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Monday, March 03, 2008 6:02 PM/EST
Aside from VKernel, I'm not seeing a lot of choice for IT managers who want to enable chargeback for virtual infrastructure costs. However, I met today with virtual test lab management toolmaker Surgient and got a little more insight into some ways IT managers might think about chargeback. Erik Josowitz, a VP at Surgient, suggested that quantifying RAM and time might be a good way to measure the amount of resources a VM is using, and therefore could be a good way to charge departments for virtual computing resources. Other resources to measure could be VLAN, IP address and MAC address consumed. I suggested network bandwidth, but agreed with Erik that the incremental use cost for bandwidth was so small as to be negligible when compared to the other metrics he suggested. What is clear is that VM infrastructure is paying for itself through hardware consolidation and power reductions. It's...
Tuesday, February 26, 2008 7:05 PM/EST
My news colleague Clint Boulton got a look at IBM's three-dimensional data center modeling software tool. IBM's 3-D data center management system is actually quite retro ... CA developed a 3-D interface for its Unicenter system management platform in 1997. I think 3-D interfaces are as bad an idea today as they were when I first flew around in CA's Unicenter. Here are the reasons why: 1. The video game interface is great for selling management systems on the golf course, but impractical in an operations center. System, network and application managers need to see what isn't working, quickly. In my testing experience, 3-D interfaces are ineffective at showing problems quickly. 2. Lists are better. A simple color-coded list that puts high-priority problems at the top is much more effective than a system that requires clambering around in a 3-D interface. 3. Three-dimensional interfaces are ineffective at sharing valuable management...
Monday, February 25, 2008 6:51 PM/EST
Novell announced today (Feb. 25) that it was acquiring PlateSpin, a data center virtualization management tool maker. As I've been covering how to prevent virtual machine sprawl, I'm interested in getting a look at what PlateSpin brings to the table, in particular the PowerRecon and PowerConvert products that enable virtual machine chargeback and usage accounting and workload portability between networked physical resources. In my tech analysis of how to prevent virtual machine sprawl, I reported that Ziff Davis Enterprise Editorial Research had found that 80 percent of respondents said lowering hardware costs was their top virtualization driver. I suggested in the story that controlling virtual machine management costs would rise in importance after the physical-to-virtual ("p2v") transition was complete. I suspect that products like those made by PlateSpin and strategies such as Novell's drive to monitor and manage multiplatform virtualized environments will quickly become the important factors in determining the...
Thursday, February 21, 2008 7:56 PM/EST
I've just returned from the Emerald City (Oracle's Redwood Shores HQ) where I was given a demo of the latest version of Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g Grid Control, Release 4. After reviewing Oracle Database 11g I felt it was time to take a look at Grid Control R4, released in November 2007. I was just able to scratch the surface of the Oracle ecosystem manager in the over 3 hours of demonstration time. My basic takeaway is that database and system administrators should definitely get the basic Enterprise Manager 10g Grid Control R4 product, which is available at no extra license cost with most Oracle products. I'll take a closer look at the add-on management packs that Oracle charges for when I take a full look at the product. In most respects, the basic shape of Grid Control R4 is comprehensive systems and application management. The three-tier architecture uses agents...
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