VM /ETC

Posts Tagged ‘Las Vegas’

I know I am a little late getting these posted, but better late than never. Not all shots are the best of quality, but they still provide a good feel of my week at VMworld 2008. My photos include shots of the hotels while walking the Las Vegas strip to and from the Venetian, pics of Paris where I stayed, photos from the conference and keynotes, and shots of The Freemont Street Experience.

After the photo album is a video of the Tribute to Queen multimedia experience I caught on the world’s largest big screen on Freemont Street. The 6 minute video is an amazing display of Queen videos and images to the soundtrack of “We Will Rock You” and “We Are The Champions”.

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Since the VMworld 2008 party is at Las Vegas Motor Speedway let me use a NASCAR analogy to describe what has happened. My previously published conference schedule has failed the pre race tech inspection. I had too many Instructor-led labs. I was instructed to adjust my schedule so it conforms to the standard 2 labs per attendee template. As a result I am starting at the back of the field and have ended up on the waiting list for LAB 09 – Scripting VMware Infrastructure. Oh well, I guess “it’s just one of them racin’ deals.” I plan on driving the ugly green VM /ETC Dodge hard into Turn 1 on Monday morning to see if I can gain some positions back. If you are already in LAB 09 Monday morning don’t be surprised if you end up with “donut” on your driver-side door panel.

Here in the Southeast U.S. if we can talk about football or racing we are happy …

Sven Huisman commented in my original post about my schedule that the same thing happened to him a few years ago. He had more labs than he was supposed to, and then 2 weeks before VMworld he got an email telling him to change his schedule. Jay Rogers also commented that he could not believe I was able to schedule more than 2 labs. VMworld is 2 weeks away and I got an email late last night:

Subject: VMworld2008 Instructor-Led Labs – Action Required Read the rest of this entry »

Microsoft is throwing a free virtualization event next Monday. The September 8th Launch Event at the Meydenbauser Center in Bellevue, WA is obviously strategically timed to grab the world’s attention before VMware holds it’s annual VMworld conference the week after in Las Vegas. So, what does Microsoft have planned while they have the spotlight to themselves? The Microsoft Virtualization launch web page explains they are doing a lot!

“Find out how Windows Server 2008® with Hyper-V™, Microsoft System Center – including Virtual Machine Manager 2008 – and Microsoft Desktop and Application Virtualization allow you to deploy, manage and get VIRTUAL now like never before.

• Learn about Microsoft’s virtualization strategy and roadmap from senior Microsoft executives and industry analysts from Burton Group, Forrester Research and Greenmonk
• Hear from customers who have deployed Microsoft Virtualization products
• Get a free Microsoft Virtualization evaluation software kit*
• Visit the exhibit hall and test-drive the latest hardware and software solutions for a virtual environment from Microsoft and its partners.
• Take a technical deep dive by attending one of the conference sessions or hands-on labs.
• Join us at the closing launch party featuring the band Live.

This is a FREE event!”

With Keynotes from top Microsoft Executives mixed between Breakout Sessions covering Read the rest of this entry »

There has been some anticipation that VMware will announce and possibly release a newer version of the ESX/ESXi hypervisor at VMworld 2008 next month. Along with the hypervisor would come new versions of VirtualCenter, VCB, and the various features and functions that would create Virtual Infrastructure Enterprise Edition version 4 (VI 4.0). After talking with a VMware employee today that will be working at VMworld as both a lab instructor and session presenter, I was informed otherwise. VMware does plan to discuss the various new features of the upcoming product versions during the week, but will not officially refer to a new release or announce an expected release date. Instead VMware will talk about these new features as “future trends”.

I was told that VMware did not instruct it’s employees and those working at VMworld to Read the rest of this entry »

For those of you that don’t already know (or who haven’t read my About page), VM /ETC started last year during VMworld 2007 in San Francisco. I had just built a Fedora 6 “desktop server” in my basement and fumbled my way through the configuration of Apache, MySQL and WordPress. I don’t even remember why I decided to take on that particular home project, but it was definitely nothing to do with this blog.

About a week later it was time to go to VMworld, and I made a last minute decision to try to use WordPress to keep my notes from the conference. I made sure my Linksys home router was configured to auto update my DSL dynamic ip address at DynDNS.com and I created the treesum.homeip.net/vmworld2007 blog url. I did not even know that WordPress is configured to update Pingomatic by default. I had no idea what I was about to start.

I took my notebook to the keynotes and my sessions, I logged on and began taking notes when I could. Most of the posts were in outline form for me to try to decipher what I meant later. I also created a few “diary” posts about some of the sights of San Francisco and the things that I wanted to remember. I was learning WordPress as I went along. I had no idea anyone would even notice. I was completely surprised when I read on VMTN these words:

“treesum is doing great, in-depth coverage on his blog”

I remember my first thoughts were “that’s a link to my site and I need to shut down my little home web server as quick as I can”. I left it up, and now a lot has changed since this time last year.

• treesum.homeip.net became VM /ETC
• I registered the vmetc.com domain and moved the blog to Bluehost.
• Planet v12n added my feed to it’s aggregator.
• VM /ETC was picked as one of the Top 10 blogs for VMware admins to read
• I’m hooked up with a press pass for this year’s conference!

So, VMworld 2008 is just over a month away again, Read the rest of this entry »

This week I’ve been researching and planning my trip to Las Vegas, NV for VMWorld 2008, and I wanted to share some of my findings. Specifically, I’ve been trying to make the decision to book a room for the week at one of the official conference hotels listed on the VMworld 2008 web site or try finding a better deal on my own. I figured what I have discovered could possibly be helpful for at least a few of the 10,000 to 12,000 other conference attendees.

Basically, my hotel decision has come down to 2 important factors:

1. The proximity of my hotel to the Venetian (where the conference takes places) and the logistics of getting back and forth.
2. Finding a “wife-worthy” hotel that is affordable and agreeable to my company.

Hotel Logistics

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