It seems my vacation schedule is mostly driven by tech conferences these days.
- E2E in NY in 2018
- Synergy in Atlanta, Georgia in 2019
- IGEL Disrupt in Nashville, TN in 2020
All of which is great, as none of the above places i’d been to before, and each trip was exciting for personal and professional reasons
Nashville, TN was a bit more special for two reasons: Country music and Bourbon whiskey!
I’ve been a fan of country music all my life, especially the following artists
Dwight Yoakam
Glen Campbell
Shania Twain
Kenny Rogers
Chet Atkins
Dolly Parton
Johnny Cash
So, visiting BROADWAY street on my first night in Nashville was awesome. I got to see an awesome cover band do one of my favorite country songs: “All my ex’s live in Texas”
I drank some great local bourbon called Belle Meade and had a great time enjoying the cover band at “THE STAGE” (link to the venue)
After Sunday night, we spent all of our time in and around the MASSIVE hotel called GAYLORD. Yes, that’s the real name. It’s a really nice hotel, with indoor water falls and tons of tropical trees
The conference was small, about 500 attendees. The highlights were as follows:
1 -The Microsoft WVD (Windows virtual desktop) master class with Jim Moyle (twitter) and Christiaan Brinkoff. Microsoft has filled the gap between RDP and ICA! To me, they are neck and neck (at least on paper), i’m looking forward to doing client implementations in 2020 using WVD to replace or Citrix CVAD or for new implementations where no Citrix INFRA exists
2 -The AMD presentation on their new embedded CPUs. Talk about DISRUPT! AMD truly is a disruptive force of nature against Chipzilla (Intel). I’m very much looking forward to high quality , high performance low cost devices from AMD as a alternative to security hole ridden expensive Intel devices. IGEL product page
3 – The CUGC panel hosted by Patrick Coble . Some good debate around CVAD current release vs LTSR and MCS vs PVS.
4 -The Iron cowboy motivational speech during the closing note. I’d heard his name, but didn’t know he was from Alberta (i’m from Canada). In 2015, this guy ran 50 iron mans in 50 days in 50 states. Just incredible.
For 2020, i’ve got two more events I *might* attend, Steve Greenberg’s EUC master’s retreat (link) in Scottsdale, AZ, and possibly Synergy in Orlando. If it came down to one choice, i’m going with the former! I’ve already been to Synergy and Orlando, and I feel I would learn more at the EUC master’s retreat.
GetVpro 