Mike Foley

Husband, Dad, Geek & Senior Technical Marketing Architect for vSphere Security

Author's posts

Oct 28

New VMware Twitter Account @vSphereSecurity

Hi,

I’d like to announce a new Twitter handle for my VMware-focused tweets! @vSphereSecurity is where I’ll be. My @mikefoley account will remain, but I’ll be limiting that to just close friends and colleagues. If you follow me there for VMware stuff, I’d appreciate it if instead, you follow me at the new Twitter account. It will be much more focused on vSphere security-related activities and will have a manageable amount of traffic, making it easier to keep up with what’s going on with vSphere security issues.

Why am I doing this? I’ve always thought it was a good idea to keep work and personal stuff separate. It crosses over at many junctures and frankly, those people that are just interested in vSphere security stuff shouldn’t have to wade through postings of me complaining about seats in airliners or where I’m meeting people for dinner. While entertaining (I hope) at times, I think this is an all-around better solution for me and for the topic I’m passionate about, vSphere security.

I’ll be “culling the herd” of followers of @mikefoley over the next few months to just close friends and colleagues. Take the opportunity now to follow me @vSphereSecurity!

 

Thanks,

mike

Sep 13

Survey: What questions does the security guy ask all the time?

You’re the virtualization admin. Your security guy comes up to you, looking for information. You really don’t want to give him an account on vCenter, do you? (according to a group discussion session I did at VMworld, the answer was clearly “No” with some being a little more colorful by using the term “NFW”!)

But lets face it, the IT Security folks do have a job to do and they really could use information on a regular basis to do their job. Let’s see if we help them by helping you, shall we?

Give us questions, we’ll give you answers

I’m looking for examples of the types of questions IT Security needs regular answers to. Alan Renouf and I are mulling some ways to help both of you out. No details yet but having Alan involved should give you a hint! :) Give us the questions, let us surprise you.

I’ll start this off with some examples:

Security Guy: “I need to see….

  • all the virtual machines that have a CD drive attached
  • what virtual machines are on what network/switch/portgroup
  • what virtual machines are on what storage device
  • what roles are assigned to what users
  • ESXi server SSL certificate details like when they expire
  • What vSwitches are in promiscuous mode
  • any vDS port mirroring details
  • the ESXi shell interactive timeout values
  • what the syslog IP address is set to on the ESXi servers

Based on that, start posting the questions! We’ll try to get as many included in this little project we are working on. We hope you like it!

mike

Dec 07

Where IT happens….is where I’m going.

The past 7 years have been some of great change in my career. Always one to just kinda “go with the flow” and see what interested me, these past few years have been different.

In 2005 I was bugging people about VMware. I had used it sporadically in a previous job and saw the value right away for security. In 2009, I decided to do something about it and through some serious pushing and a very interesting chance meeting, I became RSA’s virtualization evangelist. (and an honorary vSpecialist!)

I got thrust from a “behind the scenes” role into one of meeting with C-level people and explaining to RSA and EMC customers about virtualization and security. In 2011, after assisting in many integrations of RSA products into the virtualized infrastructure (enVision, Archer, Authentication Manager, etc.) I was welcomed onto the product architecture team in addition to my evangelist role. I think I’ve come a long way.

It’s been a wild trip. I’ve talked to thousands of people, countless EBC sessions and fought hard for what I thought was the right way to do things. A far cry from my first role at RSA.

But now it’s time to take that knowledge and apply it elsewhere! So, as of January 7th, I’ll be a VMware employee working in the Technical Marketing organization.

What’s great about this is I’m not joining a group where I know nobody and nobody knows me. I’ll be working with THE BEST technical marketing group in the industry. Names many of you recognize just by first name alone. Alan, Frank, William, Cormac, Rawlinson and many others. Having been a bit of an Army of One for so many years, I’m SO looking forward to collaborating with this team on some great things. I work better when challenged and have like minded folks to bounce ideas off of.

I’ll be focusing my energies on the security of the core platform (vSphere). I’ll be working from home with regular trips to Palo Alto and I’ll be seeing many of you at VMUGs and VMworlds around the world.

As someone who has done a 100 mile per day commute for 7 years, I’m very much ready to work from home. I know, it’s not without its challenges, but I want to make it work. My kids are at the ages (10 & 7) where I was missing a lot of their activities like games and recitals. I relish the ability to be there for them. My family is everything to me.

The challenges will be immense. I envision the workload to be like a large wave that I better catch! I just hope I can paddle fast enough to get up on the board!

Thank you to all those at RSA who helped me get where I am today. I hello to my soon to be fellow VMware mates. I look forward to making something cool happen like you do almost every day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

mike