Configuration Manager and the Cloud - 31st March 2016

Thank you to all that attended the Configuration Manager and the Cloud event!

And a big thank you to our sponsors Flexera Software

The event was set for 50 attendees, but we had 8 slots reserved for the WMUG Team to make sure we had a seat. We were fully booked within the first week. On the day, our attrition rate was the lowest we've ever seen other than when we had Wally Mead over, and we were pretty much just down a handful of attendees.

This time we wanted more speakers to fit into the day so we reduced session times from 1 hour to 45 minutes, it seemed to work, gave us an additional slot at the end of the day, as a format it seemed to go down well with the attendees.

Before we move on we would like to thank those that cancelled and informed us of their non-attendance, it allowed us to pass their ticket to the reserves, good job!

The venue @ Microsoft Paddington in London was very well laid out, all our equipment worked (there were some niggles that failed a demo, but something we can resolve next time). We'll definitely go back, and we have taken note of those that would like Reading to go back on our venue list. I'm sure we'll see Reading at some point this year, as well as new venues (North of England and Ireland) being planned.

Paul Hossack was first up, with a presentation around the Flexera Software product range, was very provocative (security and keeping up with patching always is!), the audience really soaked that presentation up, lots of questions fired at Paul who had this nailed down hard, responding to all the questions with reasonable responses and style

Next up was Paul Winstanley (SCCMentor) from the WMUG Team who presented on Management Point Replica's and high availability of ConfigMgr. It provoked a lot of discussion on design and how architects should think when it comes to high availability

Followed by Gerry Hampson - Enterprise Mobility MVP and WMUG Teamie who touched on his favourite subject at the moment, managing Modern Devices using on premise Mobile Device Management. Pretty cool stuff, don't forget to check out his posts on the subject here

Next up Robert Marshall - Enterprise Mobility MVP and WMUG Leader who gave a whistle stop tour of Servicing, while impressing on the audience the importance of checking the integrity of backups and having a DEV environment to perform a TESTDBUPGRADE before upgrading DEV and PROD. By the time he'd finished everyone had a DEV lab setup due to his constant tutting at not having one (joking, practically everyone put their hand up when he asked if they had a DEV environment) and they knew to check backups before upgrading and not assuming the backups are solid :-) Read more from Robert Marshall on servicing here and here

Sam Erskine - Cloud and Datacenter Management MVP gave us a good overview of OMS, and dug deep to show us some of the features he thinks are mind-blowing, such as Event Log harvesting, as with all the other sessions, humour permeated the air and Sam entertained us well while covering off a novel but interesting technologoy

Matt White - MCS Consultant and WMUG teamie gave us a great overview of managing Modern Devices (Windows 10) in a cloud-only model. What a great way to show off how far things have come with the Cloud technologies at Microsoft

And to wrap the presentations on the day Phil Wilcock of 2Pint Software gave us a very detailed run through of BITS\BrancheCache and PeerCache, the depth was stunning, recounting tales of yore (the story behind BranchCache and its authors demise) as well as giving insight into areas of the subject matter, very revealing, empowering session. The audience would have eaten up a lot more but we ran out of time

As usual we had something to give away, and this time thanks to our sponsor Flexera Software we were able to give a Raspberry Pi (V3) away to a lucky winner

Well done Craig Strong! We hope to see some pictures of you and whatever you get the Pi to do!

Paul Winstanley gave away the prize, since Paul eats sleeps and lives Raspberry Pi! (Ask him what that is all about, interesting story ...)

We also had a special give-away, a USB Hub that was previously owned by the generous grand-father of SMS Wally Mead. Robert Marshall had this in his stash for a couple of years and it was time to let it go!

Keith Sanderson won the prize by guessing Who owned this device? I had to hint a just a little, but I did leave it open!

And finally, not really related to the event itself, but at the venue there was a Microsoft Surface Hub and some of us gave it a spin, if WMUG had the cash and a need for a meeting room We'd love to have one of these, so super cool!

All presentations except the Flexera Software presentation can be downloaded from here

Well, what is next, keep an eye on the WMUG Tweet account as we have two additional physical events lined up for the South of England, and a possible event taking place further North, as well in Ireland. We'll announce all of this as things are locked into place.

In the meantime, please do keep an eye on the WMUG Tweet account for our announcements for further WMUG Clinics - The intent is to rerun the same sessions from this event and go further, or dwell on areas that are of interest to the audience in an informal setting.

Again, thank you for attending, and thank you again to our very cool sponsors Flexera Software!

The WMUG TEAM

Join WMUG on the day for System Center Configuration Manager and on-premise\off-premise Cloud sessions.

Thursday, 31st March 2016.

Featuring three (3) Microsoft MVP's, Robert Marshall (EM), Gerry Hampson (EM) and Sam Erskine (CDM), alongside the WMUG team, guest speakers and our event sponsor, Flexera Software.

The agenda will be as follows:

The event is completely FREE to you including refreshments and lunch, courtesy of our sponsor for the day Flexera. Please note that registrants Name and Email address will be provided to the Sponsor, please do let us know if this is an issue for you. We view providing your details as a small token of gratitude towards the Sponsor, which enables the event to be free.

Flexera Software is the leading provider of next-generation software licensing, compliance, security and installation solutions for application producers and enterprises. Their next-generation software licensing, compliance and installation solutions are essential to ensure continuous licensing compliance.

We also have an open questions session back by popular demand, and of course some giveaways for those who make it to the end of the day.

So what are you waiting for? Register now! There are limited seats available, and as always, we expect these to fill up quickly. Don't delay or you may be disappointed. If you book and are unable to attend, please do cancel your booking via the event page so that others may take up the opportunity, thank you.

Venue location

Microsoft,

2 Kingdom Street,

LONDON,

W2 6BD

About the speakers:

Paul Hossack - Paul is our sponsor guest speaker for this event, and will give us a demo of Flexera Software product offerings. Paul has been securing networks since 2007. A seasoned project leader and encryption specialist, and most recently hardware firewall adept, Paul is an expert in his field. Now working with Flexera Software (formerly Secunia) he brings his skills to vulnerability defence.

Paul Winstanley - Independent contractor with 20+ years experience. 7 years specialised in Configuration Manager and Enterprise Client Management. Also a CGJam Contributor and Pi enthusiast who regularly teaches kids in his spare time.

Gerry Hampson - Senior Consultant Engineer with Ergo Group based in Dublin. Recently awarded his first MVP in Enterprise Client Management through his awesome work on gerryhampsoncm.blogspot.ie and Microsoft TechNet forums.

Robert Marshall - Owner and Senior Consultant at London based Consultancy SMSMarshall Ltd, specialists in ConfigMgr. Microsoft EM MVP in Configuration Manager since 2009, and WMUG founder in 2006.

Sam Erskine- Samuel is our guest speaker, a CDM MVP, and an independent IT consultant and trainer, specializing in System Center and MS Cloud technologies. He is the content designer and lead author of several Microsoft System Center Cookbooks, and co-author of two System Center Unleashed books.

Phil Wilcock - Phil is our guest speaker, and has been in IT for a long time. Some would say too long. He started life as a farmer, ended up managing a huge Moo-Cow database (the DB was large not the cows), worked for Bill Gates for a while, co-founded 1e.com, went back to farming for a few years, trained as a Butcher and is now Director at 2pint Software, a specialist in Configuration Manager and presenter.