"What, did you expect slides? This is a boot camp. If you end up having fun, well that was an accident."

That was my intro, as I remembered delivering it, to our initial SDL Web 8.5 R&D boot camp attendees last month. In this post I will share some of the planning process, topics we focused on for Web 8.5, and lessons learned from the two-day session. Let me also explain this initial bootcamp is definitely not the last. SDL Education is planning follow-up sessions along with training updates (e.g. Delta training) if you're interested in learning more about SDL Web 8.5.

Kick-off

For the most coverage across our global organization, we started planning by confirming the basic who, what, where, when, how, and why for the sessions.

Why

The objectives behind this session where:

1. Explain the Web 8.5 differences. Allow those that work with customers and prospects hands-on time with the system with access to R&D for background and help.
2. Provide sources and input into follow-up knowledge transfer sessions and training updates.
3. Identify Subject Matter Experts and have them meet others with similar interests or strengths.
4. Identify those interested in presenting or running follow-up workshops for Education and community events.
5. Encourage sharing on topics interesting to participants.
6. See how implementers work with the product and solicit feedback.

The rest of the "reporter questions" for who, what, where, when, and how, included setting the session in the SDL Amsterdam office, picking appropriate topics, and the schedule.

Topics

Here are the topics we considered covering. In an odd role-reversal, this is the first time I've help craft what should be in the session from a product-perspective. I've participated and even delivered these types of sessions, but never picked topics or solicited participants (by the way, I'd make a terrible bouncer).

Topics in SDL Web 8.5 that we felt people should or might be interesting in knowing about included:

• Multiple destinations (explain details on how it differs) and Scalable deployer / multiple workers (REDIS)
• Privileges feature and new Publication Admin right
• Workflow as Collaboration configuration / Translate Minor Versions
• CM Blob Storage
• Notifications API
• Experience Manager initialization performance improvements
• Translation improvements (automatically job lists via Notifcation API, Schema field options to include linked content in jobs, automatic publishing on job send)
• ETW tracing

We also realized that Web 8 may still feel new to some people and that there's a crucial difference in how someone interprets "What's in SDL Web 8.5?"

• To our developers, "What's in SDL Web 8.5?" means the most recent changes since the previous minor (cloud) version. What's in SDL Web 8.5?
• To implementers, "What's in SDL Web 8.5?" means how is SDL Web 8.5 different from SDL Web 8? What's in SDL Web 8.5?
• But most critically, to customers, "What's in SDL Web 8.5?" means "What's different between that version and what I have now?"

Along that thinking, some of the possible highlights and refresher topics included:

• More on cloud
• UI Updates (chinese option for the UI in-the-box, Favorite locations in the item select dialogue, Update to the multi-select box)
• Topology Manager overview UI and Publications Mapping tab
• Microservices (configuration, what it means to implementations)
• Site Wizard (already there)

If some of these topics interest you, consider:

• Reviewing the webinars and updates related to SDL Web 8.5 on SDL.com
• Getting the SDL Web 8.5 data sheet (no sign-in required), do share this!
• Visiting the SDL Web section in the SDL Learning Center on SDL.com or emailing learn(at)sdl.com

We converted the above input into an agenda and ran the event.

Agenda

I've written a post or two (and then some) about organizing events and knew enough to start with a basic agenda that assumed time to get situated, a break in the morning and afternoon, and of course some kind of ice breaker.

During the event we roughly followed the agenda, being flexible with some of the topics.

Exercises

For exercises you can try some of these on your own. Most of the input and sources are already available online. What an explicit bootcamp session brings is fellow Tridionauts together with support from a facilitator, developer, or technical lead.

Content Delivery

• CD quick install
• Scalable Deployer
• DXA 1.7 import including TTM Prepare
• Distributed client-caching using Redis (Richard Hamlyn (former member)  had us follow his quick install guide)

For ETW, see Exploring Hot Spots in the Content Manager. Note that the ETW feature is a product feature as of Web 8 (and improved in Web 8.5), but the tool mentioned is an example you're free to try. With ETW, you're free to use anything that can read the format.

Workflow as Collaboration

To explore the workflow as collaboration, set up a basic two-user workflow and follow the Documentation describing embargo versus collaboration workflow.

For other guidance and training, visit the SDL Learning Center or contact learn@sdl.com.

Lessons Learned

1. More People. Personally, I was concerned about space but could have invited a few more. Apologies if we missed people in this specific session--do reach out the Training or your partner contact for future sessions. By Midas Rule, definitely considering running your own knowledge transfer sessions, user groups, or hackathons.
2. Training Environments are Tough. It's not a new point, but training setups are notoriously hard. See one of my other posts on the sixth Tridion environment.
3. Note the Configurations. We also found that combining the docs, examples, and an existing environment meant that we could create and deliver the agenda quickly. But also a change in one spot might need adjustments later in terms of users, urls, ports, and other configuration. We managed okay, but in proper training documenting and confirming configuration details and testing how people walk through the steps would be helpful.
4. Playing with Redis was surprisingly easy.
5. Not Enough Time. The energy from such a group is amazing. Though the past year seemed to go by so quickly, a bootcamp gives you a chance to catch your breath and try to explain everything we've changed. When they're asking for another day to absorb it all, you realize the work is only half done.

I'll continue sharing what I'm working on, but the next steps are for you and the community. Give yourself permission. Share the knowledge. Submit the feedback. And ask for, or organize your own sessions on SDL Web 8.5 or whatever interests you.