http://www.informationweek.comInformationWeeken-usCopyright 2012, UBM LLC.2012-12-11T12:55:00ZIt's anybody's guess as to what Cisco's next acquisition will be, but here's why I'm betting on Citrix.http://www.informationweek.com/hardware/data-centers/should-cisco-buy-citrix-or-netapp/240144172?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsJohn Chambers made it quite clear last week that Cisco was not done making acquisitions and that the company has not made a sizeable acquisition in a long while. He also affirmed in so many words that he realizes Cisco has been a bit slower than expected in making acquisitions and in responding to market changes. <P> Chambers also signaled that all of that was going to change and change fast -- although he remained elusive as to what Cisco was going to acquire that would constitute "sizeable" in his mind. Now, of course, acquisitions at a company Cisco's size would have to fall in line with a certain vision it is trying to fulfill or a certain goal it is trying to reach. Not knowing that piece of information, all we can do is speculate as to what would make sense. <P> After Chambers' comments last week, Citrix Systems' stock price went up on speculation of a takeover. Today I want to look at some of Cisco's potential takeover targets and analyze each. I personally believe Cisco has two acquisition possibilities -- Citrix or NetApp -- and that either would be formidable pickups, but depending on the Cisco strategy one would be more suitable than the other. <P> <strong>[ Read <a href="http://www.informationweek.com/infrastructure/switches/cisco-to-acquire-meraki-for-12b/240142312?itc=edit_in_body_cross">Cisco To Acquire Meraki for $1.2B</a>. ]</strong> <P> Let's start with NetApp -- what would Cisco gain from a NetApp pickup? Although it likes to think of itself as a software company and it makes good software, NetApp's business is infrastructure. If Cisco is trying to own a piece of the storage market, NetApp is the last of the independents out there that is truly enterprise scale. This acquisition would enable Cisco to own the stack of compute, network and storage, and with its broad partnerships, NetApp has the virtualization stack well covered as well. Cisco would not need NetApp for its customers as it already has those customers, many of them as <a href="https://www.informationweek.com/quickview/cisco-netapp-push-integrated-data-center/1712?queryText=cisco,%20netapp%20push&wc=4">FlexPod</a> users. <P> What I'm not sure about is whether IBM would allow a NetApp acquisition, given that it sells quite a bit of N-series. Would we see an HP or Dell type fight for NetApp? I wouldn't bet on it -- IBM's contracts are grandfathered in and to IBM the acquisition would not change much. It would benefit Cisco, however, to have a footprint in some IBM strongholds assuming it doesn't already exist there. <P> To sum up, I think a NetApp acquisition would be of limited benefit to Cisco, especially at the price it would have to pay. It would not be my first choice for sure. <P> Citrix, on the other hand, is truly an interesting acquisition play for Cisco, at a market cap of about $12 billion. Citrix presents a market opportunity for Cisco on many different fronts. It's no secret that Cisco never did a great job at software; with a Citrix acquisition this concern would be laid to rest forever. Although Citrix is present in many enterprises, it has nowhere near the coverage that Cisco has, which means that Cisco could potentially grow the Citrix portfolio and grow its market capabilities especially in the mobility space, which is near and dear to Cisco's heart. Citrix also is not a very partner-friendly company as evidenced by the fact that it does not even make the list of top 20 on the CRN's 2012 best companies to partner with. Cisco on the other hand is very partner friendly; that alone could move the market and create immediate value. <P> Citrix also recently <a href="http://www.informationweek.com/security/mobile/citrix-buys-zenprise-whats-next-in-byod/240144028">acquired Zenprise</a>, and Cisco definitely needs an mobile device management offering to augment Cisco ISE. With a Citrix acquisition it could kill two birds with one stone. Zenprise already integrates very nicely into Cisco ISE anyway. In addition to all of the above, Cisco would also get XenServer, a hypervisor that is popular with large cloud providers and service providers in general; that would allow it to have control over its software defined network. <P> The <a href="http://www.informationweek.com/thebrainyard/news/mobile/240006764/citrix-augments-iphone-ipad-collaboration-apps">collaboration portfolio</a> that Citrix would bring to the table is also impressive -- complimentary in some regards, overlapping in others. A Citrix acquisition would also bring a very tight relationship with Microsoft and some interesting synergies and partnering capacities. Not to mention that a Citrix acquisition will also be looked upon more easily by EMC and VMware than a NetApp acquisition, which would put EMC and Cisco in head-to-head competition immediately. <P> Citrix also has a hidden lethal weapon: its acquisition of Bytemobile, a company with a technology to optimize carrier networks for mobility. Once Citrix optimizes its flagship remote desktop protocol ICA/HDX for seamless optimization with Bytemobile, its offering is very alluring. To make things even more interesting, Cisco and Citrix are already collaborating on the NetScaler product and Cisco could probably integrate the Citrix Branch Repeater into its WAAS solution and offer ICA/HDX capabilities that it currently does not have. Like I said, Citrix makes for a really interesting acquisition. <P> If we eliminate Citrix from acquisition contention, then I would be in favor of a NetApp acquisition and an MDM acquisition. Plenty of good options are out there, including OpenPeak, AirWatch, MobileIron and others. <P> Whatever a "sizeable" acquisition for Cisco winds up being, it will surely transform Cisco and our industry. What do you think? I look forward to your feedback! <P> <i>Join Cloud Connect for a free webcast with "Cloudonomics" author Joe Weinman. Cloudonomics is a new way to discuss the benefits of private clouds. Many have focused on the cost reduction possibilities while others have focused on business agility. However, private clouds can play a strategic role, as well. The <a href="http://event.on24.com/r.htm?e=543922&s=1&k=03050B993D09D35972131EDAF5030AD5&partnerref=jdpl">Cloudonomics</a> webcast happens Dec. 12. (Free registration required.)</i>2012-10-23T09:06:00ZCitrix may benefit from Cisco having been poked in the eye one too many times.http://www.informationweek.com/news/240009556?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsLast week's <a href="http://www.citrixsynergy.com/barcelona/index.html">Citrix Synergy Barcelona 2012</a> saw many cool announcements, but two in particular piqued my interest: the Cisco-Citrix alliance and the convergence of XenApp and XenDesktop. <P> First things first. Cisco and Citrix are expanding their partnership, and since Cisco announced that <a href="http://www.crn.com/news/networking/240007425/cisco-ceasing-development-of-load-balancer-products.htm">it will no longer develop ACE</a>, it's pushing Citrix NetScaler as an alternative. This is interesting in light of speculation that Cisco would buy Citrix, or at least the networking division of Citrix. Instead, the two are expanding their partnership. At first blush this seems to squash acquisition rumors, but if you really think about it, why would Cisco choose to go with Citrix NetScaler, which owns 25% of the market, over F5, which owns more than half of the market? Even more to the point, most Cisco customers use F5 gear, so that would have been a natural and expected choice--unless something else is brewing. Keep that in mind as we look at other announcements. <P> Cisco and Citrix also announced an expanded partnership on the Citrix CloudPlatform. This is interesting considering Cisco's newScale acquisition and some recent Cisco blogs discussing integration of features based on OpenStack, as well as the fact that Cisco's prime partner, VMware, has a competing product in the vCloud Suite (vCloud Director and DynamicOps). <P> So what's going on? Cisco and VMware are going to great lengths to say everything is business as usual. However, insiders say VMware's Nicira acquisition did not sit well with Cisco (no surprise there) and that the EMC-Lenovo alliance is also an annoyance. That EMC recently appointed a CTO with a heavy networking background also leads speculators to believe that EMC may be on the lookout for a networking company to acquire. Rumors last week took Juniper's stock soaring when some analysts mentioned it as a possible acquisition. While I love Juniper products, it has a very small footprint in the data center and would do very little for EMC. The ideal choice is Brocade, but given Brocade's OEM relationships and that most of its revenue comes from OEM, an acquisition by EMC would evaporate that revenue. So what would EMC acquire if I were in charge? Arista is definitely a contender. <P> Now bundle all of the above with the fact that EMC in essence took over VMware this past summer with the CEO swap, and we arrive at the reason Cisco is uneasy: EMC and VMware have essentially backfilled for all the technologies they would rely on Cisco for, hence the Citrix alliance expansion. <P> Oh, and did I mention that Citrix recently acquired Bytemobile, a company that accelerates audio and video for service providers (and another Cisco sweet spot)? Citrix obviously did this to accelerate HDX naturally at the carrier level, a brilliant, brilliant move if you ask me, and one that has no competition and requires no action on the part of end users or enterprise IT. <P> Let's take this one step further. Cisco's recent announcements of integration with OpenStack meet Citrix's recent XenServer 6.1 version release, which is packed with OpenStack integration. Here is my take on it: XenServer with just Citrix has few chances of succeeding for many reasons, not least the Citrix-Microsoft relationship and the fact that Citrix pushes Hyper-V more than its own product. Let's face it, Citrix lacks market share and really doesn't know how to remedy that in the enterprise server virtualization space. For public clouds, Xen does well. However, if Cisco was behind XenServer &#8230; well, that would be a totally different game at that point. With Cisco, XenServer has teeth. <P> In my opinion, if Cisco does not own a hypervisor, it will always, always be at the mercy of EMC and VMware. Let's stipulate that the future is virtualized and software defined, from data centers and networks to storage. If that's the case, Cisco needs a hypervisor. <P> What else does Cisco get with Citrix? Only the best desktop virtualization platform out there, one that's compatible with all three major hypervisors. Plus CloudGateway, and since Cisco is all in on mobility, a product like CloudGateway would spread like crazy in its customer base. <P> The synergies between Cisco and Citrix are many. Of course, such an acquisition is daunting because of the sheer size and complexity of the integration challenge. But if it were to happen, it would energize the Cisco base and change the IT landscape. <P> Cisco needs to do something to reinvent itself, and a Citrix acquisition would do that while hitting more than two birds with one stone. Is the Citrix-Cisco alliance just that--an alliance--or something more? Time will tell, but at the very least, Cisco finally snapped back and said to EMC: "Watch it now. Don't push me too hard--I also have friends and alternatives." <P> <em><a href=" http://reports.informationweek.com/514/elias-khnaser/author_bio.html ">Elias Khnaser</a> is the CTO for Sigma Solutions, a vendor-agnostic, solutions-oriented systems integrator. Follow Elias on twitter: @ekhnaser.</em> <P> <em>Our <a href="http://reports.informationweek.com/abstract/19/9066/Network-Infrastructure/research-cisco-outlook-survey.html">InformationWeek Cisco Outlook Survey</a> of nearly 600 IT pros offers plenty of reasons for the network equipment provider to be satisfied, but some kvetching by a vocal minority shows the company can't get complacent.</em>2012-07-25T21:14:00ZNVP technology will lead to sustained profitability and relevance--and throws down the gauntlet for Cisco.http://www.informationweek.com/news/240004378?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsThe tech industry acquisition pace is getting feverish as companies scramble to reinvent themselves for the cloud era. The latest eye-popping buy comes courtesy of VMware, which <a href="http://www.networkcomputing.com/virtualization/240004227">announced its intention to buy Nicira for $1.26 billion</a> just three weeks after <a href="http://www.informationweek.com/news/cloud-computing/infrastructure/240003110">acquiring DynamicOps</a>. Both are fantastic additions to the VMware family and forward the company's strategy. <P> There's been some noise about the Nicira price tag, but VMware can afford it, and the synergy is clear: Nicira is to networking hardware what VMware was to x86 server hardware in that it splits the workload from the underlying hardware resources. Essentially, it brings virtualization to traditional networking hardware by separating the control and data planes, thereby using the hardware for what it's really good at--an IP backplane--while adding via virtual switches a software layer that brings management features, flexibility, and most importantly elasticity. <P> If you think Nicira's core Network Virtualization Platform product sounds a lot like OpenFlow, you're right. Nicira's founders invented OpenFlow, and the company is a big contributor to the OpenStack project; in fact, OpenStack uses Nicira's API for its network interface, and that practically makes VMware and Citrix close (if not kissing) cousins, as Citrix's CloudStack also has heavy roots in OpenStack. <P> But I digress. <P> In VMware's cloud computing vision, virtualization must be possible at every layer--compute, storage, and network--to facilitate automation and the orchestration of pooled hardware resources into meaningful virtual workloads. The network is the last bastion of resistance, yet it's also a critical component as we strive for global workload mobility. <P> And that's why the planned Nicira acquisition is such an important and strategic buy. This is clearly the technology that will lead VMware into sustained profitability and relevance in the enterprise and the cloud. It's also a direct threat to Cisco's core business, and I'll be watching to see how the company will react. It may try to buy Red Hat, but I'm not convinced that will help much. What I am convinced of is that it's high time for Cisco to think about reinventing itself. <P> VMware clearly gets that, despite the unprecedented success of its flagship virtualization product, it cannot ride the vSphere horse forever. Competitors, mainly Microsoft, are closing in--I see Hyper-V making inroads and quite possibly pulling even with or overtaking vSphere in the next two to three years. As a result, VMware has its eyes on the private cloud, hoping to carve out a stronghold in that emerging market. It's made a nice start. In the <em>InformationWeek</em> <a href="http://reports.informationweek.com/abstract/5/8864/Cloud-Computing/research-private-cloud-vision-vs-reality.html">2012 Private Cloud Survey</a>, IT pros building private clouds were presented with a list of 18 vendors and asked which were key to their efforts. VMware led, with 54%. Cisco and Microsoft tied for second, six points behind. It's a slim enough advantage that VMware is smart not to open a second battlefront in the public cloud arena with the likes of Amazon, Google, and IBM. It's too risky right now. <P> In the private and hybrid space, on the other hand, VMware has a strong story. Besides Nicira, the DynamicOps acquisition provides orchestration and VDI-specific capabilities and is also heterogeneous, so it can support more than just the VMware virtualization stack, a capability VMware desperately needed. DynamicOps is VMware's bridge to the public cloud and to third-party virtualization and cloud platforms, and thus critical to its hybrid cloud strategy. <P> Competitors are trying to keep up on the reinvention track, with varying degrees of success. So far this year Citrix has bought Podio (cloud collaboration), Virtual Computer (client-side virtualization management), and Bytemobile (mobile data and video). Dell is well on its way too via its Clerity Solutions, Make Technologies, and <a href="http://www.informationweek.com/news/cloud-computing/infrastructure/232800098">Wyse Technology</a> buys. HP has been struggling, while Microsoft is moving ahead in a calm, calculated, and methodical manner. <P> Cisco, which arguably has the most to lose, has been making some acquisitions here and there, but I get the sense John Chambers thinks there's no hurry. I disagree and think Cisco will be forced to accelerate the reinvention process as companies like VMware start to move in on its turf. <P> For IT, it's extremely exciting watch our industry reinvent itself, with vendors scrambling to realign and remain relevant and profitable. I can't wait to see who comes out on top when the dust settles. <P> Which companies do you think have the clearest strategies and why? Tell us in the comments. <P> <em>Elias Khnaser is the CTO of Sigma Solutions, a vendor-independent systems integrator focusing on mobility, cloud, and big data. Follow Elias on Twitter: @ekhnaser.</em>2012-06-04T21:31:00ZI used to dislike the hypervisor and subscribe to the idea that Redmond is where technology went to die. Here's how Microsoft changed my mind.http://www.informationweek.com/news/240001483?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsA few years ago, I wrote a <a href="http://www.informationweek.com/news/software/bi/229203974">controversial column</a> listing nine reasons Hyper-V was not enterprise ready and suggesting that Microsoft had lost its innovative edge. I think the only Microsoft employee who <em>didn't</em> send hate mail was Bill Gates, and I still maintain that column cost me an MVP award. <P> While I stand by my previous assessment, I also maintain that the situation has changed significantly. Over the past two years, Microsoft has gone strongly into innovation mode, not only on Hyper-V but on many other product lines. The turnaround started with Exchange 2010 and its leveraging of local storage as opposed to complete reliance on expensive shared storage and extends from System Center 2012 (probably my favorite) to the new version of SQL Server, which is following in Exchange 2010's footsteps and technology, to the new, long-awaited and overdue version of App-V, a technology Microsoft acquired many moons ago but on which it bestowed very little development effort. <P> But back to Hyper-V. The new version not only addresses all of my previous beefs with the product, it goes from a position of just playing catch-up with the market leader to actually giving VMware a run for its money at the feature level. This is the first release where Microsoft is putting forth a feature that VMware does not have: the ability to do live migrations of storage virtual machines. <P> Let's take a look at that and eight more features that earn Hyper-V a serious look. <P> <strong>1. Storage Live Migration:</strong> This capability is now built into Hyper-V Manager as opposed to requiring System Center Virtual Machine Manager, as was the case with the Quick Storage Migration. Storage live migration allows IT to migrate a VM, without any downtime, from one storage system to another. Remember that innovation I was talking about? Well, traditionally with storage live migration technologies from Microsoft, VMware and others, a shared storage repository is required for this feature to work properly. In Hyper-V 3, that is not the case. While you could use shared storage, of course--and I highly recommend doing so--you can migrate a live storage VM from local disk to local disk without any downtime. Now the ball is in VMware's court to match that functionality. <P> <strong>2. Concurrent Live Migrations:</strong> I have for many years criticized Hyper-V's lack of concurrent live migrations, and I'm very happy to report that the new version finally supports this capability. For a virtualization administrator, this is invaluable functionality. We live in fast times, and we need to be able to react at the speed of the business. Quickly moving all the VMs running on a given server is a definite requirement in any virtual infrastructure, and this release delivers that. <P> <strong>3. Dynamic Memory:</strong> While not a new feature in Hyper-V 3 (it was available as of Hyper-V R2 SP1), it's worth noting in a list of reasons Hyper-V 3 is ready for enterprise use. In a nutshell, dynamic memory is a memory management enhancement that allows IT to automate adding or removing memory from a VM on the fly--very helpful when trying to improve the density of VMs on a host, for example. And it's a vital feature in any enterprise virtual infrastructure. <P> <strong>4. Continuous Availability:</strong> This is actually a collection of technologies in Hyper-V 3 that includes, in addition to Live Migration and Storage Live Migration, NIC Teaming and Guest Failover Clustering. <P> -- Failover Clustering: Today, the cluster supports only 16 nodes; in Hyper-V 3, the cluster will be able to support 64 nodes and as many as 4,000 VMs. <P> -- NIC Teaming: IT can now combine NICs from different vendors, say, Intel and Broadcom. We also have three modes for configuring NIC Teaming: switch independent, static teaming and Link Aggregation Control Protocol; LACP is huge as it extends support for demanding applications like Citrix Provisioning Services. <P> Finally, for Windows Server 8 or Server 2012, depending on what the name ends up being, Hyper-V 3 has a really cool feature that leverages SMB 2.2 (I am super-excited about SMB 2.2). It can leverage file shares as storage destinations. I'm sure you're thinking "single point of failure," but remember, you can build up to four-node active-active clustered file servers, which provide simultaneous access to file shares. Yeah, SMB 2.2 is cool; the locking mechanism is great as well--watch out, NFS. <P> <strong>5. Network Virtualization:</strong> Microsoft is all-in on cloud, and in order to be effective in the cloud era, you need the network stack in your virtual infrastructure to be solid. It's worth mentioning here that Cisco supports Hyper-V on the Nexus 1000V, so the ecosystem is also coming together. In addition, Hyper-V 3 will support policy-based, software-controlled network virtualization; this is crucial in the cloud era because everything will be about policy-driven automation and orchestration, all key enablers of infrastructure-as-a-service deployments. As part of the Hyper-V 3 network virtualization capabilities, you can also create a bridge between your on-premises and cloud deployments that enables you to move your subnets into the cloud and create logic to allow them to communicate, essentially creating a hybrid cloud. <P> <strong>6. Storage Enhancements:</strong> No enterprise virtual infrastructure is complete without tight integration with storage, and Hyper-V 3 introduces some impressive improvements here as well. First, the new Offloaded Data Transfer is similar in functionality to VMware vSphere APIs for Array Integration, and I'm very eager to see how that improves or even solves the locking issues with CSV, which still redirects I/O through the parent partition. Virtual machines can now support up to four vHBAs with direct access to SAN LUNs using multipath I/O. You also have built-in replication, hardware snapshotting and, my personal favorite, Remote Direct Memory Access networks for SMB storage <P> <strong>7. Platform Enhancements:</strong> The platform has seen some major improvements as well, with support for 320 logical processors and up to 4 TB of memory per host. It's now possible to provision virtual machines with up to 64 vCPUs and 1 TB of memory, a huge upgrade from four vCPUs and 8 GB of memory. The new VHDX file format supports up to a 16-TB virtual hard drive. These enhancements will fuel the virtualization of Tier 1 applications and are critical for an enterprise-class virtualization platform. <P> <strong>8. RemoteFX:</strong> This, again, is not a new feature of Hyper-V 3, but it's very relevant to enterprise IT. Hyper-V supports GPU virtualization, which in desktop virtualization applications can be of great benefit in terms of enhancing the user experience. Essentially, you're able to expose a virtual graphics device to a virtual machine and allow multiple virtual desktops to share a single GPU. This would enable users to run graphically intensive applications on a VM. <P> <strong>9. Hyper-V Replica:</strong> Hyper-V Replica is a new feature of Hyper-V 3 and is somewhat comparable to VMware vSphere Fault Tolerance. Hyper-V Replica will asynchronously replicate virtual machines from one Hyper-V host to another over an IP network. The process is configured at the VM level, so it's not an all-or-nothing proposition. The technology tracks write operations on the source machine and replicates them to the destination VM so that both VMs are in constant lockstep. If one VM fails, the replica takes its place without missing a ping--a pretty cool enterprise-class feature. <P> I am really excited about Hyper-V 3, and I hope Microsoft continues its innovation trend and directs more attention toward alternatives for the parent partition approach and to building a better clustered file system. CSV is not bad, but I think the natural evolution is a really solid, scalable file system. Hyper-V 3 will be the first real challenger to VMware vSphere 5, so let's see how VMware responds. I think competition in this space will continue to drive innovation, and the customer will definitely be the ultimate winner. <P> <em>Elias Khnaser is the CTO of Sigma Solutions, a vendor-agnostic systems integrator focusing on mobility, cloud and big data. Follow Elias on twitter @ekhnaser.</em>2011-10-10T15:14:00ZThink an influx of shiny tablets is the main worry? Sorry to break it to you, but hardware is the <em>least</em> of our problems.http://www.informationweek.com/news/231900458?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsThe <a href="http://reports.informationweek.com/abstract/20/5975/Network-Systems-Management/research-end-user-devices.html">consumerization of IT</a> is forcing IT departments everywhere to rethink their policies, processes, and support procedures. But device diversity isn't all you need to worry about. Consider the applications that users now have free access to--and that allow them to circumvent all those policies and procedures you've so painstakingly put in place. <P> Take Dropbox, the bane of every BC/DR and content management admin. Sure, you could block Dropbox, but what happens when an end user walks down the street to her favorite mobile device store and picks up a wireless 3G card, which she can then plug into her laptop or desktop and use to gain access to the Internet uncensored? You see where this is going, right? Whac-A-Mole isn&#8217;t a long-term strategy. <P> I think this problem will eventually reach the point where IT will demand that a regulatory effort be launched. The goal would be to enforce criteria around how software-as-a-service (SaaS) applications are developed, ensuring that capabilities that will empower IT to protect the integrity and security of corporate data and access control are built in. <P> The big question, of course, is what body would have the power to enforce such regulations. The government is too inflexible and slow, not to mention the outcry that would result. A better route would be a standards body that has in its membership both SaaS vendors and enterprise security pros. That's one option; another possibility, likely more effective and faster on the uptake, would be for OS vendors to require certain criteria for applications that are going to run on their operating systems. But for that to happen, customers of those platforms would need to demand this change. <P> My bigger point is that, as technology companies stop marketing to IT departments and start marketing to your end users, smart shops will think differently and push the ecosystem to invent solutions for today's reality, instead of trying to make yesterday's tools fit a changed world. <P> One promising technology that we could base such new thinking on is location awareness. If SaaS applications are required (by the standards body we discussed earlier) to have functionality for location awareness, we can then develop tools to allow IT to enforce policies and procedures on the use of consumer services when devices are located within the organization. Think about it this way: If Joe is trying to move some files from the server to his Dropbox account, and location services track that he is in XYZ building, where IT has subscribed to the location service and specified a policy, then Dropbox would enforce your regulations based on location. When Joe goes home, he can do whatever he wants. At work, rules apply. And not to pick on Dropbox--Amazon Cloud Drive and Apple iCloud present similar challenges. <P> Take this approach and apply it to all applications, and we regain a reasonable level of control. <P> Right now, location awareness is completely optional, which means some software developers will build it within their applications, others will not. Similarly, some operating systems may have this framework, while others don't. But it's one way we could get a handle on the consumer applications that are threatening to unravel years of data management and security efforts. Would you get behind such an approach, or do you have a better plan? Let me know. <P> <em>Elias Khnaser is the technology officer for integrator <a href="http://www.sigmasolinc.com/">Sigma Solutions</a>. Follow Elias on Twitter: @ekhnaser </em> <P>2011-10-05T18:18:00ZHow do we reconcile a pile of legacy Windows apps with the era of mobility? http://www.informationweek.com/news/231900090?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsI subscribe to the school of thought that we're already in the post-PC era, simply based on the number of mobile devices we support. That point may be arguable, but one thing is not up for debate: PC-based applications, specifically those that run on Windows, are going to be around for a very, very long time, especially in large enterprises. Yes, we hear a lot about SaaS and Web-based alternatives, but who among us doesn't have some legacy software that we have to keep running? <P> Most IT teams have struggled to marry new devices, mostly tablets and smartphones with small displays and touch-screen keyboards, with Windows operating systems and the applications that love them. The main sticking point is that Windows is a point-and-click interface. Some smartphones, such as the Motorola Atrix, allow users to dock a phone in a laptop shell, thereby giving access to a full laptop screen and keyboard. <a href="http://www.celiocorp.com/companion">Celio offers a Redfly</a> mobile shell and dock. That is, however, another piece of equipment users have to carry. Newer phones also have some sort of video output, like HDMI, that would allow the projection of the phone's screen onto a larger display, provided such a display is available. <P> The form-factor problem is another issue. I don't believe anyone enjoys working on a Windows desktop from a smartphone screen, so people will still carry multiple devices when they move around -- a smartphone, a tablet for meetings or on a plane, maybe a laptop PC or Mac just in case. <P> This problem isn't going to go away anytime soon, especially because vendors like Citrix and Microsoft are releasing software that works or will soon work on any device, from Android to iOS and Windows Mobile Phone, all the way to BlackBerry and HTML5; users will be able to connect to PC-era applications leveraging VDI and other technologies. Your users may like seeing a Windows desktop or application on their favorite mobile devices, but this is just perpetuating the problem. <P> In response, many enterprises that have deployed desktop virtualization offer Bluetooth keyboards and mice for their tablet users to maximize the experience, but is that really the solution? There has to be a better way of addressing a PC-era computing architecture with the post-PC-era mobility frenzy. <P> We expect more vendors to start playing in this space, and we'd like to offer a suggestion: Figure out a way to zoom and project the keyboard and screen onto a larger surface, like a holographic display, that can be resized and that allows users to control the brightness and contrast. <a href="http://www.ssidisplays.com/holographic-projection">The technology exists.</a> Now all of a sudden, that smartphone and VDI just became the ultimate computing device for PC-era <em>and</em> post-PC-era applications. We can use the full-size keyboard and holographic display when using point-and-click applications like Word or PowerPoint. The phone is always connected with Wi-Fi and 4G connectivity, so all social media and SaaS applications are available. What else would a road warrior need? <P> VDI has solved the problem of running Windows apps on smartphones. Now we just need those few missing pieces. We'll be watching to see what innovations arise. <P> <em>Elias Khnaser is the technology officer for integrator <a href="http://www.sigmasolinc.com">Sigma Solutions</a>. Follow Elias on Twitter: @ekhnaser</em> <P> <em>In the all-digital issue of InformationWeek Government: As federal agencies close data centers, they must drive up utilization of their remaining systems. That requires a well-conceived virtualization strategy. <a href="http://www.informationweek.com/gogreen/081511gov/?k=axxe&cid=article_axxe_os">Download the issue now</a>. (Free registration required.) </em>2010-10-06T02:24:56ZLast month, Hitachi Data Systems unveiled the much-anticipated refresh of its USP-V enterprise storage platform. The new product, internally codenamed Victoria and officially named the Virtual Storage Platform (VSP), is packed with features and seems to me well worth the wait. The same day HDS made the VSP announcement, HP also announced the release of its P9500, which it OEMs from Hitachi; HP rebrands the VSP and uses its own management software.http://www.iweek-interim.com/news/229200556?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsLast month, Hitachi Data Systems unveiled the much-anticipated refresh of its USP-V enterprise storage platform. The new product, internally codenamed Victoria and officially named the Virtual Storage Platform (VSP), is packed with features and seems to me well worth the wait. The same day HDS made the VSP announcement, HP also announced the release of its P9500, which it OEMs from Hitachi; HP rebrands the VSP and uses its own management software.<strong>3D Without The Glasses</strong> The VSP allows you to leverage storage in three main ways: <P> <strong>Scale Deep</strong> lets you leverage storage virtualization and virtualize all your storage infrastructures behind the VSP for a maximum capacity of 255 PB. The obvious benefits are storage consolidation, but it goes beyond that in its ability to use the virtualized storage in the second-dimension Scale Up. <P> <strong>Scale Up</strong> (and down) is probably THE coolest feature of the VSP; it allows you to dynamically and automatically move data between different storage tiers based on a configured policy. This feature is known as Dynamic Tiering, or Sub-LUN Tiering. It allows you to group SATA, SAS and SSD disks, for example, in a single large resource pool; the system will then move data between the tiers based on a "heat index" that determines which pages are being heavily utilized. <P> It moves the heavily utilized pages to tier 1 disks, thereby allowing them to gain the performance they need; as the heat index for these pages goes down, it moves them to lower-tier disks. This not only saves money on tier 1 disks and dedicating applications to this tier indefinitely, it allows all applications and workloads to more efficiently get access to the right storage tier at the right time. Furthermore, it allows external virtualized storage to participate in this technology, thereby maximizing your investment in external storage and treating these systems as raw resources. <P> <strong>Scale Out</strong> is a grid-type approach that allows you to add multiple physical resource modules (compute and capacity) and logically group them to act as a single entity. <P> <strong>SAS Back End</strong> As of this writing, the VSP is the first enterprise-class storage array to have a SAS (Serial Attached SCSI) back end; this would replace the current Fibre Channel Arbitrated Loop (FC-AL). With this change, HDS also introduces the 2.5 inch disk drives to replace the 3.5 inch drives. While 3.5 inch drives currently have higher capacity, can save more on power, and deliver higher performance, the future is most definitely in the 2.5 inch disk drive, which can provide much more storage capacity in the same amount of space. <P> <strong>Multitenancy</strong> Secure MultiTenancy, or SMT, is a feature of the VSP that I am also particularly interested in as it would be an enabler of cloud technology, both public and private. While the benefits to public clouds are obvious for those providers that will host multiple clients' data, the benefits to private clouds are equally important as many organization require separation of data within the different departments of the organization, or they would require this separation as they interact with data they receive from their customers. Legal consulting and market research firms are among the many that come to mind right away. <P> <strong>The Command Suite Management Software</strong> After seeing the software, one of my colleagues paused for a few minutes then said, "Wow, you guys went from having the worst software on the planet to having one of the best interfaces on the planet." This pretty much sums up the drastic change that was made to the management software. <P> You no longer have to install each piece separately; you install it once and enable the features you want based on a license key. The interface is very GUI-driven, very fast, and when the software is doing something, you will see an animation that tells you, in effect, "I'm still here, I'm executing your task." <P> I will write more about the management software soon, especially the orchestration piece, as it does an amazing job at provisioning resources from physical, to logical, all the way to a functional virtual machine. <P> <strong>VMware's VAAI</strong> One area of (limited) disappointment with the VSP announcement was that it did not include support for VMware's VAAI or vStorage APIs for Array Integration. In summary, VAAI makes storage arrays VM-aware and as a result improves performance greatly. That being said, HDS did promise support in the first code update, which is due about 60 days after the initial launch date. <P> To sum it all up, the VSP lives up to the expectations of an enterprise-class storage platform with flexibility, scalability, security, and performance at the core of its architecture. <P> There are tons more new features in the VSP, I make mention of my favorites in this post, but for more technical deep dive, check out Nigel Poulton's <a href="http://blog.nigelpoulton.com/hitachi-virtual-storage-platform-vsp/">blog</a> and StorageNerve's <a href="C:\Users\Elias\Documents\PowerGramo Records">blog</a>. <P> Disclaimer: I work for a system integrator that partners with HDS, HP, EMC, Dell, Xiotech and others. The opinions expressed here are my own and do not represent my employer. <P> <b>Elias Khnaser is the practice manager for virtualization and cloud computing at <a href="http://www.artemistechnology.com">Artemis Technology</a>, a vendor-neutral integrator focused on aligning business and IT. Follow Elias on Twitter @ekhnaser</b>2010-08-24T00:12:25ZHP's trumping of Dell's bid for 3PAR is a masterful preemptive strike. HP is certainly not that interested in 3PAR and will most likely not counter offer should Dell choose to pursue the deal. What HP <em>is</em> interested in is making the buy as expensive as possible for Dell in order to throw a wrench into the PC giant's further acquisitions ambitions.http://www.iweek-interim.com/news/229200806?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsHP's trumping of Dell's bid for 3PAR is a masterful preemptive strike. HP is certainly not that interested in 3PAR and will most likely not counter offer should Dell choose to pursue the deal. What HP <em>is</em> interested in is making the buy as expensive as possible for Dell in order to throw a wrench into the PC giant's further acquisitions ambitions.Dell has been strategically making moves to expand its business and position itself for the "cloud madness" that is inevitably going to reshape data centers. Its acquisition of Perot Systems echoed that of HP's EDS and creates a very powerful services arm for Dell. That was step No. 1. <P> Dell's strategic vision is to further its move into the data center space by building a converged infrastructure offering that is similar to HP's Converged Infrastructure, EMC's vBlock and Hitachi Data Systems' UCP. In order for Dell to accomplish that, it needed a strong storage offering, and 3PAR was the perfect choice. However, in order to build a converged infrastructure end to end, Dell still needs a networking partner. I, and a number of others, believe that the next target acquisition for Dell will be Brocade. That would complete the circle and transform Dell from a PC maker into a full- blown player in the data center space, competing with HP, IBM and others on all levels. <P> Dell with 3PAR, Brocade and Perot Systems would be perfectly positioned to help customers of all sizes move to the private cloud and eventually to the public cloud. Its consulting arm would provide the expertise required, and its fulfillment arm would provide all the hardware needed. Dell would also be able to build Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) offerings that would allow it to host and manage organizations' infrastructures and relieve companies of the burden of building and managing data centers. <P> While I believe HP's move is aimed more at stopping or slowing down Dell's future acquisitions than an interest in 3PAR, make no mistake: HP would benefit from a 3PAR acquisition. HP is surely interested in 3PAR's storage virtualization offerings, and HP is well positioned to sell that line into its accounts as a means of storage consolidation. That being said, however, I think the bigger question here is, Who will get to the cloud first? The road to the cloud is surely paved with a converged infrastructure, and by bidding for 3PAR, HP slows down its rival's ability to build a true competing converged system. OK, so HP is the chip leader and has raised Dell; the question is, Will Dell call or fold? If Dell calls the bid, it will have paid much more than it expected to for 3PAR. Or, Dell could be considering a different (less costly) acquisition -- Compellent comes to mind. The only problem there is, if Dell backs down on 3PAR, will this be a "compellent" precedent for others looking to deny Dell a storage partner? <P> The worst thing in all of this? My interview with 3PAR CEO David Scott at VMworld next week was canceled due to the events that unfolded this week. Thanks a lot, HP. <P> <b>Elias Khnaser is the practice manager for virtualization and cloud computing at <a href="http://www.artemistechnology.com">Artemis Technology</a>, a vendor-neutral integrator focused on aligning business and IT. Follow Elias on Twitter @ekhnaser</b>2010-07-21T09:27:00ZLast week I read a few interesting articles about storage in desktop virtualization, VDI in particular. The consensus is that this storage belongs on local disk, not the SAN. One industry expert even says you can use SSDs locally and <em>still </em>get away for less money. I beg to differ.http://www.iweek-interim.com/news/229200982?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsLast week I read a few interesting articles about storage in desktop virtualization, VDI in particular. The consensus is that this storage belongs on local disk, not the SAN. One industry expert even says you can use SSDs locally and <em>still </em>get away for less money. I beg to differ.Blogger Brian Madden <a href="http://www.brianmadden.com/blogs/brianmadden/archive/2010/07/14/f-the-san-vdi-storage-should-be-local.aspx">posted an article</a> making the case for using local disk. Madden makes some good points, so kudos for starting a needed conversation. Industry veteran Ron Oglesby followed Madden's post, going one step further and suggesting that <a href="http://blog.unidesk.com/virtual-desktop-management-blog/bid/12697/Why-Is-Local-Disk-Being-Ignored-In-VDI-Deployments">we can even use SSD</a> and it will still be cheaper than SAN. <P> But I think they're missing a key point. <P> When talking local disk vs. SAN for desktop virtualization, the first thing that comes to mind for me is, Why are we even comparing these two technologies? Are we trying to save on CapEx expenditures to justify the project? If so, both Brian and Ron know very well that VDI does <i>not</i> deliver significant CapEx savings. Desktops have no data center footprint and have always been a decentralized model. <P> Desktop virtualization, however, <em>will</em> save you significant money on OpEx, which is where the highest spend tends to be. CapEx costs have been steadily going down and represent less than 20% desktop total cost of ownership, according to Gartner, IDC and others; meanwhile, OpEx costs have been steadily going up and represent more than 80% of total cost of desktop ownership. <P> Beware trying to justify a VDI project by showing savings in CapEx just to get it approved. You may well create an administrative nightmare in which you spend more in operational and management costs than you saved. And no, you can't hide that from the CFO for very long. <P> Rather than comparing local disk to SAN, then, we should be comparing how much it will cost us to refresh these desktops vs. the added SAN capacity. If you have to refresh desktops, then you must have money allocated somewhere. So let's look at the numbers. <P> <strong>Desktop Refresh</strong> Consider a midsize company that has about 2,000 desktops. To keep the math simple, I am going to assume each desktop will cost $500 to refresh, hence: <P> 2000 x $500 = 1,000,000.00 (1 million dollars) x 20% (generous discount) = $800,000 <P> So it will cost us this much just to refresh the hardware. I am not going into the costs of preparing the desktop or anything of that nature. Now let's examine both the local disk and the SAN options. We are making the following assumptions: &#8226; 45 VMs per host &#8226; 2 GB memory each &#8226; 12 IOPS <P> There are other very relevant metrics, but for costing purposes we will stop here, assuming the rest is equal between the two scenarios. <P> <strong>Solution 1: VDI Using Local Storage</strong> To support 2,000 VMs with 2 GB memory each and 12 IOPS using local storage, our calculations are as follows: <P> 2,000 VMs / 45 = 45 hosts (rounded) + 3 extra hosts for HA = 48 total hosts. <P> 2,000 VMs x 12 IOPS = 24,000 IOPS total required <P> To achieve this IOPS level, we will need our 45 servers to be populated with eight local disks (Brian mentioned eight in his article) at 300 GB each with 15,000 RPMs. We ran a quick config on Dell's Web site for a 2U server with those specs and the price came out to about $16,000 per server. Considering we need 48 of them, the total came to $768,000. With a generous 20% discount for special pricing, our final total price for this config comes out to $614,400 <P> Assuming we will have a RAID 10 configuration in these servers for best performance, that will cut the number of spindles we have from eight to four, and considering we get about 170 IOPS per 15,000 RPM HDD, the math is as follows: <P> 192 spindles x 170 IOPS = 32,640 IOPS <P> This is more than adequate to handle the load based on the requirements we suggested. Now, I am hoping that Brian and Ron are not suggesting we don't use any sort of RAID with local disk, because that would mean eight different data stores if we are using ESX, and a entire mess when using Citrix PVS, but especially if we are using linked clones. <P> <strong>Solution 2: VDI Using SAN</strong> Now let's take the same example and price it out as well to see how it becomes different. The server calculation changes slightly as we add a single dual-port 8 GB HBA in each server and 2 RAID 1 HDD. <P> 48 x $12,000 = $576,000 - 20% = $460,800 <P> The storage, however, looks like this: <P> We calculated the cost of a Hitachi AMS 2500 with 408 HDD (600 GB 15k RPMs) in order to get 30,000 IOPS; our calculations after special pricing came to $400,000. The total cost of Scenario 2 comes to $860,800. <P> That's a deficit between local disk and SAN of $246,400. If we compare this with the cost of a desktop refresh, you will notice that there is no CapEx savings as we stated earlier, unless you go down the local disk route. <P> So let's take a closer look at the challenges you will face using local disk. <P> <strong>No Blades</strong> The first thing that stands out is you cannot use blade technology, so if you are deploying these 48 servers, you will need 2.5 racks, at least, if you can find 1U servers that take 8 local disks, or 3.5 racks if you are using 2U servers. Now you also have to factor in the network infrastructure costs to support these 48 servers. However, going down the SAN route, one could easily use blade servers in a single rack. Of course, you will need at least 2 racks for the storage trays as well in this configuration. <P> <strong>Hardware Refresh</strong> When deploying an enterprisewide solution like desktop virtualization, the total cost of ownership is not the only metric that should be used to measure viability. One should also take into consideration the longer term cost of maintaining this environment. The scenario that suggests local disk neglects the fact that servers typically are on a three-year refresh cycle. In this case the cost of deploying the environment with local disk will be incurred every three years or so. On the flip side, SANs have a much longer lifecycle within any enterprise organization. SANs can go anywhere from five to 15 years, thus maximizing the investment made. <P> There is one other thing I want to mention about SANs: The hard drives that are delivered within SANs are much better architected and have a longer life span than those available with servers. There is a lot we can get into about hard drive manufacturing efficiencies and everything that goes into it. That is a topic for another discussion, but not all hard drives are manufactured equal. <P> <strong>Server Maintenance</strong> Let's examine area where the use of a SAN maximizes efficiency. In a local-disk model, how do you maintain your servers? From a patching perspective, hardware perspective, the only way is to schedule downtime for the desktops on these servers. Sure, you will say right away, we can use some of the spares, true, but if those spares are also put into production (as they should be if you go down that model) then you would have to manually load balance your VMs across all remaining hosts. You would need to go through this exercise every time you want to do any maintenance task on your host. <P> One of the advantages of a SAN is that you can migrate all VMs and redistribute them appropriately at any time of the day, and run your maintenance. Contrary to popular belief, most IT people don't enjoy working after hours and would appreciate any technology that allows us to complete all our tasks during the normal business day so we can go home. <P> Another metric to consider and add to the local disk scenario, is how many extra hours your employees will register supporting this environment? <P> <strong>Efficient Resource Usage</strong> The whole idea behind virtualization is the effective utilization of resources. When we deploy a local-disk scenario, we are not using our storage resources efficiently. Let me explain. If your SAN is configured correctly, you can utilize the full spectrum of spindles that are available to you in order to complete any given task in a timely manner. The idea of a SAN is that you can move these workloads or schedule them to run at a different time of the day where they can get access to as many spindles and render the best performance. <P> Let's take our local disk example. During business hours, local disk resources will be utilized. However, as the business day comes to a close, users will tend to use their desktops less often and all these local resources are going to waste. <P> A SAN can take advantage of these resources and dynamically balance them during the day, but can also take full advantage of them after hours if there was a need to run certain disk-I/O- intensive applications. An IT manager's role is not to look at projects in an isolated way but rather try and find ways to maximize the IT infrastructure, as it is a single entity that delivers IT as a service. <P> <strong>Dynamic Load Balancing</strong> When deciding to use desktop virtualization and VDI in particular for an enterprise of 2,000 desktops, you want to at least know you have the flexibility of having this infrastructure load balance itself as it needs to. In the Terminal Services days, that was always one of the downsides as we could not load balance resources without having them disconnect. vMotion solved this problem for in VDI. Having the ability to load balance VMs across the least busy host is not a nice to have, it is a must have. <P> The alternative with local disk is what? Manual load balancing? Can someone tell me how that would work? Ruben Sprujit <a href="http://www.brianmadden.com/blogs/rubenspruijt/archive/2010/05/02/vdi-and-storage-deep-impact.aspx">presented a valuable piece on storage design as well.</a>If we are using Sprujit's document as the basis for our discussion, he suggests different profiles for different users. Power users will use more IOPS, So what do we do? Isolate power users on dedicated hosts? That would require more hosts as the IOPS requirements increase. <P> A mixture on the same hosts? And who would manage that? And how do you scale? Do you <em>really</em> want to go backwards and not use all the advancements that virtualization has brought to the table? <P> <strong>The Final Analysis</strong> If you are going to do so much manual work when using local disk as your VDI design, then what is the point of virtualizing? You may as well stay on physical desktops as they require as much support. <P> It all comes down to why you are considering desktop virtualization. If you are doing it because you want a better way of supporting and managing desktops, then great. But if you are doing it just because it is the hottest thing and you don't have the right budget, then take a step back. <P> Local disk could play a role in environments where you are virtualizing fewer than, say, 500 desktops. But for larger enterprises, local disk is just not a viable solution. <P> And one final thought: In a world moving more and more toward converged infrastructures and private and public clouds, I am not sure that suggesting local disk is in the best interest of enterprise organizations. <P> <b>Elias Khnaser is the practice manager for virtualization and cloud computing at <a href="http://www.artemistechnology.com">Artemis Technology</a>, a vendor-neutral integrator focused on aligning business and IT. Follow Elias on Twitter @ekhnaser</b>2010-07-15T11:18:57ZAs I look back at the timeline of technology, I can clearly distinguish a turning point in IT's evolution. I see the technology landscape in terms of "Before Virtualization" (BV) and "After Virtualization" (AV).http://www.iweek-interim.com/news/229201000?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsAs I look back at the timeline of technology, I can clearly distinguish a turning point in IT's evolution. I see the technology landscape in terms of "Before Virtualization" (BV) and "After Virtualization" (AV).Up until recently, every time I heard the term "cloud computing," it would annoy me, it rubbed me as just another hyped up marketing term that means nothing. As technology advanced and as I start to understand the significant effect that virtualization has had on technology, cloud computing starts to make more sense to me, even as the term is very general and can mean a lot of things. In this blog, I want to focus on the Infrastructure As A Service aspects of Cloud Computing. When I look back at my years in this industry and how many data centers I have been part of building, millions of dollars spent, I find it fascinating to think that in 10 years' time if not earlier, organizations will not need to build data centers anymore. Why would they? <P> As IaaS evolves, as communications links and pipes grow, as security in the cloud is enhanced, why would we spend the upfront capital cost of building a data center when we can pay a consumption cost just like we do utilities? <P> I am sure someone will jump and say we have had this for years, true, the idea of outsourcing existed for years but was extremely difficult to implement, manage efficiently and deliver the expected results. There was two types of outsourcing models, one that says we will move all your hardware into our data centers and we will manage it for you. This model, typically always ends up in heartache, as the company that is outsourcing is under staffed or is incapable of delivering the quality expected etc&#8230; <P> The second model called for placing your equipment in an outsourced data center but continuing to manage it yourself. This took the cost of building a data center and moved it to a better suited facility but did not reduce cost much, if at all. I am aware that there are other models, all of which never took off and did not make any financial or technical sense, until now. <P> This is all "BV." Now, while the concept of virtualization is not new, it was new on the x86 platform and made enough of an impact that it affected the way we build systems, applications and data centers. The impact was so large, that we now can add a third model of outsourcing, if I can even call it that, and that is to outsource the entire infrastructure and use resources on as-needed basis. <P> Why build my own data center, my own storage area network, my own servers, worry about management, maintenance, refresh and all the hassles that go with it? When I need a server with 2TB of tier 1 disk, I can request it and it will dynamically be allocated to me in minutes. If I need more disk space, I can request it and pay for it when I need it. Why do I have to bother worrying about how much storage I will need this year? And plan for 3 years ahead? If I can offload these tasks to my cloud provider, have them build the infrastructure, provide me the security I need, the SLAs I need, why should I spend my capital on IT when I can invest it in my business and grow it? <P> Organizations will still need an IT department, as the functions remain, but the infrastructure goes away. You still need system admins to build your servers, configure them and maintain them, but they don't maintain the underlying hardware that they run on. This concept was not possible "BV." Just imagine if you are a cloud provider in the physical world and had to spin up a physical server every time it is requested of you. It would not be viable on any level. Thus the era of "AV," which is changing the way we do technology and transforming IT into a real services organization that bills on actual resource consumption. <P> It is going to be exciting to see how this transforms companies like Dell, HP, IBM and others, companies which are built on selling hardware. My guess is that they will transform into the biggest consumers of their own products, they will become the biggest cloud providers; they still need to build servers but instead of selling them, they host them and sell resources. They will become the biggest IT staffing companies, as these infrastructures grow, so will the need for more people to maintain them. <P> Will there be lock in? Perhaps, but ask yourself this, how many choices do you have when it comes to your electricity provider? For those of us in Illinois, it is ComEd. At least you will have choices in IaaS, and as communications links grow, moving your data from one provider to another should not be difficult. <P> I wonder what our technology landscape will look like in 2020? I wonder how we will leverage technology and if I will be reading this blog and smiling, remembering how we built data centers and saying, Wow, we really did hard labor. <P> <b>Elias Khnaser is the practice manager for virtualization and cloud computing at <a href="http://www.artemistechnology.com">Artemis Technology</a>, a vendor-neutral integrator focused on aligning business and IT. Follow Elias on Twitter @ekhnaser</b>2010-07-12T02:37:13ZIs Microsoft trying to win back the virtualization market by, once again, leveraging its desktop dominance? Redmond has a history of using this strategy -- remember when Novell was its main competitor in the server market? The popularity of Windows on the desktop eventually forced IT to adopt Windows NT. The approach that Microsoft is reportedly taking with Windows 8 and Hyper-V 3 seems strikingly familiar. And that's OK by me.http://www.iweek-interim.com/news/229201056?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsIs Microsoft trying to win back the virtualization market by, once again, leveraging its desktop dominance? Redmond has a history of using this strategy -- remember when Novell was its main competitor in the server market? The popularity of Windows on the desktop eventually forced IT to adopt Windows NT. The approach that Microsoft is reportedly taking with Windows 8 and Hyper-V 3 seems strikingly familiar. <P> And that's OK by me.Some background: Last week, <a href="http://virtualization.info/en/news/2010/07/first-details-about-hyper-v-3-0-appear-online.html">information leaked</a> that Hyper-V 3 will be integrated into Windows 8. The information, if confirmed, is significant as it highlights the importance of a Type 1 client hypervisor. You see, if we are able to virtualize desktops using the native operating system functionality without incurring an additional cost, it will trigger adoption of Hyper-V on the server virtualization side. That would help IT unify the virtualization platform and give many of us the ability to centrally manage client hypervisors and use advanced synchronization features. <P> This is the only way Microsoft can hope to counter or catch up to VMware's vSphere, as the product matures and the offerings become very granular, addressing enhancements in every aspect of virtualization, from storage I/O enhancements to network I/O enhancements and more. The question then becomes, Will vSphere eventually become the very large private and public cloud platform, ceding the SMB space to Microsoft? Or will VMware be able to dazzle us once more with features and functionality that reinforce its leadership across the spectrum? <P> The interesting thing about this announcement is that Microsoft acknowledges that it has a problem with the current version of Hyper-V; its reliance on the parent partition, which requires a lot of disk space, is an attack surface, and so on. All of these are concerns that I raised months ago in my <a href="http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2009/12/9_reasons_enter.html">InformationWeek article "9 Reasons Why Enterprises Should not Switch To Hyper-V"</a>(I will have a follow up on that article soon). Thus it is an extremely welcome step that Microsoft is taking in making virtualization an integral part of Windows 8. <P> To do this, Microsoft is reportedly expanding on an existing technology, code-named "MinWin." As the <a href="http://www.pcinpact.com/actu/news/58083-microsoft-bernard-ourghanlian-virtualisation-noyau-windows-win8.htm">original article</a> (in French) discusses, MinWin was introduced with Windows Vista and will be further enhanced into a true bare-metal hypervisor with a very small footprint and no reliance on a parent partition. Actually, it seems MinWin will be smaller than an install of Windows Core. <P> This approach removes the concerns of an attack surface that I and others have raised, reduces the resource needs around installing Hyper-V, and modularizes it so that only the needed components are loaded. One of the main things Microsoft is working on that will arrive with Windows 8 is the separation of Internet Explorer from the operating system. This means that you will be able to add IE as a component if you need to, but it will not be so tightly integrated with the shell of the operating system. Another feature that Microsoft is working on disintegrating, specifically for MinWin, is the shell itself. MinWin will be an extremely small install base with practically no traditional Windows shell. As you know, the Windows shell is a resource hog; by introducing this thin hypervisor without a shell, you remove unnecessary resource consumption as well. <P> The French article goes on to talk about another cool feature of Windows 8: the tight integration of App-V with it, to the point where you can run Windows XP, Windows 7 and Linux apps all natively on the operating system, further compartmentalizing Windows and encouraging the use of virtualized applications. <P> The big question that I have is, Can we run virtualized applications on Windows 8 using <em>just</em> MinWin without loading a virtual machine and full install of an operating system? This would be a great step forward, but I wonder how, and even if, it is possible. What happens to the registry and other dependencies? Certainly, the idea of writing applications that run directly on the hypervisor is interesting, but is it feasible? <P> <b>Elias Khnaser is the practice manager for virtualization and cloud computing at <a href="http://www.artemistechnology.com">Artemis Technology</a>, a vendor-neutral integrator focused on aligning business and IT. Follow Elias on Twitter @ekhnaser</b>2010-06-30T20:43:20ZEvery now and then, a technology comes along that's intriguing enough that I sit up and take notice. Unidesk, a start-up based in Massachusetts, recently introduced the concept of "composite virtualization," a technology that addresses a missing component in VDI implementations: user personalization. Now, you may be saying, "That's not new, it's existed forever in profile management and other tools." In this blog, I will explain why the way Unidesk approaches personalization really <em>is</em> new.http://www.iweek-interim.com/news/229202463?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsEvery now and then, a technology comes along that's intriguing enough that I sit up and take notice. Unidesk, a start-up based in Massachusetts, recently introduced the concept of "composite virtualization," a technology that addresses a missing component in VDI implementations: user personalization. Now, you may be saying, "That's not new, it's existed forever in profile management and other tools." In this blog, I will explain why the way Unidesk approaches personalization really <em>is</em> new.<strong>The VDI Challenge</strong> <P> Everyone is wondering why desktop virtualization has been slower to take off than server virtualization. The problem to my mind is that the first wave of desktop virtualization adopters treated it the same way they did server virtualization. However, the desktop is a totally different beast. They are very personal, very customized and with an infinite number of applications. Desktops pose support, security and manageability issues unknown on the server side. <P> This first wave of adopters were creating VMs in the data center, placing a thin client or some sort of device on the client side, and giving users access that way. They quickly realized this solution does not scale, nor does it yield the results they were expecting. Needless to say, it is also a very expensive strategy. This led to a wave of pundits declaring that desktop virtualization is not ready. <P> Another group of adopters took the VMware and Citrix approaches of streaming and linked clones. They got much further and earned better scalability, TCO and ROI. <P> A third group, the real geeky ones, understood that the problems in VDI are the applications and the user personalization, hence Unidesk. <P> <strong>Layering With A Twist</strong> <P> A new buzzword being thrown around today is "layering," the idea of separating certain components from the underlying operating system. For that matter, some might say that server virtualization is another form of layering, as it separates the hardware from the software that gets installed on it. Microsoft, Citrix and VMware can also say that they are doing layering with their application virtualization offerings, as they are laying the applications on the operating system without installing them, or modifying the operating system at all. They are right, they are layering on top of the operating system, and therein lies the problem ... for years we have been trying to solve the issue of application compatibility, conflicts, isolation, and we have come up with great ideas and solutions <strong>but all on top of the operating system. </strong> <P> <img src="http://i.cmpnet.com/informationweek/1272/FigureA.jpg" width="496" height="520"><br /> <P> Windows, today, is an OS that allows everything to be directly installed on it. The consequences of that are that applications, drivers and other software affect each other. A good application can be affected and slowed down due to the presence of a bad application. A driver can crash the operating system. Add to all of that the fact that repairing Windows is difficul, aside from reimaging the machine back to its gold state, and then restoring the data. Some of us image their machines every six months to start fresh and improve performance. <P> Compare that with the very siloed and isolated approach we take with servers. Typically, each server (physical or virtual) is dedicated to an application; therefore, we eliminate the issues and stabilize the operating system. A good workaround for servers, but for desktop that would mean giving users a desktop for each application they want to use, clearly not a practical approach. All this being said, you can see how Windows is the weak link. Unidesk is taking a shot at fixing windows itself. <P> Unidesk's Composite Virtualization addresses this issue by isolating everything in separate containers or layers. The operating system will always be in its own layer in read-only format, so it will never be modified. Applications are also separated in their own containers, and so is the user personalization and data. The best part of isolating these components is the fact that you can do snapshots at the personalization layer, say every 24 hours. So let's imagine a situation where the CFO somehow corrupted Excel; with the click of a button, you can roll back the personalization layer to a different point in time when Office was working and thereby repair that particular application. For a file, you can snapshot back to an earlier point in time where the file was not corrupted; all this without affecting the different layers, applications or other data. <P> <img src="http://i.cmpnet.com/informationweek/1272/FigureBone.jpg" width="396" height="367"><br /> <P> <img src="http://i.cmpnet.com/informationweek/1272/FigureBtwo.jpg" width="398" height="366"><br /> <P> Unidesk will allow for a self-service, self-healing portal that a user can access and repair her desktop, taking it back to a point in time when it was working. This rollback ability is available with most VDI packages today. What is not available is the ability to roll back in time at the personalization-layer level, or to give the user aself-service portal to do so, which is what differentiates Unidesk. <P> <strong>How Does It Work?</strong> <P> Unidesk's offering is currently VDI-only, which means it requires a hypervisor of some sort to function. Composite Virtualization operates on top of the hypervisor, but below the operating system. You first build your Windows gold image the way you are used to, and configure it to your liking. Once it is ready, you install the Unidesk converter, which will then import the gold image and inject the Unidesk driver under the file system. The imported gold image is then moved to the CacheCloud appliance, where it is stored. The CacheCloud appliance is the storage point that hosts all the virtual disks. <P> Once you have imported your gold image, any additional application that the user installs, or IT provisions, will be layered in its own isolated container. These layers will represent the different files and registry changes that this new application introduces. The power of Unidesk lies in the fact that while these files and registry settings are isolated and stored separately, they are still merged and presented to the OS as if they were locally installed. Now that's pretty cool. In addition, the layers that IT creates can also be versioned for easier management and support. <P> When a VM is created, it gets a very small virtual disk that contains the Windows page file and some necessary boot files needed to get this VM connected to the CacheCloud appliance. The CacheCloud then maps the necessary virtual disks to this VM, composites them together, and presents them as a single entity to the operating system. Think of this boot process as booting to SAN, instead here you are booting to virtual disks on the CacheCloud appliance. <P> <strong>Storage Savings</strong> <P> One of the biggest hurdles for the adoption of VDI has been the storage costs associated with the initial build out and maintenance of the environment. Many software makers have tried to address this issue ... Citrix has its provisioning server, VMware its linked clones and others have deduplication solutions that at first glance sound very interesting. However, if you take a step back and think about it logically, if you can solve the duplication issue then you would not need to deduplicate. Citrix and VMware were both on the right track with the provisioning server and linked clones; they allow many users to share a single instance of an operating system, thereby reducing storage costs. The problem with both of these approaches is that you lose personalization, and the only thing you can really retain are profile changes. <P> VMware and Citrix are still taking Windows the way it is and applying technologies around it. Everyone is working around Windows, on top of Windows, but the problem is Windows itself. <P> By layering applications, user data and the operating system, you can then leverage the CacheCloud Appliance as a storage point to boot hundreds of VMs. This allows you to maintain the flexibility and control that we have been talking aboute. Now, all of a sudden VDI is not that expensive, is flexible and achievable. <P> <strong>WAN Optimization</strong> <P> The WAN, the WAN, the WAN, there is no escaping the WAN. How do you support VDI across the WAN? There is a caveat which I don't think we will ever be able to get around, you will have to pay an initial replication tax, which means in one way or another you have to get the initial files to the remote location. The ideal design would see an appliance deployed at every site you have an infrastructure or you intend on providing VDI. That CacheCloud will then serve as the storage point for the VDI instances in that site. Assume your HQ is in Chicago but you have a VDI presence in London, and you have deployed the CacheCloud appliance there but you need to make a change, perhaps an application or OS upgrade. Typically that would mean you have to move the entire image to this remote site, thereby paying that replication tax each time. <P> Unidesk's approach is smarter, it allows you to replicate at the block level and only replicate those bits that have changed, thereby significantly reducing update and replication times. <P> <strong>Offline Support</strong> <P> The offline use case has most definitely been one of the biggest hurdles that has stood in the face of server-based computing adoption, even before VDI, going all the way back to Terminal Server. Users in today's fast-paced world need to be able to access their stuff offline. <P> Unidesk will leverage the type 1 client hypervisors that are available from a number of companies, including Citrix (already released beta) and VMware (soon). What Unidesk will do is deploy that same CacheCloud Appliance to the type 1 hypervisor and serve up VMs locally. <P> The best part of this approach is, again, the WAN friendliness. We can now update these VMs without having to push an entire image down to the user, just send the bits that have changed. Unidesk's technology finally allows us to harness the power of a centralized environment without losing the flexibility and customization that users expect in a desktop environment. <P> Going forward, I expect that Unidesk will be a tempting acquisition target. Microsoft would be my bet because a Unidesk acquisition would give it a technology that it can extend into its operating system, transforming Windows into a very dynamic and powerful OS of the future. Citrix could also make a strategic move here to enhance its position in the desktop virtualization race, and VMware is always a possibility to up its VDI cred. We'll be watching. <P> <b>Elias Khnaser is the practice manager for virtualization and cloud computing at <a href="http://www.artemistechnology.com">Artemis Technology</a>, a vendor-neutral integrator focused on aligning business and IT. </b>2010-06-29T01:21:52ZA few weeks ago, HDS put together its first-ever blogger day, hopefully the first of many. Titled "HDS Blogger Day 0.9," I and other bloggers had access to an impressive lineup of executives and technical leaders. The company's CEO, Jack Domme, attended the dinner after the event, a great show of support for the community in general. But I do have some remaining questions.http://www.iweek-interim.com/news/229202448?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsA few weeks ago, HDS put together its first-ever blogger day, hopefully the first of many. Titled "HDS Blogger Day 0.9," I and other bloggers had access to an impressive lineup of executives and technical leaders. The company's CEO, Jack Domme, attended the dinner after the event, a great show of support for the community in general. <P> But I do have some remaining questions.During my visit it became clear how much of a focus HDS is placing on virtualization and cloud computing. The Unified Computing Platform (UCP) is a promising technology (I will be blogging about this in coming weeks) but how do you intend on countering or competing with EMC, Cisco and VMware's VCE? I understand that the UCP is an open platform that may at some point even include and support EMC storage, Cisco servers and VMware hypervisors. However, you still have a competing product. <P> EMC is building an army (I'm referring to "Chad's army" of vSpecialists -- industry experts, bloggers and influencers -- assembled by Chad Sakac, VP, VMware Technology alliance at EMC.) This group's <em>sole purpose</em> is to evangelize VCE. That is brilliant knowledge marketing. Sakac says he intends to double his army this year. So where is "Miki's army" -- run by Miki Sandorfi, chief strategist, file and content services at HDS? Here is EMC building an army while it has one component of the VCE solution, storage. HDS has storage, servers and software that brings it all together, but no army. It takes an army to fight an army. Skirmishes and guerrilla warfare doesn't work in a technology world. <P> An example of how Hitachi is not discussing how it uses technology within HDS or Hitachi LTD itself is the 40,000-user VDI deployment that you have. I never knew that Hitachi LTD strictly enforces the use of VDI as the only method of computing, and I follow tihs space closely. Would you not agree that VDI is one of the hottest topics in virtualization today? Considering you have one of the largest VDI deployments up and running on your own storage, servers and platform, can you share details? How was it built to scale? How many iops per VM, how many servers are being used, what connection broker are you using? And the list goes on. <P> On a related note, why is it that other big tech manufacturers have yearly U.S. conferences in which they announce their products, reveal their visions, and interact with their customers and the community, but HDS does not? I did learn during my visit that Hitachi LTD has a yearly conference in Japan, but that is a world away, and until the conference I had never heard of it. Would you not agree that an HDS conference in the U.S. in which customers hear from you about current and future plans would be valuable? <P> The fact that you invited us demonstrates that HDS is shifting its marketing focus to a more community-oriented "knowledge marketing" approach, and that is a very welcome step. I hope it succeeds. You could start with my suggestions. <P> <b>Elias Khnaser is the practice manager for virtualization and cloud computing at <a href="http://www.artemistechnology.com">Artemis Technology</a>, a vendor-neutral integrator focused on aligning business and IT. </b>2010-06-18T03:03:01ZOn June 14, InfoWorld published an article titled <a href="http://www.infoworld.com/d/virtualization/the-unvarnished-truth-about-vdi-desktop-virtualization-472?page=0,0&source=rss_virtualization">"The unvarnished truth about VDI desktop virtualization"</a>. In it, the author, Frank Ohlhorst, makes some claims about VDI and desktop virtualization that I believe need to be addressed.http://www.iweek-interim.com/news/229202435?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsOn June 14, InfoWorld published an article titled <a href="http://www.infoworld.com/d/virtualization/the-unvarnished-truth-about-vdi-desktop-virtualization-472?page=0,0&source=rss_virtualization">"The unvarnished truth about VDI desktop virtualization"</a>. In it, the author, Frank Ohlhorst, makes some claims about VDI and desktop virtualization that I believe need to be addressed.Ohlhorst starts off by saying that Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) will grant IT control over the desktop and succeed where thin-client computing failed. Not to nitpick, because I understand what the author is trying to say, but if IT does not have control of the desktop today, who does? Accounting? VDI will give IT better and more centralized control, especially if thin-client hardware is deployed. But if you've lost control of your desktops, you have bigger problems than VDI can solve. <P> My second issue is the author's assertion that thin-client computing failed. Again, Ohlhorst is addressing server-based computing, specifically Terminal Services and Citrix XenApp. Thin-client computing can be used outside of these technologies. <P> That being said, the fact is, there are over 80 million users of Terminal Services/XenApp today, worldwide. That's a failure? Ohlhorst seems to be saying that because Terminal Services and XenApp did not go totally mainstream, replacing every desktop, the model is a bomb. In fact, these technologies, while fully capable of replacing traditional desktops, were intended more to control the delivery of certain applications to users. In that respect, they have succeeded with flying colors. Major healthcare, financial and other sectors deliver selected applications such as Epic, SAP and Oracle ERP on a Terminal Services model with great success. <P> Most instances where these technologies did fail to meet the needs of the business were cases where the people responsible for the projects lacked the know-how to be successful or failed to plan properly. Neither Terminal Services nor VDI is a solution that you unbox, install, and figure out as you go. Unfortunately, many IT engineers ventured into such projects unprepared and hit brick walls. Any technology that has to do with the user community will typically be a high-profile application that generates a lot of noise and fury. Misconfigured environments lead to a user perception that the solution itself does not work, is slow. or not capable of the task. I believe Citrix is partly to blame, that the company should have been more insistent on a basic level of training for those embarking on XenApp deployments. But that was a business decision, one we expect Citrix may regret. <P> Desktop virtualization is shaping up to be d&#233;j&#224; vu all over again. I see consultants every day architecting systems that are not based on carefully examined data. Poor planning is the main reason why desktop virtualization projects are failing; it's not that the technology is not mature enough. <P> <strong>The Challenges Of Managing Physical Desktops Today</strong> Is desktop virtualization really that complicated? Does it require <em>that</em> many more tools than physical desktop management? <P> Let's see... how many tools do you use today to manage your physical desktops? I am not sure they will fit in this blog if I start listing them. We can start with Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager and the list goes on, from security, backup, and antivirus all the way to imaging and troubleshooting tools and beyond. Managing physical desktops today is not a streamlined, automated, easy thing to do. The desktop is the most complicated computing environment you have in the organization. <P> Us server guys are smart, we silo applications on dedicated boxes or VMs and as a result, avoid application conflicts and ensure uptime However, the poor helpdesk team does not have that privilege. They have to deal with multiple applications, user data control, profile management, printing, and performance tuning and troubleshooting. <P> The answer, to my mind, is desktop virtualization. Note that I am using the term "desktop virtualization" because the InfoWorld article in question made a salad of technologies, for example, client hypervisors, blending them all under VDI. It is extremely important to understand that VDI is one form of desktop virtualization, but is not the only form. Client hypervisors and streaming are other forms of desktop virtualization. We can do one technology without doing the other. It is important that industry bloggers and authors do not contribute to the terminology mess that marketing gets us into sometimes. <P> <strong>Desktop Virtualization Is Ready Today</strong> The claim that desktop virtualization and VDI aren't fully baked just isn't true. While there are many organizations still investigating it, there are plenty of others that have embraced it and have figured out the most suitable solutions for their environments, from school districts and law firms to financials, call centers, healthcare and manufacturing. <P> Is today's desktop virtualization better than Terminal Services and XenApp? No, it's just different. Certainly the claim that was made in the InfoWorld article, that we could not put hundreds of users on a server and that it is more expensive, is flat out false. The user density that we can stack on a Terminal Services is still far greater than what we can do on VDI today. Furthermore, the InfoWorld author claims that replacing PCs with thin clients did not yield any cost savings. Well, of course not, if you decided to use the $550 thin client with an embedded Windows operating system. There are no cost savings there, but if you buy the $250 or less true thin client, you will see a significant cost reduction from a hardware, software, and management perspective. The TCO and ROI picture for Terminal Services and XenApp can be quite rosy, another area the author needs to brush up on. My take: Desktop virtualization is the natural evolution of Terminal Services and XenApp. It does solve certain challenges that we had in the Terminal Services days, such as that applications were not always developed for multiuser environments. Not every application was Terminal Services compatible. We could not assign resources on a per-user basis and so on, there is a large list. <P> But today's desktop virtualization has limitations and challenges compared with Terminal Services, too. Ohlhorst asserts that VDI has issues for which we are just seeing tools being developed. I will disagree here, as well. The challenges and troubleshooting scenarios that the author references are not new. They are the same issues that we had and still have with Terminal Services. After all, the remote protocols are the major bottleneck. While the author listed RDP and ICA, considering he mentioned VMware in many instances, he should have also referenced PCoIP. The author then talks about protocols and their consumption of bandwidth. Remote protocols can be very efficient and require little network bandwidth. That was the beauty of using them back in the day, because they worked over high-latency links. The question should be, how are you using these protocols? If you are using them for VDI on the corporate LAN, then you really don't care much, but if you are using them across the WAN or public internet, then you have to do some homework. What are the applications that the user will need? If it is just Office, then you don't need that much bandwidth. However, if the user will print, say, and printing is not configured properly, then yes, you will need a lot of bandwidth. The point I am trying to make is, no desktop is an out-of-the-box, turnkey solution. VDI requires proper planning and testing. <P> The question you should ask yourself is, are you happy with your existing desktop strategy? If the answer is yes, your costs are under control, backups and DR are not a challenge, moves and operational burdens are fine, then why change a model that is working for you? But if you are interested in exploring a desktop strategy that will reduce costs, enhance IT's grip on desktops and offer better ways of addressing old issues, then you should absolutely take a look at desktop virtualization. <P> Desktop virtualization is here today, there is no need to wait. IT is up against a Windows 7 upgrade and hardware refresh on the desktop. The choices are simple: Invest in new fat hardware and management software and continue to do it the old fashioned way, or leverage virtualization and explore new, better, and faster ways of managing desktops. <P> <b>Elias Khnaser is the practice manager for virtualization and cloud computing at <a href="http://www.artemistechnology.com">Artemis Technology</a>, a vendor-neutral integrator focused on aligning business and IT. </b>2010-05-13T09:43:44ZDay 1 of Citrix Synergy 2010 in San Francisco brought some exciting advances. The highlight was Citrix CEO Mark Templeton's keynote address that confirmed earlier product availability news and introduced several other new offerings and roadmaps. There is definitely more energy and excitement at Synergy this year than could be felt in previous years. Here is a quick summary:http://www.iweek-interim.com/news/229202756?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsDay 1 of Citrix Synergy 2010 in San Francisco brought some exciting advances. The highlight was Citrix CEO Mark Templeton's keynote address that confirmed earlier product availability news and introduced several other new offerings and roadmaps. There is definitely more energy and excitement at Synergy this year than could be felt in previous years. Here is a quick summary:<strong>Type 1 Client Hypervisor - XenClient</strong> The long-awaited (originally announced in 2008!) Type 1 client hypervisor is finally at release candidate (RC) stage. While it is still beta, it is most definitely a welcomed step in the right direction. XenClient comes with the Citrix Receiver, which is used to launch virtualized applications, and the synchronizer, which allows the locally running VM to synchronize with its partner running in the data center (very cool). XenClient will also allow more than two virtual machines to run and has a rich set of tools that allow for policy-based deployment, management and control. <P> HP, Dell and Lenovo offer laptop versions that are compatible with XenClient, which requires the Intel vPro processor. All demos that were shown around XenClient were impressive; for many, the type 1 client hypervisor will be the enabler for their desktop virtualization initiatives. <P> <strong>Wyse Xenith Zero Client:</strong> Probably my favorite announcement of the day was the Wyse Xenith Zero Client device, finally a true zero client for HDX. The Xenith terminal supports local USB devices like iPhones, Web cams and more. This device was shown to boot inside of six seconds and comes with an extremely attractive price tag. Wyse has positioned itself as a necessary addition to any XenDesktop deployment. <P> <strong>McAfee Security Suite:</strong> McAfee had an interesting announcement around redesigning its security suite to allow for the scanning of VMs without having to install software inside these VMs. This is huge considering how much processing and resource savings it could potentially yield, further increasing the performance and enhancing user experience. <P> <strong>Citrix Receiver Encrypted Storage Spaces:</strong> The Citrix Receiver will now be able to encrypt specified local storage zones, where offline applications store data. The technology will also allow for a kill pill that can remotely destroy data on mobile devices. This is good news for security and compliance officers, though I would love to see it in action, as the proof remains in the pudding. Still, most definitely a step in the right direction. <P> Templeton then announced the launch of several new projects that Citrix is currently focused on. The disappointing part was the limited amount of information disclosed about this roadmap, but we will definitely dig further into these projects and report on them. He mentioned the following: <P> <strong>Project Zoom </strong>(geared towards instant application launch) <strong>Project mach 3</strong> (3x faster HDX performance) <strong>Project Laser </strong>(enhanced high remote printing by consuming 10% less bandwidth) <strong>Project Mercury </strong>(WAN Acceleration enhancement for network latency of 300ms) <strong>Project Dynamo </strong>(adaptive QoS Policies) <P> <strong>Innovation Award</strong> The innovation award this year went to a Chicago-based company, and of course I always have a sweet spot for anything to do with Chicago (GO HAWKS!). Sonnenschein desktop virtualization initiative achieved complete centralization across the enterprise, which spans 13 offices and over 1,500 users. As a consultant in Chi-town, I have had business relations with Sonnenschein. That being said, I was aware of the Citrix XenDesktop and XenApp initiate there and was very happy with the route they took embracing and adopting desktop virtualization at a time when many companies were still very skeptical as to whether it would succeed. Kudos to the business team for embracing such cutting edge technology and to the IT team on the successful implementation. Check out the video <a href="http://web.citrix.com/synergy/innovationaward/">here</a> <P> <strong>A Successful Day 1</strong> Day 1 was successful; I wonder if Citrix can keep this pace and wrap up Citrix Synergy on such an upbeat note. Day 2 will focus on virtualization in the data center, more specifically around XenDesktop and XenServer. <P> <b>Elias Khnaser is the practice manager for virtualization and cloud computing at <a href="http://www.artemistechnology.com">Artemis Technology</a>, a solutions integrator focused on aligning business and IT. </b>2010-04-19T12:17:31ZHitachi Data Systems Monday unveiled its version of a converged infrastructure. Dubbed Hitachi Unified Compute Platform (UCP), the HDS offering is a direct competitor to Cisco's Unified Computing System (UCS).http://www.iweek-interim.com/news/229202837?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsHitachi Data Systems Monday unveiled its version of a converged infrastructure. Dubbed Hitachi Unified Compute Platform (UCP), the HDS offering is a direct competitor to Cisco's Unified Computing System (UCS).HDS also announced an extended partnership with Microsoft to OEM Microsoft's System Center and use it as an architectural framework to manage the UCP from a centralized, tightly integrated console. Some elements are available now, notably blades, but the converged platform as a whole is due beginning of 2011. <P> The converged infrastructure model treats servers, storage and networking as resource pools that can be rapidly allocated, manually and dynamically, to satisfy a business need. HDS' version is an open platform with a converged infrastructure approach. <P> The platform will initially launch with HDS blade servers, storage and networking hardware, and support for Microsoft's Hyper-V and VMware's ESX from a hypervisor perspective. It will then extend support to additional hardware manufacturers and software developers through the use of the open APIs that are built into the platform. These open APIs will enable other manufacturers to leverage HDS' platform by writing software that can plug into the Orchestration console, and as a result, replace certain components of the platform. Say you don't like HDS network switches and you want to replace them with a Foundry switch; if Brocade writes APIs into this console, you can do so. That goes for Cisco too, for that matter. <P> HDS says IT can also swap servers, although it's unclear how that will work exactly, blade technology being proprietary to manufacturers. And, while UCP will leverage Microsoft's System Center, HDS will use its own developers to code into the platform, creating a tightly integrated centralized console that can manage the entire platform across its different layers. <P> The highlight of the platform will be the "Orchestration" software, which is the unified management console that promises the following: &#8226; Workflow coordination &#8226; Centralized management &#8226; Templates &#8226; Service-level management &#8226; Billing and chargebacks &#8226; Version control &#8226; Backup and replication &#8226; Ability to manage multiple sites from a single Orchestration console &#8226; Easy expandability <P> A converged infrastructure is ideal for highly virtualized organizations. Say you want to expand your use of virtual desktops. IT could buy a converged infrastructure pre-designed for VDI. Here is your rack, it has been tested for 250 users with this configuration and these applications, and here are your metrics. We also have a version tested for 500 users. Have a SQL cluster project, Exchange and SharePoint? This box was tested with this configuration, and here are your metrics. IT would no longer need to buy the components separately and stitch them together. HDS and other converged infrastructure manufacturers finally understand that it is the usage model that drives the purchase of their products, and not the other way around. <P> <strong>Alliances Will Change The IT Landscape</strong> A few months ago I asked in a blog entry on InformationWeek, <a href="http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2009/12/wheres_hitachi.html">"Where is Hitachi Data Systems in all these alliances?"</a> <P> While the HDS/Microsoft announcement is more an expanded partnership rather than the codevelopment of a system a la Cisco/EMC/VMware vBlocks, it is nonetheless a step in the right direction, though I still think Citrix and HDS have a lot to gain from the co-production of a product that is geared toward desktop virtualization. <P> Traditionally, HDS has followed a passive marketing approach to products, seeming to believe in the Japanese way of "product quality will speak louder than marketing hype." But it now seems to be adopting the American way of "marketing is king," having hired some new blood in the marketing department and promising to rectify some of longstanding issues, like no road map announcements and the fact that we don't know what HDS makes-some think it's just TVs, others think it's just enterprise storage. <P> The fact of the matter is, HDS produces so much that it's quite possible no one person has a complete inventory. Up until a few months ago, I didn't know HDS even made blades, much less that its blades can be partitioned into several logical blades, a hardware-level virtualization technique that's new on the x86 platform. Each HDS blade can be partitioned into 16 logical blades; say, 8 can be used for hypervisor-based virtualization, with the rest reserved for hardware level support for those applications you still are not comfortable virtualizing. Now, granted, that creates a single point of failure on that particular blade, but even if you have a 2:1 ratio, that is still better than dedicating an entire blade to a single application. <P> Another useful feature of these blades is the ability to combine multiple blades and present them to the operating system as a single server entity with all their resources. We have to admit, that's pretty cool. <P> <strong>Stay Tuned</strong> They say the proof is in the pudding, so we've asked HDS to show us how this platform works. After interviewing some folks at HDS that promised to give a demo of the product and its capabilities, I'll report back and post the video interview and the findings. In the interim, if you have any questions about this platform that you want me to ask HDS, feel free to find me on <a href="http://www.twitter.com/ekhnaser">twitter</a> <P> <b>Elias Khnaser is the practice manager for virtualization and cloud computing at <a href="http://www.artemistechnology.com">Artemis Technology</a>, a solutions integrator focused on aligning business and IT. </b>2010-04-12T12:00:00ZDisaster recovery and business continuity are made easier by virtualization, but cost and complexity are holding back users. http://www.informationweek.com/news/224202378?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsWhen we set out to look at the use of server and desktop virtualization in business continuity and disaster recovery strategies, the last thing we expected was to have to make a case for adopting a BC/DR plan. But of the 681 business technology professionals who responded to our <i>InformationWeek Analytics</i> Business Continuity/Disaster Recovery Survey, 17% have no BC/DR plan, and 20% are still working on one.</p> <P> Cost and complexity are holding most of them back. "DR is a bear to get people to spend money on and difficult to justify--except right after a data loss," says one respondent.</p> <P> So how best to overcome the obstacles to continuity planning? First, focus on getting the business to drive the project, enabled by IT. And then, leverage the latest technologies; virtualization, in particular, will boost ROI, cost savings, and resource efficiency levels.</p> <P> <strong>Why Virtualize?</strong></p> <P> There are all the usual reasons: Virtualization consolidates server infrastructures, thereby cutting power, cooling, floor space, and other costs. It lets you reduce the number of servers you use so that the data center doesn't sprawl out of control. It also provides quick provisioning capabilities so you can respond to project requests faster and meet sporadic utilization spikes.</p> <P> In addition, hardware is advancing at a faster rate than software designers are able to keep up. As a result, applications underutilize the process and memory support available in most of the equipment out there. Take a quad-core server with four or six sockets. This is more than what a single instance of Exchange 2007 can utilize. Therefore, it's beneficial to virtualize; even if you get only a 2-for-1 ratio, it's still better than overcommitting expensive hardware to applications that can't take advantage.</p> <P> Virtualization can also be used to solve high-availability issues on the local LAN, minimizing or even eliminating server failure brought on by faulty hardware. Yesterday, when a physical server went south, rebuilding could take two hours at best, more likely four or more. Virtualization can leverage high-availability technologies and put a server back in production in minutes. With the right technology in place, you can even eliminate downtime altogether. Here are three HA options:</p> <P> <strong>&bull; VM restart on another host.</strong> Because virtual machines are a collection of files that aren't bound to any specific hardware, if the host fails, it takes only minutes to power on that VM on another server.</p> <P> <strong>&bull; Traditional clustering.</strong> You can extend clustering technology to VMs. Setup is often a bit easier, especially when dealing with networking.</p> <P> <strong>&bull; Fault tolerance.</strong> When enabled, this technology runs primary and secondary VMs in lockstep. That means every process, task, and operation is executed on both VMs. They operate on separate hosts, so in the event of a primary VM failure, the secondary picks up exactly where the primary failed with no interruption.</p> <P> <strong>Same As It Ever Was</strong></p> <P> Another response of concern in our survey: 21% of respondents say they'll maintain 80% of their BC/DR systems in physical form, with 20% of the environment virtualized. An additional 34% say they won't leverage virtualization in BC/DR, period.</p> <P> So apparently more than half of respondents are still building dedicated BC/DR facilities stocked with the same hardware as in production data centers--doing regular backups, making clone images, sending data off site, and (in theory) keeping a fairly accurate runbook of how we'll recover. But as we buy new production servers, the old images and backups stop working well, and runbooks inevitably fall out of date.</p> <P> "It's not a big secret that DR/BC is a pain in the ass," says one respondent. "You can try to co-locate, but then you essentially have to double up all of your equipment. Virtualization makes full co-location more palatable, ... but there's still a significant cash outlay involved." The best approach is to create a plan where both locations contribute to your production environment, the respondent says.</p> <P> Another benefit of virtualization in BC/DR is portability: The ability to literally back up your entire environment and carry it with you is revolutionary.</p> <P> The fact that VMs are regular files means you can back up the entire state of the system. This is reason enough to use virtualization in BC/DR, even if you totally ignore all the other benefits. Couple that with the ability to easily extend your network, test your BC/DR plans, and support more applications, and you end up with a strategy that saves money <i>and</i> lets you leverage the investment on a day-to-day basis.</p> <P> <strong>Why Not?</strong></p> <P> When we asked respondents with less than 80% BC/DR virtualization their reasons for holding back, nearly half, 45%, say some vendors don't support their apps on a VM. Meanwhile, 39% say they want to mimic exactly the same setups they have in the production environment, while 27% say it would be too costly to virtualize their BC/DR sites, and 20% lack expertise.</p> <P> Frankly, we find these responses amazing. To those looking to mimic the production environment, there's no reason why you aren't already virtualizing in production. BC/DR initiatives are a great opportunity to get exposure to the technology, and you can do it with older servers.</p> <P> For those who say some vendors don't officially supported their apps on VMs, we have one question: How many of you know your critical applications better than the vendor's tech support does? We can understand the argument against it in production environments--you want to make sure critical apps are supported, no questions asked. But your BC/DR setup is a great place to test the application in a virtualized infrastructure.</p> <P> We have yet to come across an application that absolutely can't be virtualized. For maybe 2% or 3%, the effort isn't worthwhile, but in general, vendors are simply trying to avoid having to support virtualized instances. </p> <P> And for those who say it would be too costly to virtualize, if you dedicate Tier 1 shared storage, top-of-the-line equipment and network devices, and enterprise-class virtualization software to your project, it will cost a significant amount of money. But it's likely still less expensive than mimicking what you have in production.</p> <P> If you budget and design properly, you'll likely conclude that the best way to maintain a BC/DR facility is to make it an extension of the data center when everything is fine and a BC/DR site when an outage occurs. Think about it: Instead of spending money to build out only your production data center, why not budget to build out your production and BC/DR co-locations simultaneously. If a central data center were to cost you $1 million to build, for $1.3 million you could get a BC/DR facility as well that could also off-load some operations, say for peak times or maintenance.</p> <P> By making your virtualized BC/DR site an extension of your data center, you can also use your existing virtualization management products, for example, to control the process of moving copies of apps with sensitive data around to different locations, a must if your organization is subject to compliance audits.</p> <P> We were pleasantly surprised to see that 52% of respondents leveraging virtualization would consider using their BC/DR equipment for testing, development, and production. However, 20% limit that to just testing and development, while 22% say that BC/DR equipment should be on standby for any interruption in business and should have no other purpose.</p> <P> To those who want to keep the equipment in standby, we ask: What's the downside of taking advantage? Again, the deciding factor here is virtualization--it's easier to use this equipment if you're virtualizing as part of your BC/DR strategy because you can have VMs that are intended for BC/DR available and powered down while you're using the hardware for less mission-critical functions. In the event of an outage, you power down the unnecessary VMs and power up the necessary ones.</p> <P> Now, we understand that old habits die hard, but it pays for CIOs to do what it takes to increase their organization's comfort with using virtualization. It has changed the landscape for good, and IT must adapt. Instead of being dragged along, make the most of this paradigm-shifting technology to solve what's been a problem for decades. IT groups that employ virtualization in a smart BC/DR setup can rest assured that they'll be ready for any disaster.</p> <P> <em><strong>Elias Khnaser</strong> is practice manager for virtualization and cloud computing at Artemis Technology, an integrator focused on aligning business and IT.</em></p>2010-04-12T12:00:00ZDisaster recovery and business continuity are made easier by virtualization, but cost and complexity are holding back users.http://www.informationweek.com/news/224202364?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsWhen we set out to look at the use of server and desktop virtualization in business continuity and disaster recovery strategies, the last thing we expected was to have to make a case for adopting a BC/DR plan. But of the 681 business technology professionals who responded to our <i>InformationWeek Analytics</i> Business Continuity/Disaster Recovery Survey, 17% have no BC/DR plan, and 20% are still working on one.</p> <P> Cost and complexity are holding most of them back. "DR is a bear to get people to spend money on and difficult to justify--except right after a data loss," says one respondent.</p> <P> So how best to overcome the obstacles to continuity planning? First, focus on getting the business to drive the project, enabled by IT. And then, leverage the latest technologies; virtualization, in particular, will boost ROI, cost savings, and resource efficiency levels.</p> <P> <strong>Why Virtualize?</strong></p> <P> There are all the usual reasons: Virtualization consolidates server infrastructures, thereby cutting power, cooling, floor space, and other costs. It lets you reduce the number of servers you use so that the data center doesn't sprawl out of control. It also provides quick provisioning capabilities so you can respond to project requests faster and meet sporadic utilization spikes.</p> <P> In addition, hardware is advancing at a faster rate than software designers are able to keep up. As a result, applications underutilize the process and memory support available in most of the equipment out there. Take a quad-core server with four or six sockets. This is more than what a single instance of Exchange 2007 can utilize. Therefore, it's beneficial to virtualize; even if you get only a 2-for-1 ratio, it's still better than overcommitting expensive hardware to applications that can't take advantage.</p> <P> Virtualization can also be used to solve high-availability issues on the local LAN, minimizing or even eliminating server failure brought on by faulty hardware. Yesterday, when a physical server went south, rebuilding could take two hours at best, more likely four or more. Virtualization can leverage high-availability technologies and put a server back in production in minutes. With the right technology in place, you can even eliminate downtime altogether. Here are three HA options:</p> <P> <strong>&bull; VM restart on another host.</strong> Because virtual machines are a collection of files that aren't bound to any specific hardware, if the host fails, it takes only minutes to power on that VM on another server.</p> <P> <strong>&bull; Traditional clustering.</strong> You can extend clustering technology to VMs. Setup is often a bit easier, especially when dealing with networking.</p> <P> <strong>&bull; Fault tolerance.</strong> When enabled, this technology runs primary and secondary VMs in lockstep. That means every process, task, and operation is executed on both VMs. They operate on separate hosts, so in the event of a primary VM failure, the secondary picks up exactly where the primary failed with no interruption.</p> <P> <!-- KINDLE EXCLUDE --> <center> <table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="6" style="border:solid 1px #cc0000; background-color:#e1e1e1; width:300px;"> <tr valign="middle" align="center"> <td> <a href="http://analytics.informationweek.com/issue/481/informationweek-full-issue-april-12-2010.html"><img src="http://twimgs.com/infoweek/1262/smallcov.jpg" alt="InformationWeek: April 12, 2010 Issue" title="InformationWeek: April 12, 2010 Issue" width="65" height="87" hspace="0" vspace="0" border="0" align="left" style="margin:0 10px 0 0;" /></a> <strong>To read the rest of the article, <a href="http://analytics.informationweek.com/issue/481/informationweek-full-issue-april-12-2010.html">download a free PDF of <nobr><em>InformationWeek</em> magazine</nobr></a><br /> (registration required)</strong> </td> </tr> </table> </center> <P> <!-- /KINDLE EXCLUDE --> <P> <!-- KINDLE EXCLUDE --> <br clear="all"> <center> <div style="margin:0; padding:8px; border:solid 1px #cc0000; width:460px; text-align:left;"> <div style="margin:0; padding:5px; background-color:#CC0000; text-align:center; font-size:1.3em; color:#ffffff; font-weight:bold;"><a href="http://analytics.informationweek.com/abstract/15/1893/Risk-Management/research-bc-dr-and-virtualization.html" target="_blank" style="color:#ffffff;">Final Frontier: Leveraging Virtualization for BC/DR</a></div> <div style="margin:8px;"> <a href="http://analytics.informationweek.com/abstract/15/1893/Risk-Management/research-bc-dr-and-virtualization.html"><img src="http://twimgs.com/informationweek/1262/262F3reportCover_110.jpg" width="110" height="110" hspace="10" vspace="0" border="0" align="right" style="margin:8px 0 9px 9px;" /></a> <center><strong><a href="http://analytics.informationweek.com/abstract/15/1893/Risk-Management/research-bc-dr-and-virtualization.html">Get This</a> And <a href="http://analytics.informationweek.com/">All Our Reports</a></strong><br /> <br /> Become an <i>InformationWeek</i> Analytics subscriber for $99 per person per month, with multiseat discounts available, and get our <a href="http://analytics.informationweek.com/abstract/15/1893/Risk-Management/research-bc-dr-and-virtualization.html">full report on leveraging virtualization for BC/DR</a>.<br /> <br /> This report includes 32 pages of action-oriented analysis, packed with 16 charts.</center><br /> <br /> <strong>What you'll find:</strong> <ul> <li style="margin:0 0 7px 0;">A look at the virtualization platforms respondents are using</li> <li style="margin:0 0 7px 0;">Using VDI to drive remote user access in a disaster</li> <li>All the data from this survey</li> </ul> </div> </div> </center></p> <!-- /KINDLE EXCLUDE -->2009-12-16T15:09:24ZIn my job I'm privileged to help companies navigate virtualization challenges. Lately, more and more enterprise IT groups are asking about migrating to Hyper-V because of perceived significant cost savings, from a licensing perspective. I always expected that at some point I would have to address this question, but I thought that time would be two or three years from now.http://www.iweek-interim.com/news/229203974?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsIn my job I'm privileged to help companies navigate virtualization challenges. Lately, more and more enterprise IT groups are asking about migrating to Hyper-V because of perceived significant cost savings, from a licensing perspective. I always expected that at some point I would have to address this question, but I thought that time would be two or three years from now.I am always amazed when a marketing machine is so fine-tuned, so elegant and effective that it can almost package and sell air. Microsoft's marketing machine is unsurpassed in the industry, and I mean that in the best of ways. Let's face it: Microsoft historically has been the underdog many, many times, but through smart marketing, aggressive pricing, and slow but steady improvement of its products, it emerges with the lion's share of the market. Remember the Apple "cold war" back in the day, the Netscape "browser war," the Novell directory and file server "incident," and the Lotus Notes "struggle"? Well, welcome to the virtualization "coup attempt." <P> Microsoft has a history of crushing its competitors in every space it decides to extend into, and virtualization seems to be a market it's adamant about dominating. But will it succeed? As an adviser to my clients, one of my obligations is to recommend software that is enterprise ready and can meet their requirements, and while Microsoft advertises Hyper-V R2 as having many enterprise features at a lower cost than VMware, the reality begs to differ. While Hyper-V R2 has closed the gap significantly with VMware vSphere, I don't think it's enterprise ready just yet, and I don't think that the advertised cost savings will materialize today given the migration costs, the loss of third-party support, and the loss of functionality. Here are nine points to consider before taking the bait of lower licensing costs. <P> <strong>1. Breadth of OS support</strong> Before we get into the nitty gritty, let's start with the most basic of features and simplest of tasks. Say you are an IT shop that supports more than just Windows servers; you have a mixed environment with different flavors of Linux and Unix. Hyper-V, however, supports only Windows and SuSE Linux. That's it. If I am to recommend an enterprise virtualization infrastructure, it would need to support a bit more than one flavor of Linux. <P> <strong>2. Memory management</strong> This one is always downplayed by the Microsoft folks, but to me, poor memory management is a show stopper, as it would significantly limit the density of VMs per host, even as the whole idea behind virtualization is to have a large number of VMs consolidated on a small number of physical hosts. <P> The Microsoft argument here is flat-out ridiculous. For starters, it recommends having a host in standby mode, which means, "Have a host that is not serving VMs running so that in the event of a host failure, the standby host can be used to cover for its martyred cousin." Really? One of the main driving factors behind virtualization is the efficient use of hardware, yet Microsoft expects us to put one or more hosts in standby mode? <P> As for memory oversubscription, Microsoft says we should just buy more memory; it's cheap, right? While we're at it, buy more hosts too, and you can attain the same level of VM density as you could with ESX. So, I get more hosts to manage, patch, cool, rack, and more memory? Why would I do that again? Thanks, but no thanks. I want to make my life easier, not harder. <P> But say you can accept the idea of buying more hosts and more memory. If you don't have memory oversubscription, how exactly do you expect to power-on VMs when a host experiences hardware failure? More physical hosts in standby mode? <P> Another scenario where memory management plays a significant role is in desktop virtualization; without memory oversubscription, the desktop virtualization model is unattractive. <P> <strong>3. Security</strong> Hyper-V's reliance on a general-purpose operating system, in this case Windows Server 2008, makes it a security vulnerability unto itself. In the past, if a security vulnerability was discovered for Windows, you had to patch all your machines, which were physically separated from one another. You had some time to patch before the exploit hit all your servers. If a Windows vulnerability exploited Windows Server 2008, however, that would jeopardize all the VMs that are running on it in one shot. <P> We see it as a security best practice to never use a general-purpose operating system to load your enterprise production VMs, for just this reason. Of course, this holds true for other virtualization vendors, not just Microsoft, but since Microsoft owns the lion's share of the OS market, it would be a continuous threat and just a matter of time before an exploit is found. Using a hypervisor that is different from the operating system leader isolates and stabilizes the hypervisor significantly. Moreover, the installation of Hyper-V, even in just the Windows 2008 core model, still consumes about 2.6 GB of disk, and while local disk is cheap, the larger the installation footprint, the bigger the attack surface becomes. ESXi is about 100 MB in size. <P> Hyper-V also supports and loads all drivers in the primary partition, and loads all memory in the primary partition. This is traditionally a cause for concern for Microsoft OSes. <P> I am by no means implying that Windows Server 2008 is not a secure operating system. It is definitely the most stable, most secure OS that Microsoft has ever released. But bear in mind that it comes with a healthy fan base of hackers all trying on a daily basis to show they are smarter than Microsoft. In my analysis, using vSphere as the hypervisor provides a layer of security and peace of mind. This is kind of the same method we used in security-conscious enterprises where two different antivirus software suites were deployed to provide a layered approach. If one suite did not catch malware, the other should. <P> <strong>4. Live Migration</strong> Contrary to popular belief, even geeks and technologists want to complete tasks in a timely manner so they can get home to their families, maybe even on time. Why would I want to deploy an infrastructure that would cause me to spend more time in front of my management console waiting for live migration to migrate 40 VMs from one host to another, ONE AT A TIME. That's right, Hyper-V R2 introduces Live Migration so you can move your VMs with no interruption, but the limitation is one VM at a time. Considering Microsoft's frequent weekly updates for Windows Server 2008, that would take an administrator double or triple the time it would an ESX admin just to move VMs from host to host in order to apply security patches and properly secure his deployment. Think about that in light of the security concerns mentioned earlier. When discussing the cost model, there has to be a way to attach a dollar amount to tasks completed faster. Live migration has to be able to do multiple simultaneous VM migrations; today it does not. Tomorrow? I am sure it will. <P> <strong>5. VM priority restart</strong> In a virtual world, I expect automation levels that far surpass what I had in my physical infrastructure. If you intend on running all virtual-and you should-the ability to prioritize your VMs by importance is crucial, and the ability to recover from host failures based on VM importance is even more crucial. In the event a host that is running 60 VMs fails, for example, I want to make very sure that my virtual infrastructure can restart my failed VMs on another host in a certain order. I don't want Exchange, SQL, and IIS to come up before my domain controllers, DNS server, or DHCP servers, for example. I don't want to do it manually, I like the flexibility of automation, and I expect it in a virtualized infrastructure. Sadly, Hyper-V R2 does not have that feature today, though again, I'm sure Redmond is working on it. <P> <strong>6. Fault tolerance</strong> This feature takes system availability to highs that are truly unheard of, and to no one's surprise, it is available only with vSphere. The ability to run a single VM in lockstep with a shadow VM simultaneously, executing on both primary and secondary VMs at the same time, provides for continuous high availability that we never had in the physical world with this much ease. <P> If the host supporting the primary VM fails, the secondary VM automatically and with no interruption in service will take over where the first one left off in a seamless manner. It will then create a new secondary for itself on another host. <P> These are features that enterprises cannot afford to ignore; these are features that are worth money. Of course vSphere will cost more, but how much more is a different story. <P> <strong>7. Hot adds</strong> In the physical days, we were always promised hot adds, but if most of you are like me, you probably never tried to add or remove physical memory more than once on a physical powered-on machine before you said, this is not worth it and way too risky. In a virtual environment, however, there should be no reason why we cannot add more memory, disk, and peripherals on the fly to any powered-on VM. Except if you're using Hyper-V. <P> <strong>8. Third-party vendor support</strong> It goes without saying that any enterprise-class infrastructure will always need third- party tools to extend its capabilities. However, when we examine the third-party tools that support Hyper-V and those that support vSphere, the gap is significant and swings heavily in VMware's favor. Will this also change at some point? I am sure it will. <P> <strong>9. Maturity</strong> The last thing I want to talk about is maturity of the product. When choosing a virtualization infrastructure, you are making a strategic decision about the basis upon which your organization's critical systems are going to run. It is a decision that will have far-reaching consequences; this is not some piece of software that you can just decide to change half way through the project. You want to make sure the platform has been field tested over time and that performance metrics exist that can show how the different enterprise applications function on it and whether these metrics will suffice for your environment. <P> I could go on for a while with enterprise features that are missing from Hyper-V, such as vShield Zones and others, but I think you get the point. <P> <strong>But Hyper-V Is So Much Cheaper!</strong> That is true, and no matter how much VMware tries to even it out with calculators and what have you, Hyper-V with its management server is less expensive. But Hyper-V also lacks many features vSphere has that save money, save time, and may well save business critical applications. When you weigh all this, the cost picture isn't nearly as straightforward. Now, we're not saying enterprise IT shouldn't bring Hyper-V into the lab and start testing. And, some smaller organizations will be able to get away with using Hyper-V in production, though everyone needs to be aware of security considerations. I have no doubt in my mind that Microsoft will eventually close the gap with VMware to the point that selecting a virtualization platform will be difficult. We're just not there today. <i>Is your organizations prepared to make a strategic choice to deploy Hyper-V, accept the limitations, and wait for Microsoft to address these issues? Let us know what went into your decision.</i> <P> <b>Elias Khnaser is the practice manager for virtualization and cloud computing at <a href="http://www.artemistechnology.com">Artemis Technology</a>, a solutions integrator focused on aligning business and IT. </b>2009-12-09T07:30:16Z2009 has definitely been the year of acquisitions and mergers and strong alliances, as far as the technology industry is concerned.http://www.iweek-interim.com/news/229203997?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_Authors2009 has definitely been the year of acquisitions and mergers and strong alliances, as far as the technology industry is concerned.The Oracle/Sun drama, the HP/3Com phenomenon, the Dell/Perot marriage... the list goes on. On the other hand, we saw the <a href="http://www.virtualization.info/2009/12/new-details-about-vmwareciscoemc-vblock.html">Cisco, EMC and VMware alliance </a>and most recently the <a href="http://www.virtualization.info/2009/12/microsoft-and-netapp-form-3-year.html">Microsoft/NetApp alliance</a>. Seems to me that some form of "loneliness" flu has swept through our industry. Everyone wants a partner. <P> The Cisco, EMC and VMware alliance gave birth to VBlock, and the Microsoft/NetApp alliance will mark the beginning of a new era of collaboration between these large companies. The hot topic for 2010 will remain virtualization. with a different flavor and focus on cloud computing and desktop virtualization. The synergy between these allying companies is a "storage company/application company" approach, and the only two without any serious collaborative partners would seem to be Citrix and HDS. <P> I am sure someone will reply that Citrix has many partners it works with, like Intel on desktop virtualization. What I mean is a joint product, a solution along the lines of the partners mentioned earlier. I am also certain someone will say HDS has allied with Microsoft. If so, what are the details of this alliance because it seems to me Microsoft is pretty set on NetApp. <P> This brings us to Hitachi Data Systems, a company with fantastic and solid products that you rarely hear about. If you don't go knocking on its door for some storage, you would not know it was there. The funny part is, HDS has so much more than just enterprise storage to offer. Its solution sets range from SMBto enterprise. Did you know that the HDS modular array was the first active-active array in its class? <P> Have you ever heard of the HDS blade servers? I hadn't. A blade system that performs virtualization at the hardware level, something no one else in the industry is doing. That is some cool technology that will be the topic of another blog entry. What about its HCAP, a content archiving system that is truly open, and doesn't alter the data the way some competitors do? <P> The problem with HDS is it doesn't market its products. As a consultant, I have walked into many IT shops where I have had to mention HDS because it was not on the list of vendors my clients were considering. Even more ironically, when I mentioned HDS, they were convinced HDS only played at the enterprise level. <P> <strong>Bottom Line</strong> In the virtualization and cloud computing world, storage and virtualization go hand in hand, and all these companies are aligning their resources and introducing joint products to gain more market share. It would seem to me that HDS and Citrix would be a good combination. They could go to market with a solution around desktop virtualization, for example. They could both benefit from one another's technology. HDS has blade servers that it cannot seem to market properly even though the technology is fantastic, Citrix has the software suite from the server hypervisor all the way to desktop virtualization. It would seem like a marriage made in heaven.2009-11-22T11:50:49ZI recently wrote a column for InformationWeek Analytics that got some e-mail responses, and I thought the discussion was interesting enough to post the column and some of the comments that sparked the discussion. So here goes.http://www.iweek-interim.com/news/229204334?cid=RSSfeed_IWK_AuthorsI recently wrote a column for InformationWeek Analytics that got some e-mail responses, and I thought the discussion was interesting enough to post the column and some of the comments that sparked the discussion. So here goes.<strong>The Newsletter Column</strong> <P> In this space last week we discussed the problems industry leaders have with the term "cloud computing." But terminology is the least of this concept's problems. The big issue, as I see it, is that this buzzword came out of nowhere and introduces nothing new whatsoever. It still requires the same type of hardware and software, does not solve any new challenges, and does not introduce a new way of doing things. <P> Think Salesforce.com is cloud computing? Nope. The idea of a hosted application that works over the Web instead of having a client/server model has a name-or a few, actually. Remember ASPs? How about SaaS? OK, so you say hosted processing power is the cloud. We can now pay for what we need as far as storage and virtual machines. Been there, done that, got the tee shirt. <P> Here's what WOULD be innovative: Using new virtualization software in conjunction with grid computing. That's a concept that should get more attention. We could finally build applications in the "cloud" that can draw their computing power from several different computers on the network or over the Internet. Take all the desktop machines that you likely have in your company. After 5:00 p.m., most employees go home, and you have all this processor power that is available, sitting there collecting dust. If we could somehow harness these computers to fuel faster processing of applications that could lead to faster task completions, that would be cool. <P> What if a virtual machine, for example, lived in the "real cloud" that I'm describing. It would draw its computing power from several hundred machines, and it would not be bound to any host, so the potential for this VM to stop working due to a host failure is "virtually" impossible. Some of you may know seti@home, an application that uses the computing power of several million PCs around the world to analyze radio signals, searching for signs of extraterrestrial intelligence. Something like that on a smaller scale would spark my interest in this buzzword. <P> The real harm here is that the noise around tacking a new term onto old ideas is a distraction from true innovation. If you disagree, I would love to hear from you. <P> <strong>Reader comments</strong> Daniel Longo wrote to me: Elias: <P> Enjoyed your post on virtual grid power. You only used acronyms when appropriate, and you didn't use the word 'product' once. It seems 'cloud' has become just a new word for salespeople to use (my background). We couldn't sell you ASP (or is it the ASP product?), or SaaS, so maybe you'll buy some cloud. At least it's not another 3 letter acronym. Good explanation for your interesting idea for unused processing power. I'm sure there are some issues with licensing and security, but there should be a way to make it work. The idea seems well suited to certain tasks like global updates, end of month accounting or maybe e-discovery.