On balance I think it’s very clear that virtualization offers huge cost advantages for small to moderate sized business that can allocate IT budgets more effectively using virtualized hosting and other services.   There are also different but major benefits for enterprise level businesses where server needs can be reduced significantly using various virtualization techniques.

As internet travel publishers we’ve had many experiences with both the challenges and the pitfalls of partial virtualization, especially for DNS and hosting services and indirectly as participants in cloud based storage of photos, blogs, and email.   Our small infrastructure needs meant that virtualization issues with our own small number of servers were not of much consequence.

Virtualization + Cloud Services = Big Savings

For hosting and DNS there are generally large cost benefits in virtualized server environments. this type of virtualization can be combined with cloud services like email and documents to offer a business exceptional savings.  This approach is especially suited to small businesses that do not need or can’t afford a local server and network but require 24/7 website and online services uptime.  Even a tiny business can easily manage a website, blog, email, and documents for trivial to *zero costs* thanks to environments like WordPress or Google free hosting and blogs, Google or other free document services, and Microsoft, Yahoo, or Google free mail services.

Over the past several years the ability to customize and combine or “mashup” complex and free services and website applications has grown dramatically, and these very inexpensive or free services now offer exceptional value to even the smallest business.   Even a huge enterprise-level encrypted website with robust shopping cart functionality, security certificates, and more can be run remotely and effectively at very low cost via any of dozens of remote hosting services, all of which use partial virtualization to keep costs low.

Yes Virginia, Santa Uses Virtualization, too.

There are also clear virtualization benefits for an enterprise deployment with high security needs although in this case they are not so much from remote hosting and DNS which may not suit larger businesses.  Instead, large scale deployments that utilize 24/7 data centers and many staffers will be able to use virtualization to more flexibly and effectively manage extensive resources that are likely to include a storage area network or other centralized storage as well as several networked servers that must function together in a “no downtime” environment.  

This earlier insight by Lucas Kubin sheds some light on how virtualization can be used with respect to implementation of storage area networks.

Without virtualization many routine maintenance tasks can become problematic in that they’ll create downtime for workers and for the websites, lowering productivity and confusing or losing potential customers.

So, why isn’t everybody reaping these benefits?

For the many small businesses that are struggling with server management issues I think the most common impediment to increased virtualization is simply the difficulty or confusion about switching from a managed local server and network to a remotely managed data center environment.    Although I’m now fairly confident that our largest travel websites would have been (and would now be) both easier and cheaper to manage if we were set up at a data center with virtual dedicated servers, the cost to move and reconfigure the whole show would now be prohibitive as it uses several servers and is also integrated with the office network, email, spam filtering, and more.    In addition to advantages mentioned above many business websites will experience greater uptime and excellent load balancing in remotely hosted, virtual server environments which have tumbled to a fraction of former prices even as they have dramatically improved in terms of quality, uptime, and support response time.    An example is that only a few years ago I was spending $800 per month for a single dedicated server hosting several websites that I can now serve via a virtual dedicated setup at under $50 per month.    Unfortunately our main projects can’t be moved easily to this type of environment at this time.

Although we have an excellent server administrator, the tasks done only a few times a year by staff are a daily routine at the hosting center, so even assuming *equal employee quality* regular IT folks are likely to need more time to perform the routine but rarely done tasks (such as IP provisioning, zone files, domain troubleshooting, etc, etc).   For a data center these are handled either automatically or routinely by staff, often lowering the net cost for the data center and for the customer.

Summary:

It was not very long ago that virtualization was poorly understood by many server administrators and not commonly used for most applications, where now almost all enterprise applications and most remotely hosted websites and cloud computing services are using partial virtualization to more effectively manage resource and reduce the cost of creating effectively independent websites and networks.    Regardless of the size or focus of your business it would be advisable to consider the many benefits of virtualization in light of the cost to revise your enterprise configuration and/or make better use of remote virtualized hosting and cloud based services.

 

Joseph Hunkins is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight from Joseph Hunkins and other experts, please visit www.insightcommunity.com.

Virtualization Background

I have a few years of experience using virtual servers.  Early on, virtualization was so complicated to implement and maintain that it only made sense for those organizations with the most dire need for software segmentation or other complex architectural needs.  Virtualization is so easy now that implementation is almost an afterthought.  I am currently implementing several virtual servers on a massive grid as part of a major virtualization effort at my organization.  Virtualization has definitely come a long ways since my earliest experiences, and the value it can provide to me and my coworkers is now much more obvious.

Direct Benefits of Virtualization

Virtualization is expected to directly provide me and my coworkers with the following benefits:

1.  Easy-to-manage future hardware upgrades.  The virtual machine operations folks can just add processor power, disk space or RAM to our configuration instantly at any time, at a near zero cost compared to the complexity involved in roll out a new physical server in our very large server environment (many thousands of servers).  Conversely, if a piece of physical hardware that is connected into the grid dies, it can be swapped out without shutting down any of the virtual servers, yielding a far greater “hardware uptime” end-user experience.  The hardware still dies just like it always does, but it doesn’t affect the performance of the software in as significant a way as if a single system dies and takes some application down.  For those who have never had a direct hardware failure, remember virtualization when it happens to you (and it will happen one day!)

2.  Easy-to-redeploy software configurations.  If one of these virtual machines were to suffer a data loss or software misconfiguration that would require a rebuild, we can rebuild and redeploy the entire server in minutes instead of hours or days.  If we need other “firmware” changes, those are equally easier on the hardware folks to implement.

3.  Other logistics are faster and more easily controlled by IT staff.  For example, relocating the virtual machines to a different physical location can be achieved easily and without physically moving the old hardware to the new location.  Finally, software upgrades and patches are easier for IT to roll out.

Management and Indirect Benefits

Those are some of the benefits I will realize that will improve my ability to deploy custom software solutions to those servers vs. our old physical server configuration.  There are far more benefits than that to the operators and upper management, such as the cost savings of having the minimum necessary virtual hardware added to each application or project.  The larger your virtual grid becomes, the more this cost savings will outweigh the overhard costs and ultimately with a multi-thousand server grid, I can’t imagine everyone wouldn’t be impressed with the new bottom line.

The Performance Cost of Virtualization

Virtualization has a performance cost on the hardware due to the overhead of the virtualization management software.  This overhead would have a huge effect if you had a large application and only a few pieces of hardware, and you were hammering the hardware to max capacity before virtualization.  However, if like our organization you can get a big grid of hardware going, that overhead cost will be vastly outweighed by the virtual-hardware-minimizing savings noted above.  If you have a lot of smaller apps that need their own distinct servers, virtualization is definitely worth consideration.  I would even prefer hosting my own apps in a third-party virtual environment to having to manage my own hardware, because I know it’s so much easier to manage virtual servers that I will get way better and cheaper service via that compared with paying for my own hardware.

Systems Architecture Considerations

Virtualization is the most technically correct way to implement hardware and software from a systems architecture standpoint.  Consider the following scenario: if I purchase hardware, no matter how I choose to upgrade the software, I am stuck with that hardware configuration’s limitations because it is directly controlled by the software.  Contrast this with a virtual environment, where the hardware can be upgraded and configured independently of the software.  This allows for legacy systems to either be emulated or otherwise virtualized and kept functional far beyond the original hardware’s lifespan.  Furthermore, the latest software and hardware can be implemented basically immediately with little cost to at least test the software, versus trying to purchase an entire new physical hardware configuration. 

New Ways to Solve Problems

Finally, virtual servers allow for the consideration of possibilities far outside the restrictions imposed by traditional physical server environments.  One of the future enhancements I may propose for our virtual grid is the ability to have tons of client systems automatically test various components for us, so that we can know right away if a specific type of configuration will be incompatible with our software.  Organizations can realize substantial savings and time-to-market improvement from a grid of virtual QA tester machines in different configurations, and that’s just one random idea out of a whole new industry made possible by a virtual server grid.

 

Devin Moore is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight from Devin Moore and other experts, please visit www.insightcommunity.com.

Application-Centric Virtualization

Virtualization systems today work with operating systems. They support deploying virtual machines, failing them over to another physical hardware when disaster strikes, they optimize physical memory utilization and many more OS-related tasks. What is more, the virtualization platform can deploy new operating system automagically, according preset scenarios. Well, where’s a problem?

It’s application, not operating system what the end users really need to work with. They need the application interface to be available on demand, to respond fast, to stay available should one of company’s facilities fail. And there are many services like databases, fileservers, mail stores and other which that application interface depend on. And it’s the operating system at the end of this application dependency chain.

This means we have a mature technology available to cover the last link of chain. Now it’s time to move operating systems’ role to background, wher they’ll provide a simple runtime environment for applications. Let’s move the focus to applications and let them be managed through the same interfaces we use to manage virtual servers.

It’s not enough, however. We need to keep those applications highly-available and their data consistent. There’s one problem with current OS virtualization systems’ high availability solutions, however: If one physical hardware fails, the application stops until the OS is auto-restarted on another. Not to mention the consistency is usually corrupted in such events.

To move further to 100% available applications there are two options:

1. To redesign each (suitable) application separately to cluster their transactions among multiple running instances and thus be ready to transparently failover in case a single hardware fails.
2. To create a generic API layer in operating system to take care of applications HA features. Similarly to what Volume Shadow Copy did for applications’ consistent snapshots on Windows platform.

Server-bound storage

Most of current server virtualization features depend on central storage, connected to many physical servers. Few companies realize this to be a single point of failure case, when that array’s failure causes a disruption to all connected virtual machines running applications. Mirroring that array or yet better – clustering it using technologies like those by LeftHand or Equallogic – can eliminate this SPOF issue.

There’s another option, however – use the same x86 box for both the virtualization system and storage. Just imagine a common server used for virtualization – it boots from an internal flash drive and still have some 6 drive slots available to accommodate SAS or SATA drives.

By implementing a synchronous block replication feature – or implementing an existing one – to replicate data between boxes, we could start building an autonomous virtualization cluster. Should one box fail, the other one will transparently take over both it’s applications and storage.

Do you worry about such storage performance? You might be right, you need tens of SAS drives to satisfy some applications’ IOps needs. Soon, however, such performance will accommodate in both read and write operations a single SSD drive.

Putting right virtualization system platform, block replication system, 2 SSD drives and some large capacity SATA drives into a single box is a dream solution of most server administrators. We have all technologies available to build such system, the time some server vendor designs it is comming. I believe.

 

Lukas Kubin is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight from Lukas Kubin and other experts, please visit www.insightcommunity.com.

Ways to maximize profits:

• Reduce costs
• Increase productivity and output
• Be resilient to risk
• Attract and retain customers

Reduce costs

Many costs are incurred by IT departments.  These include money spent on electricity, hardware, staff support time, deployment time, and disaster costs to name a few.  Virtualization can reduce all of these expenses.  Virtual storage on SANs will only allocate storage used, making it easier to manage and increasing utilization of storage.  100% of allocated space is used instead of a storage manager having to juggle space between LUNs and decide whether to overallocate or manage storage more frequently.  Virtualization allows several server operating systems to be hosted on one piece of physical server hardware which increases its utilization.  All of those unused clock cycles and memory are now being utilized to the fullest saving real dollars by not having to buy a physical server for each system that demands a dedicated server OS.

Time of deployment for a new server drops from two or three hours down to fifteen minutes or less when cloning server or workstation templates in the virtual world.  With technologies such as high-availability and disaster recovery managers for virtual machines, there is unheard of uptimes and true business continuity, not just disaster recovery.  Less equipment means less energy used for redundant power supplies on each server.  This also means more servers per square foot in a data center, which means the data center doesn’t need to waste valuable real estate.

Increase productivity and output

With much shorter deployment times and decreased maintenance and recovery times, IT staff has much more time for projects and improving support of business units.  To the business this means less staff required to maintain more servers, or it could mean much more is accomplished in the same amount of time.  There is also a better perception of the IT department when the business isn’t upset about a server being down to long, taking too long to recover or deploy.

Be resilient to risk

Risk to the business can come in all forms.  One of the most obvious risks discussed with IT staff is the concept of “disaster recovery”.  Some firms have evolved this concept into one of business resumption or continuity, as if there is no pause or hiatus, and business simply resumes.  This advanced concept is certainly more of a reality now with HA or “high availability” technology.  Virtualization takes advantage of their resource abstraction to offer impressive HA features.  For example a physical server can go down, yet the application server marches on little or no downtime with no impact to the users. 

Couple the HA technology with snapshot or backup technology and the risk of data, system, or registry corruption is mitigated as well.  With various management front-end interfaces now available, an entire site can go down physically, but its data and features can be available virtually, either in the “cloud”, or with replicated HA virtual machines becoming active at a remote site.

Attract and retain customers

This may be the hardest part, but one that every business strives for.  Virtualization can help with this aspect by marketing their dominance in the first three categories.  By offering more product for less money with strong resilience to risk, your business becomes much more attractive to both customers and shareholders.

Virtualization Defined

Let’s not forget, virtualization is not just separating the operating system from the hardware, rather it is the abstraction of all resources.  This means adding a layer of abstraction between two resources.  There are several current examples, such as storage system from the storage used as in the case of virtual storage.  The most obvious is abstracting the hardware of a server from the OS and software of a server.  There are VLANs and VSANs, allowing for complicated network configurations without the complicated wiring of them.  Let’s not get boxed in to how “it’s always been”.  We need to move forward and expand the exciting world of virtualization and abstraction of resources.

 

Michael Kramer is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight from Michael Kramer and other experts, please visit www.insightcommunity.com.

Virtualisation is a solution to that problem. I can take a “snapshot” of my server before the upgrade, make a copy of it, then start work. Then at 10PM when the team is tired, we can make a decision to “roll back”. Then migrate back to the copy of the server disk image or snapshot and….. go home.

More recently, for certain types of server software, we have been performing the upgrades on a copy of the virtual server in lab environments. We take a snapshot of the Virtual Hard Disk, move it into a lab virtual server, and then run the upgrade procedure. As we find problems (there is always a problem isn’t there?) we read the manuals, contact tech support, communicate with the developers, get external resources or any of other myriad things that can fix the problems. 

Previously, we were restoring from tape, or a backup on a SAN. And this could take hours to do the rollback. The temptation to keep pushing through the problem.

But now, we have often performed the upgrade a number of times and know exactly what is going to happen. Importantly, becuase we never need to load a tape or backup media, or put the Boot CD into the drive, or press F12 at boot time, we are able to do all this work from home. The hypervisor console means that we have total control over the machine environment from a remote console. 

Ah, home. Now that is where work should be done from. 

We are also saving money. It’s surprising and it’s not obvious, but we save money by:

- no longer needing to have external consultants on standby or on site for the upgrade “just in case” (and having to pay penalty rates for night work)
- travel and accomodation at the data centre
- reduction in time used for low risk projects because we can prove the upgrade in the lab
- Less overall resources. Many operational projects use less resources to achieve an outcome. 
- reduced training budget because people can learn on test systems and copies of the live systems. 
- not purchasing expensive KVM systems to have remote control of servers

You might also guess that there is a lot less stress going on. While it is true that designing and creating the virtual servers then learning the tools that manage and control those systems took some time and some money, it is not as bad as you might think. Why ? Because it is the same as what we already do ! You see, a virtual server still just a CPU, Memory and Hard Disk Drives. 

Virtualisation means that I can usually go home at a good time, be less stressed and spend more time at home since I can do server work remotely. Thats good enough for me.

 

Greg Ferro is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight from Greg Ferro and other experts, please visit www.insightcommunity.com.

At my last job each developer had their own personal development system. Since it was a military-affiliated command, there were 3 separate networks that required development efforts. There was on server where code was stored in a repository for community access. The command did have thin-client terminal systems for most users but the developers couldn’t use them because of the work that they performed.

Because each developer had 3 personal computer systems, space was at a premium. It also meant that special privileges had to be set up for everyone so they could have Administrator access to the computers to install software for testing and compatibility research.

One problem that we ran into was making sure everyone had the necessary version of software for testing and development. There was no central file server that had the software the developers required so everyone was on their own to ensure their systems were up to date.

Additionally, since each developer programmed on his local systems, there was no data redundancy in case of a system failure and there were no policies or procedures to back up data on a regular basis. Network profiles enabled each person to have a network “hard drive” for personal data storage; these profiles were backed up with the normal server backups. However, no one trusted them for important file storage because network problems could prevent access when needed and there was no way to synchronize the files between the local hard drive and the profile.

To try and reduce the number of desktop systems we were responsible for (and the associated licensing issues) and to resolve many of the problems mentioned above, a virtualization scheme was tested for the development process. Three servers that were recycled from a previous project were converted to virtual machine servers, each with 4 virtual systems created. A default image was created for initial testing purposes to see whether a viable development system could be virtualized.

The test was conducted for a year with one developer using the virtual system for most of his work, and several developers using the VMs on an occasional basis. There were no problems programming in the virtual environment. The developers who didn’t use it simply felt they didn’t have as much control as they would like (even though each person had complete admin access to their VM) and some programming tasks, such as compiling, seemed to take longer than normal over the network.

Some of the highlights of test were:

1.       We controlled the servers so control of the VMs wasn’t up to a third party. We could administer them as needed without having to wait for approval or having to notify anyone.

2.       Custom environments could be created, depending on the programming tasks required. For example, a separate VM image could be created for Java programming, web development, image processing, or MS Windows development.

3.       Once a development environment was created and approved, an image snapshot was taken and stored both on the server and offline. Any new VMs that needed to be created could simply use the established snapshots as-is or as a template.

4.       Memory and disc sizes could be dynamically altered on the servers depending on the needs of the developers. It also enabled more resources to be devoted to the tasks that needed it, such as compiling, when it was necessary.

5.       When a developer no longer needed the VM, it could be saved and closed, freeing up resources for other uses.

6.       Software could be updated and monitored centrally rather than having to keep track of each person’s systems.

7.       The virtual environment allowed use of the thin-client workstations, bypassing the limitations of the normal network. This meant users could simply use one, small workstation instead of 3 towers to do the same work. It also meant that security was enhanced because the unclassified and classified workstations were no longer physical entities within the workspace.

The test was concluded to be a success. Even accounting for the complaints from the part-time users, the virtual development environment was proven to be usable. The problems with the arrangement were generally issues that were out of the division’s control.

1.       Purchasing VMWare or other virtualization software requires the headaches and hassles of regular software purchases. Open-source software, e.g. Xen, doesn’t have the corporate support “required” for approval. Free software, e.g. MS Virtual Server, often doesn’t have the enterprise-capabilities necessary for a full-blown rollout.

2.       Servers need hardware upgrades to support a reasonable number of VMs and the minimum requirements are higher than for “normal” uses. For servers that weren’t under the control of the division required approval and support from the Enterprise Support Dept.

3.       A small learning curve is required for users to learn how to “remote in” to the virtual systems and for administrators to learn how to properly administer a virtual environment.

Overall, virtualization can make life easier for users and administrators. The learning curve is relatively small, especially for users. Money can be saved by reducing the physical systems required for work and the associated overhead of those systems (energy costs, cabling, hardware repairs, etc.). Fewer administrators are required for the same number of users and administration is easier to centralize. The initial costs may be higher than normal but, in the long run, the benefits justify going virtual.

 

Cody Jackson is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight from Cody Jackson and other experts, please visit www.insightcommunity.com.

The Problem with Virtual Servers

Implementation of virtualization technology to date has merely delivered condensation of physical resources: 250 physical servers are condensed onto 20 physical servers, but 250 virtual server images remain. True, this does result in the reduction of data center footprint, from rack space to power and cooling, enabling moderate cost savings. But these are not examples of real consolidation, let alone business transformation.

Many have lamented this “virtual server sprawl” and suggested alternative methods of consolidating low-utilization applications into larger, more flexible “resource servers”. For example, numerous SQL servers can be combined on a single central server with more focused management. But these larger resource servers are not normally virtualized since their concentrated I/O demands can overtax current server virtualization platforms. Therefore, consolidation and virtualization remain separate.

This is the problem with conventional server virtualization. It enables us to condense data center demands for some systems, but delivers very little else apart from new backup and management headaches. Certainly we can provision servers more quickly, and we might be able to recover from a disaster more easily, but these are IT-facing benefits that other business entities care little about.

Storage and Network Virtualization

Virtualization of storage and network resources face even higher barriers. Where server virtualization has quickly delivered incremental “green” savings, these benefits are harder to come by in other areas.

Storage virtualization primarily delivers flexibility. SAN or NAS systems can be combined into larger pools, allowing existing resources to be better utilized or provisioned more quickly. But there is only a little cost avoidance to be gleaned from more efficient use of storage capacity. Real cost savings would require reduction of infrastructure, and constant data growth makes this extremely difficult to achieve. Other benefits, like enhanced data migration or heterogeneous replication, ought to be invisible to the business anyway.

Network virtualization lags even further behind. Only a few shops have attempted to use technology like InfiniBand to enable flexible virtual connectivity, though the future Converged Enhanced Ethernet concept is beginning to spark some interest. Here again, financial benefits from network virtualization technology are limited to a moderate reduction in future equipment cost.

Transforming the Data Center

In all three instances (server, storage, and network), the financial benefits are merely the sideshow. The underlying benefit from virtualization of IT infrastructure comes from the extension of IT systems outside the data center, a change on the order of the advent of minicomputers or the spread of open systems.

VMware recently laid out a serious and compelling vision of this future Virtual Data Center as VDC-OS. Their concept is evolutionary and radical at once, with the simple virtual server infrastructure of today augmented with increasingly uniform and flexible storage and network layers. This culminates in a truly virtual data center, where running server images can move from device to device, location to location, and even out to the cloud.

VMware’s brilliance is in leveraging what works today (virtual server images on ESX) to build a foundation for complete virtualization of physical resources. But virtual servers running on VDC-OS remain tied to the present: They run the same operating systems and will likely remain bound to the same “one (virtual) server per application” world view that pervades open systems today. This leads to exactly the same situation of server sprawl that has proven a management nightmare.

Others are extending the web hosting concept to enable custom applications to be run on the scalable, flexible, multi-homed servers that run the world’s biggest Internet applications. Google and Amazon’s visions are decidedly post-data center, with applications, rather than server images, being the primary unit, and database-style storage replacing conventional blocks and files. Use of these web-oriented application platforms has so far been limited to entirely new systems built from scratch to take advantage of them, limiting their appeal to current IT environments.

Where Is the Business Value?

Yet, most discussions of these virtualization strategies (mine included) fails when it comes to demonstrating real business value. We must move away from quickly-forgotten cost savings and focus instead on profoundly transforming how IT serves business goals. Virtualized infrastructure allows flexibility and scalability, changing how everything in IT works.

Whether it uses conventional operating systems and applications (as in VDC-OS) or re-engineered web-enabled solutions, virtualized infrastructure fundamentally changed our world. Organizations would be free to physically move their systems, even outsourcing or offshoring the infrastructure component entirely. They could move to an on-demand purchasing model for logical capacity, not just bits and bytes.

In the process, they would render current server platforms, operating systems, and storage devices irrelevant. Undoubtedly, attaining this future remains a while off, but IT professionals should consider its implications. Much of what we do is focused on making the “plumbing” work efficiently rather than serving the needs of the business. Where do we stand once the perennial issues of performance, availability, and scalability are solved?

 

Stephen Foskett is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight from Stephen Foskett and other experts, please visit www.insightcommunity.com.

There are three scenarios discussed here that show what the flexibility of some form of VM solution can provide.

1.  Disaster Recovery Opportunities.

Traditional DR strategies around failover, system and whole site replication and third site options rely on similar server and operating systems to make them viable. Data recovery is a problem solved long ago and IT operations are more than familiar with incremental backups, snapshots and recovery.  As more businesses begin to realise that systems/applications are increasingly mission critial the applications themselves need to be more resilient.  
    
Having to have replicated server environments for Windows, Unix and/or Linux means that many Data Centres are over designed and carrying unused capacity just in case one architecture dependent application fails.
    
This is where the power of virtualization becomes a tangible benefit. Owning or leasing some short term capacity in it’s cheapest form (either Windows or Linux) could be a solution for many enterprises.  In essence all you need to buy is CPU time and memory to host a guest VM soltion of your application.  The data may be in the cloud or on portable storage that can be easily accessed by the stood up virtualized platfrom.
    
Needless to say the focus then becomes on well trained administrators who are comfortable with working with hybridized solutions and not a single flavour of architecture.
    
2.  Pre Sales Demonstrations.

Virtualized platforms are a must for the average pre-sales or training consultants.  No lenghty installs are required and you are no longer reliant on the right hardware being in the right place at the right time.  Now you can take a VM solution of your application either as part of an image on your laptop or on a portable USB drive.
    
The benefit is the ability to pre-configure the scenarios in advance of the session but still have the flexibility to model new scenarios as the demo evolves.  Most VM solutions allow for persistent or non-persistent storage so this allows a quick recovery if you have deviated away from your configuration that you might need in the next session.
    
The only limitations are processing power and disk, but with high end laptops and portable USB drives with up to 1TB of storage this should not be  limiting factor for most demo systems.

It’s akin to having your test server in your laptop bag or suitcase.
    
3.  Massively Parallel Processing.

Having worked with a Unix based billing system that like most billing solutions has to deal with peak loads for rating and billing processing virtualization could offer a solution to a common problem.
    
Typically disk is a cheap and well used resource that can be added to an expanded.  There will always be a need to manage such a resource effectively but CPU and memory in enterprise servers are expensive and less easy to add in a 24×7 production server.  Even planned downtime can severely impact on the SLA of the billing department.
    
Virtualization can work in two ways in such a situation.
    
Lunchtimes and out of hours there is an untapped resource of idle CPU and memory in distinct units, the common desktop on the employees desk.  If these are Windows PC’s (which most are) then a VM solution that allows you to run a unit of rating or billing in a hosted Unix or Linux Virtual Machine allows you to distribute the processing across the available computing power of the enterprise.  Even as a stop gap solution to handle abnormal peak loads (SMS sent on New Years Eve, phone calls made in the aftermath of a terrorist event) or a longer term transition to more CPU and Memory on the production server virualization allows for this to happen.
    
New Linux version of Suse, Ubuntu and Redhat are becoming more and more usable for the average end user.  The interface looks familiar and in a time of web clients a browser run on XP has the same functionality as one run on Suse 11.0.
    
So what prevents enterprises from mass adoption of Linux clients? the inertia of trying to replace Microsoft Office is usually cited as a reason. Despite the efforts OpenOffice or GoogleDocs don’t have the same draw. The answer is a VM solution to allow users to run Office applications on their Linux clients.
    
Alternatively adoption of application virutalization options like the Mono Project or Wine allow Windows applications to be run directly in the Linux environment without the need for guest virtual machines.
    
With the release of freeware options like VirtualBox, virtualization is set to become a growth area.  With the focus on green data centres and new domains (e.g. Healthcare) starting to understand the need for cost effective DR strategies 2009 should be a good year for the proponents of virtualization.

 

David Mould is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight from David Mould and other experts, please visit www.insightcommunity.com.