All Things Open 2018 - Career, Cloud and OpenSource

Last year I planned on targeting this great conference in the South of the US, called All Things Open. After submitting my talks I was forced to back out due to work priorities requiring my presence elsewhere, something I have never done to a conference, ever.

I made a mental note to go all in the next time around and here it is, in Raleigh, North Carolina from Oct 21-23.

The call for papers deadline is April 24th, so get your talks in if you have them. I have put forth a mix of soft skills and hard core cloud application delivery sessions that I hope get me in the door.

Here's what I came up with.

Shift Developer Conference 2018 - Diving in deep with Open, Containers, Cloud and AppDev

I have been watching the Shift Developer Conference for some time, but it rarely has fit into my schedule so attendance was never an option.

This year the stars are aligned and I pulled this one into my must-do list.

Not only do I plan to attend this conference, I've taken it a step farther and submitted some of my ideas as a test bed for their validity. I am always working towards new and better ways to share what's going on in my world, so here's what I have come up with.

I have a few ideas to share some of the softer skills that have been a part of my toolbox as a developer in the open source universe I live in. These first two sessions target these kinds of talks, so we'll see if this conference gives them any traction:

10 Steps to Cloud Happiness: Step 10 - Agile Cloud Service Integration

This is the tenth step on our journey introducing a path to cloud happiness, one that started four months ago and it's been a vast array of content to help you discover the joys of cloud development.

It's the pinnacle of your climb to the top where you find cloud happiness, having led you from the basics to the more advance solutions as you learn how to leverage development, containers, a container platform and more.

As previously discussed in the introduction, it's possible to find cloud happiness through a journey focused on the storyline of digital transformation and the need to deliver applications in to a cloud service.

Application delivery and all it's moving parts such as containers, cloud, platform as a service (PaaS) and a digital journey requires some planning to get started. There's nothing like hands-on steps to quickly leverage real experiences as you prepare.

In earlier steps you covered how to get a cloud, the use of a service catalog, how to add cloud operations functionality, centralizing business logic, process improvement, the human aspect, a retail web shop, curing travel woes, and explored financial solutions, so what's next?

AppDev in the Cloud - Data Virtualization Solves Acquisition Use Case

In a past role I helped put together a rather expansive travel agency booking project to show some of the more interesting feature of JBoss BPM Suite.

The project continued to expand over time, adding on not just a bookings process, but also a payment process that included advanced features like compensation (rolling back bookings), integration of traditional web services in service tasks and a credit card fraud detection system.

An interesting use case came to light that required the use of a data virtualization tool and this travel booking example project was a perfect fit. It's a use case where a sister travel agency is acquired mid-booking season and we don't want to have to re-deploy new applications to account for maintaining data in two disparate location.

Before we get into the solution, let's look closer at the use case shall we?

Inside Open Innovation Labs Residency (Part 1)

This series takes the reader on a journey, taking a peek inside life in a Red Hat Open Innovation Labs residency. This is the top tier experience for any customer*, exposing them to open collaboration, open technologies, and fast agile application delivery methods.

This experience often escapes organizations attempting digital transformation, so through submersion in an Open Innovation Labs residency Red Hat shares its experience in managing, developing, and delivering solutions with communities, open technologies and open collaboration.

Join me as I share experiences from inside a real life residency, watching Red Hat work intimately with a customer, exposing new ways of working, leveraging open technologies using fast, agile application delivery methods and open collaboration.

10 Steps to Cloud Happiness: Step 9 - Exploring Financial Services

Step 9 - Exploring Financial Services

Every journey starts at the beginning and this journey's no exception, a journey of 10 steps to cloud happiness

As previously presented in the introduction, it's possible to find cloud happiness through a journey focused on the storyline of digital transformation and the need to deliver applications in to a cloud service.

Application delivery and all it's moving parts such as containers, cloud, platform as a service (PaaS) and a digital journey requires some planning to get started. There's nothing like hands-on steps to quickly leverage real experiences as you prepare.

Previously we covered how to get a cloud, the use of a service catalog, how to add cloud operations functionality, centralizing business logic, process improvement, the human aspect, a retail web shop, and curing travel woes, so what's next?

AppDev in the Cloud - Financial Services with Process Driven Application

Process driven with KPI's

There has been much written about AppDev in the Cloud on this site.

From series on cloud happiness to example demo projects, it's all about getting you started with containers, application delivery, and open technologies to support your digital journey.

Not only that, it's a starting point for your hybrid cloud planning, satisfying the need for running your applications anywhere. You have been running examples provided here locally on your machines, in your data centers and in your private cloud, and now you can continue that journey with container deployments and applications delivery that can span many cloud providers.

Along these lines there are always processes in your organization that are being optimized for maximizing your customer's experiences with your services. A good example of this is automating and easing a new customers onboarding experience in your organization. To this end, you are driving business through process driven applications that integrate services, front end applications and processes in your organization to ease new customers onbaording experience.

Let's take a closer look through the use of an example project with open technologies by Red Hat.

2017 in review - Global Technology Evangelist Director and more

Every year ends and every year it's always good to look back on the times we have shared, the trips taken and what's been accomplished.

This year started off with a promotion to Global Technology Evangelist Director in March, after over five years in various technical marketing roles throughout Red Hat.

I am now approaching nine years at Red Hat and it's never been more fun than now.

This year saw a transition from supporting integration portfolio solutions like Red Hat Cloud Infrastructure and Red Hat Cloud Suite, to focusing the coming year on hybrid cloud stories.

With that in mind, here is my review of my activities in 2017.