SWFLDEV actually started AGES ago (in Internet time). Back in the day, it was known as the Naples .Net User Group. Kevin Barnhill ran it back then, and while there were Groups in Fort Myers, it still performed a valuable community service. Kevin’s still around, but he’s moved on to bigger and better things.

Around summer of 2005, I (John Dunagan) moved out here from Oregon after dev jobs dried up in the Willamette Valley. When I got to Florida, I lived for a time in Port Charlotte and went up to Stan’s Group just up the road in Sarasota, while I drove to the corners of the state, interviewing. Neighborhood America (now Ingage Networks) found me, and so I moved down to Naples, FL.

When I got here in January 2006, the Fort Myers groups had vanished in a cloud of smoke, and our Group itself had gone semi-dormant. When I complained, wtfed, and threatened to move to Tampa, our Microsoft Developer Evangelist, Joe Healy, put me in touch with Kevin, and at our first lunch, he said I could have it if I would run it. I agreed on the condition that he help me. He said he would, and in March of 2006, we kicked it off again right there in his former training room at WilsonMiller.

16 people showed up just to talk about what we wanted out of a Group. Joe funneled in our first speaker, David Silverlight, and generally kept us propped up while we figured out what was going on.

Since then, our little .Net community has done some great work. Two Code Camps, both of which drew accolades from the Florida community at large, and as I write this, we kick off our fifth year of monthly meetings.

It’s been an awesome run, and I hope to see it continue exactly like it has. I think the world of my membership, and have happily accepted from long ago that at most meetings, I’m gonna be the um, least experienced person in the room.

So if you find yourself down this way, and it’s that day of the month, come hang out with us. We think you’ll have a great time.

-John