Teched North America 2011 started off today with the pre-conference sessions. These full-day workshop offers in-depth study on a particular topic, which has been specifically developed to address the most relevant needs of today’s technology experts. Tech·Ed attendees pay an extra fee to attend these workshops - and receive seven hours of dedicated class time with a noted industry expert, lunch, and breaks.

Teched North America 2011 is being held at the Georgia Convention Center this year, in Atlanta. Microsoft is expecting thousands of IT professionals and developers for Microsoft’s flagship IT conference. Together with industry analyst like Mary Jo Foley, Steven Bink and others, Techlog will be reporting live from the conference — starting with the Keynote tomorrow.

What can we expect this week? Well, Mary Jo Foley has her predictions which you can read here. Personally I expect a lot of “Cloud” and strong focus on areas where Microsoft is in heavy competition; virtualization and phones. Robert Wahbe — Corporate Vice President of Server and Tools Marketing, which handles marketing for Windows Server, SQL Server, Visual Studio, System Center, and Forefront security and identity products — is one of the keynote speakers so we also expect updates on SQL codename “Denali” and upcoming Cloud management tools such as System Center codename “Concero”. Stay tuned for our live keynote coverage tomorrow for the exact details.