balance between innovation and risk mitigation in AI adoption?”
• “What ethical considerations should guide AI implementation, especially when dealing with sensitive data?”
• “How have you addressed fears of confidential data getting released?”
• “What's the business challenge that you think AI could address at your company, but you won't get stakeholder approval to try and tackle?”
• “How do you address the “black box” problem in AI models, especially when explaining decisions to stakeholders?”
• “What strategies have proven effective for scaling AI initiatives across an organization?”

This session will get you up to speed fast on Microsoft’s powerful Semantic Kernel. Similar to the open source LangChain framework, Semantic Kernel is an SDK for .NET, Python and Java AI developers that makes it easy to integrate AI services like OpenAI, Azure OpenAI and Hugging Face into C#, Python and Java. In this session you will learn how to use Semantic Kernel to accelerate your AI coding. You will learn to abstract your code, build and use plug-ins, tackle complex AI tasks, and leverage built in tools, saving significant time, getting to market faster and making your solution more maintainable. Semantic Kernel is Microsoft’s special sauce for building copilots, and it can be yours too. Join us to learn how you can orchestrate your AI with Semantic Kernel!

As artificial intelligence becomes increasingly integrated into the fabric of society, the imperative for robust AI governance and the pursuit of fairness in AI systems has never been more pronounced. This session is dedicated to unraveling the complexities of AI governance and the principles of fair AI, providing a comprehensive overview of current practices and a forward-looking perspective on future developments.

We will guide attendees through the intricate web of ethical, legal, and social considerations that underpin AI governance. We will dissect the mechanisms currently in place to ensure AI operates transparently, responsibly, and without bias, and we will forecast the evolution of these mechanisms as AI continues to advance.

• Foundations of AI governance: Understand the key components of effective AI governance, including regulatory frameworks, ethical guidelines, and oversight bodies that ensure accountability.
• Current state of fair AI: Examine how fairness is currently addressed in AI systems, the challenges of bias and discrimination, and the tools and methodologies employed to mitigate these issues.
• Case studies: Explore real-world examples of AI governance and fairness in action, learning from both successes and shortcomings in various industries.
• Future horizons: Anticipate the future of AI governance and fair AI, considering emerging technologies, potential regulatory changes, and the evolving landscape of AI capabilities.
• Actionable strategies: Develop actionable strategies for implementing robust AI governance and fairness principles within your organization, ensuring that your AI initiatives are both ethical and effective.
• Measuring impact: Learn how to measure the effectiveness of AI governance and the fairness of AI systems, using metrics that reflect both performance and ethical standards.

Do you wonder how ChatGPT and other large language models (LLM) work? We’ll walk through a comprehensive example to illustrate the intricate process behind how LLMs like ChatGPT generate answers. Through this session, attendees will gain valuable insights into the underlying mechanisms that enable LLMs to understand and respond to human-generated queries. This session will demystify the complex algorithms and advanced techniques used by LLMs, providing a deeper understanding of their capabilities.

Through a carefully curated example (no code demonstrated), you'll witness firsthand how LLMs analyze and interpret the context, meaning, and nuances of questions, enabling them to provide contextually relevant and accurate responses. This interactive exploration will shed light on the state-of-the-art technology driving LLMs, allowing you to appreciate the incredible depth of their knowledge and reasoning abilities.

Whether you are an AI enthusiast, a researcher, or simply curious about the capabilities of LLMs, this webinar promises to be an enlightening and interactive experience. Don't miss this chance to uncover the secrets behind how LLMs transform raw input into insightful and meaningful answers.

This session covers the world of hacking, focusing on three main areas: exploitation, persistence, and social engineering. We'll look at how hackers find and use weaknesses in systems, keep their access over time, and trick people into giving up information. We'll also discuss how they hide malware and avoid detection. Using real-world examples, attendees will learn about current threats and how to protect against these sophisticated attacks.

In this talk, we'll delve into advanced coding patterns that can significantly enhance the performance of your Blazor applications. From array pooling and zero copy approaches to the structs of arrays pattern and span slicing, we'll explore how these techniques can optimize memory usage and processing speed. Whether you're developing complex enterprise solutions or interactive web apps, understanding and applying these high-level strategies can lead to more responsive and efficient applications. Join us to unlock the full potential of Blazor and deliver top-notch user experiences with cutting-edge performance improvements.

In the rapidly evolving landscape of customer experience, the integration of AI technologies is no longer confined to the realms of tech-centric industries. This session aims to illuminate the transformative potential of AI in personalizing customer experiences in non-technical fields such as healthcare, education, and beyond following the security and privacy policies. We’ll demystify the application of advanced AI tools in environments where technical expertise is not the primary focus. We will explore how organizations can harness OpenAI and GPT to create more intuitive, responsive, and personalized interactions between customers and applications in diverse sectors. Key takeaways:

• Understanding AI: Gain a foundational understanding of how AI functions to enhance customer interactions without delving into the technical complexities.
• Real-world applications: Discover how AI is being used in non-technical fields to provide personalized advice, support, and learning experiences, with examples from medical diagnostics to customized educational content.
• Overcoming challenges: Learn about the challenges of implementing AI in non-technical fields, including data privacy, ethical considerations, and the importance of maintaining a human touch.
• Strategy development: Equip yourself with strategies to integrate AI into your customer experience model, ensuring that your organization remains at the forefront of innovation while delivering exceptional service.
• Measuring success: Understand how to measure the impact of AI on customer satisfaction and business outcomes, ensuring that your investment in AI is delivering tangible benefits.

In today’s cybersecurity landscape, proactive defense is crucial. This session explores how red teaming—simulating real-world attacks—helps uncover vulnerabilities, test responses, and improve security. Through practical examples, we'll show how red teaming strengthens defenses, enhances risk management, and raises security awareness. Discover the real-world benefits of red teaming and how it can enhance your organization's cybersecurity strategy.

In this session we’ll discuss the limitations and impact of generative image AI. We’ll explain how the underlying technology of state-of-the art models like DALL-E and Stable Diffusion work, how it can be used in combination with other technologies like LLMs and how they can be adapted to specific use-cases. Generative image AI has made significant progress in recent years. Models like DALL-E and Stable Diffusion can generate high-quality images from textual descriptions or from a given input image. This opens a wide range of possibilities for creative and practical applications. However, these models also have limitations and ethical implications that need to be considered. Whether you are a developer, designer, product manager or business leader, this session will provide you with a better understanding of the current state of generative image AI and how it can be used to create new realities.

Speakers: Ciprian Jichici (Solliance), Zoiner Tejada (Solliance) Kevin Johnson (Synovus), Markus Egger, YAG, Brian Cunningham (FoundationaLLM)

Generative AI derives a lot of its power and promise from being fundamentally a horizontal technology that delivers similar value (and often faces similar challenges) in vastly different domains. Come to this panel to hear five experts share their perspectives on what's real about generative AI across industries and sectors.

Join Zoiner Tejada for a thought provoking fireside chat with Kevin Daniel Johnson from Synovus as we discuss his experiences banking on AI, and the modernization, transformation and innovation dividends it is paying.