I’m off to Attend MMS 2012 In Las Vegas

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Life is good people. I have to good fortune to work in an interesting industry, doing great projects with modern technologies. On top of that my employer allows me to fully develop my skills . In that respect it makes a serious difference to have a good boss & management that understands the benefits of ongoing education. They look a both the short & long term value of people educating & developing themselves a lot more than at that nagging Excel sheet on the screen. Professional development is not just a cookie cutter 4 day training course once or twice a year but real opportunities to become a better professional if and when you’re willing to put in the effort. They’ve figured out that you cannot just use utmost cost reduction to catapult both your business and employees in to prosperity & wellbeing. You need to keep learning, evolving, networking, … The contacts I make and the education I get by working with and learning along very smart & motived people are priceless. Sure it costs money and effort form everyone involved but it beats doing nothing and saving a few € as a long term strategy for growth & success. On top of that I feel appreciated & valued for my contributions and the efforts I put in.So to the tunes of some eighties rockers I’m off again.

Here I go again on my own, goin’ down the only road I’ve ever known.
Like a drifter I was born to walk alone. An’ I’ve made up my mind, I ain’t wasting no more time. I’m attending MMS 2012

Alone, heck no, many thousands of us will be descending on Las Vegas (Nevada, USA) to attend the summit. This event sells out fast each year. A friend told me to register a.s.a.p. or miss out, so I did as soon as I got the go ahead to attend, securing my spot. So now I’m travelling over LHR to LAS following my buddies & other attendees journey from their respective countries to Las Vegas on line, mostly via Twitter.

If you can’t come, whatever the reason, you can always enjoy a good number of sessions here MMS 2012 goes digital: LIVE streaming and On-Demand for attendees AND non-attendees! 48 hours after the live presentation.

I don’t have to tell you what System Center 2012 means to the IT Pro in the Microsoft ecosystem. Combine that with the RTM of Windows 8 later this year and I just had to go and attend the Microsoft management Summit 2012 in Las Vegas.  It’s more than training. It’s networking and an education.

Apart from the formal agenda & sessions I already a have some meetings lined up with vendors, colleagues from around the globe. We’re making the most of this opportunity to meet face to face with people we other wise only get to talk to on line and often with huge time zone difference.

MMS2012_Server

I’ve you’re going and you read my blog or follow me on twitter. Give us a shout out and perhaps we can have a meet & greet.

To all my geek & nerd friends, colleagues, MEET members, business partners, Microsoft employees & MVPs in route to Vegas & the Summit at The Venetian, I’m looking forward to seeing you all again! But first I have some traveling to do in the next 24 hours, to make my way over there.

TechEd Europe 2012 (Amsterdam, 25-29 June 2012)

After a sad year of no TechEd Europe in 2011, one of our favorite tech conferences for Microsoft technologies is back in full force. Ladies & Gentlemen, TechEd Europe 2012 will be here sooner than you think.

It’s more than just technical training, it is networking, white board sessions and passionate discussion amongst peers, experts & Microsoft employees who built the products. If you still need more technical content than that take a look at the pre-conference agenda for a full day of expertly delivered education.

No this is not just a commercial, I haven’t missed a TechEd Europe yet this century and for good reasons. If you’d like to read why take a look at this blog post Why I Find Value In A Conference

There will be loads of sessions on all products in the System Center 2012 and Windows 8. In the developer sphere there’s the .NET Framework 4.5 & Visual Studio 2012 to look forward to. Combine this with a lot of experience based guidance on current technologies and you can’t afford to miss out. To avoid disappointment register as soon as possible to join your fellow IT Pros & Developers.

Hope to see you there!

My Recommendations For Our IT Pro at TechDays 2012 Belgium

I’m very busy with storage at the moment and as I’m already doing some other conferences this year we’re giving some other members of our IT the opportunity to attend TechDays 2012. That doesn’t stop me from giving some hints to the junior but very smart & fast learning IT Pro that’s in our delegation (4 developers & 1 IT Pro) and I might as well share those hints with you. The idea of sending him to TechDays is to expose him to a variety of subjects that are related to current and future needs/trends in the industry and in our line of business. It’s not just focused on training. I want him to look at the bigger picture of all parts in the puzzle. It’s about getting some context and tasting the possibilities. It’s also good to see some of our local IT talent (like Mike Resseler and Kurt Roggen) in action. Naturally I leave it up to him to make his own choices, and I hope he does. So here are, in chronological order, my recommendations:

February 14th

10:45-12:00
Monitoring and Operating a Private Cloud with System Center 2012

12:00-13:00 (If you want to lunch & learn)
Manage VM’s and Services across Private Clouds and Windows Azure with System …

13:00-14:15
Take the Spaghetti out of Windows Azure – an insight for IT Pro Techies Part 1 (John Craddock)

14:30-15:45
Take the Spaghetti out of Windows Azure – an insight for IT Pro Techies Part 2 (John Craddock)

16:15-17:30
System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2012, Fabric Management, creation and consumption of the cloud (Vijay Tewari)

17:45-19:00
Windows 8 Dynamic Access Control (John Craddock)

February 15th

09:00-10:15
Windows 8 Hyper: Availability (Bryon Surace)

10:45-12:00
Discover what’s new in Windows 8 Active Directory (Paul Loonen)

13:00-14:15
The Private Cloud, Principles, Patterns and Concepts (Tom Shinder)

14:30-15:45
Toolmaking for Administrators using Windows PowerShell (Jason Helmick)

16:15-17:30
Windows 8 Disk Dedupe (Speaker: Mike Resseler)

17:45-18:45
What’s new in PowerShell V3! (Jason Helmick)

February 16th

09:00-10:15
Private Cloud Day Session 1- Building your Private Cloud Infrastructure (Kurt Roggen)

10:45-12:00
Private Cloud Day Session 2- Creating & Configure your Private Cloud (Kurt Roggen)

13:00-14:15
Private Cloud Day Session 3- Monitor & Operate your Private Cloud (Mike Resseler)

14:30-15:45
Private Cloud Day Session 4- Automating & Delivering Services in your Private Cloud (Mike Resseler & Kurt Roggen)

16:15-17:30
Private Cloud Day Session 5- A Solution for Private Cloud Security (Tom Shinder)

Trip To London for BriForum

I’m on the Euro Star on my way to London. Well, we’re supposed to be heading there but we’re standing still in the middle of nowhere due to a train in front of us having some sort of (technical?) difficulties. The rails at this spot are not level so we’re hanging over a bit to the left. To make this little uncomfortable situation even a bit more uncomfortable I’m in a coach with a bunch of Dutch high school kids on a trip. Let’s just say that they are verbally strong and overactive.

My sidekick on this trip handed me an iPhone with Angry Birds so I can have a go at this blasting pigs to get some eggs back.

The Euro Star needs a haul over I think. The wagons are a bit worn out and are starting to show their age. As to the promise of fast travel … well at the moment I’m not very impressed with this high speed as we’re standing still … now we’re moving as I type this at cycling speed  … and now we’ve stopped again. Right …it’s like being on a local commuting train that stops in every village.

No need for the telco industry to worry about mobile internet business. The Internet on trains doesn’t seem to have taken off.

So I’m at the hotel. 1,5 hours later than planned. I’m off the register and attend the welcome reception at BriForum next. Sunny day in London, that’s always nice.