Congratulations to this week’s VMware Community Warrior: @Ray_Handels. I could write Volumes about our newest 2017 Hall of Famer *pause for laughter* but his activity in the VMware App Volumes Community speaks for itself (1,151 points…).
Not a workstation management expert? Check out this brief video introduction:
Ray was nominated by sachindsharma (featured in the video above) for his involvement within the community, his seat on the App Volumes customer council, and his involvement in testing the latest and greatest App Volume builds as they roll out.
What makes Ray remarkable, is that he maintains a strong relationship upstream, with the VMware product team, and downstream, with customers like himself. He provides support to others in the forums, listens, and constructively communicates to the VMware product teams to improve App Volumes for all users.
Learn a bit more about how Ray manages these relationships…
K: What makes you passionate about VMware App Volumes and answering community questions?
R: I have been in workstation management for over 8 years but haven’t seen anything like App Volumes (formerly known as CloudVolumes) for our environment. The technique and idea, providing the application to the user while he is actually logging in, was a perfect fit for our business model as we never know what user is logging in to what machine.
Also, the writable volume feature enables us to provide users with a virtual machine, but they don’t even know that they are actually using a virtual machine because they get all of their applications and settings. Looking at the applications progress from CloudVolumes 1.8 (yes, we did use that version) to 2.12.1, which we are using now, it’s great to see where the program is going.
K: You have a unique relationship with the VMware App Volumes product team… Tell me a bit about that.
R: We started using the application as one of the first customers worldwide and really believed in it’s technical features. Because the old team was (and still is) very customer driven we had multiple sessions with people like Jason Marshall (product engineering) and Matt Connover about what features we would like to see added to the product, and tested a lot of those features for them. This gave us a unique opportunity to be a part of the building process for App Volumes.
K: How can community members get as involved with our product teams as you are?
R: I’d say the best way to start is to be active on the forums, not only to ask questions and take information, but also to share knowledge with other customers. The larger and more active the user base, the better the products will be for customers and users.
Thanks Ray!
Contact Ray with any follow-up questions here:
VMTN: @Ray_Handels
LinkedIn: Raymond Handels
Twitter: @raymondhandels
Do you see someone frequently answering questions in your favorite forums? Did someone provide server saving support to you recently at a VMUG or over Twitter? Any community involvement counts. Head to the Community Warrior page to nominate, or email [email protected].
