We are nearing the end of 2014 and the start of 2015 so I figured it was the time to look back at what I did in the past 12 months. I have a bunch of stats which may be of interest, but of course also on a more personal level 2014 was a hectic year so lets start with that.
In 2014 from a more personal point of view:
- Joined the VMware Foundation on a life changing trip to Vietnam. 2 weeks in Vietnam helping the great (and inspiring) folks of Orphan Impact. I was happy that I was able to contribute in some way, and very happy with all the kind readers who decided to donate to Orphan Impact, it really does matter!
- Was part of the product team that made VMware EVO:RAIL happen. What a journey… Had never been part of a product team, and seeing something growing from just an idea on a whiteboard to a full blown product and seeing it launched is a great experience
- Was promoted to Chief Technologist. Very honoured and humbled. What an insane journey the last 7 years at VMware, starting in PSO as a senior consultant, who would have thought.
- Joined the VMware Office of CTO. Long dream to join this team of super heroes.
- Co-authored “Essential Virtual SAN”, published through VMware Press and went to China for a book signing with a crazy long queue of people waiting.
Needless to say, but 2014 was hectic and life changing in many ways for me. But what about the stats?
- Published 143 new articles, bringing it to a total of 1810 posts (including this one)
- My 5 top referrers:
- blogs.vmware.com
- Frankdenneman.nl (thanks buddy :-))
- facebook.com (surprise to me!)
- Techrepublic.com
- Visitors came from 224 countries with the US leading by large (6x more than the UK and India)
- I had 3 major contributors in terms of comments, thanks John Nicholson / Forbsy and James Hess!
- My top visited page was the Virtual SAN page
- My top article was the EVO:RAIL Introduction article, but all VSAN articles score extremely high
- Visitor traffic grew with 20%
Also from a stats perspective 2014 was a great year. I am hoping 2015 will be even better, and I want to wish all of you a Happy New Year!
Great achievements in 2014, keep it up for 2015. Wish you and your family a very happy year full of joys and health.
Congrat Duncan and Happy New Year!
I read your blog every morning with my coffee, as do many many more, thank you, and best wishes in the coming year!
Congratulations Duncan, and happy new year to you too!
Hi Duncan,
I have to say that your site is the best resource for VMware centric information that I have found so keep up the good work.
I would be keen to get your thoughts on the following:
1. EVO:RAIL
I am still really struggling with this one – as far as I can see it is a completely flawed idea and it not even available to purchase yet (much more thoughts at http://blog.snsltd.co.uk/vmware-evorail-or-vsan-which-makes-the-most-sense/).
I assume it has been put on hold pending the release of vSphere 6.
2. VSAN
It’s a 1.0 product so lets slow down on the hype as clearly it is nowhere near as mature as EMC’s ScaleIO let alone a storage array from the likes of EMC or NetApp (much more thoughts at http://blog.snsltd.co.uk/comparing-vmware-virtual-san-with-emc-scaleio-and-conventional-storage-arrays/).
But clearly it does have great potential.
Best regards
Mark