My name’s Sir Hackington Appbuilder III for those of you just meeting me, and I’m the trusted guardian of all the swag when members of the HPE Developer Community (HPE DEV) head out to conferences. I’d like to tell you a little about our recent time at VMworld Las Vegas that was hosted at the end of August.
Tame the IT Monster
HPE’s theme at VMworld this year was Tame the IT Monster. What does that mean? Simply put, it means reducing IT complexity as businesses continue on their digital transformation journey. With software eating the world and a substantial shift from a hardware-based to a software-based tech economy, companies must embrace a DevOps mindset to increase their opportunity for new business growth and to serve their customers better. HPE DEV promotes taming the IT monster with a two-pronged approach: by offering multiple integrations for HPE products, and by building deep connections to developers across the industry to collaborate and pool collective knowledge.
HPE DEV is always excited to talk to people at conferences – especially VMworld. That’s because the HPE DEV portal hosts many integration activities with VMware that include applications and products like HPE OneView, HPE SimpliVity, and HPE Synergy. Spreading the word through our subject matter experts and having these guys on hand to talk through the integration projects was a great way to let customers and partners understand where they can become more involved in HPE DEV’s community activities.
Not everyone who stopped by the booth knew about these VMware integrations, but the HPE DEV team made sure that everyone they met with came away fully informed about the specific integrations and the HPE DEV portal more broadly. Even folks from the operations side of their businesses were excited to get signed up for the HPE DEV newsletter so they can forward it to their teams’ developers and engineers.
In addition to getting folks to sign up for a newsletter, HPE DEV team members worked to spread the word about the community by participating in collaborative activities at VMworld. Pramod Sareddy, HPE DEV’s representative at VMworld, was invited to attend two VMworld VBlogger sessions, where VMware experts, developers and industry bloggers met up to compare notes and share VMware knowledge with each other. This was a great opportunity for Pramod to promote what HPE DEV is doing and get direct feedback from this group. One of the items he promoted was the contributions made to the community by HudsonAlpha, which got the attendees excited to contribute in a similar way.
Spreading the word
One of the biggest challenges HPE DEV currently faces is spreading the word about the community and the value it’s providing. For instance, did you know that HPE DEV has an HPE SimpliVity plugin for VMware vRealize Automation (vRA), which allows users to back up, restore, clone, and move their virtual machines on-demand via the vRA interface? Or that HPE DEV offers HPE OneView for VMware vCenter, which seamlessly integrates manageability features with VMware virtualization solutions?
I’ll brag a little here—it’s my presence that often draws people over to our booth. From there, HPE DEV conversations start around specific integrations, and then they typically turn into even larger conversations about HPE DEV and all the platforms they support. HPE DEV is committed to developers, DevOps, and helping businesses make their digital transformation successful.
Want to see more of HPE DEV?
Missed HPE DEV at VMworld? There are still plenty of chances to see the HPE DEV team this year at other developer-friendly conferences all over the world. For more information about where you can find them, visit the Events page. HPE DEV is going to have a busy autumn, with appearances at VMworld Europe, HPE Discover, and AWS re:Invent! And don’t forget to follow the Community page to see ways to get involved and contribute. See you soon!