To my readers who are traveling to one of the upcoming fall conferences, here’s a few of my favorite travel tips.

Use SeatGuru.com to get the best seat.

I’m not talking about first class versus coach – even in coach, not all seats are created equal.  Every plane has some surprise seats that have more room or different setups.

SeatGuru has maps of every airplane flown by every airline.  Call your airline or check online to find out the exact make & model of plane you’re flying and then pull up that map on SeatGuru.  The seats are color-coded by comfort level.  Hover your mouse over your seat, and you’ll see detailed notes about the comfort level of that particular seat.

Then, with that map up on your screen, call your travel agent or go to your airline’s web site to change your seat.  You can sometimes do this online even when it’s too early to check in for your flight, and the earlier you do this, the better your chances are for getting a good seat.

I’m typing this from the comfort of a Continental Embraer RJ-135, seat 12A.  It’s an exit row seat with no seat on either side of me, so I have plenty of space in front of me for my legs, and plenty of space on either side for my arms.  It didn’t cost me any extra – I just went to Continental.com and tweaked the seat on my reservation.

If you don’t find a better seat, don’t give up: check again exactly 3 days and 2 days before departure.  Airlines automatically upgrade their elite frequent fliers to first class for free at those times, and guess what – that means their seats in coach are suddenly empty.  These people are exactly the kinds of people who usually know to grab exit row seats and those “special” seats with more room, so you’ll find these seats opening up again.

No assigned seat?  Check in online ASAP.

If your airline reservation doesn’t show an exact seat number, your flight may be overbooked.  Airlines routinely overbook flights because not everybody shows up for a flight.

Go to your airline’s web site and try to check in right now.  You won’t be able to, but it will tell you when the flight checkin will open up.  Set yourself a reminder to check in at that date/time.  The earlier you check in, the more likely that you’ll get an assigned seat.  The later you check in – well, let’s just say you don’t want to get a miserable $100 air travel voucher in exchange for being late to PASS.

Thinking about taking a late flight for a voucher?

Think again.  Those travel vouchers usually have blackout dates, and the blackout dates are like “Valid only for trips with a Saturday stay on the third week of the month.”  If you really want to risk it, then talk to the airline staff before you volunteer the seat.  Ask whether the voucher has any restrictions at all, and ask them to show you one of the vouchers.  If it says anything about “Only valid for fare code X”, there’s a catch.

Not a frequent flyer?  Find someone who is.

If you only take one or two flights a year, and you’re not a member of any frequent flyer clubs, talk to people in your company who are frequent fliers.  Ask them if they want your miles for this trip.  If you’re doing a cross-country flight like Florida to Seattle, they might be willing to take you out to lunch and dinner in exchange for those free miles.  You just have to call the airline and tell them that you want to add your frequent flier number to your reservation, and give them your buddy’s account number.  There IS such a thing as a free lunch.

Leave a tip for the hotel maid on your pillow.

Hotel maids make minimum wage, and it’s common to leave them tips.  Some folks only leave the tip on the day of checkout, but I prefer to leave a tip daily because the same maid may not clean your room the entire time – they do get days off, ya know.

Also, make it as easy as possible for the maid.  Use just one trash can if you can, and dump your used towels in a single pile on the toilet seat (with the seat closed, speedy).  It’s less bending over for them.

Things to ask vendors and peers

Ahead of time, make a list of projects you’re working on, new products you want to implement, or large challenges that you’re facing.  Write this stuff down now, because you won’t remember it when somebody asks, “Do you have any questions?”  Us humans are terrible at that.

This is just my personal opinion, but I say do NOT ask tech support questions at a conference.  Tech support people aren’t usually the ones sent to conferences.  If you want support, call the support line.  If you have large architecture questions, implementation ideas, or tips and tricks, then you’ll find good answers at a conference.  If you’re getting error 0×8004005,search the web.

Things to bring to the conference

Here’s a list of things you may not think to bring along:

• A small, light extension cord or surge strip.  There’s never enough outlets, especially at tech conferences.  If your laptop has a two-prong electric adapter, try to use a two-prong extension cord too, because not all outlets have three prongs.
• An extra laptop battery.  It ain’t cheap, but if you want to take notes during the sessions, it’s easier if you don’t have to fight over power outlets.
• Business cards.  If you have a personal web site you want to promote, or if you use Twitter, order business cards now.  They’re surprisingly inexpensive if you’re doing simple text with no logos – like $10 for 250-500.  I order a set just for conferences that have conference-relevant information like my work email, personal email, Twitter link, web site links, etc, but not mailing address.  (Nobody at a conference wants your snail mail address, although you can put city & state if you want an icebreaker.)

Set up your phone or PDA with my Twitter link

If you’re going to the PASS Summit 2008, bookmark these two links now on your phone or your PDA:

• http://twitter.com/BrentO
• http://twitter.com/Quest_SQLServer

During the conference, I’ll Twitter whenever I find out about after-hours events, dinners, meetups, or spontaneous meetings during the day.

I remember what it was like going to PASS 2007 as an attendee who didn’t know anybody – man, it was tough to find out what was going on!  I ate lunch and dinner by myself most of the time.  Let’s face it, us DBAs aren’t always the best party people.  (Except for the PASSCamp Germany guys, they know how to put on a party!)  Now that I’m an insider (woohoo!) I’ll share the knowledge to get you folks into the action.

Brent Ozar

Brent specializes in performance tuning for SQL Server, VMware, and storage. He's one of the very few Microsoft Certified Masters of SQL Server, a published author, and a Microsoft MVP. He likes travel, Jeeps, Apple gear, jokes, and writing about himself in the third person. Read more and contact Brent.

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