My Five Tips to Attending VMware Explore

As of this writing, we are two weeks away from this year’s VMware Explore conference. Once again, this conference is being held at the Venetian in Las Vegas. In the event this is your first time at either this or any conference, here are some tips and information that you may find helpful while attending the conference this year. If you have not registered yet, there is still time to sign up and attend this year’s conference.

1. Good Footwear – there is a lot of walking during the conference. The conference generally consumes four to five of the floors at the conference center in the Venetian. Breakfast and lunch are typically served in the bottom floor at the far end of the conference center. There is also lunch generally available in the Hub as well. So, there will be a lot of walking between meals, sessions, and the Hub. So, be sure to bring a pair of good, comfortable footwear.
2. Session Schedule – be sure to have scheduled your preferred sessions before the conference begins. The scheduler came out a few weeks ago and many popular sessions were quickly filling up and waitlist being created. If you go without having sessions booked, you may not be able to access sessions that are important to you.
3. Review Conference Map – The sessions are always great, and sometimes hard to choose from when reviewing the catalog. However, be sure to check where the sessions are in relation to each other as well as meals. The first ever conference I went to over a decade ago, I booked all of the sessions as soon as possible. However, the first day of the conference, when looking at where each session was in relation to each other, it was going to be impossible to make some of them in a timely fashion. Some were not only floors, but in other building. The advantage of the Venetian is it is all in one building, but there are still multiple floors, escalators, stairs, and crowds to navigate.
4. Hand–On-Labs – Be sure to check out and attend some of the many hands-on-labs that will be running. This gives you a chance to give VMware Cloud Foundation 9.1 a test drive and learn about many of the new features that are available in the product. While trying some of the labs, head over to the Odyssey Challenge and test yourself against other attendees in completing tasks and solving problems.
5. Meet People – Whether at a meal, a session, or just sitting at a table in the Hub, introduce yourself to other attendees around you. This will not only enable you to grow your network, but expand your knowledge. In-person conversations is one of the most beneficial aspects of attending conferences like this one. You may encounter someone who has solved a challenge you are having or you may have a solution for them. In any case, I always find these interactions informative and helpful.

Those are my five tips for attending the conference this year. If you are attending and interested in meeting and having a discussion about VCF, infrastructure, or toss around an idea, feel free to reach out via the conference app. I look forward to attending the conference this year and hope to see you there!