IBM TechXchange is coming to Atlanta on October 26–29, and RedMonk Senior Analyst Kate Holterhoff is welcoming everyone to her hometown live from the Atlanta Beltline. In this RedMonk Preview she runs through the sessions she’s most excited about. She’ll catch the IBM Bob roadmap, then try to outwit a supervillain called “The Architect” in the Deep Blue Heist game lab. She’ll debug impostor syndrome, level up on MCP, hear about generative engine optimization, and hear how to build 3D frontends with Bob. She’ll also cheer on Atlanta’s student developers at Student Dev Day. Plus: aquarium whale sharks, the World of Coca-Cola, and a local’s tip on the Beverly. See you in the ATL!
This RedMonk Preview is sponsored by IBM.
Links
Transcript
Hello, Kate Holterhoff, Senior Analyst at RedMonk, and I’m so excited because this year IBM TechXchange is coming to my hometown. That’s right, October 26th through 29th, right here in Atlanta, Georgia. In celebration of this fact, I’m recording this from the Atlanta Beltline, which I wholeheartedly suggest everyone check out whether in town. And here’s the best part about TXC landing in Atlanta.
A lot of speakers on the agenda are local tech celebrities. I will be bumping into folks I usually only see at meetups the whole IBM crowd is gonna be here. HashiConf is part of TechXchange this year too. So the Hallway track is gonna be so much fun. Last year, TechXchange had more than 1500 sessions, so how do you even choose? You can’t clone yourself, believe me, I have looked into it. Everyone has to build their own agenda, but here are the sessions.
I am the most excited about. Okay, first up, Bob. If you haven’t met Bob yet, Bob is IBM’s AI development partner, and Bob has tons of sessions in the agenda, and I am 100% here for it. So I’m heading straight to “Roadmap: A closer look at IBM Bob’s new agentic capabilities and what’s next” With Bob’s product manager, Arvid Ottenberg and Liam Allan. They’re covering the agent client protocol.
Subagents, and what’s coming next. But I don’t want to just hear about Bob, I also want to play with it, which brings me to the session with the best premise of the entire agenda. I might be a little biased here. Deep Blue Heist, the IBM Bob Game Experience, the Deep Blue Drive
has been stolen by an infamous supervillain known only as get ready for this “The Architect.” I’m sorry, a villain called the architect. Every developer who’s ever had a design doc rejected feels this in their bones. So to catch him you pick your MCP tools, code an agent with Bob, and send it chasing clues across cities in a text adventure. Then your agent competes against everyone else’s. It’s agentic AI meets Carmen San Diego and I am 100% in. Next up, developer experience, which is a topic we care a lot about here at RedMonk,
And DX isn’t just tools, it’s also humans using them. That’s why I’m making time for that. “rm -rf self-doubt: Debugging Impostor Syndrome for Developers” with Vincent Mayers from Neo4J. I know Vincent well from the local Atlanta Tech scene, and he’s even joined me on the RedMonk podcast. He’s going to be digging into the actual neuroscience behind the little fraud.
Detection alarm that goes off in your head, whether you’re opening your first pull request or giving a keynote. Then there’s a session I’d call required reading for 2026. “Everything a Developer Needs to Know About MCP” with Daniel Oh. Daniel is an absolute legend in the Java community, and I never miss a chance to hear him present.
Daniel is tackling the hard parts context bloat, authentication, and authorization, keeping data from leaking, and how MCP gateways help as you scale with of course a Bob demo. Okay, front end friends, this one’s for you, and it’s a subject very close to my heart. My friend Nerando Johnson, a front-end engineer at Hygienia, is presenting “Beyond SEO: Optimizing Your Web Content for the Age of AI.” Here’s the problem:
You can ship beautiful accessible code, and AI still won’t cite it because your content isn’t structured the way AI agents ingest it. Nerando will walk through generative engine optimization, and how to write content that AI actually cites. And then there’s a session that just sounds cool. “Practical IBM Bob Prototyping: 3D + IoT + Frontend Patterns” with Seigo Tanaka. Seigo is going to be doing live prototyping with Bob, building 3D front ends in Babylon.js,
Wiring up IoT devices and deploying to IBM Cloud Code Engine. 3D IoT, AI, and front end in one session. You can count me in.
Finally, as a former academic, I always want to see what’s happening with students, and Atlanta has some of the raddest undergrads anywhere. Between Georgia Tech, Georgia State, Emory’s Spelman Morehouse, Kennesaw State, and so many more, the city is full of talent. As a proud member of the Georgia Tech community, Go Jackets, I am particularly excited for “Student Dev Day: Agentic Engineering in Practice.” It’s a hands-on workshop where students use Bob.
And a realistic fintech app to move past vibe coding toward real spec-driven development basically how to work with a coding agent and still own your own code. The lineup is great. You got Gabe Goodhart, the SkillsBuild team, and naturally Daniel Oh again.
Students, you’re getting real engineering rigor from some of the best in the business. And I’d love to see you there. Okay, I’ll wrap up here. To recap, I’ll be catching up on Bob’s roadmap, chasing a supervillain called “The Architect,” debugging my own imposter syndrome, leveling up on MCP, optimizing for answer engines, building in 3D, and cheering on Atlanta’s future developers. And on Wednesday night, there’s TechXchange Unplugged at the Georgia Aquarium.
And the world of Coca-Cola. pro tip for those of you who make it to the Coke Museum: don’t miss the Beverly.So if you’re coming to TechXchange, welcome to Atlanta. Come find me and say hi, I’ll be there all week. See you in Atlanta.
