The Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF) is a blueprint that companies can use to standardise the way they manage their IT, pretty similar to what the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) set of practices does.
Virtualisation is such a complex technology that involves Operating Systems, networks and storage administration, security hardening, performance monitoring and even applications troubleshooting in some cases and there is a real need for operational frameworks to handle virtual infrastructures.
A step in the right direction may be from Microsoft, which released the first beta of what they call Reliability Workbook for Hyper-V, as part of the existing MOF 4.0 framework.
The Reliability Workbooks are task lists (in Excel format) that Microsoft recommends to follow to monitor and maintain the health and reliability of their products.
Before using a Reliability Workbook a company has to fine tune it, performing a list of steps:
Once done, the customer can move on the spreadsheet, which includes 5 pages besides the Overview and Acknowledgements:
- Monitoring Activities
- Maintenance Activities
- Health Risks
- Standard Changes
Here’s the Health Risks table:
Its still quite basic as a product, but I assume it will be much richer for end users when it hits RTM.