Mark Michaelis is an Enterprise Software Architect at Itron Inc. Additionally, Mark recently started intelliTechture, a software engineering and consulting company with high-end skills in Microsoft VSTS/TFS, BizTalk, SharePoint, and .NET 3.0. Mark also serves as a Chief Software Architect and Trainer for IDesign Inc. Mark holds a BA in philosophy from the University of Illinois and an MS in computer science from the Illinois Institute of Technology. He is also recognized by Microsoft as a Regional Directory. Starting in 1996, he has been a Microsoft MVP for C#, Visual Studio Team System, and the Windows SDK. He serves on several Microsoft software design review teams, including C#, the Connected Systems Division and VSTS/TFS. Mark speaks at developer conferences both nationally and internationally and has written several articles and books. His most recent book is Essential C# 3.0 (Addison-Wesley, 2008). When not bonding with his computer, Mark is busy with his family or training for the Ironman.