VMworld

VMware Hands-on Labs public beta

One of the most awesome parts of VMworld, at least in my opinion, is the Hands-on Labs.  There, you get to actually put the new product through its paces.

At VMworld 2012, one of our announcements (which I think kinda got lost in all of our other announcements) is that we’re going to make our Hands-on Labs available online.  Our first step towards that is live now: add yourself to our list for the public beta.  We’ll use this to figure out how much demand there actually is for this, and we’ll add people to the Hands-on Labs so that we can manage the experience and make sure that it’s all happily working for everyone.  So get on the list!

Full details are in the blog post announcing the public beta.

vSphere

The Register on vSphere 5.1’s Flex-based web client

The Register’s click-inducing title Love vSphere? You’re going to have to love Flash too made me wince when I saw the title, but I was pleasantly surprised to see that it’s a pretty even-handed look at the new web client and how it came into being.  I won’t spoil the whole thing, but here’s the conclusion:

VMware has done a spectacular job of delivering the first enterprise-class Flash application I have had the pleasure to use. The web client in vSphere 5 was an interesting toy that we collectively poked at, shrugged, and went back to the familiar C# client. This time the training wheels are off, and VMware doesn’t disappoint.

For those of you who install 5.1, I’d love to hear your thoughts on the web client.  My team has put a lot of work into this, and we’re continuing on it in the future.  Stay tuned for more announcements of research that my team is doing so that you can help us shape the future of vSphere and the vCloud Suite.

MWSF

submit your proposals to MacIT!

MacIT 2013, which is part of Macworld Expo, is looking for speakers to discuss topics of importance to the Mac IT community. It’s held in San Francisco on January 31 – February 2. Some ideas for topics include:

  • integrating iOS devices and Macs into Windows environments
  • OS X enterprise solutions
  • enterprise applications for Apple devices

The complete call for submissions, including more information and potential topics, is here.

I’ve just been invited to join their advisory committee, and I’ve spoken at MacIT and Macworld Expo several times before.  I’d be remiss if I didn’t also include the call for submissions for Macworld Expo.  The deadline for submissions to both events is September 9.

The difference between the two is that MacIT is for an IT audience, whereas the Expo is for a more general audience. For example, a few years ago (while working for my former employer), one talk that I gave at MacIT was how Exchange administrators can configure their Exchange environment to better support Mac users and troubleshoot issues that occur for those users, whereas my Macworld Expo talk was about how Outlook:Mac end users can take better advantage of Exchange features.

Please feel free to email me if you’d like to brainstorm ideas for potential topics, chat about the conference in general, or ask any other questions that come to mind.

VMworld

VMworld run down

This was my first VMworld, and I’ll post some thoughts about it later, but for now, here’s a great list of what happened at VMworld.  From my perspective, here’s one important point:

The new vSphere Web Client is where VMware is going, and you can tell this in the vSphere 5.1 release.

Once you install vSphere 5.1, I’d love to hear your thoughts about the web client.

Fusion, Mac

Fusion 5 is here!

Before I get swept up in all of the VMworld madness, I’d better not forget to let you know that Fusion 5 has been released!  I’ve been dogfooding it for awhile, and ’tis awesome.  It works well with both Mountain Lion and Windows 8, not to mention the Retina display on the new MacBook Pro.

The thing that I’ve noticed the most is that Fusion 5 has made some great strides in performance.  I used to have to be careful with running Fusion if I wasn’t going to be near a power outlet soon, but now I don’t worry about it.

More details are over on the Fusion blog‘s announcement.

VMworld

BYOD for the VMworld Hands-on Labs

I know that the Hands-on Labs are one of the most popular parts of VMworld, including bragging rights if you finish all of them.  So one way to work on those bragging rights is the new BYOD for the VMworld Hands-on Labs.  We’ll still have the traditional workstations set up, but you can also use your own device.

My awesome team made a video about it, which you absolutely need to watch:

Nadyne, VMworld

VMworld! next week!

Next week is VMworld, and I’ll be there.  Want to meet up?  Ping me (honestly, reaching me via twitter is probably going to be best, since my mail is going to get pretty backed up next week) and we’ll meet up for coffee or cocktails.

user experience

on watching user studies

This week, I’m conducting some user research.  Just after I had wrapped up a session with one of the participants in this research, I saw a tweet:

Have you ever wondered what it feels to be an engineer watching research studies on your product? http://i.imgur.com/1Hheq.gif  via @iamnirav

Have you ever wondered what it feels to be an engineer watching research studies on your product?

a Macintosh girl in a Microsoft world

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