This year DNN-Connect was in Belgium. Coming from The Netherlands, it was very much doable by train. Just a few hours, adding some slides to my presentation, enjoying first class (this is how we roll, baby). Changing trains 3 times and the end of the road: Louvain-la-Neuve. The cleanest University city on the planet (I felt like I wanted to kick a garbage can) and home of Tin Tin. 

Before the hotel Michael gives me a big hug, inside more friends and Peter is talking to someone...I never seen him before at the conference. A bit older, quite small but the face seems familiar. Peter goes "Tycho, this is Joe Craig"...OMG..."Joe! The Legend!". The Dutch honesty was a suprise to him. "It is nice to meet you too, sir..."

Last year DNN-Connect was very special. As Sacha showed a path forward towards DNN running on .NET Core, we decided on a stepping stone. A switch that allows you to tell the website whether it should be running on Webforms or running on .NET Core. Actually, also on page level. That way anyone can migrate at their own pace. In case, you have a vendor that is a bit slower, or you have your own custom modules and the documentation is...well...like most documentation, you can do with more flexibility. In order to get this show on the road several community members stepped up for sponsoring. Because it is vital and a strategic home run if we can pull it off.  

This year...we were all anxious. Did Sacha come through? Was this the start of the new era? 
First, Peter gave a long talk about processes, meetings etc etc. Really? You know what we wanna see, right? It was like the code version of a striptease. Almost an art form. I suspect, he was secretly enjoying the moments of suspence.
Second, Timo asked "Who in the room already tried the MVC Pipeline?".What? There is a working DNN version for download? Apparently, there is a project on https://github.com/orgs/dnnsoftware/projects/5 and apparently, there is also a version somewhere that we can take for a spin. 

Although, I was not aware of this download, more than half of the room raised their hand. They did the download. They tested the MVC Pipeline. And were very excited!
Now, I am too :-) 
Looking at the Project, it looks like the work was done 6 months ago. So, now the only thing we need is that the approval work (and I understand that is a lot of work) will be done. The most important part, because otherwise all the work was in vein. And to speed things up, I have already been in contact with several vendors who have declared to adjust their modules to work with the DNN .NET Core version as well.

Multiple sessions were about migrating modules and themes. And yes, that is work but it very well within reason.

For all other sessions, keep an eye out on https://dnn-connect.org/events/2026/schedule because, the powerpoints and or recordings will be added there. Dave had his Rocket suite already in the MVC Pipeline, Marco gave the latest in SEO/GEO, Tonci explained how the workflow works, of course multiple sessions on 2SXC cause a lot happened, Peter about the new CDF and I updated anyone on the DNN AI Chat.

The last breakfast, I had the chance to talk to Joe a bit more. His summary of the event: "I think I have a whole bunch of new friends!".
Yes Joe, you do!