This is an attempt to live blog at the Hitachi Data Systems (HDS) Bloggers Day.

Session 1

8:00: Hitachi Welcome

Pete Gerr, Director Strategic and Solutions Marketing

8:25: Hitachi’s Global Presence, Europe, Americas, Asia, Japan, many other countries.

8:26: More than 1000 Companies Globally, 400,000 employees globally, 100Billion in Revenue

8:30: Introductions

8:31: Nigel introduces himself as “I am Nigel Poulton” and pauses for a few secs… a chuckle in the room…the troublemaker

8:32: Rick Vanover, Chris Evans, Devang Panchigar, Nigel Poulton, Simon Long, Bas Raayman, Greg Knieriemen, Phil, Paul Miller, Elias Klnaser

8:33: Michael, Hu, Pete, Claus, Harry, Carli and many more from the Hitachi Team

8:34: HDS is part of a larger organization Hitachi

8:35: Retelling the HDS Storage

8:40: Data drives our world and information is the new currency

8:42: Unified Management, Common Platform, Virtualized Infrastructure irrelevant of structured, unstructured data.

Claus Mikklesen, Chief Scientist

8:45: Claus shows a picture of the first hard drive from 1956, 24 platters, 2100 pounds

8:50: Nigel kicks off a nice discussion on Software platforms within HDS, VP of Software platforms jumps in, Pete and Michael talks about software platforms

Harry ZImmer, Senior Director, Global Competitive Marketing

Mandy Perera, Senior Competitive Market Analyst

8:55: Competitive discussion kickoff

9:00: Hot Topic: Dynamic/Auto Tiering of Storage, top on the list

9:01: Hot Topic: Cloud Evolution: Customer adoption, Private-Hybrid-Public Clouds, second on the list

9:02: Hot Topic: Simplified/Comprehensive Storage Mgmt, third on the list

9:06: Thin provisioning was a request that was submitted and HDS managed to deliver on it through this new process

9:08: Harry Zimmer works at HDS, but before that worked for EMC and IBM.

9:20: Elias has deployed Hitachi Blades and loves it. Has some vmware integration issues with loading drives etc.

9:31: We have been storage virtualization for years when compared to Vplex

9:32: Lets find out implementation and application needs for long distance storage virtualization and see if there are existing products within HDS that might be able to accomplish it.

9:34: Containers, POD’s, Racks and End to End Stacks: Biz Dev Wars, was on top of the list but has now fallen to 15 now. This is a comparison to vBlocks. The question is how successful is EMC is in this strategy.

Disclaimer: Though we are not required, it is up to the attendees to blog and tweet about this event if they wish to. Our travel, boarding and lodging expenses for two days will be paid by Hitachi Data Systems (HDS).

The tradition continues, after the success of HP Tech Day, HP Blades Day, HP Storage Day and GestaltIT Tech Field Days (San Jose & Boston); now Hitachi Data Systems (HDS) has decided to host a HDS Bloggers Day. The twitter hash tag for HDS bloggers day is #HDSday.

The #HDSDay is being hosted in San Jose, CA on the 15^th and 16^th of June, 2010. This two-day event is an attempt by HDS marketing to bring industry bloggers to HDS headquarters and introduce them to Hitachi Storage and Virtualization products and also give them face-to-face time with HDS executives.

I am glad and honored to be attending this event. For me personally these events have been a great means to learn more about storage technologies, products and services that these companies are offering today. As much as these events help me take a deep dive into these products, write about them, it also helps me with my current job to work with our existing & new customers and bring more value in terms of services we offer to them.

As far as the attendees go, there are many focused towards virtualization, many towards storage and networking technologies. Folks like Nigel Poulton, Chris Evans and Bas Raayman have really strong HDS background.

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The attendees (in random order)

• Nigel Poulton – @nigelpoulton – www.nigelpoulton.com
• Chris M Evans – @chrismevans – www.thestoragearchitect.com
• Rick Vanover – @rickvanover – rickatron.us
• Paul Miller – @paulmiller – cloudofdata.com
• Greg Knieriemen – @knieriemen – www.iknerd.com
• Devang Panchigar – @storagenerve – www.storagenerve.com
• Simon Long – @simonlong_ - www.simonlong.co.uk/blog
• Bas Raayman – @BasRaayman – www.basraayman.com
• Elias Khnaser – @ekhnaser – www.eliaskhnaser.com/blogs.aspx
• Phil Jaenke – @rootwyrm – rootwyrm.us.to

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HDS Executives attending the event are (in random order)

• Hu Yoshida, VP and CTO at Hitachi Data Systems
• Claus Mikkelsen, CTO of Storage Architectures
• Michael Hay, Sr. Director of Product Strategy
• John Harker, Product marketing lead for HDP, tiered storage, HTSM, BOS V
• Ken Wood, Director of Product Strategy focusing on File Platforms
• Miki Sandorfi, Chief Strategist for File, Content and Cloud Portfolio
• Linda Xu, Market Strategy for File, Content and Cloud Portfolio
• Harry Zimmer – Senior Director Global Competitive Marketing
• Michael Heffernan – Solutions Product Manager – Server Virtualization (Hypervisors)
• Mandy Perera – Competitive marketing analyst
• Mark Adams – Platform Product Marketing for AMS platform
• Pete Gerr, Director of Strategic and Solutions Marketing
• Carli Gelfi, Marketing Manager

I had a chance to talk to Hu Yoshida and Miki Sandorfi earlier in the year about HDS storage, cloud and convergence strategy. On the footsteps of other Storage vendors, HDS seems to be very alert in its Convergence Strategy. A platform announced earlier this year called the UCP: Universal Compute Platform that competes with vBlocks and HP Unified Computing Architecture.

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So this might be a good opportunity to learn and understand more about HDS as it relates to the topics below

• Cloud and Storage platforms strategy
• Convergence and UCP
• USP V
• AMS
• Market Competitiveness
• Microsoft Partnership
• Architecture (deep dives)
• One on one time with HDS executives
• Social Media Strategy

I have to honestly say, attending all these events through out the year has given me an ability to learn more and more about these platforms and compare them side-by-side.

With the background of the attendees and the talented folks at HDS, these two days will be action packed with discussions, one on one interviews, chats, blogs, tweets and video recordings.

Special thanks to Carli Gelfi for inviting me to this event.

You can follow me on Twitter @storagenerve, the hash tag for this event is #hdsday. Promise to keep the tweet volume sober. Might attempt other approaches like live blogging and/or videos.

Stay tuned for more blog posts on this event.

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Cheers
@storagenerve

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Disclaimer: Though we are not required, it is up to the attendees to blog and tweet about this event if they wish to. Our travel, boarding and lodging expenses for two days will be paid by Hitachi Data Systems (HDS).

Relaxing on a Friday evening after a long week, got an email from John Troyer and the VMware team about the vExpert 2010 award and program invitation. I am humbled and very honored to participate in it. Hope along with many storage topics that I cover on this blog and GestaltIT, this will give me another reason to keep on writing more about related virtualization topics.

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This is the first time I have received the vExpert award. Hope this gives me a chance to work with fellow vExperts through out the world, many of which are friends, colleagues and delegates from various events. These folks are truly industry experts and leaders in the virtualization space.

The success we saw with vExpert 2009 program and the emerging details of the 2010 program, there are great advantages to be able to participate in this. This program will enable us to get a sneak peek into the futures, conference session materials, test lab licenses, beta programs, etc at VMware.

Here is the VMware vExpert page.

Twitter users can follow the list of vExperts here by @maishsk

A comprehensive list of vExperts 2010 by Arnim van Lieshout on his Van-Lieshout Blog

To my fellow vExperts, big congratulations and I am really honored to be part of this community. Big thanks to John Troyer, VMware Team and VMware Community in allowing me to participate as a vExpert.

The fun begins now…… looking forward to an exciting year ahead.

Cheers
@StorageNerve

Facebook

At least has been 15 years since high school, but it really feels like yesterday. Friends from various grade levels, college, professional contacts and social networks all connected on Facebook….

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Yes, Facebook….

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It was my birthday yesterday and I was expecting this day to start as a pretty regular weekday. Expected a few people to call me during the day and wish me Happy Birthday and talk to me for a few to see how everything was going.

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There are a few callers that call once a year on days like the birthdays and anniversaries, some people send out emails while some sent out text messages. Which is what I was really expecting. Few friends that I have been in touch over the past year and may be some close family members would call or email to wish.

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I have been on Facebook for a few years now, may be 2 or 3. But never used it, until last August, September 2009. Blogging was my first attempt in social media, Twitter followed it and I call myself a pretty late adaptor of Facebook.

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As I was getting ready to hit the bed late night, started seeing these wall notification and direct messages come to my inbox on Gmail, people wishing me Happy Birthday. Thinking how people knew, I realized there was something on Facebook that reminded people it was my birthday.

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As I woke up in the morning, saw the inbox filled with hundreds of these messages, again some on the wall, some direct messages, some twitter DM’s, people wishing me Happy Birthday. Some folks even timed it at 12 midnight EST.

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I went to high school in Surat, India. A ton of friends still live there and a ton here in the States or Europe. As early AM hit India, people started checking Facebook for updates and saw the birthday reminders, I guess. People I haven’t spoken in years and I haven’t received emails in years, decided to wish me on my birthday.

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School life was great, very very cool, tons of fun, lots of friends and it was just a hip school…and honestly hard to forget those innocent fun days. Then as life progressed got Bachelors and Masters and made tons of friends there.

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By the time the day ended, I had more than 200 emails in my inbox with comments and messages and wall posts. People from all over, friends, family and business contacts wishing me on my birthday.

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One of the friends I am connected to on Facebook is from Kindergarten, which has to be like 30 years ago or a little less.

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It’s changed everything…..

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Click, Click and you create a profile on Facebook. Click Click and you can upload a profile picture, Click Click and you can write some information about you, Click Click and you can import your Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo and Skype contacts into Facebook, Click Click and you can upload pictures movies and share them too. Click Click and you set the privacy settings for your profile.

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Based on your existing connections, Facebook will now recommend you more connections, people that you may know because they share same friends of yours or are at a second degree of separation. One contact opens possibilities to connect to 50 other people…

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Click, Click and people can send you messages, either private or public. Click, Click and you can send birthday cards, gifts. Click Click and you can write comments to someone or join a group or become a FAN.

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Click Click and you can create a business page, Click Click and you can track your users based on the activities and areas of interest they have, Click Click and now you can see updates on your Fan’s profile.

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I guess I had my cell phone information published in my profile. It was just not about wall posts and messages, as the day progressed, saw people calling me on my cell phone to wish me. Again some of these people, I may have not spoken in past 5 to 10 to 15 years….very surprising.

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All and all, it was just surprise after surprise. Heard from friends from middle school, high schools, college, professional contacts, twitter and blogging friends, …. And honestly after high school, I don’t remember having such a blast and receiving birthday wishes from so many friends and family, it was an exciting day.

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Oh….add Skype reminders…..and then Twitter updates to the list.

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I guess staying connected is good?

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Some updates both wall and messages came in as early at 5 AM (People waking up early to go to work) and before going to work, people check Facebook updates. This may be before checking their personal and work email. Click Click and you are there.

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And honestly, I am not a Facebook junkie, though I make a point to check Facebook updates once a day to see what’s going on…and make a point to write something stupid that only makes sense to me. Click Click and I am done….

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Now devices like Blackberry, iPhone, iPad all have Facebook apps on it, which allows users to stay connected to Facebook using these devices. Click Click and you are on Facebook either browsing or updating it.

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A while back, we used egroups, which later became yahoogroups. This was a means to stay in touch with school friends, college friends and family (groups). All that became history as Facebook got more popular and got more users. Being moderator of 3 yahoogroups today, I absolutely do not see any activity on these once so busy groups. Rather people have been creating group pages on Facebook and it’s easy. Click Click and you can accomplish the task.

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Its amazing to see when social networks like Facebook come and change what, how, when we interact with friends and family, improve the communication gap. With our busy lives, its still so much important to stay in touch with friends and family. Click Click and all information is here, pictures, updates, new kids born, reunions, party’s, all information…on your finger tips….

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Are you ready for Facebook

Click, Click and become a member of this large growing community of more than 500 million users today.

After high school this is probably the year where I believe I have been so connected to people both professionally and socially.

Yea…and I truly think, it’s because of Facebook….

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