Next week is SpringOne Platform (S1P). This annual conference is where developers from around the world learn about about Spring, Cloud Foundry, and modern architecture. It’s got a great mix of tech talks, product demos, and transformational case studies. Hear from software engineers and leaders that work at companies like Pivotal, Boeing, Mastercard, Microsoft, Google, FedEx, HCSC, The Home Depot, Comcast, Accenture, and more.
If you’re attending (and you are, RIGHT?!?), how do you pick sessions from the ten tracks over three days? I helped build the program, and thought I’d point out the best talks for each type of audience member.
The “multi-cloud enthusiast”
Your future involves multiple clouds. It’s inevitable. Learn all about the tech and strategies to make it more successful.
- Pivotal Cloud Foundry, Google Machine Learning, and Spring (Tuesday 4:20pm). See how to use Google’s rad machine learning APIs from your apps.
- Power of Google Cloud Platform with Spring Cloud GCP (Wednesday 11:30am). See some brand new Spring/Google integrations live.
- Debugging Serverless for Cloud (Wednesday 3:20pm). This looks like an interesting talk from a pair of Microsoft folks.
- Avoiding that $1M AWS Bill (Wednesday 4:20pm). Case study from Pivotal Tracker team that explains how they moved from managed hosting, to AWS, and finally to GCP.
- Rapidly Develop, Deploy and Scale Java Cloud Apps Using Spring Boot (Thursday 10:30am). Microsoft’s program manager for Java-on-Azure talks about deploying across locations.
- Quickly Build Spring Boot Applications to Consume Public Cloud Services (Thursday 11:50am). See how to use AWS, Azure, and GCP services in your Spring Boot apps running in Cloud Foundry.
The “bleeding-edge developer”
The vast major of S1P attendees are developers who want to learn about the hottest technologies. Here are some highlights for them.
- Reactive Spring (Tuesday 11:30am). Spring Framework 5 is soaked in reactive programming support. Learn all about it.
- What’s New in Spring Boot 2.0 (Tuesday 11:30am). This is the same time as the previous, so you have TOUGH CHOICES. Important talk from those who built it.
- Kafka Streams – From the Ground Up to the Cloud (Tuesday 3:20pm). See Kafka in action with someone who really knows it.
- Spring Cloud Gateway (Tuesday 4:20pm). This is an exciting new project that’s important for microservices devs.
- Serverless Spring (Wednesday 4:20pm). Java has an important role in a serverless world, and hear from a real expert on the topic.
- Why Spring ❤ Kotlin (Thursday 10:30am). Kotlin is super hot. Learn how Spring makes it better.
The “enterprise change agent”
I’m blown away by the number of real case studies at this show. If you’re trying to create a lasting change at your company, these are the talks that prep you for success.
- Discover’s Journey to Cloud Native (Tuesday 11:30am). Hear about creating a lasting strategy to change methods and technology.
- Cloud-Native Journey in Synchrony Financial (Tuesday 12:10pm). This looks like a good enterprise story about a thoughtful path from vision to implementation.
- Crossing the CI/CD Chasm (Tuesday 12:10pm). If a hundred year-old insurance can transform, why can’t you? Liberty Mutual has some lessons to share about CI/CD practices.
- Zero to 12 Million (Tuesday 2:00pm). A sense of urgency often leads to results. Hear how T-Mobile accelerated their change.
- Bringing New Technology to Legacy Land (Tuesday 2:40pm). If West Corp systems goes offline, you’ll notice. This looks like a helpful story about improvement.
- How to Navigate a Sea of “No” (Tuesday 3:20pm). Creating a lasting transformation requires more than one champion. If you’re trying to build out your sponsor pool, this looks like a helpful talk by the Great American Insurance Group.
- Tech Modernization: A Cloud Migration (Tuesday 5:00pm). What did Schwab learn about building scalable systems? Find out here.
- Scaling from Startup Mode to Enterprise Mode – Accelerating FedEx’s Cloud-Native Transformation (Wednesday 12:10pm). How do you scale a transformation? Looks like some good lessons learned.
- How Comcast Embraced Open (Wednesday 5:40pm). Do you need to convince your org that open-source makes sense? Learn how Comcast built their practice and strategy.
The “ambitious operations pro”
Automation doesn’t spell the end of Ops. But it does change the nature of it. These are talks that forward-thinking operations folks want to attend to learn how to build and manage future tech.
- Cloud Foundry Networking: Enabling Direct Communication for Microservices (Tuesday 2:40pm). I don’t know many devs who love dealing with networks, but a well-designed network is an enabler. Learn about policy-based network automation here.
- Enterprise CI/CD – Scaling the Build Pipeline at Home Depot (Tuesday 3:20pm). Delivery pipelines at scale? It’s a huge enabler. See how The Home Depot did it.
- Five Cloud Native Ops Superpowers: Yes, You Can Do That! (Tuesday 5:40pm). I’m not recommending this (just) because I’ll make a guest appearance. I’m recommending it because Dave Bartoletti of Forrester has some captivating insight into modern ops.
- CredHub and Secure Credential Management (Wednesday 12:10pm). More apps means more connections and more credentials. How do you deal with it all? Find out here.
- PCF Platform Monitoring with Prometheus and Grafana (Wednesday 12:10pm). Find out how Northern Trust figured out a modern way to manage Pivotal Cloud Foundry.
- Ensuring Platform Security with Windows Bosh Add-ons and Runtime-Config at Boeing (Wednesday 2:00pm). The team at Boeing has some strict security and deployment guidelines. They share their best practices here.
The “modern app architect”
What a fun time to be an architect! We’re expected to deliver software with exceptional availability and scale. That requires a new set of patterns. You’ll learn them in these talks.
- The Beginner’s Guide to Spring Cloud (Tuesday 11:30am). Thorough walkthrough of all the Spring Cloud projects, and how these improve your app resilience and performance.
- State or Events? Which Shall I Keep? (Tuesday 2:00pm) This should be an exceptional talk about event-driven architecture.
- Leveraging Netflix Eureka and Hystrix from .NET (Tuesday 2:00pm). I’m pumped about the movement to bring cloud-native patterns to .NET. Hear all about it from Beth (Microsoft) and Zach (Pivotal).
- Reactive DDD: Modeling Uncertainty (Tuesday 4:20pm). Learn about implementing domain-driven design from someone who wrote the book on it.
- Cloud Event Driven Architectures with Spring Cloud Stream 2.0 (Wednesday 11:30am). I’m looking forward to this extensive talk on implementing event-driven architecture.
- Ford Motor Company’s Cloud Native Reference Application (Wednesday 5:00pm). To scale best practices, you often need a canonical example that everyone can relate to. That’s what the Ford team built.
- Refactoring to a System of Systems (Thursday 11:50am). Oliver is a smart fella, and isn’t afraid to call out the bad and good of microservices and distributed systems. This should be great.
The “curious data pro”
How we collect, process, store, and retrieve data is changing. It has to. There’s more data, in more formats, with demands for faster access. These talks get you up to speed on modern data approaches.
- Not Only Reactive – Data Access with Spring Data (Tuesday 2:00pm). What does it mean to have reactive data access, and which stores support it? You can find out here.
- Delivering the Power of Data Using Spring Cloud Data Flow and DataStax Enterprise Cassandra NoSQL Database (Wednesday 2:40pm). This looks like a practical take on modern data movement and processing.
- Cloud-Native Data: What is it? Will it Solve the Data-DevOps Divide? (Wednesday 3:20pm) This may be one of the most important discussions of the conference. Great panel, crucial topic.
- Orchestrating Data Microservices with Spring Cloud Data Flow (Thursday 10:30am). It’s time to rethink data integration, and this talk shows you a relevant approach.
- RDBMS and Apache Geode Data Movement: Low Latency ETL Pipeline By Using Cloud-Native Event Driven Microservices (Thursday 11:50am). The folks at HCSC are doing some important work with modern integration pipelines. I’m looking forward to this talk.
The “plugged-in manager”
Any engineering lead, manager, or executive is going to spend considerable time optimizing the team, not building software. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be up-to-date on what your team is working with. These talks will make you sound hip at the water cooler after the conference.
- From Zero to Hero with Spring Boot (Tuesday 2:00pm). Get a full walkthrough of one of the most critical technologies for Java developers.
- Concourse in the Real World: A Case Study in CI/CD and DevOps (Tuesday 2:40pm). Shrinking your cost of deployment may the most important thing you can do as a leader. Hear from health tech company Cerner about how they do CI/CD with Concourse.
- Kubernetes for the Spring Developer (Wednesday 3:20pm). Your devs won’t shut up about Kubernetes! What’s the story? Meaghan from Google gives you the lowdown.
- The Modern Family – Modernizing Applications to Pivotal Cloud Foundry – Getting Out of the Big Ball Of Mud (Wednesday 4:20pm). How do craft a broad modernization strategy that strangles your monoliths? Hear from experts.
- Deconstructing Monoliths with Domain Driven Design (Thursday 10:30am). Liberty Mutual worked with Pivotal on a very successful transformation. Learn their techniques and bring them back home.
Fortunately all these sessions will be recorded and posted online. But nothing beats the in-person experience. If you haven’t bought a ticket, it’s not too late!
Richard Seroter's Architecture Musings 
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