Archives May 2010

I got asked a –great- question the other day by my boss (Props to my boss for giving me some great blogging material!)

“What are the Top 5 things you learned or thought valuable at EMC World 2010”

I cannot guarantee I’ll give you 5 top things… or that I won’t even exceed 5 things, but at the very least I’ll outline what I found as the most valuable things, as well as discussions I had with various others as to what was the most valuable to be had/found!   If there are things you found particularly useful – Please do share it here so we can all benefit as well! :0

Yes, this was a big one for me, top of mind! So many useful things to talk solely about VPLEX alone! To share all of it would be a challenge! So let me break down some of the value points!

EMC has a great portal page around VPLEX which shares lots of useful information, collateral, white papers and more! (I’ll publish a nice one later with PowerLink things soon)

My good friend Bas Raayman collated all of the blog posts covering VPLEX from the general purpose Blogosphere and Media analysts too!  EMC VPLEX – Introduction and link overview

So to wrap up my own personal experience around the VPLEX from the sessions, prior knowledge and playing with the live VPLEX LAB – This is really cool – Live data access on both sides of a metro link = rockstar event! Check it out! Check it out! :)

After you pick yourself up after drooling all over VPLEX, it’s time to sign up for the Unisphere train, the Highlander of getting you to the Private Cloud “There can only be one… Private Cloud” and apparently, you’ll manage that with Unisphere!

You can listen to and watch Chad present a video on using Unisphere to get you kicked off on things! Certainly, if you’re at some of those non-youtube type locations, ask your local EMC to get you a demo :)      Though once you get yourself settled on a single interface for fun and managing off this rocking system, well.. you likely want it to do a little more!

This video actually takes you through some of the new features discussed at EMC World – Sub-Lun FAST, FAST Cache, and Primary block storage compression!

1) Sub-LUN FAST = automated tiering of storage (think "VMware DRS for Storage") – lowers cost of storage by between 30-50% on average.
2) FAST Cache = up to 2TB of low cost read/write cache – get more performance for the same $. In some cases, like VMware View – it can deliver same performance at 10x lower cost.
3) Primary block storage compression = save between 30- 50% on average on your storage consumption.

All sweet features which are pretty damn cool if you ask me! (Feel free to ask me.. we could discuss for hours on end ;))

Another cool feature which was announced at EMC World which most people don’t usually think about, but I’m gonna get you to start thinking about it now!

It’s easy to be efficient with EMC.

EMC® unified storage brings efficiency to a whole new level. We’ve even created a capacity calculator so you can configure efficiency results for yourself. You’ll discover that EMC requires 20% less raw capacity to achieve your unified storage needs. This translates to superior storage efficiency when compared to other unified storage arrays—even those utilizing their own documented best practices.

If we’re not more efficient, we’ll match the shortfall

If for some unlikely reason the capacity calculator does not demonstrate that EMC is 20% more efficient, we’ll match the shortfall with additional storage. That’s how confident we are.

The guarantee to end all guarantees

Storage efficiency is one of EMC’s fundamental strengths. Even though our competitors try to match it by altering their systems, turning off options, changing defaults or tweaking configurations—no amount of adjustments can counter the EMC unified storage advantage.

Here’s the nitty-gritty, for you nitty-gritty types

• The 20% guarantee is for EMC unified storage (file and block—at least 20% of each)
• It’s based on out-of-the-box best practices
• There’s no need to compromise availability to achieve efficiency
• There are no caveats on types of data you must use
• There’s no need to auto-delete snapshots to get results

This guarantee is based on standard out-of-the-box configurations. Let us show you how to configure your unified storage to get even more efficiency. Try our capacity calculator today.

So, hmm.. What does this mean exactly?! Well, if you read above, that gives you a break down of what the deal offers.  But like you, I want specific use-cases which I can relate to!  

This basically says, by using the EMC Unified Storage Calculator – Without enabling features (like thin provisioning, etc) you know.. ‘magic’ features, out-right the system will save you 20%, and once you start to enable other features you’ll see it grow above and beyond that – Sounds pretty compelling when it comes to the value of your solutions right?!

This is actually pretty damn sweet because it lets you use YOUR figures to determine what your space and layout concerns are, instead of generating off some spreadsheet with a bunch of jibber jabber and you go ‘eh, I still don’t believe it’  – But hey, don’t let me be the judge, load up the EMC Unified Storage Calculator and give it a try your self :)

Oh, did someone say “Hey, Wasn’t there some cool Ionix UIM 2.0 and Vblock things going on?!”

But we cannot discuss the rocking unified world of Vblock’s and vSphere without at the very least mentioning the Next Generation vCenter Plugins!

So, while there were a REAL LOT OF COOL THINGS both Announced and able to be seen at this years EMC World 2010 – You’re going to come away from it, whether you attended or missed the opportunity with some questions! So let me help you address these questions in tangible ways you can take it to your TC/SE and Sales Guy so you can make them work for YOU and your Organization.

Pick up the phone/email – Reach out to your EMC Guys and tell them you want to hear about:

• EMC VPLEX – And how it’s ease of use and whether the various use cases, Local, Metro and beyond will be a fit for your organization
• EMC Unisphere – Taking next generation unified up a notch and enabling your datacenter to grow and scale with the Cloud
• But seriously, the last one is really cool (Check it out, get a briefing with your Unified Storage guys as soon as you can because…)
• Oh, and don’t forget to ask about FAST Cache! I’ll be covering this fairly deeply soon in some blog posts, including direct use cases, and my deep technical considerations and assaults on engineering I already have in the works to make sure that it works as I architect and not as marketing tells me to :)
• EMC Unified Storage 20% Guarantee – This isn’t 90 pages of caveats, this is heads up, you will save period.  Ask your TC to help you save! ;)
• EMC Ionix UIM 2.0 – If you remember all of my coverage on UIM 1.0, 2.0 is actually gonna be the cats meow!
• EMC vCenter Plugins! – These are pretty sweet, and will help manage your experience!

I’m sure there are numerous other things I did not cover (You be the one to tell me!) but the ones above I found particularly cool – So go check them out, ask your TC or Sales Rep (Let me know if you do… I’m pushy… :) But I particularly want to hear your experiences and impressions!)

Enjoy the new world, and share share share! :)

(sorry for the delay getting this out.. I’ve been running non-stop since I got back, figuratively.. but it was important to get this out, so here it is!)

I had the great honor and privilege to run as part of an amazing team (Team EMC – Run as One) part of an Amazing Organization (EMC) to run on behalf of an excellent cause (Michael Carter Lisnow Respite Center) and let me tell you, I wouldn’t change anything about what I went through in order to get there.

But I’m getting ahead of myself…  Let’s go back many months and start at the beginning, shall we?

The day was September 14th, my birthday! Oh, and it also happened to be the first day I started at EMC as a Technology Evangelist in the Enterprise sector of Chicago.     My feet were not even the slightest bit wet from dipping my toe in the water, and then I see an email come out “Apply to be a part of TEAM EMC to run in the Boston Marathon!” (I’m paraphrasing.. I cannot find the original email ;))   I thought.. What do I have to lose? I’m new here, the worst thing that can happen is, by entering into this lottery, filling out an application and an essay; I don’t get accepted – Right, no skin off my feet (that would certainly come later ;)) – So I went and applied! And less than a month after I start, October 9th, 2009 I receive notice that:

Congratulations!

You have won an invitational, non-qualifying official number for the 2010 Boston Marathon.

Wow! Can I say wow here? I’ll try it again.  Wow!!! I did it! I’m part of the team! I’m on board to be part of something bigger than myself at my newly joined organization! Where do I start?!

At this point, my schedule is wracked filled with so many different things, but I took it upon myself to begin my [unorthodox] training regime as I would need to.   While my training did include some running with my personal trainer, it also included learning to breathe appropriately while running (a challenge of mine) as well as ensuring I was mentally fit for this task before me.

I began regularly attending Power Yoga classes at my favorite Yoga Studio – Sky Yoga Studio, which would help ensure I was limber, fit, and breathing constantly.   And also took up TaeKwanDo with my son, because it’s good for us, we needed to get our kung-fu on so to speak, and the type of activity you get in there is rather complimentary as training!

All the while, letting life happen – winter happen… and then… as if no time had passed at all, the fateful week was here!

Unlike others who had the extreme luxury of a cast of characters to cheer them on while they run the course, my options were a little more limited than that (Though I did receive a wonderful sound off and a hug at the start line by my good friend stv, so that was nice! :))  But before I was ever going to get to this point.. I needed to get to Boston!

I spent a fair amount of time on the road… more than would be needed, but I was tired and didn’t leave earlier in the morning as I had planned, so this is the challenge we bring upon ourselves!   I tweeted pictures along the way, but more importantly… I regularly tweeted updates of my status, including questions and whatnot to my friends and community on twitter!   The support I received while driving was amazing!   I was given updates of what the ‘appropriate’ speed to drive in areas, what to watch out for, and general ‘be safe’ type of messages.  The marathon drive was off to a great start!   And in the blink of an eye (of a very tired person….) I had arrived in the general Massachusetts area! very late on a Friday night! (I left Thursday evening)

Unable to make the kick-off festivities on Friday at 3PM, I was ready, able and capable of making it to the event at EMC 176 to meet/greet with all of those we are running on behalf of! and let me tell you, this was a beautiful experience!

The turnout on a rainy saturday afternoon was almost overwhelming! you can see from the photos above just a small sampling of those who turned out.    The number of people coming up to us, shaking our hands and sincerely expressing their gratitude for what is they’re doing for their loved ones – It’s beyond heart warming, I’m tearing up just typing this, and it’s been over a month!

The last photo there taken in front of 176, me in front of my car was taken by one of those gracious attendees who expressed how much we are able to do for her daughter who visits the Respite Center.  Beautiful is a word which cannot even grasp the sheer feeling or atmosphere here.    And this video, sums up the extents and effort they went to for us, as we were going to for them.

So, with all that behind us.. all that is left is to get my bib and get ready!

The sense of community in boston resonates in so many ways and the support you get – which I helped contribute to when on the day before the marathon I met a lost Vancouverian who had just barely gotten their Bib before the convention center closed.   Using the power of the iPhone and Google Maps, I was able to help her get the pre-race carb-loading dinner on, and through active directions, a way to get her back to her hotel on the T! Yay power of the internets!    But, the time is finally here… the fateful morning would be before us!

That monday morning I woke up early! (3am – read that to be 2am chicago time!) and started EATING! Yea, that pre-load.. my body knew what it was doing.  And then I headed on the road to Boston to drive in, park and take the busses back to Hopkinton!    It was a BRISK COLD MORNING.  For those of you who know me.. I’m a VERY cold person even in the best of environments.. but even given the circumstances I wasn’t nearly as cold as I should have been for the situation – Yay me? :)    But after the hearty long wait in line at a time I’d never normally be up.. I was boarded onto a bus and headed to Hopkinton and Athletes village. (Did I mention tweeting along the way entirely?   All of the photos I’m using are taken from my Tweet Stream, so the internet KNEW what I was doing at all times :))

Once in the Athletes village I encounter the great challenge of “Where do I change… why didn’t I change in the first place before showing up” These are definitely the lessons learned you don’t normally hear about considering this is my first marathon!   But I did ensure I was appropriately pre-stretched in the pre-race massage area – And then like a lark I headed down to the corrals ready to race! (thanks stv for taking my iPhone and taking that pre-race shot for me! :))

And… I ran! Taking my picture by myself in front of as many mile/km markers as I possibly could!   Let me tell you a little bit about the support both on the ground and in the clouds.    I’m sure some of you have run a 5k or other types of events, where it’s often you against yourself running, keeping and making a pace – And that is quite a feat to accomplish.  But a Marathon, and I cannot speak for other marathons.. but this marathon – You cannot ‘practice’ or ‘prepare’ for.    The sheer on the ground support you receive in the form of liquid (water, gatorade) food-stuffs (people giving you oranges, grapes, twizzlers) and even moreso importantly, the morale boost you get from the cheering, the hand slapping, people calling out your name – genuinely caring and cheering for you individually.   You CANNOT (not easily) replicate that in your own practice runs.   This is an enabler making you capable of things you otherwise would feel not possible.

(I do recall a certain bout/area whereby I was HURTING like you wouldn’t believe! and then a whole row of ~50 people cheered and had their hands up, which sent me into a power-sprint, slapping the hands of every one of them along that run!   If the entire race were lined that way I’m not sure people would ever stop!)

But when you’re not on the ground and have your head in the clouds like I do, you get support which transcends the mere physical.   I had friends, colleagues who were supporting and cheering me on via Twitter, Facebook, even LinkedIn!   People who were sharing my donation/sponsorship link (I raised an additional $195 DURING the race from their efforts!).   These were good friends who would inform me what the official BAA site was reporting as my current pace time, and offering up tips and guidance as I ran.   So as I said.. both of these channels of support… they cannot be replicated – only experienced and truly to give you that kind of extended feeling of gratification as you cross the finish line.

I was fortunate to not have suffered some of the grave and life complicating challenges which others had experienced – I simply had a host of blisters (encountered in the first few miles due to getting splashed by water) and not to mention the chaffing… oh that was the worst, that shall be my bane!    But I was fine for the most part.    Shortly after the race, and I finally made it to my car to drive back home, my body temperature started having problems being regulated… and I’d encounter extreme shivers for the next 12-18hours.  But once I had that aside and settled in, albeit my body EXTREMELY sore.    I got back in the car… and headed on my way home! (After all I had work to get back to! :))

The road wasn’t too bad, I was stressed and strained moving around, but I spent a fair amount of time on cruise control thankfully!  Honestly the worst part of the journey home could be summed up into the experience of the rest stop terror on the right…. Those are not the kind of post-marathon stairs I want to spend my time climbing up/down (I did make it ;))

In the end, I made it home successfully, safely.. and in recovery for some time, but it was an amazing experience which I would do again and again if I could and have the opportunity.    The thought of would I drive again – Definitely.  I’d prefer to have someone drive with me, so I can go nearly-nonstop instead of continuous stopping and sleeping as I had, but these are the burdens I place upon myself.    For my marathon did not start and finish within 26.2 portions of one mile… No…  My marathon begins and ends with a 1000 mile journey, with a little running in the middle – And it is determination like that which will raise your mental fortitude every time – It’s not about me, nor the race; it is about the children and helping others.

I thank all of you my supporters – And gladly still take your sponsorship dollars to help those of the Michael Carter Lisnow Respite Center, even still!  Thank you all!

Wow… Oh and Wow… Look at me publishing this DAYS Later.  The first reasoning behind that is frankly.. I WAS and still sort of AM Exhausted! OMFG it was quite a tiring yet amazing experience! I believe the best follow-up quote I had (which I tweeted and just noticed it didn’t send) on my way home from the airport in the cab was… “I’m so tired I was wondering why it all of a sudden got dark and realized my eyes had closed!”  So, quite the great and amazing set of experiences.. oh, but don’t take my pre-fix word for it… get ready for the final coverage of the event!

Day three of the EMC World Conference also happened to be Day 1 of the TC (That’s Technology Consultant if you’re asking) conference.  This is a great event where our finest TC’s, TC Managers and some various other ninjas get together and well.. Learn stuffs together!   In the picture above you see a small sampling of ~1700 of EMC’s finest, all collapsed into a single room to learn together as one!   I wish I would have gotten more photos on the whole of day three (or four, or five) but my coverage was limited and I was focused on the events at hand.. so you’ll need to take my word for it!    This particular session/meeting above is what kept me.. well, for quite some time, so long that I missed the “Bloggers Lounge” group photo.  So don’t take the word of some of the bloggers that I apparently don’t exist because I wasn’t in the photo! It’s not true! :)

We had the great pleasure of having a birthday here at the EMC World this year – the birthday of the wonderful @c_weil – As you can see by this beautiful Symmetrix cake above, there was definitely some planning which went in to it :) (I was so disconnected from things going on… I didn’t find out until I saw the cake! shame on me I say!)  It was great to finally meet her in person in this event of events where Christina was receiving an award as part of the Women’s Leadership Foundation (Please let me know if I’m bastardizing the name/etc :))

But that’s not all, right? I mean, seriously… how can that be all?!   I didn’t get many good photos to speak of later until we had our team dinner (but who wants to see photos of my entire team.. I’m not sure if they want that out there, so I won’t share :))   But I did get to have a great interview with a great organization!

I’d like you to meet StudioE! They’re the folks who the customer/community of EMC’ers are able to leverage and other magical mysterious stuff.. I’d say watch the video to find out more, as well as visiting their website.. I’ve talked with some others who are in StudioE and from what I hear, it’s a great program to be a part of, makes me wish I were a customer!

Being that they have Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and the new ECN… well, to tell you the truth, I dragged/stole the icons off of their site! Makes my work easier! :)

And on the final-final day I got the opportunity to attend what was a HIGHLY and HEAVILY attended session of the VPLEX Labs! (What does highly attended mean? After each lab session.. there were HUNDREDS waiting outside of the room ready to pile in to play with VPLEX.. I consider that to be fairly heavily attended :)) I heard there were similar things happening for the Unisphere demo labs as well, but hey… I like new juice and VPLEX is new! :)

What did I learn from the VPLEX session, well.. I learned… I’ll find out soon if (via access to the lab) whether I can expose some of the internals and share with you far more than you’d normally typically see! Oh, and be excited about some other things to come.. I talked with some groups and there will be some amazing things coming on the horizon over the next several months, which will equal a win for people all around!

So, in wrap-up, let me break down the high-lights of this past week and over the events of everything encountered!

• Counting Crows put on a rocking concert, and apparently I do not remember nearly as many songs of theirs as I thought! (++)
• I believe someone in my hotel at Colonnade stole my Counting Crows Concert glow cup, WTF?! Yea, no idea there, but it WAS in the room! (-)
• EMC definitely knows how to put on a Bloggers Lounge! OMFG that was amazing and really a shining beacon for the community as a whole! (+++++)
• EMC really has no idea how to coordinate the unique requirements of Vegans and Gluten Free folk, I wonder how Halal and Kosher is handled (—)
• The Partner Pavilion was populated by the best of breed in industry who really knew how to engage and take care of the customers in attendance! (++)
• VMware is a real stickler with their SWAG, making me ‘listen’ to their presentation and answer a question to win a T-Shirt #advertisingfail ;) (null)
• (Disclaimer… I merely hovered nearby at the end and knew all of the answers they were positing, I told them I could run the preso if they wanted)
• Labs, Labs, Labs – Wow, people could not get enough of these! Every one in attendance was a clear winner who got time with those (+++++)
• I lost my voice by the third day.   Imagine me barely able to speak, well, an extremely distorted version of my voice total suck (null)
• Boston as a city took care of us, with numerous highlights and an accommodating Public Transportation (T-Line) (+++)
• The Red Sox put on a great game which we had the opportunity to be a part of an amazing ecosystem of characters, they’re real family the fans. (+++++)
• Brocade put on an OMFG great event the likes of which were unparalleled the whole week, well done!  Yes they were strict on attendance but they made sure me and my people (you people :)) were taken care of, so I commend them for that, and a special shout out to @charleshood of charleshood.net! (+++++)
• Emulex put on a good event too, but I didn’t show up until the end, so I cannot really speak to the full character of the event but I heard good things from other attendees, so champion for Emulex (I do like Emulex, and they’re not paying me to say this – and I don’t drink nor eat food at events, so it’s not like they’re convincing me somehow :)) (+++)
• Beantown Bash was pretty good, I did spend a fair amount of time trying to get my customers who forgot their badges into the event, so… that should have been communicated to them a little better of the importance of the badge (That, and find better ways for me to circumvent your security to get them in, and yes Security does not stop me from getting what I want) (null)
• The TC Conference was by far the most amazing employee focused event I’d ever been to.  The care and attention and access we were given, both to our needs, driving us technically and enabling us as individual leaders, and not to mention the sheer number of our leaders who turned out to talk with us (not to us) including Joe Tucci, it’s no wonder this is one of the best places to work for (often not recognized outside of our walls).   If you were ever looking for a good reason to work with these rock stars, this event certainly shines as an example – Just let me know and I can get you in touch with hundreds of others who will tell you their take!

So in final… I’d like to thank EMC, the Partners and other Vendors, but most importantly the Customers which made all of this possible.   If not for you, well, there’d be no cool technology to be solving problems… and I’d have no reason to go out to Boston! :)

I hope you find these summaries and break downs useful, I know I will go back and reference it and probably end up getting yelled at about the SWAG (Hey, it’s for my customer! And it’s true, it is!   Don’t you dare tell me I can’t get my customer the little trinket you have, or you’ll find yourself staring down the gaze of an upset @cxi and I don’t get upset ;))

I hope you all had a great time, and I’d love to hear your take, experiences and more, and how to make the next one just as successful! (Anything you share I’ll be sure to communicate it upstream to people who will not only listen, but even take action!)

EMCWorld 2011 will be in Las Vegas, so that’ll be quite a unique experience… :)

In closing.. it’s good to be home with my family, and my dogs! I wish you all well and get ready for the onslaught… the technology is only getting better! :)

By now, I’m sure you’re noticing a trend in the titles of my blog posts (Yes, I’m sure the core semblance you’re able to surmise is that I start it “EMCWorld Day x” and then a bunch of jibber jabber which you really have to stretch to understand, and even then you ought to be committed if you truly understand…:)) But I’m sure this will all come to fruition and understanding as you read through this particular break down! :)

Welcome to Day 2! Woohoo! I don’t know about you, but every single day is LONG, not in a bad way.. and getting back to the hotel late after being out with peers, colleagues, customers, partners and beyond until the late hours… writing these blog posts and waking up early in the morning certainly doesn’t help.  But it is all good – And I apologize for the lack of tweets… the ATT network just cannot sustain thousands of people DDoS’ing the 3G and Edge networks by simply trying to use their devices in a very small area :) [re:keynote, session, anything ;)]

I’m sure the first words out of your mouth when you see my blog posts is WTF IS UP WITH ALL OF THE RED PHOTOS! Yea, I know, I get it. No seriously, You’re preaching to the choir, or more specifically to roxanne – I wish she didn’t have to turn on the red light.. or atleast if the iPhone would have the ability to not take the powers of Suck and combine them with red lights to produce photos which look like this.. but we’re going to walk past that.. and we’ll start by quoting my good friend Charles Hood (@charleshood) to do that!   The masterful blogger Charles Hood said it right and properly in a recent Flickr photo he appeared in, where he said “When it comes to Social Media, EMC *gets it*.”  And let me tell you just how true that is.

So, our journey into Social Media at EMC and EMCWorld begins… at the Bloggers lounge!

The cast of characters in the photos above.. the sheer mindshare is enough to take on the world, twice and come out prosperous multi-fold!

Starting in order of sequence, It is paramount that I bring to you, the amazing, hyper-intelligent, cat loving and beautiful Jamie Pappas! (@jamiepappas)   If it weren’t for her, everything that Charles Hood and so many others have had to say would not be true as it is today, and we have her to thank for this!   Infact, if you have the opportunity to meet and talk with her, you will be better for it :)    I guess I cannot leave Stu-master @stu “Stuart Miniman” out since he is after all in the photo.  Stu is great too, and helps make the EMC Social Media experience what it is today as well, not to mention if you want to know about Fa-ko-ee, he’s definitely your man there too. ;)

I’m sure everyone has met, read and knows Barry Burke (@storageanarchy), I mean how could we not know the man who gave me the Symmetrix sticker which sits on my laptop.. ;)

Challenge me to say otherwise.. but I have to say.. the smile on Steve Todd’s (@stevetodd) face… if that doesn’t bring a smile to your face, I think you need to re-evaluate your priorities!

Bringing us on to Photo #4 which is the rare shot of the beautiful Mark Twomey (@storagezilla) deep in conversation with the mysterious non-blogging Gilda Farvid! (Hey! How did Gilda get into the bloggers lounge?!?! ;)) We’ll see about getting Gilda back on the blogging circuit since she joined our ranks of champions :)

HELP! HELP! HELP! There’s a Virtual Army at my door and I need some vSpecialists to extract my VM’s of Mass De…. eh, this example is going nowhere fast!  But people who are going up, up and up!, the motherload in this photo definitely calls for an “OMFG HOWZ CANS i MEETZ THEM!”  – Incase you cannot make out their names or faces… You’re looking at (from left to right) Simon Seagrave (@Kiwi_Si), Alan Renouf (@alanrenouf) and finally the champion master himself, the infamous Scott Lowe! (@scott_lowe)

Finally we have a group shot with the lot of us, you know of all of us, however on the far right the other hidden vSpecialist, Ed Saipetch (@edsai)

So what does this mean? Are you trying to say that everyone at EMC not only maintains a blog but a transparent relationship with the community, customers, partners and even competitors through mediums like Twitter and beyond?   No.. I’m not saying that, but you can.   This entire relationship around how EMC handles it’s social media is akin to that old adage, keep your friends close, and frankly we don’t have enemies.    For those of you who think we do… just remember how closely knit the entire tech community is – We’re not enemies, we’re all friends who at one point or another in the past (and in the future) will work together and collaborate on one thing or another – Welcome to EMC 3.0 – The future of not only doing things right, but doing it transparently.   (Disclaimer: Hopefully no one spanks me for in any way claiming what EMC’s social media strategy is, I’m just an observer, it’s pretty damn obvious ;))

But, that’s enough about the Bloggers lounge, social media strategy, ninjas and giant celerras! (err….)

I did attend a session! In between being unable to get a cell signal in order to make it onto conference calls, and meeting some absolutely great people at lunch.. no.. I did attend a session! Later in the week I’ll also have some mega-deep dives on sessions.. but being that I was only into one session today a little bit, I’ll give you a brief overview:  Architectural Deep Dive of the VPLEX! … Hmm, Yea I knew that, damnit, how dare I do my home work before these sessions…. Good session, absolutely informative for the FULL BALLROOM it was in (Can we say STANDING ROOM ONLY) around just the Architecture of the VPLEX alone? Yea.. Definitely good things coming from this bad boy.   So, sorry I won’t tell you much more than… you’ll see the deep dive later on the sessions I attend… (I hope I’m allowed to share what I learn from the sessions… because I will be anyway, grin)

Afterwards, with mega-sessions running continuously and constantly everywhere, I headed back down to the Bloggers Lounge where Steve Todd was interviewing people on the moment they realized their future was in technology (the watershed moment) [Oh, did I mention that the explanation of what the watershed moment involved Steve Todd serenading me with an indigo girls song? How can you not love this man?! :))   So, I did my interview (and separate other interviews which I’ll publish details on when I find out where it’s posted) And good thing… as my voice is dead from this point forward!   Dead how and why?!

I think that helps explain the first bit of it… My first Red Sox game, and they won! (Wow, the ENTIRE crowd really comes together as one large ecosystem, feeding upon each others emotions and the relationships and bonds from simply sitting near others.. this is definitely a reflection of social dynamics – It’s no wonder they do so well…! The cubs are similar.. except that’s purely alcohol driven. ;))   But after that involved spending an amazing time with my good friends at Emulex for a good bit before the night closed out and we headed off for some Karaoke!

Hopefully YouTube doesn’t block this wondrous short video I captured because it has ‘music’ included in it.. but I have a tendency to sing along… loudly… and lose my voice. #fail? ;)

I hope you other attendees have been taking advantage of everything the vendors, partners and beyond have had to offer because this is the time and place to enjoy yourself! :)

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

$Wait!%$! You can’t end your post there! What? Why?! You barely even mentioned Emulex! Sure, but who cares about them, even though I really like their CNA’s.   Hmm, didn’t you meet someone who is an absolute rock star over there? Think.. think back.. ringing any bells?! ;)

Yes, I think it is important that if you’re not aware of Thomas Jones (@niketown588), a rockstar over at Emulex now is the time for the introduction!   Thomas GETS it.  You know how we were talking about EMC “Get’s Social Media”, well Thomas Jones really GETS it. (It doesn’t hurt that he’s buddies with Louis Gray ;)) But his take on things, his character, demeanor, Emulex should be proud to have an (I’m refraining myself from using expletives because of how much Thomas rocks :)) … amazing guy like this to take the company forward into the future :) – Oh and be sure that you get to see his Shirt which is signed with everyone’s Twitter ID’s :)  Okay.. enough… Time to crash.. have a GREAT Day 3 and be sure to enjoy all of the rest of your time at EMCWorld! :)

I sure do say Wow a lot, but seriously, do I not have an infinite number of reasons to?! :)   Today in particular was a heavy and hectic one! (One in which involved a lot less photos being taken in general!)    But that is solely driven just on the sole fact of SO much going on! If you’re here in attendance at EMC World 2010, I hope you’re having as good of a time as I am! (I’m certainly having my fair share of busy times! :))

My day actually started off a little similar and yet extremely different than everyone else’s!  Not only did I get to take in Joe Tucci’s keynote, but in the final moments of his speech and presentation, as the clock ticked past 10:30AM, I was no longer under marching orders which entitled me to deliver this blog post!  EMC and AOL use VPLEX to reduce complexity in migrations, eliminating downtime!  What a way to start off the day, right?!

I was able to get that published, online and out to you guys from the amazing Bloggers lounge, where I had the great honor of finally meeting so many of my peers, good friends, colleagues and industry champions!    I’m not sure I have the power in me to even be able to reference even half of the folks of you… so feel free to make yourselves known:)

Knowing I had matters to attend to, I headed out from the Bloggers lounge over to the Partner Pavilion, a man on a mission as I was.. to visit my good friends at Brocade :)    It was at this point I finally got to officially meet in person the lord master, @charleshood of the infamous blog Welcome to my valve on the series of tubes.  Charles is quite a dynamic character, great guy and an absolute gentleman!  

So, other than Charles playing with my iPad (or that might be his.. I honestly forget.. doesn’t matter, right?! :))  As I was curious to talk to one of their masters of the IP stack solutions which Brocade brings to bear, I had the amazing opportunity to meet my new best friend from Brocade, Seth Fiermonti!  Watch the video to see Seth take me and your on a whirlwind tour of the NetIron MLX-16 IP switch from Brocade (all the benefit of Foundry with the honor of the Brocade name! :))

The time was however on… to take a trip back over to the Bloggers lounge… I did tour about a bit, visit a session.. and then came back down to catch this random glimpse of my best friend and honorable executive, Joe Tucci!   While I didn’t have the opportunity to shake Joe’s hand, I do have the honor of him understanding and respecting what we do as bloggers :)

After this point, it was time to head back out to the Pavilion floor to show all of the wonderful Sponsors, Partners and more that we truly appreciate them being there.. by taking their SWAG! :)

Check out these sexy new VMware stickers, they’re not only sweet! (No, they’re not pink.. but that’s the photo I took.. me thinks you ought to deal with that! :))  And one of the best ways to deal with this, is by watching @mrdenny compete to provision storage using the SMC for the VMAX – And realizing.. wow, it really IS EASY to win prizes! :)

But hands down, the best of the best is the photo of my fellow TC on the right there, Greg.  He said this (unprompted) which forced me to not only take his photo, but to share his quote :)

“This is what I envision heaven being like”.  And if you were there in that particular area, you’d find it to be sooooo true! Both from the stand point of how bright, lively and airy that section is, but equally taking other undertones of the premise of the Cloud giving you that ultimate kind of Nirvana, whereby… your future is heavenly! (and no, not because you’re dead. ;))

After this point, we headed off to the House of Blues for the Brocade event, where there were literally casts of thousands in attendance! The event itself was amazing, great, my feet are DIEING! My phone was low as it was, and the subsequent battery death resulted in fewer photos. :)  Perhaps my phone will last longer here on Day 2, so I’ll have the opportunity to share more with you :)

I hope if you’re attending you are having a great time! If you’re not, hunt me down and I’ll be sure you get the most out of this experience, whether it be through meeting who you need to meet, learning what you need to learn, and solving what you need to solve!   Rock on everyone, and ready for another raucous EMC World Day 2 coming soon!