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VMworld started its warm-up today with the TAM and Partner Day which have sessions designed for partners and very large customers.

I flew in yesterday from London and desperately needed some refreshment after the long flight working on blog posts (hint, hint, see tomorrow!) rather than movie watching. I had my choice of the annual VMworld #vBeers at The Chieftain or the vCommunity Meetup at Jillian’s. Choice wasn’t really an option so I went to both and networked with the massive global virtualisation community meeting up with some great old friends I hadn’t seen for a year and meeting some new. There’s plenty of excitement and anticipation for what for many is the biggest IT get together of the year.

Today was meant to start with our new initiative Run VMworld to literally kick start the day with a relaxed community #vRun at 7am.  I had an emergency phone call to deal with so unfortunately missed it but Eric Wright, Cody Bunch and Forbes Guthrie at least kept the initiative going.  Tomorrow’s another day.

Not as guilt free as I’d hoped to have been I still or course joined the vBreakfast organised by Shane Williford and tucked into good old American Diner fare with Alastair Cooke.

   

Time to register at the conference venue, the Moscone Center resplendent in all things VMworld right in the middle of San Francisco.

Hands on Labs:

The Hands-On-Labs were open today to all attendees, not just partners so a good opportunity to do a lab before the masses descend tomorrow. The Labs are open every day but you need to give yourself time before closing.

• Sunday August 24, 2014: 09:00am – 7:00pm
• Monday August 25, 2014: 10:30am – 7:00pm
• Tuesday August 26, 2014: 10:30am – 6:00pm
• Wednesday August 27, 2014: 8:00am – 5:00pm
• Thursday August 28, 2014: 8:00am – 3:00pm

 

 

 

I had a look at two labs, the first was:

HOL-SDC-1413 – IT Outcomes – Faster Delivery of Infrastructure and Apps through Automation.

This was about integrating vCAC, vCO, NSX, App Director in ways that you can automate the delivery of many applications, not just provisioning VMs but also associated networking and storage.

 

Even the VMworld Hands on Labs are not immune to Java updates and I did spot a vSAN rather than VSAN.

 

I then also did parts of:

SPL-MBL-1451 – Horizon 6 with View from A to Z.

I selected the section on Remote Desktop Session Host and went through the steps of publishing applications. I also spotted a new VMware Fling called Xen2View which you can use to migrate your applications from Citrix XenApp to VMware Horizon.

I felt the Labs were even better this year. More spread out & more seats. The interface was even slicker with a pure HTML5 remote desktop connection to the management VM so no RDC. Another things that I noticed was it was a little lighter than previous year. I remarked last year thet it was so dark you could hardly see the keyboard so was nice to feel you were not doing a lab in a dungeon.

Next up was Opening Acts which is a joint production of #VMunderground and #vBrownBag. These took the form of panel discussions next door to Moscone at a great venue with virtualisation illuminaries taking audience questions and then discussing. A great initiative to get the juices flowing. I hope this can become a permanent feature of VMworld.

I managed to see part of each of them which were recorded. I’ll post the links when they are available.

Social Media/Careers

• John Troyer (@jtroyer) moderator
• Amy Lewis (@commsninja)
• James Bowling (@vsential)
• Jeramiah Dooley (@jdooley_clt)
• Gina Minks (@gminks)

Storage (SDS & traditional) – write-up by Derek Seaman

• Keith Norbie (@keithnorbie) moderator
• Michael Webster (@vcdxnz001)
• Matt Vogt (@mattvogt)
• J Metz (@drjmetz)
• Matt Cowger (@mcowger)
• Wade Holmes (@wholmes)

Networking (SDN & traditional) – write-up by Derek Seaman

• Chris Wahl (@chriswahl) moderator
• Tom Hollingsworth (@networkingnerd)
• Joe Onisick (@jonisick)
• Scott Lowe (@scott_lowe)
• Lisa Caywood (@realLisaC)

Orchestration, Automation, & Optimization

• Lauren Malhoit (@malhoit) moderator
• Emad Younis (@emad_younis)
• Mike Foley (@mikefoley)
• Al Renouf (@alanrenouf)
• Josh Atwell (@josh_atwell)
• Luc Dekens (@lucd22)

 

Cloud & General Virtualization

• Leah Schoeb (@vleahschoeb) moderator
• Stu Miniman (@stu)
• Sean Clark (@vseanclark)
• Stephen Foskett (@sfoskett)
• Hugo Phan (@hugophan)
• Aaron Delp (@aarondelp)

Architecture & Infrastructure (3pm)

• Matt Liebowitz (@mattliebowitz) moderator
• Melissa Palmer (@vmiss33)
• Phoummala Schmitt (@exchangegoddess)
• Maish Saidel-Keesing (@maishsk)
• Mike Preston (@mwpreston)
• John Arrasjid (@vcdx001)

I had a quick chance to dash over to EMC’s Annual #v0dgeball Charity Tournament 2014 which raised $20,000 for the Wounded Warriers Project.

 

 

  

The Solutions Exchange which is the bear pit where vendors get to sell their virtualisation complementary (not complimentary) solutions opened officially with a sponsored Welcome Reception. The Solutions Exchange is open until Wednesday and I’ll certainly be having a look around.

Next up after clearing up the venue #VMunderground held their annual VMworld kick-off party where I managed to catch up with so many more people.

For fun I have a Jawbone UP this year which tracks my movement, I did 14174 steps and travelled 11.8km.