So it’s HP Discover time again and it’s in Las Vegas from 4th to the 7th of June, some colleagues and I have been talking about attending, one of my colleagues asked us over lunch how he could justify it with work, so in the interests of declaration we put this list together, they’re random and might need adjusted for your line of business or role:

1. Keep up to date with HP trends, products and understand product or technical road-maps so you’re up to date with what is going on in the industry by visiting the keynotes.
2. Ask those questions that you can’t ask through a support call by speaking to one of the analysts in the meeting center or solutions areas or drop by to speak with the business/technical teams at the booths
3. Take part in an interactive demonstration at the different booths where you can see illustrations of the technology in place and understand how it could work in your environment, your business. Check out the latest HP products and solutions to see how they might help with your challenges or create opportunities for revenue or business empowerment.
4. Join in with the interactive sessions and learn not only about the technology, but best practices, deployment and support techniques, how people are using the technology and how you might make it work for you on cloud, on virtualization amongst other things.
5. Solve technical issues, understand how to deploy and use your technology more effectively, expand your connections and your horizons by talking with an industry expert, an analyst, a HP specialist and importantly a fellow customer – “you using this, great how did you over come this problem?”
6. Discover what HP and their partners have to offer combining the best of HP and partner technologies, such as Fusion-IO with HP Proliant servers for high performance computing solutions or VMware on HP Blade Systems.
7. Use HP Cloud live and for free during the event, play with it, explore the possibilities and see how it could work for you and your business and speak with an adviser to answer your questions and get it all set up for effective testing and sign off.
8. Leverage your skills and gain certification through the HP ExpertOne on site testing center with free testing during the event saving on exam fees.
9. Refresh your interest in technology, in the strategies, the opportunities and challenges ahead so that you’re thinking ahead of the curve rather than following it.
10. Learn all about the new HP Proliant G8 servers, their latest next generation of servers bringing and array of enhancements to system management, energy efficient and ease of deployment.

(Chris also highlighted to me that he might get a free pen – I agreed with this point but highlighted that might not assist with budget sign off for attendance.)

For the document then, the email for technical justification:

Dear …

I would like to attend HP Discover which is in Las Vegas June 4th-7th, I appreciate there is a cost of attending such an event but I feel that it would be invaluable to my role in particular with (insert a key technology to your role virtualization for example).  Additionally I am looking forward to observing and learning about the latest HP technologies and participating in the learning sessions they have and seeing how the HP Cloud offering could be used in our business.  There is an opportunity for certification during the event allowing me to meet my goals to further enhance my technical skills without necessarily encountering further cost above and beyond those of attending the event.

Regards

For the document then, the email for business justification

Dear…

I would like to attend the HP Discover event which is in Las Vegas, June 4th – 7th. I appreciate that there is a cost of attending such an event but I feel it will represent good value by furthering our understanding of what HP has to offer to meet our business goals and create opportunities to enhance functionality and reduce operating costs for our line of business or application. The additional sessions and offer of being able to trial HP’s Cloud solution delivers further value and opportunities to identify opportunity to add value through the appropriate deployment and use of technology.

Regards

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http://www.vmware.com/company/news/releases/vmw-myron-steves-04-17-12.html

PALO ALTO, Calif., April 17, 2012 — VMware, Inc. (NYSE: VMW), the global leader in virtualization and cloud infrastructure, today announced that Myron F. Steves and Company, a Houston-based insurance wholesaler, has deployed virtualization and cloud solutions from VMware to help ensure that the company’s 200 employees can respond to customers when disaster strikes.

“A sizable percentage of small and mid-size businesses (SMBs) place a critical or high priority on virtualization — particularly server virtualization,” said Tim Harmon, principal analyst with Forrester Research, Inc. “Companies, both large and small, are investing aggressively, as they did last year, in ever more efficient backup and recovery capabilities, but the growth is most acute for SMBs because they view their computer systems and data as invaluable assets, realize that users will always be lax when it comes to backing up their data and want to free up their IT resources to focus on growth and their core competencies.” ¹

An interesting post, I remember writing about this as a concept about five years ago, the idea being that you could have your disaster recovery systems running in virtual environments allowing you to reduce the number of physical servers to support and host, it’s great to see more discussion about it and the concept being put into practice combined with cloud technology.

The concept as I recall (and I remember examining it with some colleagues over lunch), was that everything except the DC’s (at the time), the database and NAS/SAN would be hosted on ESX, so live might be a DL380 G3 (at the time) but your DR (unless it needed it) would be on a virtual machine, realistically this is as true today as it was yesterday, most of the challenges are operational in terms of risk and capacity in your disaster recovery suite combined with internal standards for production etc.

A few thoughts the suitability of running virtual containers in disaster recovery configurations will depend on the application, the underlying infrastructure linked to it and the associated recovery or permissible outage time, as with everything it’s going to be client specific based on requirements, legislation, best practice and comfort amongst other things.

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The source files are here – http://www.findmyfirmware.com/firmware/php.zip

You’ll need to put them on some kind of web server that servers php.

You can read all about the concept here, or on the actual ‘product’ site here. It’s mean to be an empowerment tool if you will, by that I mean, the bridge between where we are right now (which might be a spreadsheet) and where we should be, a fully automated tool which builds the os and loads the applications.  When you press submit at the moment it will email you with a xml file attachment which you could (with some tinkering/coding) load into your build tool if you so wished.

The rules of engagement:

• I do not accept any liability for loss or damage caused from using or installing the application.
• It’s supplied as is without ‘support’ if it breaks download it again, or work it out.
• We can put you in touch with the guy that wrote it if you want further functionality.
• You are supplied with the source files and therefore have full development rights.

The iPad version is also online, again if you wish to claim it’s yours and use it internally as a branding exercise that’s fine, a donation to our development fund would be appreciated though.  I can supply the source files for the iPad edition for deployment internally so you can brand it, just get in touch by email: martin237@gmail.com.

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http://www.marketwatch.com/story/teradici-apex-2800-server-offload-card-now-supporting-vmware-view-50-on-esxi-50-2012-03-27

BURNABY, Canada, Mar 27, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) — Teradici, the developer of the innovative PC-over-IP® (PCoIP®) protocol that enables a true PC experience for desktop virtualization, today announced the compatibility of its Teradici APEX 2800 server offload card for VMware View deployments on ESXi 5.0 vSphere Server.

VMware ESXi 5.0 combined with View 5.0 improves VDI user experience through a brand new virtual GPU capability, which enables better graphic performance, starting with the 3D/aero features present on Windows 7 OS. However, this new feature is enabled at the cost of increased server CPU utilization. The Teradici APEX 2800 server offload card enables IT managers to reclaim these CPU cycles and eliminate the need to re-architect the VDI environment already in place, all while ensuring a reliable and consistent user experience even as VDI loads change.

An interesting article talking about how Teradici are innovating their offering to help improve and innovate the user experience on virtual desktops, something which has to be good for the virtual desktop platform and open up the platform to new usage cases and markets, very cool.

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http://www.loginvsi.com/en/product-overview

Performance is one of the most important aspects of a good user infrastructure. But are you able to predict the impact of necessary updates and upgrades in advance? How do you select the SBC or VDI product that offers the best performance in your environment? Do you find out the maximum capacity of your current systems? And how do you know for sure if your new system is powerful enough for your needs?

Login Virtual Session Indexer (Login VSI) is a unique benchmarking tool to measure the performance and scalability of centralized desktop environments such as Server Based Computing (SBC) and Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI).

Performance and service level agreements are an important concept and consideration in managing users expectations as we move to a more virtualized and centralized desktop offering, I came across this offering from Login VSI, I’m off to read up more, do check it out.

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http://www.amazon.com/Administering-VMware-Recovery-Manager-Technology/dp/0321799925 or http://www.informit.com/store/product.aspx?isbn=9780321799920

I got sent this through the post to read and review and have just started reading it, I’m excited to see what’s covered and read more up on VMware Recovery Manager. Do check it out if you’re looking for a book about VMware Site Recovery Manager, as I complete more pages, I will update more, there are some pictures below in the meantime.

As I write this there are only 8 left on amazon.co.uk, so you might want to pay a visit sooner rather than later to get a copy:

The back of the book is as follows:

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BuildMyVirtual is our latest iPad and web based application for both the SMB and Enterprise space, it’s a very simple concept based on the self service model for requesting and building virtual machines.

The user selects the specification and options from the screen below (End user customizable with your logo / your color schemes etc)

User having selected everything then clicks the send button which submits the build request:

Both the drop down values and the text can be adjusted easily.

Now the shockingly cool bit.  The application in the background generates an XML file containing the values selected so that you can script it into your build mechanism whatever it is, and then emails it either to a shared mailbox like server builds, a user’s email address or even the help-desk for it to be logged and the xml as an added attachment.

A thank you/confirmation page is then displayed:

This page is called ok.html, and is fully configurable so it can do any cool things like generate xml scripts or commands to kick off the build, or simply have your team/company logo with a confirmation message and mail box or link to the server build/process documentation.

So what is the aim of the server:

• Make the virtual server provisioning process look more professional
• Remove our dependency on endless complex spreadsheets
• Move towards a centralized virtual offering – standard configurations which the user selects
• Bridge between next generation fully automated solutions and where you might be today
• Maintain control for IT to validate configurations, so it can be as automated or manual as you like.

What do you get then?

A zip file containing all the bits you need to put on a web server and host for the tool to work

The source files, the code, everything you need to start with as a template to building our your own version of the tool with the branding, the logos and the functionality you choose. You could even build it around LDAP/SSO if you wish, integrate it to your help desk tool so it allocates a call or a build request number – the possibilities are endless.

What don’t you get?

A tool that builds virtual machines – this app aims to give you the framework from which you can automate or manually provision machines with less manual paperwork, but the right level of professionalism and ability to check what the user has requested is deliverable.

When does it go live?

Soon, we’re finishing off the base product so to speak and making a version for the iPad, and then launching it for free as a template or a real tool for all to use. No tricks, unlocked source files, no debate. However if you want it customized and extended to bring new functionality, we can of course provide that.

Our Live Demo version is here for you to play with until the end of time.  At the moment it just sends me an email with what you selected, but once the code is finished we will make it ask what account you want to send it too so you can see it in action.

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• Standardized offering provides customers with a single source for multivendor support and simplified IT management, regardless of vendor as IT providers potentially change strategic roadmaps
• Hardware support from Dell now available for customers using HP, IBM, Lenovo and Acer products
• Helps reduce customer costs by eliminating the burden of managing varied systems, contracts and warranties
• Now available In Europe, in addition to North America, with expansion plans for Asia and Latin America

Dell has extended its award-winning ProSupport service to include non-Dell systems and devices in Europe, freeing customers from the burden of managing multiple vendors, disparate systems and service contracts. With one point of contact and accountability for all support needs, customers can rely on the proven ability of Dell to manage their systems, freeing up valuable IT time and resources.

Dell has been providing Multivendor Hardware Support through custom and managed services offerings for customers in the U.S. and through Dell ProSupport™ that includes hardware break/fix, 24x7x365 phone support, escalation management and collaborative support. According to TBR’s Q1 2011 Customer Satisfaction Study, Dell ranks No. 1 among Support Providers in Overall Support Providers, and has been ranked No. 1 in 33 of the 43 reporting periods.

This is great news, that Dell can offer its customers a holistic IT service offering extends the possibilities for Dell as a business/partnering service provider and reduces the barriers to customers getting their problems managed and resolved under one support contract, bringing further choice to the market both in terms of competition and opportunity in the multivendor support contract space. I praise the concept, I’m off to read up more about the announcement. I wonder if this might also strengthen their portfolio of services and offering?  That if I am deploying VMware on Dell servers, they might not only support my new servers but those systems which I am virtualizing or continuing to run during the transition, very cool.

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For many we rely on spreadsheets and provisioning forms to meet requirements for billing and inventory management, some way of capturing for IT to know what has been requested and built that week, that month or year, inside or outside of the SLA.

When I write spreadsheet it could be something as simple as the Project Manager, the business guy logging a call or sending an email requesting a new server be built. For the moment, I’m looking at addressing the virtual server space, this is the space where we have deferred success, we can indeed build virtual servers typically in an hour or much less, however our internal processes don’t work like that, the change process, the data gathering and the cross charging mean a form of some sort has to be filled in.  I’ve made an example below.

So what am I doing, what are we working on?  Well I’ve called it buildmyvirtual. It’s a simple web based tool which works from an XML template file, the user selects from pre-determined values to select the virtual machine they want, the specification they want, when the press submit, it then generates an XML input file.

Some notes

• The input file is user editable meaning you can specify the disk sizes, the memory or operating systems your IT department supports.
• The export file contains the values selected from that file allowing you to script this into your build mechanism as a template, as an input file using whatever language you choose, Powershell, C or anything else.
• The application is distributed for the end user to use on a not for profit basis as an end user, ideally if you’re going to sell it on and make millions you would buy me a cup of tea.

So what do I provide or support?

Well it’s end user configurable, I will make sure that you can take the zip file that will be made available put it on a Linux web server or a IIS webserver with PHP support, then you can edit the html file to have your company logo, your team name and then edit the xml so it meets your corporate standards. If it breaks, then you will need to fix it or download it again. We can however put you in touch with our developer who can customize it for you.

So what is it not

It’s not a provisioning tool. It is a bridge between olden days IT processes around requesting service or compute resource and the time at which automation and your in house processes have been improved.  It’s a branding tool, one which allows you to empower the user, free them from paperwork, and at the same time streamline the provisioning process by having just the information you need as an engineer to build the virtual machine.

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http://www.oracle.com/us/corporate/press/1356190

Oracle today announced availability of Oracle Solaris 11, the first Cloud OS.

Oracle Solaris 11 is designed to meet the security, performance and scalability requirements of cloud-based deployments allowing customers to run their most demanding enterprise applications in private, hybrid, or public clouds.

It will be interesting to see what range of innovations are brought with version 11 to prepare it for next generation solutions including the cloud. The main concepts seem to be:

There seems to have been an emphasis on scalability, virtualization and performance, I’m off to read more about Solaris 11, do check it out.

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