VMware's Popularity Belies its Complexity
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Businesses need to exercise caution in this new virtual environment by understanding the complexity that virtualization introduces.
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Analysts believe it's Viridian, the virtualization application, that will drive adoption of Windows Server 2008.
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A set of newly discovered flaws in components of VMware Inc.&#39;s virtual machine software has called attention to some of the security risks associated with the practice of running virtual computers on a single system.
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(InfoWorld) - Going virtual is becoming a real answer for data center managers, according to a survey of large and small businesses. Fifty-one percent of North American companies are either testing virtualization technology in their data centers or have already deployed it, according to a report released Friday by Forrester Research. Use of virtualization is less in Europe (35 percent either testing or deploying it) and Asia-Pacific (21 percent), but is generally growing nonetheless. Forrester compared results of a 2006 survey to a similar one in 2005 in which 41 percent of companies in North America, 30 percent in Europe and 23 percent in Asia-Pacific were using or testing virtualization. Although the Asia-Pacific number is lower in 2006 than 2005, Forrester notes the survey sample was smaller there than in the other regions. Whether or not they are using virtualization, interest in or even just awareness of virtualization grew in all geographic regions in 2006 from 2005. Virtualization refers to dynamic management of a company's total information technology infrastructure. The most common use of virtualization is in the operation of x86 servers in data centers. Virtualization makes it possible to run multiple software applications and operating systems simultaneously on one physical server. The result is that instead or running at only 15 percent to 20 percent of capacity, when one server runs only one application, servers can run at 80 percent to 90 percent of capacity. Thus, a company could spend less money buying servers. Although virtualization is more likely embraced by large enterprises, awareness of it by SMBsÂ is growing at a faster rate, the survey showed. Awareness of virtualization by Global 2000 large enterprises grew to 92 percent in 2006 from 87 percent in 2005. But awareness by medium-to-large business jumped to 86 percent from 60 percent andÂ to 83 percent from 62 percent by SMBs. Server virtualization software company VMware remains the dominant provider. Fifty-three percent of those surveyed would consider VMware for virtualization, versus just 9 percent for Microsoft's Virtual Server product. Only one respondent mentioned the open-source Xen virtualization software as a choice, while just six mentioned Sun's Solaris operating system, whose virtualization feature is called Containers. EMC, which operates VMware as a subsidiary,Â announced plans this week to launch an initial public offering of VMware stock. Microsoft, which introduced its Virtual Server product in 2004, is expected to launch an updated version later this year. Forrester surveyed 1,267 enterprises with more than 1,000 employees, and 503 SMBs with 100 to 999 employees for its report.
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3.0 already? Better toss the 2.0 rubbish Virtualization has become somewhat of a Wild West for the data center market, promising streets paved with gold for IT groups - and endless riches for the vendors hawking this new-age server slicing technology.â¦
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InfoWorld - Like other adopters of server virtualization, Purdue University was concerned that its datacenter would hit the wall, exceeding physical space, power, and cooling limits. The use of EMC VMware let it combine 140 physical servers into three Hewlett-Packard DL-585 servers, a 40:1 compression ratio, says Mike Rubesch, director of IT infrastructure systems. &quot;It helps postpone the inevitable,&quot; he adds.
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'Virtual security solution' is designed to slow virus and malware attacks.
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VMware offers its app free, but competitors ask whether it treats all virtualization products equally.
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(InfoWorld) - In 2006, many enterprise IT groups saw the potential in virtualization, rushed to consolidate servers and subsequently propelledÂ VMwareÂ software to a market-leading spot. As 2007 begins, VMware's prices are under attack, just as more CIOs look to virtualization to control server and storage sprawl and tame data center power costs. For starters, VMware rivals XenSource and Virtual Iron Software have launched new open-source alternatives, undercutting VMware on price. Also, new processors, such as IBM's Power 5 and upcoming Power 6 chips, and new operating systems have virtualization capabilities built in, negating the need for some additional software, says Clay Ryder, president of The Sageza Group. Sun Microsystems' Solaris 10 OS includes a virtualization feature it calls Containers. MicrosoftÂ is expected to release a beta version of Windows Virtual Server in the first quarter of 2007 and ship it a year later. That's good news: As virtualization features become part of the hardware or the OS, software providers will have to offer useful extra features, Ryder says, such as automated new software testing or security patch management. Virtual Iron introduced Version 3.1Â of its virtualization platform in December for a license price of $499 per socket--compared to $2,875 per socket for a comparable VMware license. XenSource also introduced new virtualization products at sub-$1,000 prices. Both XenSource and Virtual Iron build their proprietary products on top of the open-source Xen platform for virtualization hypervisors. (A hypervisor lets a computer run multiple operating systems at once.) VMware's products are not based on open source. Meanwhile, middleware vendor BEA Systems is making its own cost-cutting move. In the first half of 2007,Â BEA plans to releaseÂ WebLogic Server Virtual Edition (WLS-VE), a version of its Java application server that includes Liquid VM--a BEA-specific Java Virtual Machine that lets Java applications run directly on a hypervisor without requiring an operating system to be present. This will let users substantially reduce the amount of computer power, lowering the hardware costs per application, says Guy Churchward, vice president and general manager of the Java Runtime Products Group at BEA Systems. Initially, Liquid VM will work only with VMware's ESX Server hypervisor. Analysts advise CIOs planning for virtualization in 2007 to think strategically, not just tactically. "To really make virtualization work you want to do it so end users access capability, not just specific machines," Ryder says. "That's only going to be possible if you take a strategic approach," he says, noting that virtualization needs to be applied to storage, networking and the introduction of new software, not just servers. Mike Williams, CIO for the Defense Contract Management Agency (DCMA), learned a lesson about thinking strategically when he did a virtualization project in 2006. (The DCMA, a federal Department of Defense agency, places contract managers inside companies fulfilling defense contracts for weapons systems, jets, military equipment and parts.) Williams deployed VMware, reducing the agency's number of servers to 160 from 560 and the number of data centers to three from 17. But that move taxed the WAN when all the network traffic converged on the three data centers. His advice: Optimize the WAN first. Still, Williams likes the results. Before virtualization, DCMA replaced about one-third of its 560 servers annually at a cost of about $2 million, Williams says; virtualization cut that expense to $560,000.
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New flaws in VMware's virtual machine shine the spotlight on issues of virtualization security.
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Ask Microsoft Analysis My friends in the financial industry keep lobbing the same question - how long can VMware keep up its growth? The answer to that query revolves around Microsoft and how competent it decides to be.â¦
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InfoWorld - Hoping to keep the heat on archrival Microsoft, VMware on Wednesday will give developers a glimpse of an early version of its Virtual SMP product that allows a single virtual machine to work with as many as four processors, which in turn can more effectively drive mission-critical applications.
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Virtualization looks tasty, but VMware is so scary -- let's shack up with another also-ran!
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The fragmented  software business is growing up.
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much more so than the average home PC user realizes. That notion, widely held in the tech industry, is borne out
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InfoWorld - Virtualization software leader VMware Inc. is testing a desktop virtualization program that can be stored on a USB drive and moved from one computer to another.
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(Source: VMWare)  One of America's fastest-growing counties comes in 1 million dollars under IT budget while reducing downtime to a few minutes annually using VMware virtualization and EqualLogic iSCSI technologies.  Learn more in this new report.