Missed Quest at VMworld this year? Not to worry, VMware is hosting a series of events in EMEA called the VMware Virtualization Forums 2008 that Quest will be attending. Come see us at one of the following venues/dates:

October 2008

• Sweden - Stockholm  02.10.08
• France - Paris  08.10.08
• Netherlands - Rotterdam  15.10.08
• Australia  - Sydney  15.10.08 ( not EMEA obviously )
• Germany - Dusseldorf  22.10.08
• Austria - Vienna  29.10.08

November 2008

• Spain - Madrid  06.11.08
• Italy - Milan  12.11.08
• Switzerland - Zurich  20.11.08

We will be showcasing the newest version of the Virtual Access Suite as well our Experience Optimization Pack and cool sneak peaks into the future of the Virtual Access Suite.

So come see us at one of the VMware Virtualization Forums 2008. We look forward to meeting you!

Quest Software, Provision Networks Division, are a Platinum sponsor at the forthcoming Virtualization Congress in London, England. Quest Software will be showcasing Provision Networks Virtual Access Suite, which will include the demonstration of new and exciting product features.

We are proud to be offering a 25% discount code to our customers and business partners attending the conference, this equates to a £200 saving. The discount code is ‘PartnersAtVC2008′.

It must be entered during the registration process that starts here: http://www.virtualizationcongress.com/registration.htm

Virtualization Congress 2008 – October 14-16. 2008 – ExCeL London, UK

Virtualization Congress, launched in 2008 by virtualization.info, the leading virtualization news and analysis site since 2003, brings together the entire sector under one roof, giving customers and potential virtualization users the opportunity to hear about all of the latest products and technologies on the market without prejudice.

The event will feature an innovative lecture format, showcasing real products in real world situations, from the key market players and the newest startups.

The Virtualization Congress takes place between 14-16 October, 2008 at London ExCeL conference centre in Docklands.

Visit the site at: http://www.virtualizationcongress.com

This week Rick, Jeff and I attended Briforum in Chicago.  The event was at the Navy Pier, which was a fantastic location, right on the water.  In addition to that, the expo floor was in a single room of a brownstone building, which made it very easy to see what was going on at the different booths.

Exhibitors of note were Quest Software (us), Microsoft (Nelly Porter), Citrix (Gus Pinto & Rich Crusco), Ericom and Qumranet.  Each vendor was showing off something new, i.e. Citrix XenDesktop, Ericom’s use of the Teradici Display Protocol, Microsoft’s RDP enhancements and Qumranet’s KVM Hypervisor, Solid ICE Connection Broker and SPICE Protocol.

We were showing Virtual Access Suite 5.10 at our booth, which we shared with the guys from Thin Client Manufacturer CLI (Computer Lab International).  Rick gave presentations on Printing and Application Compatibility, and I gave our Vendor Presentation were I demonstrated 5.10 and new technologies like Multimedia Redirection and Bitmap Acceleration.

Below are pictures from the event, and from downtown Chicago.  Some of the pictures were taken by The Brian Madden Company, and some were taken by “yours truly”.

Briforum 2008 - Event Photos + Chicago Photos
http://www.flickr.com/photos/27803145@N05/sets/72157605707824803

A selection of things from the set

While not exactly the most well known technical conference in the world, if you’ve been working with Server Based Computing for any length of time, this is a conference you should plan to visit.

Briforum is organized by The Brian Madden Company, which is run by Industry Analyst and Author, Brian Madden. Brian runs the most popular Server Based Computing Community Website www.brianmadden.com, and has authored books on Citrix and Terminal Services.  Brian is also a Microsoft MVP for Windows Terminal Services, and Citrix Technology Professional.  All that being said, Brian is “probably” most well known for being able to get the attention of  companies like Citrix, for speaking his mind (typically on his website) and not backing down from his controversial statements.

So what is BriForum?  It is a yearly technical conference that focuses on Application Delivery, whether via Terminal Services, Application Virtualization or Desktop Virtualization (VDI).  What makes this conference special is that the sessions can be presented by anyone, so long as they submit interesting content, and have experience to backup what they’re saying.  It is truely a technical deep-dive conference, where geeks go to learn from other geeks.  There are also presentations given be each of the vendors, and often by Microsoft and Citrix.

So what is Quest doing at Briforum?  The Provision Networks division of Quest has five employees that have presented at previous BriForum Conferences, and three of them will be at this conference.

Dr. Ulrich (Rick) Mack is our Sr. Sales Engineer from Brisbane Australia and is probably the most popular presenter at Briforum.  He’s probably the most humble guy you’ll ever meet, but is completely brilliant.  His two sessions this year are:

My Application Won’t Work!
Monday, June 16, 2008 at 17:30, in Room 3

Bring us your hardest printing problems (Workshop)
Wednesday, June 18, 2008 at 08:30, in Room 2

 Jeff Pitsch is our Sr. Sales Engineer for the Midwest United States & Eastern Canada, is a Microsoft MVP for Windows Terminal Services and has presented at Briforums in 2005 and 2006.  Jeff will be running our Exhibitor Demo Lab, so if you what to see what our Virtual Access Suite does, Jeff will have a demo rig at his disposal so you can get a one on one with an expert that uses our software every day.

Patrick Rouse (me) is also a Microsoft MVP, and is our Sr. Sales Engineer for the Western United States & Canada and Latin America. Patrick previously presented at  Briforum 2006 in Germany and will be delivering our Vendor Presentation:

Quest Software, Provision Networks Virtual Access Suite - Help, my connection broker is on steroids! (sponsored by Quest Software)
Monday, June 16, 2008 at 13:45, in Room 4.

I did mention that there were five of us that have previously presented at Briforum, but only three were going to be in Chicago. The other two are:

Michel Roth, also a Microsoft MVP for Windows Terminal Services and our Sr. Sales Engineer from The Netherlands (Holland), and my partner in crime (so far) for maintaining this blog.  Michel also runs the popular Server Based Computing Blog www.thincomputing.net.

Peter Ghostine.  Peter is our CTO, and the Technical Architect of Virtual Access Suite.  Peter has traditionally been the person that delivers the Vendor Presentation, but he’s busy getting Virtual Access Suite out the door (next Friday, June 20, 2008).  Peter has been creating widgets to improve the performance and ease the management of Windows Terminal Services and Citrix since the 1990s.

The Provision Networks division will be presenting at the Virtualization and Beyond event in Brussels, Belgium on June 19. The events is at the Business Faculty, St. Lendriksborre 6 Font Saint Landry, B-1120 Brussel (Neder-Over-Heembeek). The event starts at 9.00 and ends at 15.45.

If time permits the Provision Networks will showcase the newest release of their Virtual Access Suite, version 5.10 at this event. The Virtualization and Beyond event is organized by one of our distributors in Belgium, Distrilogie.

Take a look at the agenda and sign up here:http://www.distrilogie.be/BE/events/event.aspx?id=9286.
We hope to see you there!

Monday June 2nd and Tuesday June 3rd the Provision Networks division will be joining their distributor CDG Europe  at the Virtualiserings Forum 2008 in Sweden, Stockholm. This promises to be a very cool event!

Some of the speakers at this event:

• Brian Madden
• Alessandro Perilli
• Mike Neil (Microsoft Virtualization)
• Reza Malekzadeh (Vmware)
• Simon Crosby (Citrix)

It is being held at the Rica Hotel in Stockholm and entrance is about  7000 Swedish Crowns.
Sign up here.

Be sure to drop by our booth because I gather we have some extremely cool prizes to give away (depending on which country you are from …)

This week at Citrix Synergy (iForum) Doug Brown of www.dabcc.com did a presentation where he compared VMware VDM2 to XenDesktop. At 18:45 of this video he was asked “who does he think has the best (connection) broker”, to which he answers “I like Provision Networks, I think it’s the best…”

Watch Video

Want to see the Virtual Access Suite (VAS) 5.10 in action? Curious about the Quest Provision Networks Division in general? Then there’s good news (even better news if you live in Belgium, Finland or Sweden)!

On May 20,21 and 22 the Quest Provision Networks division together with one of their distributors, CDG Europe, will be hosting events in Belgium, Finland and Sweden. During these events, amongst other things, a preview of VAS 5.10 will be shown and the Provision Networks division CEO, Paul Ghostine, will discuss the future of the Provision Networks division products. This event is free and open to anyone that want to attend but registration is required. For this registration, the agenda and other information refer to the following:

• Belgium - May 20
• Finland - May 21
• Sweden - May 22

We hope to see you there!

Check out the Provision Networks Division event calendar for more events.