For those of you who follow me on twitter you may well have seen me tweeting about the View 3D Experience over the duration of both of this years VMworlds.

Myself and a colleague Tim Federwitz (virtuallygeeky.com) had been tasked to showcase VMware's vSGA (Virtual Shared Graphics Acceleration) that will be released in the next release of VMware View at some point in H1 2013.

What is vSGA?

Before I go into what we had running at VMworld, I'll just go into a little more detail about vSGA (Virtual Shared Graphics Acceleration).

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Around 1am this morning I awoke from a dream where I was repeatedly refreshing my email in the hope I would get my VCDX defense results. Before returning to sleep I decided to check my phone, and there it was. My result was in. Blurry eyed I open the attached PDF to see the magical words:

Your VCDX number is 105

I've passed! It's over! After working towards this goal for the last 4 years, I have finally made it. Time to relax. 

My VCDX Experience 

Overall, despite the many many hours I spent working on my design to make sure it was as solid as possible, I enjoyed the process. I learnt the most from just being extremely careful on EVERY design decision I made. I knew, if I made a mistake on anything I would be picked up on it, so I spent many days going through everything to make sure it was accurate and I could back up the reasons for making those design decisions. This has undoubtedly helped me as a consultant.

As for the defense itself, for some reason I wasn't actually nervous, no dry mouth, no shaky hands. I think this was because I knew my design was good, I was confident in what I had designed.

Filled with confidence and a clear mind, I tired to answer and explain everything that was asked and if there was something I really didn't know, I was honest and held my hands up. You can't trick these guys, so don't bother trying. The whole experience was over in a flash. The wait for the results was the opposite.

My VCDX Tips

Defense – Spend time making sure everything you have chosen in your design is accurate and you fully understand the reason you chose it and the reasons why you didn't chose the other options.

Design – Read the scenario thoroughly. Understand it. If something isn't clear, ask the panel. Talk them through everything you are thinking with regards to how your design might look. If you don't talk, they don't know that you aren't just making something up.

Troubleshoot – Don't worry too much about finding the issue. Make sure you troubleshoot methodically. If you need the "customer" to do/test something, tell them why you are asking them to do it, so they understand your train of thought. And DON'T PANIC if at first you don't know what the issue might be.

Hello people, I've just noticed that I have neglected my "Recommended Blogs" section for far to long.

So if you have a Virtualization focused Blog, you are not already on my list and would like appear on my recommended blogs section please use my Contact page to email me your url and I will review you blog. If I feel it is appropriate, I will add it to my list. Could you also include your RSS feed URL so I can add you to my personal RSS Feed Reader and keep up with all of your great articles.

Thanks guys

Taken from: http://blogs.vmware.com/kb/2012/09/alert-vsphere-5-1-is-not-compatible-with-any-versions-vmware-view.html

VMware vSphere 5.1 is not currently supported with any versions of VMware View.

vSphere 5.1 is in the process of being certified against VMware View. We recommend that you do not upgrade vSphere above the supported versions listed in the VMware View 5.1 Release Notes.

For further updates and more information on this alert, refer to KB article:
vSphere 5.1 is not compatible with any versions VMware View (2035268).

Just a quick post to let everyone know that the UK VMUG which will be held on the 15th November 2012 in Solihull, UK has opened their call for papers. If you are interested in presenting at the UKVMUG alongside the likes of Duncan Epping, Frank Denneman and hopefully myself, then submit your session ideas here:

UK VMUG Call For Papers

I'll hopefully see you all there.

I just wanted to bring this to peoples attention. 

Registration Now Open: Northwest England VMUG Meeting 
Join us for the next Northwest England VMUG meeting taking place on Thursday, Sept 13th, 2012. 
Registration is now open and available to all VMUG members. This is a great opportunity to meet with your peers to discuss virtualization trends, best practices, and the latest technology!

Meeting Agenda

• VMware Keynote – Spencer Pitts, VMware's EMEA End User Computing Practice Lead
• Technical Presentations and Updates from Trend Micro and Whiptail
• VMware View Case Study
• vNews from Matthew Steiner and Mike Laverick, Including a Review of VMworld San Francisco and a Look Forward to VMworld Barcelona
• Raffle Drawing and vBeers in Lloyds Bar (Printworks) Following the Meeting

Looks like a great agenda for their next VMUG. You can follow the official NW England VMUG Twitter profile for the latest VMUG news.

For those of you who have no idea what Operation #PinkShirt is, I'd recommend you give this post a quick read before reading on: Operation #PinkShirt but in a nutshell it is about getting over my fear of public speaking. As you'll probably notice, the post was created after VMworld 2010 and my goal was to present at VMworld 2011. I failed to make this goal, as I really did not want to present, so I made every excuse possible to get out of it. 

However this year was different. I actually submitted a session with the view to presenting. Unfortunately my session got rejected, so I thought that was my chance over for another year. To be honest, I was quietly relieved. Then a few weeks later a VMware colleague asked me to co-present with him, as the customer he was going to present with was unable to attend VMworld with him. I reluctantly said YES!

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VMworld San Francisco 2012 is almost here and it’s time for another vBeers Tweetup!  The last vBeers Tweetup from VMworld SF 2009 was a great time  so I couldn’t let this opportunity go by without arranging one. The VMworld San Francisco vBeers Tweetup will be held on Saturday 25th August, the day before the show doors open.

The vBeers Tweetup is intended as a way to relax, chill-out and catch up with friends, new and old.  If you don’t know anyone attending then that doesn’t matter as your fellow vGeeks are a friendly welcoming bunch who also like to network, talk tech and share vStories.

In true vBeers tradition this vBeers is not sponsored, it is a case of turning up, enjoying yourselfand covering the cost of your own drinks and any food.  Vendor sponsored parties start the following day.

For the full details, please visit the vBeers website and checkout the VMworld San Francisco 2012 vBeers post.

Further to my VMware View: Microsoft Lync 2013 Support = Yes Sir! article earlier this week which talks about VMware View support with Microsoft Lync 2012, I also wanted to draw your attention to the latest change made to Microsoft's Client Virtualization in Microsoft Lync 2010 document. I have copy/pasted the changes below for your viewing pleasure.   Read the rest of this entry »

I've posted this up for those of you who may have missed this announcement yesterday.

In many of my VMware View projects customers have asked for Microsoft Lync support. Up until View has been unable to support Lync and for a lot of customers this has caused pain. However, yesterday VMware announced that VMware is working closely with Microsoft to bring support for Microsoft Lync 2013 to VMware View desktops!!

You can read the full announcement here: http://blogs.vmware.com/euc/2012/07/microsoft-lync-2013-support-with-vmware-view-desktops.html

From a VMware EUC perspective, this is a big win. As I said before, customers want to use VMware View, but have often been restricted by this limitation…..Not for much longer!