vExpert Spotlight: Manfred Hofer
Manfred Hofer
Today’s vExpert Spotlight interview is with Manfred Hofer. Manfred, or Fred as he also goes by, it a TAM (Technical Account Manager) at VMware in Austria. Fred is somewhat of a certification junkie also it seems, holding more than 25 (if my counts are correct) technical certs. Wow! When Fred is not virtualizing his brain or gaining more certs, he enjoys playing the drums as well as taking the wife out for a night of dancing. Shake that money maker boy!
The Interview
Star Wars or Star Trek?
Star Trek
Peanut Butter?
No Thanks!
Favorite Adult Beverage?
Guinness
What was your 1st IT gig?
My first job was right after college for a small company in Austria. I done there a lot of Microsoft, networking, security and hardware stuff. Payment was bad and training wasn’t on their list because it costs money. In 2007 this company became a VMware partner and I started to work with ESX 3.0. I think everybody who saw at this time a vMotion went like me saying: WTF.
At this time, I decided that I would go the route of virtualization. The learning experience at the company was great because without training you need to play with software you don’t know, see how it works/reacts and then fix it. Without this experience of all the different kind of technology (networking, OS, security) and without an awesome mentor I wouldn’t be where I’m today.
What is your current job title and role?
Technical Account Manager at VMware
How many years have you been a vExpert?
2 years
What other IT Communities are you involved with or frequent?
I was involved in the PernixPro program before I joined VMware. It was really cool to get all the beta information of the product, give feedback and see how this “small” startup evolved over time.
What advice would you give to others involved in the VMware community who are looking at becoming a vExpert?
Good question. I would advise everybody who wants to become part of the community to join Twitter and follow all the awesome guys out there like Duncan Epping, Frank Denneman to name a few. After that join their conversations and don’t be shy, they are just people like you and me. If you have an active VMUG get involved there, maybe do some presentations at their quarterly meetings.
You do not necessarily need a blog but it would help to spread your word, experience and thoughts. I think the most important thing of becoming a vExpert is to be active in the community and to be visible and help others. Finally ask yourself if you would do all the things if there where no vExpert or similar program. If you do it only for the award, then it’s the wrong motivation.
Do you currently have a Home Lab environment?
I’m totally one of the freaks/nerds/geeks running their own home lab. My lab currently consists of the following components:
Primary Lab:
2 Server with Xeon E-5 2620 v2 HexCore, Supermicro X9SRH-7F/7TF board with 80GB RAM, 1x 128GB SSD for caching and 1x 500GB 850 EVO for nested environments each server
1x Synology DS1515+ with 4x 3TB WD Red for VMs and Plex
1x QNAP 239 (really old one) with 2x 4TB WD Red for Backups (Veeam, personal data)
1x Readynas Pro 2 with 2x 2TB Seagate for Software (Isos etc.)In addition to my primary lab I have also a HP ML110 G6 with 32GB memory as a resource cluster for vRA etc. and an old IBM x3650 M2 with 128GB for special testing scenarios like NUMA/vNUMA or NUMA switching etc.
How do you use VMware products or services in your daily work life?
As a Technical Account Manager I’m talking most of the time to my customers how and why they should use particular VMware products they have purchased through an ELA or which product can benefit their business. For more deep technical questions, I’m running a home lab to stay up-to-date and test things.
What certifications do you currently hold (if any)?
VCP-DCV/Cloud/DT, VCAP-DCA/DCD/DTA/DTD/CIA/CID, CCNA-DC, Veeam VMCE and some Citrix and Microsoft certifications.
What’s your go to song or music genre when work stress becomes too much?
My favorite music genre is Metal and there especially Power Metal. When I need to clear my head I’m listening to Sabaton or Hammerfall.
Tell us something about yourself that the community may not already know.
I played drums for a couple of years but my problem was that I practice not so much because my technical interest had always more priority to me. I’m not only a certification junkie, I’m also a TV series junkie watching a lot of series in my spare time 🙂
Do you have a blog that you would like to share?
Let us know how to contact you via social media.
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Fred_vBrain
Skype skype: Fred_vBrain?call
Google+: https://plus.google.com/u/0/117534423081305021815/about
Fred it was a pleasure & thank you very much for being a part of the vExpert Spotlight series! I appreciate you taking the time to chat with me.
Please hit up Fred on Twitter as well as his personal blog.
Lookup and browse the current 2015 vExperts in the vExpert Online Directory
Learn more about VMware’s vExpert Program: https://communities.vmware.com/community/vmtn/vexpert
Please do not forget to SHARE, TWEET, REPEAT!