Hottest tech events for March: IT Roadmap, VoiceCon, VON.x, BrainShare

VoIP, wireless and mobility, everything Novell and SuSE Linux, security and Google Android are among key themes at IT industry conferences coming in March (here’s February’s list). For those of you thinking you could use a business trip and some education, what follows is a quick rundown of what’s ahead. Add your comments at the end of this story regarding other events this month (and sign up for Network World's Trade Show News Alert here):

* Network World’s IT Roadmap on March 4 in Denver (register here): Naturally, we need to start off with our own event. This is the first in a series of eight one-day IT Roadmap events this year. Tracks zero in on the hottest of network topics: virtualization; VoIP, collaboration and unified communications; network management; network access control (NAC); next-generation WAN services; Security and compliance; Web 2.0 in the enterprise; network and application acceleration; enterprise mobility; and data center infrastructure and management. Plus, hear a keynote address from Neville Teagarden, CIO of ProLogis, a Fortune 1000/S&P 500 company that is the world’s largest owner, manager and developer of distribution facilities. This is a complementary event for qualified attendees. Here’s a recent headline from an IT Roadmap event: "Healthcare firm offers wireless lessons learned."

* AIIM International Exposition & Conference, March 3-6 in Boston: Enterprise Content Management (ECM), document management, Web 2.0 applications, records management and portals are among the focus areas at this annual event. Companies such as Canon, Kodak and Fujitsu will show off their latest wares. Patrick J. Buchanan, a two-time Republican presidential candidate and former adviser to 3 U.S. presidents, will be a keynote speaker. A slew of case studies are on tap, including from the Associated Press; Pittsburgh Steelers; Orbitz; AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals; and Wells Fargo Bank. Our coverage of the event last year included this headline: "Google exec says content management systems lacking."

* O’Reilly Emerging Tech Conference (ETech), March 3-6 in San Diego: This conference mixes the future of IT with the future of all sorts of science, energy and societal issues. Sessions feature titles such as The PC-free Internet and How Technology Almost Lost the War: In Iraq, the Critical Networks are Social – Not Electronic. Last year, Microsoft unveiled a mobile Web browser code-named Deepfish at the show.

* NIST’s 7th Symposium on Identity and Trust on the Internet (IDtrust 2008), March 4-6 in Gaithersburg, Md.: This workshop brings together academia, government and industry to explore all aspects of identity and trust. Previously known as the PKI R&D Workshop (2002-2007), our new name reflects interest in a broader set of tools and the goal of an identity layer for the Internet.

* Gartner Wireless & Mobile Summit, March 3-5 in Chicago: Mike Lazaridis, president and co-CEO of Research in Motion, the BlackBerry company, will be a keynoter, and we’re thinking BlackBerry customers might have a few questions for him in light of the recent outage. Unified communications, wireless security and emerging technologies will be among hot topics in sessions led by analysts. Gartner recently shared its top 10 predictions for this year, including that by 2012, half of all workers will use devices other than their laptops when they travel.

* InfoSec World Conference & Expo, March 10-12 in Orlando.: This security-focused show will have a political bent as well, with Oliver North and former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft on the speaking agenda. InfoSec is a great venue for sharing tips with other IT security pros, as we detailed at last year’s event, including in this piece on using honeypots.

* Northeast Regional Computing Program (NERCOMP), March 10-12 in Providence, R.I.: Program focused on tech issues for IT pros at educational institutions. Our past coverage of the event includes this story on higher education slowly embracing shared services.

* IDC Directions 2008, March 11 in San Jose, March 19 in Boston: Network World’s sister company, a leading market research firm, examines virtualization, storage and the rest of the important IT market sectors.