Are you awake at night because you aren’t as familiar with Hadoop/Ruby on Rails/ Ajax/security pitfalls as you think you should be?

Is your boss moving up your deadlines without putting any additional resources on the project?

Are you being asked to do more with less?

If you or someone you know is an underappreciated developer, we can help.

Come to Web 2.0 Expo and begin your recovery today. Through February 20, we are offering 20% off the conference program to all developers, engineers, and code monkeys.

Cut and paste code websf09dev in the “discount code” field in registration.

The Development Track at Web 2.0 Expo is for experienced developers who need to stay up to date with the latest tools, frameworks and trends, as well as ways to code smarter, faster and more elegantly.

Topics covered include:

• Hadoop – easily write and run applications that process vast amounts of data
• Security around web services and data sharing applications
• Greener coding
• Drizzle
• Ajax, Flash, Silverlight
• Mobile web services
• Writing faster code
• Ruby on Rails, Django, Dojo
• Making use of free data
• Online identity
• The best new development tools
• Scala

We hope to see you there.

Tuesday Barack Obama becomes the 44th President of the United States.  In honor of this historic occasion, we are offering 44% off the conference program at Web 2.0 Expo San Francisco (enter code Obama153 in the “discount code” field during registration).  But don’t procrastinate – this offer is only good through Inauguration Day, January 20th.

Need more reasons to register today?  Here are 44:

1. 77 speakers (and counting)
2. Tim O’Reilly
3. Meet thousands of other like-minded people whose brains you can pick (or fill – your choice).
4. Marketing & Community Track
5. Sometimes this happens.
6. Parties!
7. Strategy & Business Models Track
8. Work at a large enterprise?  This is your year.  Lightweight apps and tools are how smart companies will weather this storm.
9. Your friends/coworkers/enemies/next boss/future husband or wife will be there.
10. Fundamentals Track
11. Web 2.0 is the grease for the innovation engine.
12. Dion Hinchcliffe’s Workshop on the Web 2.0 Recession Diet
13. San Francisco in late March will be nicer than 90% of the rest of the country (unless it rains).
14. Learn exactly what to do to make your website that much more user-friendly – increasing engagement, generating more revenues and making you a superhero at work.
15. Design & User Experience Track
16. If you miss this one, we aren’t having another Web 2.0 Expo until November in New York.
17. Starting up?  Web 2.0 Expo is a great place to meet VCs and other investors.
18. Development Track
19. More networking opportunities than you can shake a stick at
20. We’re talking about mobile devices as the primary interface.  Is your site ready?
21. Get a great new idea for a business/product/feature/revenue model.
22. Europeans:  your money will go far over here.
23. Web2Open:  attendees set the agenda and lead the program (and it’s free)
24. Focus on Entertainment Track
25. You will find ways to make your company more productive.
26. Expo Plus Pass – rock star access for regular-person prices.
27. Stephan Spencer’s SEO 101 session
28. BoFs:  after-hours get-togethers for the topics you want to explore further
29. Focus on Security Track
30. While other events are closing down, Web 2.0 Expo is here for you with the practical information, ideas and education to find opportunities in challenging times
31. San Francisco is a fun city!  Bring your spouse/significant other and don’t tell the suits – you deserve it.
32. Focus on Web Operations Track
33. Will Wright, creator of Spore and The Sims, is keynoting.
34. You will learn concrete ways to save your company money.
35. Demo dozens of new tools in the Expo Hall.
36. The Booth Crawl – featuring FREE DRINKS
37. Moscone’s Green initiatives
38. Free sessions: free education from leading technology companies.
39. We’ll be listening.  Sound not loud enough in the session room?  Looking for a power strip?  DM us on Twitter @w2e and we’ll take care of it.
40. Focus on Mobile Track
41. Backchannel.  Discuss, debate, ask questions in real time during sessions and keynotes.
42. Web 2.0 can make your job (hell, your life) easier.
43. Ignite!  5 minutes, 20 slides, unbelievable topics.
44. Attending Web 2.0 Expo will make you more attractive*  *claim not scientifically proven

With our event planning well underway, I’ve been thinking about ways that I can have an even better time at Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco this year.  As marketing director, I get to share in the attendee experience since the keynotes, expo hall and conference are very relevant to my day to day job – especially the marketing track.

1. I’m going to go to at least 5 conference sessions outside the marketing & community track. In NY, I got to see at least one session on UX that gave me a great understanding as a marketer of how to present information to visitors. This year, I’d like to explore more in the design and user experience track, the mobile track (I *heart* my iPhone), and the strategy and business models track.
2. I’m going to meet more new people – maybe put some real faces to the Twitter personas I’ve been following.
3. Ignite. I attended last year’s Ignite at the DNA Lounge but only made it through the first half. However, now I’m hooked. It’s like open mike night meets geek grad school! Here’s hoping there will be more robots.
4. Bye-bye to schlepping my laptop all over Moscone West. I got an iPhone from my husband for my birthday so I can check my calendar, view the online schedule, Twitter and keep up with my email. I think this one device will have a huge impact on my enjoyment of the event and I’m really looking forward to experiencing the mobile apps created to enhance Web 2.0 Expo as an attendee would.
5. Web2Open.  The last two years I’ve only had a brief moment to pop my head into the Web2Open area, but this year I’d really like to participate.  This “unconference” portion builds itself and I think this will be the perfect spot to pick others’ brains and get a feel for what topics are really resonating with the community.

I’ll come back and post again with some tips for how you can make the most of your experience. Please leave any suggestions or questions in the comments here.