VMworld 2018 - Day 0

VMworld 2018 - Day 0

From Boston To Las Vegas

I am participating in the annual #v0dgeball charity tournament this year on Sunday afternoon as a member of the WWT team. The only direct flight that got in early enough was a 6 AM flight out of Boston, so a 4 AM start was required. One nice feature of a 4 AM start is that the typical Boston traffic is non-existent.

Kudos to JetBlue for continuing to fly nice airplanes with legroom. Our mostly-VMworld flight was on an Airbus A321. Regular seats are plenty wide with legroom. Oh, and there are power outlets even in coach. Yay.

JetBlue's Terminal C has done a nice job showcasing major innovations based in Massachusetts. This proud statement is probably my favorite: "Farmers Defeat World's Most Powerful Army"

 

Flying pro tip learned from the gentleman boarding ahead of me. Bring a gift for the head flight attendant and they might give you special treatment during the flight. We were walking onto the plane and the gentleman in front of me hands a small Hudson News bag to the lead flight attendant who says thank you and asks the gentleman his seat number. As we walk down the aisle, I ask the gentleman about what he did and what was in the bag. He responded that the flight attendants have a hard job, stand all day, and it doesn't hurt to be nice to them. He bought a bag of M&Ms for the flight attendant which brightens their day and gets him a little special treatment in return. 

VMworld Registration

After a lovely Lyft ride with Arthur, I made the winding trek from the Luxor registration to the Mandalay Bay Conference Center. The VMworld app alerted me that registration was experiencing a 15-minute wait and to maybe try back later. I was in no rush, so I headed over anyway. To my luck, a super secret "remote registration desk" was set up in a back room and I was directed there. Excellent. I walked right up to a terminal, typed in my email address and my badge was printed out. No swag to pick up as there is a scavenger hunt in the Vendor Showcase this year to earn one's backpack or to donate one's backpack to charity.

Super Secret Registration

Regular Registration (Desk 1 of 5)

#v0dgeball

This year was the 10th anniversary of the charity dodgeball tournament that Chad Sakac and Fred Nix began. All proceeds go to the Wounded Warriors Program. Chad was in attendance leading his Pivotal team and introduced a marine who spoke about how Wounded Warriors had helped him after losing a limb. At last count, over $10,000 was raised this year by all teams. The teams this year were from Dell, Dell ISG, Pivotal, combined DTUG/VMUG, and WWT. The event was great fun, the volunteer refs were awesome and we even had a DJ play rousing arcade music. The highlight for me was when the head ref threw a wrench at Chad. That wrench was the best fake plastic wrench I have ever seen. Here is a photo of the happy WWT team after the tournament:

Vendor Showcase Reception

From 5-7:30, the show floor was open to meet the vendors and enjoy some food and drink. There are hundreds of vendors present and the VMware section takes up about 1/4 of the giant room. I made a quick visit to see a few of my friends at booths as it was getting late and I had not checked into my room yet.

My apologies for the lack of technical content today. Tomorrow (Day 1) I will be in some _very_ technical sessions which I will share in my next blog post. I welcome your feedback.