ORLANDO, Fla. -- Microsoft Ignite -- 30,000 of Microsoft's closest friends braved the heat and humidity this week to learn about the vendor's vision of the future of IT.

That future is based on the cloud, of course, as well as other key trends where Microsoft believes it excels:

• AI (See Microsoft Flexes Muscles on AI, IoT & Security.)
• Security (See Microsoft Goes Captain America, Launches 'Defending Democracy' Program and Microsoft: Now You Don't Need a %$#! Password.)
• The Internet of Things. (See above.)
• And partnering, rather than competing, with its customers -- Microsoft strongly suggested, without naming names, that competitor and market leader Amazon Web Services does just that. (See Microsoft: We're Not Bullies Anymore! We're Nice!.)

I was there for a week, with my new iPhone XS, where I took some pictures and sent some tweets. Here's some of what I saw and had to say.

 

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Now entering its fifth year, the 2020 Vision Executive Summit is an exclusive meeting of global CSP executives focused on navigating the disruptive forces at work in telecom today. Join us in Lisbon on December 4-6 to meet with fellow experts as we define the future of next-gen communications and how to make it profitable.

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— Mitch Wagner Executive Editor, Light Reading