One of the most rewarding things I got to do last year was to help educate the VMware community on the value and the workings of the OpenStack cloud platform.  As well, I had the opportunity to educate the OpenStack community on how VMware has been integrating their technologies into the OpenStack platform.  Along the way, I’ve been privileged to be named both an OpenStack Ambassador and a VMware vExpert.  As I’ve interacted with folks in both communities,  I’ve been asked numerous times how the two technologies stack up and where do they differ in their design and approach to delivering infrastructure services.  My response has been to differentiate between the platforms in terms of the differing workloads that are best suited for the VMware vSphere technology and those that are best suited for OpenStack.

This approach is one that is aligned with that of my employer, Rackspace, and allows me, in my new Technology Evangelist role, to talk about the advantages of a vSphere with OpenStack hybrid solution.  The hybrid approach enables users to leverage both technologies, working together, in order to deliver a solution that can power both legacy and next-generation application workloads.  In our continuing efforts to broadcast this hybrid solution message and to educate both VMware and OpenStack users, Rackspace will be sponsoring several VMware User Group (VMUG) conferences in 2014 and I’ve been fortunate enough to be tasked with speaking at most of these conferences.  VMUGs are core to the success of the broader VMware community and these user conferences are great resources for learning and networking.

The table below lists all the VMUG conferences I am currently scheduled to speak at on the topic of vSphere with OpenStack.  I encourage all those who are or anyone who knows folks who are VMware Administrators, Architects, or Partners to attend these events and to participate in my sessions.  The reality is that a growing number of companies are either deploying or evaluating OpenStack as their private cloud platform and will be looking for technologists who can help them to understand how to leverage OpenStack, either as a replacement for or as a complementary platform to their existing vSphere environments.

As a preview of what I will be presenting, I’ve uploaded the latest working draft of my “vSphere with OpenStack” presentation to SlideShare.  You can also find the presentation below.  Please note that I consider any presentation I create a work-in-progress and there will likely be changes throughout the year.

I am looking forward to hitting the road and meeting as many folks in both the VMware and OpenStack communities as possible.  As always, I invite you all to engage with and to help me make what I present useful to as many people as possible.