Blade Watch

http://www.bladewatch.com/2009/09/04/the-need-to-launch-it-training-university-v2-0/ and http://www.bladewatch.com/2009/12/15/short-essay-on-training-the-next-generation/

I have written a few posts about educating the next generation of IT and business people going forward, and I know there are so many groups and individuals working on this going forward, whether it’s education based around a specific platform, or qualification and certification against a set of processes or concepts like ITIL, like Prince 2. I still feel though that what I needed when I was thinking about IT was a grounding a rules of engagement training coupled with interactive or real life concepts to ready me for the real world – where we can’t just rebuild the server or order a new switch, there are processes and procedures to be followed. At the same time though, in an environment where we have people that think outside the box, “..have you thought about this,  since you can’t do that..” – how refreshing, how engaging.

The world is changing, university needs to evolve with it, I loved my time at university and finances permitted, I always said I’d go back to doing a degree in history or economics. I wonder had my university course been more like it would have been had I decided on a career in medicine it might have proved more valuable financially, emotionally and professionally. What we need to do is bridge the gap between academic study which is so important with the real world scenarios, real world qualifications and experiences so that our graduates and post graduates can not only hit the ground running know the help desk process, service level agreements and understand concepts like ITIL, virtualization or grid, but understand the economics, the business pressures the just in time, the on demand business – all the stuff that dad taught me all these years:

“…don’t reply to that she’s well meaning person, this is what you do and say…”

“…No, no, no, you run the diagnostics, you verify the patches and service packs, rule out the infrastructure, what else could it be? Could it be the application at fault? Oh dear, oh dear..”.

With that then, what would I have wanted from my IT degree going forward, from a university, what would I have recommended as useful, what case studies would I have used and what concepts would I have wished I had experienced? There are so many, there are also so many limitiations, reasons why we just cannot do that, but let us continue to live in “Martin-world” where everything is possible, where the barriers can be dealt with, and slowly head back on our journey to reality.

The core skills and subjects I would have asked for would have been:

• Economics and business studies – concepts of marginal cost combining how it should be and how it is in some businesses – direct and indirect costs, elasticity of demand
• Project management including Prince 2
• ITIL training maybe not the complete course, but the basics the incident, the service request, the change process what it all means and why they are different
• Human resource management – in terms of interacting with customers, managing expectations, dealing with failure, how to communicate in business
• Green IT – the possibilities, the justification both environmentally and economically – what it can mean from the desktop to the data center

What technical experience might I have wanted?

• Operating system – Windows/Linux/Unix
• Database – Oracle/MySQL/SQL
• Development – C++/HTML/XML
• Virtualization – Xen/VMware
• Grid/cloud – DataSynapse/Platform
• MiddleWare – MQ Series/IIS/Websphere/Apache
• Monitoring – Ganglia/NSM/OpenView

What experiences would I have wanted?

• Hardware – server stuff, SAN, RAID, network, what a server looks like, playing with blades, understanding how it all fits together
• Concepts – latency, performance per watt, redundancy, high availability and business continuity, operational risk and risk mitigation
• On call and help desk – incident case studies including failures – what went wrong and how could it have been prevented – how the teams fit together

Could we train our IT people like we do our teachers, our other professionals, provide them with the type of degree which balances the right range of theoretical and practical skills which makes them more prepared more effective members of the team? Could we have the degree which is focused around a role, development, infrastructure or application support, leadership or project management? Could the MA be the qualification which includes less technical, but more human resources and leadership training, could the degree rather than focus just on the how good is your development, but also include the documentation, the application release process and roll back?

Going forward how do we translate the traditional IT qualifications and ways of teaching students to be more business relevant, more centric to the challenges that we face today? What range of businesses, start-ups and innovations could we see simply by illustrating to the next generation here is where we are, what do you think we should do, what is your take on it? Only when you are standing outside the issue can you really see objectively where the issues are and what you might change.

Our next generation business and IT leaders share a common path, the boundaries between business and IT continue to change, as they do on several levels being just an IT person or just a business person is no longer good enough, I expect you to understand a credit derivative the return on investment on that project you are trying to get funded, just as I expect you to know what a server is, what a data center is and why it matters to your business. Complacency is no longer an option, in yesterdays world we could say “that’s an IT problem”, and we could let it be one, but as the business becomes ever more dependent on the IT, and becomes in some respects the IT, what affects your IT affects your business, what affects your business affects your IT. A lack of data center space might cause operational issues for the IT, but could be devastating to your business, more capacity, sure in 2011 once the second phase of your data center is completed, for now, no more disk space or servers installed please.

In summary, put it another way could the next generation Martin MacLeod, not just leave university with a BA or a BSC, but also a Prince2, an ITIL and be Cisco/HP/Dell/IBM/Sun/Oracle/Microsoft certified as part of that degree? Could I not be educationally and professionally suited and booted as much as the next man?

Virtensys

MANCHESTER, U.K. – February 3rd, 2010 — Virtensys™, Ltd, a leader in next-generation I/O solutions for datacentres, today announced it is expanding its network of channel partners in EMEA in response to the strong demand for its VIO 4000 I/O virtualisation switches from organisations of all sizes across the region.

The award-winning VIO 4000 switches consolidate, virtualise and share the server networking and storage connectivity, including Ethernet, Fibre Channel, FCoE, iSCSI and SAS/SATA without requiring any changes be made to the servers or networks. The switches deliver the full connectivity bandwidth to servers and significantly reduce I/O power consumption, equipment costs and server management complexity and expenses by more than 60 percent. This results in providing servers with the industry’s best I/O price/performance and lowest energy consumption for accessing the networks and storage infrastructures.

Virtensys has established strategic partnership agreements with specialist resellers in the UK, including Nviron, COAL, Virso, SGI and ADA Computer Systems. With this announcement, Virtensys is also revealing details of its channel partner programme. Through this programme, the company offers its channel partners strong margins, financial incentives, lead generation, and extensive technical training and sales support.

I met with the guys from Virtensys, they do I/O virtualization solutions and it was great talking with them about their solution and the topic of convergence of network and storage down the one interface, about how they could help with the typical issues that we face in the operational world.  The more barriers we can remove to delivery, deployments and support, whether they are process, people or technical, the more we can be seen to deliver value to the business which has to be a good thing.

I/O virtualization going forward is going to become increasingly popular as we struggle with the requirements of reducing the complexity of the systems management, improving the efficiency of the infrastructure and removing the barriers to success, that Fred has to be called to change the physical patch cable from one switch port to another switch port and everything that involves.  The interesting thing around the whole space is that we need not fear such change or innovation, the more we abstract and resolve the nuts and bolts activities, the more I can have my team add real business value and concentrate on the strategy on the continuing service improvement, put another way I can either be pressing respond on your help desk interface as a networks guy, responding to port allocations, or I can be identifying bottlenecks, looking at your traffic patterns and establish going forward how we can make small changes for greater service improvement.

http://www.poweredbycloud.com/

PoweredByCloud was the first major cloud computing conference to take place outside the US. Although other events have subsequently taken place, this year’s conference will confirm the event as the Market Leader for business leaders and strategists in the space. Technology buyers and media from across Europe, the Middle East and Asia — not just on the consumer side but also on the enterprise side — are likely to be represented in force. If your company is serious about communicating with the paying early adopters in cloud, then our 2010 event is likely to be the best venue to do that.

Check out this cloud conference, I wonder what topics around the cloud space will be discussed, whenever I mention cloud it means so many different things to different people, from a hosted Exchange environment to a pay on use virtualization or grid service, we’ll have to see.

http://www.finextra.com/news/fullstory.aspx?newsitemid=21032

Nationwide’s data centre transformation programme is designed to improve IT architecture while cutting operational and energy cots. The firm says that by removing old hardware, improving service continuity, simplifying disaster recovery and increasing hardware utilisation through server virtualisation, it will make significant savings.

To date, the company has seen a twelve to one reduction in the number of physical servers, saving space and shrinking its carbon footprint through a reduction in power and air-conditioning usage.

Check out this article from Finextra talking about how this financial organization has made savings through activities including removing their old hardware, increasing utilization and examining the way they manage their IT, topics I have blogged before, it’s an interesting read and it’s great to see how they have achieved these savings.

Realwire

Slough, UK, 1st February 2010 – International solutions provider, Logicalis, today announces it has implemented a Cisco Unified Computing System (UCS) at Winterflood Securities Ltd, an international capital markets firm and leading liquidity provider headquartered in London.  This is the first Cisco UCS to be deployed in the UK, and will deliver significant first-mover performance and competitive advantage benefits to Winterflood Securities.

As a leading electronic market maker in the UK, Winterflood Securities provides coverage of major global markets.  With data connections into each market, the company regularly processes in the order of 250 million market data updates a day with peaks often passing 30,000 updates in a second.  Winterflood has seen a ten-fold increase in market data volumes through their systems in the past three years and expect this trend to continue.   For Winterflood Securities, the accuracy and ‘speed’ of their data processing is intrinsically linked to client and company profitability.

Wayne Davies, manager networks & infrastructure for Winterflood Securities, comments, “The sheer volume of data processed and value transacted makes our IT infrastructure mission critical.  Platform performance, resilience, and stability are essential for our traders, as is the ability to flex and scale according to market requirements.  Implementing solutions to accelerate data processing and both automate and simplify IT operations play an important role in mitigating risk to the business.

It’s always interesting to read what technologies people have deployed, this article talks about how this company has deployed UCS to deliver competitive advantage, very cool, I’m off to find out more, it’s great to read how people are using the technology and what benefits they expect to see, how it will work for their business.

http://www.isaca.org/

Rolling Meadows, IL, USA (3rd February 2010)—ISACA’s European Computer Audit, Control and Security Conference (EuroCACS) is the must-attend, hot-topic event for IT audit, security and governance professionals in Europe. It attracts the best and brightest with its content-rich and thought-provoking sessions that delve into some of the biggest challenges facing IT professionals. ISACA’s EuroCACS Conference will be held 21-24 March 2010 at the Kempinski Hotel Corvinus, Budapest, Hungary.

Organized by ISACA, a nonprofit association serving 86,000 IT governance professionals, the conference contains 40 sessions that will focus on the latest strategies to address the challenges from business, managerial and operational perspectives, as well as new technologies and system approaches, while identifying risks and opportunities. Reflective of ISACA’s high standards, speakers are industry experts from all over the world.
Dániel Némethy, CIO of Hungarian Kereskedelmi es Hitelbank will present the keynote address on the best governance model to manage the challenges of aligning business goals with information and communication technology goals. Némethy will present a case study showing how the KBC Global Services branch in Hungary used the Pan-European model to continually improve processes, thus ensuring greater quality of services. The presentation will explain the governance model, share his implementation experience, discuss its advantages and disadvantages, and look to the future of the governance model.

IT Auditing both in terms of compliance, charge back and security remains a topic of interest for many. It’s not just about reporting and service delivery, its about managing the need to get everything done on demand in the here and now, whilst ensuring that we are able to identify and isolate risks, manage user expectations and meet compliance or auditing requirements, ever more so as we enter a more monitored financial sector going forward. The conference sounds interesting, it’s always great to hear what people are talking about, what the different parts of the IT organization are thinking, the more I understand your drivers, your business, the more we can operate in a way that meets your expectations.

http://www.napatech.com/news/2010.html#n102

ANDOVER, Massachusetts, Feb 3, 2010 – Napatech has been selected as one of the finalists in the Network Computing awards for 2010. Napatech’s NT20E 2 x 10 Gbps network adapter has been selected in the “New Product of the Year” category.

“We are honored to be selected as a finalist for this award. It gives great satisfaction to see that the hard work we have invested in making the NT20E the best 10 Gbps network adapter for intelligent real-time network analysis has been recognized”, said Henrik Brill Jensen, CEO of Napatech.

Network Computing is a leading computer networking publication where, once a year readers vote for the products and services that have most impressed them. The award categories have been defined to reflect the hardware, software and managed services that can assist enterprises in operating more efficiently and securely.

Congratulations to Napatch for being selected as a finalist in the Network Computing awards, anything the vendors can do to continue the platform innovation and meet business users needs both in efficiency and performance has to be a good thing, I’m off to check it out.

Following on from its award winning Mini NB200, Toshiba have raised the bar again with the launch of its new Mini NB300 and 305 Netbooks. Packed with features and boasting an 11-hour battery life, these compact PCs look set to scoop Toshiba a host of new awards – and new fans.

Netbooks have struggled to make an impact in the computing market, with allegations of limited capability and low battery lifespans. But Toshiba have taken these comments on board and made sure that their new Mini NB300 and 305 Netbooks tick all the right boxes for discerning business users. “The Toshiba principle of packing as much as possible into as small a space as they can certainly seems to have paid off this time,” says Rob Woolley, Laptop Specialist of computer experts IT247. “The real bonus is that 11 hour battery life, meaning that you can do a full day’s work without having to be tethered to a power point – perfect for business users on the go,” he adds.

I got an email about Toshiba launches their new mini Netbooks, I confess it’s something I have been thinking about recently whether to get one or to get an iPad, we’ll have to see the, last one I tried was not very fast and had an 8GB solid state disk, but then that was quite some time ago. I’m off to read up more.

I was having a chat with one of my CIO friends and he mentioned a phrase to me ‘wire once’ during a conversation about patching and networking and I asked him to explain what he meant, its a phrase that I hadn’t heard before, the conversation is summarized below:

We need to move away from the concepts where a change to the server network, the storage or the configuration results in eight different teams and resources in order to complete a given transaction, a move to Wire Once technology. I should plug in one cable for my network and storage, that move to service provisioning down that wire, a change it network speed or network lan is a configuration change, a change in storage again is a configuration change – we move away from a guy walking around the data center moving from one patch row to another, where we do fewer physical changes.  That’s where the wire once comes in, we deploy the cabling once from the patch frame to the port, from the port to the switch and to the server, changes in network connectivity, in storage should all be independent of the cabling, just achieving this will save me significant planning, resourcing and revenue, that’s not to say I don’t need the same people, it’s just that they will be free to do more valuable work, less fire fighting, more investment, more delivery, achieving more with less.

So we launched in the last few days our nice new look and I have to say that I am very pleased with it. The content continues, it’s January so there has been a mixture of things going on, IT spending is set to increase (I keep reading), I can see more jobs being advertised and more activity which is good news, one the news front it’s been quiet. Of course there have been announcements, but there’s a fine line between publishing something for the sake of doing so and putting up valuable content.

A number of things are going to be happening over the next few months, we’re going to have a few articles published by Finlay, we might be attending a few conferences and we will announce them soon. One of the things we are playing with is trying podcasting again and we’ll see how that goes. In the meantime, if there is anything I’ve missed, if there is anything you think we should be covering do get in touch.