Yellow Bricks

by Duncan Epping

voting

Top 25 bloggers 2014 results are out…

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The top 25 bloggers 2014 voting results are out. This year the competition was insane, and I know that I say this every year but if you look at bloggers like Cormac Hogan, Derek Seaman, Frank Denneman, Chris Wahl and William Lam you know what I am talking about.

1400+ people voted, 15 new blogs in the top 50, 5 new blogs in the Top 25, and a new blog in the Top 10. A big thank you to every who has voted for me again, I am honored and humbled to have been voted number 1. I want to call out the top 5 as I have worked closely with most of them the last years and it has been a great pleasure: William Lam(2), Frank Denneman(3), Cormac Hogan(4) and Scott Lowe(5). Each of them has consistently produced excellent material. I have been very very impressed by what they’ve released over the last year and hope everyone keeps putting out their material as I very much enjoy reading it.

Congrats to everyone else who made the list, if you are curious who they are head over to the full top bloggers list on Eric’s blog. Maybe even better, watch the awesome show Eric, John, Rick and David recorded… It is very entertaining!

Top 25 bloggers 2013 results are out…

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The top 25 bloggers 2013 voting results are out again. This year the competition was insane. With newcomers like Cormac Hogan and Chris Wahl, but also old-timers like Chad Sakac, Scott Lowe, Eric Sloof and of course Frank “resource management” Denneman.

First of all, a BIG THANK YOU to Eric Siebert who took the time and effort again to set this up. I know how much work these kind of things take, so once again thanks Eric for spending your evenings on this! There were over 80 new blogs this year and 4 new blogs made the top 25, and one new blog made the top 10. With a total of ~1300 votes this is probably one of biggest community awards I have seen. Yes being a vExpert is awesome, but getting votes from your readers feels 10 times better.

I am not going to list the full top 25 here, I feel everyone should hit Eric’s page for that. I do want to thank everyone for taking the time to vote for me. I am honored to have been voted number 1 blogger for virtualization again for the 6th consecutive time. This is crazy, who would have thought that when I started yellow-bricks.com years ago… I sure did not expect that, and it was also never my intention. Thanks everyone, and please keep coming back and leave comments – be interactive!

There are two bloggers I do want to call out, first of all someone who I managed to persuade to start his own blog and who entered the Top 10 as a newcomer… Cormac “the god of all things VMware storage related” Hogan. What a tremendous achievement this year by Cormac. So many great articles, not just deep technical but also his “storage vendor overviews” are awesome. Of course the resource management guru who jumped from spot 5 to spot 2, Frank Denneman. Awesome work, what can I say more?! Keep it up,

Once again, make sure to watch the vChat below and hit Eric’s page for the full list. Thanks everyone, and see you next year 🙂

VMworld session voting

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I submitted several sessions. Of course, just like everyone else, I could use your help when it comes to voting. These are the ones I submitted (or are part of):

  • 1154 – vCloud Director Infrastructure Resiliency – DR of the Cloud – Chris Colotti and Duncan Epping
    In this session Chris and I will focus on vCloud Director infrastructure resilience. Although there is no direct vCloud Director and Site Recovery manager integration, we will look at how to replicate the data, what applications are primary targets, how to size environments, how to maintain multi-tenancy, and what to avoid when architecting these solutions.
  • 1159 – Architecting and Operating a vSphere Metro Storage Cluster – Lee Dilworth and Duncan Epping
    In this session Lee Dilworth and I will discuss the design and operational considerations for vSphere Metro Storage Clusters environments, also commonly referred to as stretched cluster environments. Best practices around implementation and design will be shared. Various failure scenarios which can occur in a stretched storage environment are discussed in-depth including how vSphere 5 responds to these failures.
  • 1202 – Cloud Infrastructure Architecture and Operations Q&A – Chris Colotti, Kamau Wanguhu, Aidan Dalgleish and Duncan Epping
    This is the only session at VMworld which will allow you to freely ask four VMware Certified Design Experts (VCDX) questions around how to architect and operate your cloud infrastructure. Our panel holds expertise on Networking, Storage, vCloud Director and vSphere and consists of Chris Colotti (VCDX037), Kamau Wanguhu (VCDX003), Aidan Dalgleish (VCDX010) and Duncan Epping (VCDX007). We will help you make the right decisions while explaining some of the underlying fundamental concepts of the Cloud Infrastructure Suite allowing you to optimize your operations and architecture. This is one of those sessions that you cannot afford to miss out on!
  • 1504 – Ask the Expert vBloggers – Scott Lowe, Duncan Epping, Rick Scherer, Frank Denneman, Chad Sakac
    One of the highest rated sessions at VMworld is back for it’s fifth year! Come meet four VMware Certified Design Experts (VCDX) on stage answering your questions. We get the top Virtualization Bloggers in the industry and get them on stage answering your questions in a wide array of topics.

Of course there are a million other great sessions you should be voting for… Chris Colotti, David Hill, Frank Denneman, Cormac Hogan, Tom Stephens and many others submitted excellent sessions, don’t forget to vote for them as well. Thanks for taking the time!

Number 1 virtualization/VMware Blog!

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Eric Siebert (vSphere-Land) published the results of the best VMware/Virtualization blog election today. A slightly different format this time though as they decided to record a special edition of vChat, Eric Siebert together with Simon Seagrave, David Davis and the infamous John Troyer announced the Top 25 and had a stack of compliments for every blogger out there.

I would like to thank everyone for voting for me again. I am honored to be part of the list and humbled to be voted number 1 amongst so many excellent blogs.

Watch the webcast for the full list, or take a shortcut and check Eric Sloof’s article.