Estimated reading time: 6 minutes
If you know me, then you understand that Explore has consistently placed among my top list of technology conferences for several years. Explore 2025 delivered – perhaps earning its rightful place at the top! I made some great new connections this year, leveled up with a new certification, and was honored to co-present once again with Dale Hassinger, fellow vExpert and author of the vCROCS blog. We could spend days recapping the events, but I will discuss a small handful below.
The Venue and Accommodations
I very much enjoy Las Vegas and firmly believe it is one of the best locations to host an industry conference of Explore’s size. This year (and for a few years, really), Explore has been hosted at The Venetian Conference and Expo Center. The Venetian is the “big sister” to The Palazzo, which are two massive hotels joined together, sharing the Conference and Expo Center. The hotels are equally fabulous (fitting for Las Vegas) and offer extremely walkable options for the event, shopping, dining, and more. I know that Explore will one day relocate to another venue, but I am very satisfied with this year’s selection.
The People and Energy
Explore 2025 had a different vibe in comparison to the last couple. During Explore 2023, the acquisition by Broadcom was looming and the attendees seemed anxious. At Explore 2024, attendees seemed negative, confused, and even more anxious than before. This year at Explore 2025, the vibe felt more positive. In my observation, attendees have mostly accepted the updated pricing model and are looking for ways to extract more value from VCF. Many attendees are still operating vSphere environments and are planning their migration to a VCF-centric design. I have read a couple of media articles stating the contrary, but I can only speak to my first-hand experience at the event. Although it is true that the number of attendees seemed lesser than previous years, I feel that the quality of the event and number of engaged attendees felt magnified.
Co-Presented a Quick Talk Session
I was privileged this year to co-present a Community Quick Talk session with fellow vExpert and friend, Dale Hassinger. In our session, Enhancing VMware Cloud Foundation Operation Management Packs with PowerShell [CODEQT1121LV], Dale and I discuss leveraging the Management Pack Builder in concert with PowerShell to create beautiful and intuitive Management Packs (MPs) in VCF Operations. Although VCF Operations offers a library of curated Management Packs inside the platform, there are far too many applications and solutions to catalog. This is especially true in the case of SaaS platforms, such as Zoom.
Using the Management Pack Builder and high-level knowledge of APIs, users can monitor the Zoom service status conveniently from within VCF Operations! We also discuss methods to leverage PowerShell or Python to serve an internal API of your own and extract data points using Management Pack Builder. One of our examples demonstrated how to extract NVMe Tiering metrics, which have not yet been productized. This is one of many examples of how users can bridge gaps in data to suit specific business and operational needs and pull the data into VCF Operations. If you can script it, then the data can be pulled into VCF Operations.
Our session was well attended, with nearly 70 in-person attendees! We are also pleased to have been recognized with overwhelmingly positive feedback, courtesy of anonymous attendee surveys. It was a pleasure to share this time with the community!
The Hackathon
One of the greatest highlights of the trip was participating in the Community Hackathon, which was hosted on Monday evening. This year, I joined a small team captained by Dale Hassinger. Our objective was to leverage the power of AI by harnessing Model Context Protocol (MCP). Prior to joining Dale’s team, I hardly knew what MCP stood for, much less how to apply it in a real-world use case. Using PowerShell, we successfully deployed an MCP server capable of querying live data from vSphere, a network switch, and an offline RVTools CSV file – each approach enabled us to query the data at our disposal and illustrate the data using beautiful reports and dashboards. Before our eyes, the data was transformed into meaningful information! You can take MCP so much further by creating DNS records, modifying objects in Active Directory, and so much more! Of course, security with MCP should be at the center of your thoughts, but we enjoyed exploring the possibilities!
Each of the Hackathon teams presented interesting and compelling projects. The judges certainly had much to consider as they weighed several factors to nominate a winner. I am pleased and honored to announce that our team was victorious! Although I feel that our project was undeniably fascinating, we were in good company. The level of technical knowledge and professionalism in the room was truly on the next level! Congratulations to each of the participants!
The Certification Exam
This year, all attendees with a Full Pass were provided a complimentary exam voucher, which was a nice twist. In the weeks prior to the conference, I studied for the VCP-VCF Architect certification, with intent to sit the exam on-site at the event. During the event (possibly shortly prior), Broadcom announced that attendees with a Full Pass could leverage a new benefit: a complimentary opportunity to sit any VCF 9.0 exam! This is a separate benefit from the exam voucher code provided to attendees with a Full Pass prior to the event – so you can either retain your exam voucher code for one year from date of issue or sit another exam at the event!
There was one little catch, however… At the time of the event, only the exam objectives were available for the VCF 9.0 exams – no training courses, books, or blog posts were available to help prepare. This challenge was sort of perfect, inducing all the nerves of a typical exam, and elevated by the uncertainty of being among the first to sit the exam. I’ll admit, it felt like a toss-up all the way through!
I will write a new blog post shortly to discuss my exam experience in a bit more detail, but I am thrilled (and relieved) to announce that I passed the exam, achieving the title of VCP-VCF Architect! This was a rewarding experience and easily one of the great highlights from the event!
Final Thoughts
Although Explore 2024 set a very high bar, I felt more engaged and inspired this year. The community is showing (subtle) indications of healing from the turbulent nature of the acquisition, and VCF 9 is on the scene to help carry us all forward. I know there will be much to discuss at Explore next year! Special thanks to Dale Hassinger and Christopher Kusek for their continued guidance, inspiration, and fellowship over the years. This year’s event was especially successful in my eyes thanks to our continued partnership! Many thanks to several others for their contributions and support along the way! I hope to see you at Explore 2026!