VMware View 4.5 - Enterprise Ready

Source: Gartner

Today at VMworld North America, VMware announced the availability of VMware View 4.5. The View 4.5 Premier release represents a significant milestone as it places VMware very close to Citrix as the only two vendors that offer enterprise-ready server-hosted virtual desktop (SHVD) solutions.

For Gartner to consider View 4.5 enterprise-ready, it had to meet all requirements in the Burton Group Server Hosted Virtual Desktop evaluation criteria.

The evaluation criteria was developed over a five month period. During that time, Gartner worked with numerous early server-hosted virtual desktop (SHVD) adopters, as well as the key vendors in the space. In the end, vendors were supportive of the criteria in spite of the fact that not one met all of our requirements. The reason for the support was simple – customers were telling vendors they needed the same elements that we identified in the criteria.

Gartner evaluate and score SHVD platforms across three stratifications:

• Required: absolute necessities
• Preferred: important features that result in better experience, operational management, and improved TCO
• Optional: use-case driven features needed in select deployment scenarios

The assessment is broken down across major areas of focus such as user experience, management, and security. .

When we first assessed VMware View 4.0, there were several significant shortcomings that were deal-breakers for many large enterprises:

• Role-based access controls (RBACs) for delegation of administrative duties
• Administrative change logging capabilities to provide an audit trail for all administrative actions
• Official support for Windows 7 operating systems
• Enterprise management software integration

View 4.5 addressed all four of the above shortcomings, and the breadth of their feature improvements were deeply scrutinized with hands-on assessments in our lab. To VMware’s credit, they didn’t try to address customer management requirements with band aids. Instead, they literally scrapped their previous management console and replaced with a far improved Adobe Flex-based console. In addition, they unveiled a Microsoft System Center Operations Manager (SCOM) management pack for View 4.5 management. That was another common request I’ve heard from early VMware View adopters. On the scalability side, View 4.5 is now capable of scaling to 10,000 managed desktops per management domain, which is currently double the maximum scalability supported by Citrix.

Of course, while View 4.5 is a major release, there is still room for improvement. For example, if you want to optimize PCoIP traffic through WAN accelerators such as Riverbed appliances, you’re out of luck. Out of the box, VMware will not support highly constrained WAN environments (i.e., 50 Kbps bandwidth and over 150 ms of latency). VMware’s current recommended solution is to combine the View 4.5 “local desktop” feature with an HTTP proxy server at the remote site.

While there is always room for improvement, View 4.5 meets all of the core requirements of the typical larger enterprise. Enterprise customers understand that any next generation desktop solution requires a long term (typically 5 year) commitment to yield significant ROI and TCO savings. So today many are looking for a platform that they can standardize on and grow with. With the release of View 4.5, VMware is making the case that it should be the enterprise desktop and application delivery platform of the future. Citrix and other VMware competitors will not take this news lying down.

VMworld Update

Useful highlights from day 2 at VMworld.

As usual, the general session is opening with a video. This time, it’s a mock documentary discussing “What is the cloud?” The video compares “cloud computing” to pizza. The next reference is to The Matrix, where the narrator of the documentary goes to visit the Oracle and is told his mind is a dumb terminal. Pretty funny!

After the video concludes, VMware Chief Marketing Officer Rick Jackson takes the stage. He shares a few interesting statistics: VMworld 2004 was the first conference with about 1400 guests. Last year, there were about 12,500 guests. This year, now in its seventh year, with about 85 countries represented, there are approximately 17,000 attendees this year. Wow—this is a huge increase over last year! Of those, 4,000 new attendees (first time to the VMworld conference). Fifty-five people have attended every single conference; they are the Alumni Elite.

Rick next discussed the hybrid cloud architecture used to power VMworld 2010. The conference uses two data centers on the East Coast along with a private cloud infrastructure on site.

Next Rick transitions into a discussion of the phases of virtualisation. First there’s IT Production, and that gives customers cost savings. Next comes business production, where “applications run better virtualised”. Rick says that most VMware customers are currently in the business production phase. The third phase is business agility, driven by IT agility and enabled by operational savings and efficiency. This is IT as a Service (ITaaS). Rick stressed the “open” nature of VMware’s solutions, harps on VMware’s broad hardware support. He announced that OVF (Open Virtualization Format) is now an ANSI standard. He also reminds the attendees that VMware is working on standardising the vCloud API as an open standard.

Rick next introduces Paul Maritz, who comes out on stage to take over the presentation. Paul spends a few minutes discussing the breadth of VMware’s adoption across industries and across geographies. He then transitions into a discussion of the role of the virtualisation layer, it’s central role in innovation (and being the focus of innovation), it’s impact on operations, resource allocation, and the consumption of infrastructure. As he moves into the discussion of virtual data centers, it’s pretty clear where he’s headed—he’s laying some foundations and defining some terms for a product announcement, and wants to be sure that the audience is at the same place he is in their thought processes.

After a lengthy discussion of the three layers that need innovation—new infrastructure, new application platform, and new end user access—he now moves out of the theoretical into the practical by inviting Steve Herrod, VMware’s CTO, out onto the stage.

Steve starts out with a discussion of vSphere and the vSphere 4.1 release. He reviews a few maximums and covers some basic functionality like vMotion, and reminds the audience of increases in the performance of technologies like vMotion (faster individual vMotion migrations and more concurrent vMotion migrations). Steve also discusses the solution to the “noisy neighbour” problem where individual VMs take up too many resources; the fix, of course, is Storage I/O Control and Network I/O Control. He also discusses the vStorage APIs for Array Integration (VAAI). As most readers of this site probably already know, VAAI allows the hypervisor to offload storage operations onto the storage arrays themselves.

Herrod announced on stage the VMware’s acquisition of a company called Integrien.
Integrien flagship product, Alive, is a real-time performance analytics solution that analyzes and correlates data across the monitored IT infrastructure.

To help address security in the virtual data center, VMware announced VMware vShield Endpoint, VMware vShield App, and VMware vShield Edge. These products provide offloaded virus protection, hypervisor-level firewalling, and a “traditional” stateful firewall, respectively. It will be interesting to see how these products play with VMware’s security partners. Competitor or partner now?

Herrod also announced a concept called vFabric, the cloud application platform made with SpringSource, GemStone and other technologies acquired in the last year by VMware.
vFabric offers application management, data management, messaging, dynamic load balancing and app server.

Last but not least, Herrod announced the availability of VMware View 4.5.
It introduces support for Microsoft Windows 7, the offline VDI capability (through a type-2 VMM), a client for Apple Mac OS X (iPAD) and support for vSphere 4.1.

3Par See HP as Superior

HP’s Bid Valued at Approximately $2 Billion

FREMONT, CA–(Marketwire – August 27, 2010) –  3PAR^® (NYSE: PAR), the leading global provider of utility storage, today announced its board of directors has determined that the unsolicited proposal by Hewlett-Packard Company to acquire all of 3PAR’s outstanding common stock at $30 per share constitutes a “superior proposal” (as that term is defined in 3PAR’s previously announced merger agreement with Dell). The 3PAR board of directors notified Dell of its intention to terminate the merger agreement with Dell, immediately following the expiration of the three business day period contemplated by, and the satisfaction of the other conditions set forth in, the merger agreement with Dell, in order to enter into the merger agreement with HP on the terms set forth in HP’s acquisition proposal.

The terms of 3PAR’s merger agreement with Dell require the 3PAR board of directors to continue to recommend that 3PAR stockholders accept Dell’s cash tender offer, and tender their 3PAR shares pursuant to Dell’s tender offer, so long as the merger agreement with Dell remains in effect. Accordingly, at this time, since the merger agreement between 3PAR and Dell remains in effect, 3PAR’s board of directors continues to unanimously recommend that 3PAR stockholders accept the cash tender offer made by Dell and tender their shares of 3PAR common stock pursuant to such offer.

What else should we expect from VMworld 2010?

VMworld 2010 started yesterday as us folks in the UK enjoyed bank holiday. There is a lot of speculation of what will be announced here, such as:

More focus on OpEx
Virtualisation is a cap ex boon and an op ex bust-as compute capacity is made available by the hypervisor, it’s quickly filled in with new machines. The result? An explosion in the number of machines that need to be managed-and an explosion in operating expense. The often-forgotten fact that cap ex represents less than 30% of overall IT spending. The larger share of cost savings-higher on the mind of the CIO-is operating expense. Consequently, op ex is emerging as the new cap ex and will get considerable attention this year.

Emphasis on Business Value
Expect the business value conversation to take center stage-hopefully with more intelligibility than the adults featured in Peanuts cartoons of yore.

Automation
Automation and IT management in general will be one of the most important themes this year.

Private and hybrid clouds
The rise of public cloud services like Amazon EC2 and Rackspace have demonstrated a new standard for cost-efficiency and responsiveness that have forced IT to rethink how they measure their own performance.

Official announcement on VMware View 4.5
What exactly the announcement about 4.5 will include is anyone’s guess.

More information on VMware “Origami“

Citrix will talk about XenDesktop Feature Pack 2 and XenVault

VMware confirms EOL for ESX

There has been some speculation that VMware was going to EOL (end of life) ESX in favour of ESXi. Now, virtualization.info has been able to confirm that ESX has officially reached end of life.

“…Going forward customers will be able to deploy vSphere only using ESXi. Although the infrastructure management tasks once performed by the Service Console are now handled by tasks running under the VMkernel, some ESX users may still depend on the custom scripts, third-party products, or operational procedures that use the Service Console.

This means that upgrading to vSphere 4.1 is the perfect time to start planning on migrating to the ESXi architecture and eventually break all dependencies on the Service Console once and for all. Here is a quick summary of what you should look into:

• Replace COS-based hardware monitoring with CIM-based tools
• Replace COS-based backup technologies with products that use the vStorage APIs
• Replace COS-based scripts using the VMware Management Assistant, the vCLI, or vSphere PowerCLI “

The Top 10 Cloud Computing Trends

People, companies, businesses, and organisations are fast shifting to cloud computing from client-server model. It is very hard to guess what cloud computing will exactly look like in the future or how it will bring changes in IT. However, we can see some trends, IT and business world are setting in cloud computing.

Building Private Clouds

Larger organisations and enterprises are building their own private computing cloud. IBM’s “Blue Cloud” is such an example. Microsoft introduced its private cloud just last month. Private clouds are huge datacenters possessing information and data of all types. They remove the security concerns about cloud computing.

Shift in IT skills of the Professionals

With the paradigm shift from client server model to the cloud computing model, IT workers will need new sets of skills. They won’t have to operate and maintain IT infrastructure, but now they will have to know how to extract and use the best information from computing clouds.

Down-sizing of IT Departments

IT departments of organisations will shrink both in infrastructure and number of workers. With the advent of cloud computing, business firms will no longer need too many workers and resources for doing all the IT related tasks, but now they will be using cloud computing services.

Decrease of Concerns about Security Risks

The concern about security risk of cloud computing will greatly decrease once it is fully implemented and understood. Many people say placing organisation’s data and information on the same servers may increase security risks; they also say that when you store your data and information to cloud computing vendors, hackers may try to get it from there. In fact, this process only needs to be mature and a sense of trust needs to be developed between vendors and clients. There may be cryptographic techniques, skill level of vendors’ staff to ensure the security and some new methods may be devised to solve this issue.

Consultancy services along with the main Services

In order to attract more and more clients, cloud computing vendors would also offer professional services other than the actual services agreed in the contact. This will add expertise to organisations’ employees working with those services. Successforce of Salesforce.com is a good example of such services. NetSuite also provides such free consultancy services to its customers.

SMB’s and Large Enterprise on Cloud

Some cloud computing vendors such as NetSuite are leasing the power and applications for SMB’s. By leasing Microsoft’s Great Plains software they did not have to acquire and implement all the hardware, software and skilled workers required to run their Great Plains in-house.

More Customisable Cloud Computing Resources

At present cloud computing is implemented by using best practices in standard ways. In the future with more progress in this paradigm, cloud computing will be operating with more flexibility in almost every field, rather than CRM and business applications alone. This will bring customisation in cloud computing services in the coming years.

Large Enterprises as Part-time cloud computing vendors

The enterprises which have huge IT infrastructure and reasonable resources will build their own clouds and lease them to other suppliers and customers hence earning extra profit from that. Amazon.com is already doing it for some years now.

Cloud Computing will bring Innovation

Today a large number of innovative computing projects are stalled only because of lack of resources like infrastructure, skilled workers, and energy and cost requirements. But cloud computing will solve this problem by introducing giant datacenters. They will be primarily required for fulfilling the need of vendors’ customers, but it will not be any problem for huge datacenters to assist in innovative and large computing projects as well.

Only Browser Needed

In the future you will need only a browser on your desktop and through it you will be able to use and run everything present in the cloud.

Google Adds Push Support to the iPhone

Google has just updated its Google Mobile App for iOS, adding push notifications for Gmail and Google Calendar directly from the app.

Google posted some new screenshots that detail the new feature earlier today. In a settings panel, notifications can be configured to turn Calendar or Gmail notifications on.

An icon badge will appear beside the Google app when new messages are received and pop-up notifications will appear for Calendar reminders.

Users have been able to get push notifications from Gmail using the built-in iPhone mail application since last year, however, that has required setting up a Google account as an Exchange ActiveSync account.

Until iOS 4, users were limited to only one Exchange account, which limited some of the functionality of the feature. Although this limitation has been lifted, for users that prefer to use the web Gmail interface on the iPhone, push notifications are a nice treat.

For Calendar alerts, the feature is nice but less necessary. Apple has supported syncing and notifications from Google Calendar for quite some time and it’s easy to add an existing Google Calendar or calendars to the iPhone using the native calendar app.

Exchange 2010 SP1 Available

Microsoft announced general availability of the final version of Exchange 2010 Service Pack (SP) 1 on August 25.

Included in SP1 are the usual fixes and updates made to Exchange 2010 since Microsoft shipped that product in October 2009. But SP1 also includes new features and functionality, including archiving and discovery updates, Outlook Web App improvements, mobile user and management improvements and “some highly sought after additional UI for management tasks,” officials said earlier this year.

On the Outlook Web App front, SP1 will get a faster reading experience, as a result of enhancements for pre-fetching message content, according to Microsoft execs, as well as other UI-related updates that will make OWA work better on smaller netbook screens. Additionally, users will be able to share calendars with anonymous viewers via the Web (if admins enable this functionality).

Operating systems supporting Exchange 2010 SP1 include Windows 7 Professional 64-bit; Windows Server 2008; Windows Server 2008 Enterprise; Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise; Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard; and Windows Vista 64-bit Editions with Service Pack 1, according to the company.

Microsoft officials said more than 500,000 Technology Adoption Program partners had downloaded the beta, released in June.

Users can download Exchange 2010 SP1 from Microsoft’s Download Center.

Intel & McAfee

There's no doubt that this $7.7 billion acquisition represents a major event in the security solution space. It's worth considering for a moment the underlying logic and consequences of this surprising move.

Business fashion is clearly a factor. The pendulum is swinging towards vertical technology companies, after decades of horizontal specialisation. Of course, this might be no more than this year's fad. Pendulums eventually swing back, whether driven by customer preferences or vendor ambition. The pendulum for outsourcing, for example, has just swung from mega-sourcing to multi-sourcing. That trend's clearly going the opposite way.

Financial circumstances must have a bearing. Intel has a huge amount of cash and, like anyone else in that position, will be struggling to find decent investments that can meet their appraisal criteria. McAfee also has a higher profit margin, which might enhance Intel's P&L account, at least in the short term. These considerations, however, are more of a supporting argument than a driver for the acquisition.

In fact the real motivation behind the deal is an initiative to embed more security in hardware. Intel confidently believes that McAfee's security technology will help create "hardware-enhanced security." They see security as the "third pillar of computing devices" (in addition to power efficient performance and Internet connectivity). This is a great idea in theory. It will help build the higher assurance solutions we need for the future, and help us shoe-horn security into the growing multitude of non-PC, Internet-connected devices. Intel and McAfee are reported to have been working on such developments for some time. 

Past experience of security acquisitions by large vendors has also demonstrated high risks of culture clash, restructuring pains, and a loss of momentum in further product development. Smart, innovative competitors can benefit from these distractions. Large companies are less agile than smaller ones.

But new developments in hardware security will require a solid security base. McAfee can bring this to the table. The real enabler for hardware security, however, is trusted computing, and the foundations are already out there in the form of hundreds of millions of TPM chips in laptops and servers. Exploitation of this capability is still in its infancy, but that will come with time. Many laptops are being shipped with self-encrypting drives - a vast improvement on software encryption - yet few laptop purchasers seem aware of this. And when skilfully combined with virtualisation technology, trusted computing offers tremendous opportunities for innovative, security solutions.

So hardware security is certainly coming our way, though it might not take the form initially suggested by an Intel/McAfee merger. 

Call phones from Gmail

Gmail voice and video chat makes it easy to stay in touch with friends and family using your computer’s microphone and speakers. But until now, this required both people to be at their computers, signed into Gmail at the same time. Given that most of us don’t spend all day in front of our computers, Google have added a call phone facility.

Available now, you can call any phone right from Gmail.

Calls to the U.S. and Canada will be free for at least the rest of the year and calls to other countries will be billed at our very low rates. Google have worked hard to make these rates really cheap  with calls to the U.K., France, Germany, China, Japan—and many more countries—for as little as $0.02 per minute.

Dialing a phone number works just like a normal phone. Just click “Call phone” at the top of your chat list and dial a number or enter a contact’s name.

Google have been testing this feature internally and have found it to be useful in a lot of situations, ranging from making a quick call to a restaurant, to placing a call when you’re in an area with bad reception.

If you have a Google Voice phone number, calls made from Gmail will display this number as the outbound caller ID. And if you decide to, you can receive calls made to this number right inside Gmail (see instructions).

Google are rolling out this feature to U.S. based Gmail users over the next few days, so you’ll be ready to get started once “Call Phones” shows up in your chat list (you will need to install the voice and video plug-in if you haven’t already). If you’re not a U.S. based user—or if you’re using Google Apps for your school or business—then you won’t see it quite yet. Google are working on making this available more broadly—so stay tuned!

Its been a week of bidding!

If you have been following tech M&A last week you would have seen HP and Dell battle for 3Par, with Dell starting the bidding, then HP responding, then Dell then …..

The takeover battle for storage vendor 3PAR has kicked into high gear. On Thursday night HP raised its offer to $27 a share, topping a revised Dell offer of $24.30. This morning Dell then matched the HP offer of $27, or about $1.8 billion. Then, HP again boosted its bid to $30 a share, or $2 billion.

“HP’s proposal is not subject to any financing contingency and has been approved by HP’s board of directors,” the company said.

Friday morning Dell said its latest $27 a share bid had been accepted by 3PAR’s board of directors, and reaffirmed its commitment to 3PAR and its technology.

“Dell continues to believe that the acquisition of 3PAR, with its industry-leading storage technology, is important to its customers and will enhance Dell’s position in utility-storage solutions,” the company said in a statement. “Consistent with its previous rationale for the acquisition, Dell also believes that its global brand and broad global reach will dramatically accelerate 3PAR’s revenue growth.”

As HP continues to raise the stakes, can Dell win the game by simply calling each raise in the belief that it has the best hand (at least in the eyes of the 3PAR board)? Or will the battle end with one party  winning out with a more decisive raise?

For the moment, HP’s $30 offer has put the ball back in Dell’s court. Will the next move be decisive? Are these companies “pot committed” to the point that neither believes it can afford to lose.?

Lets see what this week brings"!

Google to tackle Facebook with latest acquistion?

Google has acquired Ångströ, a service for delivering intelligent search results about a person’s professional network. It has also hired its founder, likely in an effort to build a legitimate competitor to Facebook.

“With the help of investors like CommerceNet and advisors such as Avery Lyford, our team shipped apps to discover hot new photos on Facebook, improve Caller ID by using LinkedInprofiles, adding style and links to Twitter, create a real-time social address book, and a slew of other services,” the company said in its farewell announcement.

Founder Dr. Rohit Khare has already joined Google, according to the Los Angeles Times. Before Ångströ, Khare founded KnowNow, an RSS service for the enterprise, and before that he was director of CommerceNet Labs.

Khare will be working on Google Me, the company’s still-unconfirmed social network. He will likely be working with Max Levchin, the former CEO of Slide, CTO of PayPal and Google’s newest VP of engineering, as well as Google VP of Engineering Vic Gundotra, who was reportedly instrumental in recruiting Khare.

Google has more riding on its upcoming social network than almost any other project in the company’s history. The search giant has failed multiple times to make inroads in social media, while Facebook is growing like wildfire. Google perceives Facebook as a major threat to the company’s dominance of the web. Khare’s arrival is yet another sign that the tech titan isn’t fooling around anymore when it comes to social.

More Mobility & More Security – That’s XenDesktop 4 FP2

Citrix Systems last week announced a new release of  Citrix XenDesktop that extends the benefits of desktop virtualisation to enterprise laptop users with the addition of two new technologies:  Citrix XenClient and  Citrix XenVault.

Together, these two technologies make it easy for IT to incorporate mobile laptop users into a unified enterprise desktop virtualisation strategy with unparalleled security and simplicity – including corporate-owned laptops managed by IT, as well as user-owned devices brought in by contractors or employees in a BYOC (bring your own computer) program.

Desktop virtualisation is rapidly growing in popularity as a more secure, flexible way to deliver Windows desktops to business users in any location. With this new release, companies of all sizes can now deploy a single desktop virtualisation solution that seamlessly supports both desk-based and laptop users in just about any scenario. With laptop users representing half of the workforce in many companies, today’s announcement represents a major milestone that significantly expands the reach of desktop virtualisation to millions of new users.

Most mobile employees today do the majority of their work on company-owned laptops. For these workers, the best solution is a virtual desktop that runs directly on their laptop. This approach gives IT all the central management and security benefits of server hosted virtual desktops (VDI), combined with all the flexibility and ability to be disconnected from the network that come with traditional, locally installed desktops. And because the desktops runs in a local VM at all times, users never have to go through the cumbersome time consuming process “checking-out” their virtual desktop by downloading it from a central server each time they leave the office. These new capabilities are all enabled by the new XenClient technology, a groundbreaking client-side hypervisor developed in close collaboration with Intel, and optimised for the Intel Core vPro technology.

With the addition of the new XenClient and XenVault features, XenDesktop extends its lead as the most comprehensive and flexible desktop virtualisation solution on the market.

Key Facts and Highlights (XenClient):

• Enables Virtual Desktops “To Go” – XenClient is a client-side hypervisor that enables virtual desktops to run directly on client devices. It provides all the security and central management of VDI, while allowing users to seamlessly work online or disconnected without any cumbersome check-in or check-out requirements, just as they would with a traditional locally installed desktop. While XenClient can be run on any supported PC hardware, it is ideally suited to corporate-owned laptops.
• Control for IT, Flexibility for Users – XenClient makes it easy for IT to deliver a secure, centrally managed corporate desktop environment to laptop users without compromising user experience. They can even set up a second personal virtual desktop on the same laptop, giving users full freedom, without compromising corporate security.
• Centralised Backup and Recovery – When disconnected from the network, XenClient operates just like a traditional installed desktop. As soon as users connect to the network, it automatically synchronizes any changes with the datacenter, ensuring full centralised backup of all corporate laptops. If a laptop is ever lost or stolen, users can easily restore their full desktop environment exactly like it was to a new laptop, while data on the original laptop can be wiped remotely.
• Portable and Persistent Desktop Images – By separating the operating system from the underlying hardware, desktop images can now be created, secured, deployed and moved across any supported hardware, greatly reducing the maintenance burden on IT and simplifying disaster recovery for laptop users.
• Expanded Hardware and Device Support – XenClient now also includes several new capabilities that were not supported in the initial beta release. These include multiple usability and security enhancements, new synchronization features, and expanded support for hardware platforms, wireless adapters and USB-based devices such as webcams, iPads, iPhones, Androids, BlackBerrys and Windows Mobile devices.
• Optimized for Intel vPro – The XenClient hypervisor was designed jointly with Intel to work seamlessly with the underlying hardware. Intel Core vPro processors are designed to provide the best experience for end-users and IT through use of Intel hardware-assisted virtualisation, management and security technologies.

Key Facts and Highlights (XenVault):

• Protects and Isolates User Data – The new XenVault technology automatically and transparently saves any user data created by corporate apps into an encrypted folder, ensuring that it is protected at all times from unauthorised users.
• Ideal for Contractors and BYOC – Because XenVault supports both virtual and physical desktops, it is an ideal solution for contractors and employee-owned laptops where users don’t want IT installing software on their personal laptops. When a contract is over, an employee terminates, or the laptop is lost or stolen, corporate data remains secure, and can even be wiped remotely.
• Supports XenApp and App-V – XenVault automatically encrypts data created by any corporate app that is delivered by Citrix XenApp (or the XenApp feature of XenDesktop) or Microsoft App-V.

The new XenClient and XenVault technologies will both ship in the new XenDesktop 4, Feature Pack 2 release, available at the end of September. XenClient is available at no additional charge for XenDesktop Enterprise and Platinum editions customers with current Subscription Advantage agreements.

XenVault is enabled through a plug-in to the Citrix Receiver software client, which is available at no additional charge to all XenDesktop and XenApp customers. Citrix XenDesktop, including the new XenClient and XenVault technologies,

Cost Effective Storage for VMware

In an attempt to meet the rapid changes and  quick growth of IT environments, many organisations have responded by consolidating data centres and infrastructure. A major focus is to create a more agile and efficient data centre by closely aligning infrastructure and the applications they support in a way that provides significant ROI. Server virtualisation is one way of doing this with its ability to enable organisations to reduce capital expenses and operating costs while providing higher service levels. That is why today we are announcing Symantec VirtualStore.

Server virtualisations come with its own challenges, most notably storage management for ESX environments. While a majority of VMware ESX servers connect to their datastores using either Fiber Channel or iSCSI, NFS for VMware has squashed many associated myths related to performance and scalability and is now a very popular protocol for ESX servers.

To solve the storage challenges associated with server virtualisation, Symantec has introduced VirtualStore, a highly scalable, clustered NAS solution for VMware virtual machines based on the industry leading Veritas Storage Foundation Cluster File System from Symantec.

VirtualStore improves storage management for server virtualisation in a number of ways:

• It can help administrators deploy a scalable and highly available NAS solution for a fraction of the cost of traditional NAS solutions
• It reduces storage costs associated with the high number of virtual machines images
• It allows users to leverage their existing storage investments as they migrate to virtual environments.

Symantec VirtualStore uses an efficient FileSnap solution, which creates space optimised clones of virtual machines along with patented cache optimisation solutions to pack more virtual machines into a single NAS head. In addition to the FileSnap solution, there are a number of reasons one should choose VirtualStore for VMware instead of using VMFS volumes over Fiber Channel or iSCSI.

• You get thin provisioning by default helping you saving over 50% disk space upfront.
• You can administer and manage your NFS datastore efficiently .
• You don’t have to deal with VMFS or RDM or the associated problems with Fiber Channel including zoning, LUN sizing, HBA and identical LUN IDs.
• FileSnap gives you the ability to clone a single VM and create 100s of VMs from a template quickly.
• Since the ESX block size is small and extremely random, network bandwidth isn’t an issue. VirtualStore comes with Veritas Dynamic Multi-Pathing (DMP) to give you the I/O performance you need.
• You can not only leverage existing storage investments, you can also use different tiers of storage within a single datastore.

By providing an integrated solution that combines the capabilities and performance of VirtualStore with the industry leading virtualisation solutions from VMware, IT administrators can deliver advanced storage management capabilities over NFS while increasing business agility and driving down the total cost of ownership.

Make your storage solution match your VDI requirements

Server virtualisation and storage virtualisation is a vehicle that many companies have adopted as the leading strategy to help them accomplish more with less resources. At the endpoints, desktop virtualisation is also turning corners now and CIOs are building strategies around centralising data, applications and desktop operating systems, while realising that the savings span across multiple lines of business. However, there are many challenges associated with virtual desktop environments, which is why Symantec have announced VirtualStore.

No one will argue that desktop virtualisation comes with a significant upfront investment, but the clear goal is to reduce the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) per employee.

With a centrally hosted desktop solution, IT administrators can:

• Reduce data loss due to downtime or lost disks.
• Reduce administrative overhead of maintaining 1000s of desktops.
• Reduce OPEX helpdesk costs
• Increase security of corporate data.

Today, a majority of VMware customers use block based Fibre Channel of iSCSI storage for their VMware virtual machine images, but there has been a noticeable shift with customers asking whether Network File Systems (NFS) may be a better fit.

The result of centralising all of your servers is that managing storage for virtual machines becomes one of the biggest challenges in the data centre. Now not only do VMware administrators have to worry about managing virtual desktops and virtual servers, they have to worry about managing the storage demands underneath as well. As an example, storage demands have become one of the biggest costs for deploying virtual desktop environments. Information growth is on the rise, IT budgets remain flat and organisations need to find a way to leverage the power of virtualisation while at the same time dealing with the complex issues around managing storage in these environments.

To solve the storage challenges associated with virtual desktop environments, Symantec is introducing VirtualStore, a highly scalable, clustered NAS solution based on the industry leading Storage Foundation Cluster File System from Symantec for VMware virtual machines.

It does this in a number of ways:

• It can help administrators deploy a scalable and highly available NAS solution for a fraction of the cost of traditional NAS solutions.
• It reduces storage costs associated with virtual machine sprawl.
• It resolves storage challenges associated with deploying large virtual desktop environments.
• It improves the performance of virtual infrastructure with built in acceleration for serving up VMware virtual machines.

VirtualStore enables customers to not just leverage their existing SAN investments, but also extend the storage efficiency across different tiers of storage, and avoid getting locked into a single storage vendor.  This means storage costs per virtual machine continue to drop further.
Apart from helping reduce the storage costs associated with virtual machines, and virtual desktops in particular, another problem associated with VDI environments is the user experience. As more virtual desktops are added, the amount of storage I/O increases greatly. This can cause performance bottlenecks which directly translate to poor user experience; often referred to as boot-storm, login-storm or anti-virus (AV) update problems. VirtualStore uses an efficient FileSnap technology along with patented cache optimisation solutions to pack more virtual machines into a single NAS head while delivering the response times desktop users are used to.

Considering VMware View, talk to us to understand the most appropriate solution for you.

Microsoft & Google on $5 Inboxes

When it comes to cloud-based email, there are four major vendors vying for your IT spend: Microsoft, Google, IBM, and Cisco Systems. Each has its pros and cons, but no matter which vendor you choose the price of email will be roughly the same: $5 per user per month.

Google singlehandedly "repriced the business email market" when it launched Google Apps Premier Edition in February 2007, with $50 annual subscriptions (or $4.17 monthly) that "undercut the market price for email by a factor of two or three," says a new report by Forrester Research analyst Ted Schadler.

Google Apps vs. Microsoft Office

Microsoft followed suit in late 2009 by lowering the price of hosted Exchange seats from $10 to $5 per month. IBM's LotusLive email and Cisco's WebEx mail now offer similar pricing, in effect standardising the whole market on price at about $5 per mailbox per month, with typically about 25GB of storage.

Microsoft and Google are in the lead for customers, but they're not the only contenders.

Cisco is the newest entrant in the market, but is already pushing the envelope on price with BlackBerry support for $1 per month, "a huge price drop for a market used to paying $7 to $10 per user per month for a full BlackBerry Enterprise Server license," Schadler writes.

Each vendor has its strengths. Google's Gmail integrates with Google's collaboration tools like Sites, Docs, Talk and Video, and Google is using HTML5 to provide offline email access, Schadler writes. IBM offers tiered levels of services, with email costing either $3 or $5. Microsoft goes even lower with a $2 "deskless worker" Webmail service, and it has the advantage of integrating cloud services with Outlook and other software that business users are already familiar with.

That doesn't mean cloud email will automatically be less expensive than an on-premise deployment, but in most cases the cloud will be cheaper. Forrester analysts began a new effort to analyze the email market in 2008 and were surprised to learn "that nobody seemed to know how much they were actually spending on email," Schadler writes.

Forrester devised an email cost model that examines hardware, software, maintenance, upgrades, staff, storage, email filtering, mobile, financing, and power costs.

While inboxes may cost just $5, the total cost of cloud email, according to Forrester, is $11.33 per user per month for a 15,000-person company and $9.45 for a 45,000-person company. This is significantly less expensive than the cost of on-premise email, which runs to $17.83 per user per month for 15,000-person companies, and $13.32 for 45,000-person companies. (These calculations do not include email archiving and smartphone support).

Price isn't the only consideration, of course. IT professionals in many cases are still wary of moving mission-critical applications such as email outside their firewalls because of security concerns, and have complained about limited functionality in cloud-based tools.

HP, 3Par and Dell

Hewlett-Packard raised the stakes in the competition to acquire storage array vendor 3PAR yesterday, making a $1.6 billion bid that surpasses the $1.15 billion offer Dell made last week for 3PAR.

Dave Donatelli, HP's EVP of enterprise servers, storage and networking, said he is looking for 3PAR to take HP heavily into cloud storage if it closes the deal.

As with Dell's proposed acquisition of 3PAR, HP's bid would alter the storage landscape and raises questions about its product platform.

Although 3PARs flagship T-Class InServ storage system is positioned as an enterprise play, Donatelli said it can also be considered a midrange platform during a call with financial analysts. He also said HP would maintain its OEM deal with Hitachi for its enterprise XP system, which is the same system that Hitachi Data Systems sells as the USP-V. That means 3PAR may end up replacing HP's midrange EVA line instead.

And while 3PAR is known most for its thin provisioning, Donatelli pointed to its multitenancy capabilities for shared storage and tiering software as making it a good fit for service providers and cloud storage. 3PAR sells modular systems that can be clustered to scale, unlike the monolithic systems with mainframe connectivity that it competes against – such as the EMC Symmetrix, HDS USP-V and IBM DS8000.

Donatelli also denied HP's bid was a reaction to Dell's, and admitted HP made a previous offer for 3PAR.

Analysts expect Dell to make a counter offer, but doesn't see it getting into a prolonged bidding war.

HP has been more aggressive with acquisitions historically, but Dell has ramped up its interest in storage deals since it acquired EqualLogic in early 2008 for $1.4 billion and became the iSCSI SAN market leader. Dell this year acquired the technology of clustered NAS vendor Exanet and bought primary data reduction startup Ocarina Networks.

HP's storage acquisitions over the past few years include LeftHand Networks, scale-out NAS vendors Ibrix and PolyServe, database archiver OuterBay, and SRM vendor AppIQ.

HP challenge Dell for 3Par

A week after Dell announce their intention to acquire 3Par, HP put their cards on the table and trump the Dell bid with an updated offer of $24 a share. This represents a 1/3 increase over the Dell $18/share offer.

HP have been pretty acquisitive in the storage arena over the last few years, acquiring LeftHand, Ibrix and others. Why now would they want to acquire 3Par?

Defensive positioning – 3Par being acquired by any of the major vendors could weaken HP’s position in the mid-to-enterprise market. EVA is in a very competitive market space Maybe HP felt they had to protect their existing mid-market position.

Technology Replacement - As I just mentioned, the EVA is in a competitive landscape and do with some enhancements. Should HP replace or upgrade it? Acquiring 3Par could be the answer to that problem – use InServ as the EVA replacement. Alternatively, 3Par could be a replacement for the XP range of devices that HP OEM from Hitachi. HDS are being brought closer to the Hitachi family (and making acquisitions of their own) so perhaps this is another defensive move on HP’s part, in case the Hitachi deal unravels.

Whatever the reason, HP & 3Par would create a large overlapping portfolio of similar products. I’m not sure where the clear strategy would be, or what the marketing message would say; which product is best for enterprise, mid, SME and so on.

Location:London Rd S,,United Kingdom

OCS Director Role – Why you need it?

There has been some confusion about the use and value of the Director role. To be clear, the Director role doesn't exist. You won't find this server role in the Communications Server 2007 and 2007 R2 Setup. So then what exactly is a Director? A Director is simply a Standard Edition Server or Enterprise pool that has NO users homed on it.

The follow up question that immediately comes to mind is, "What value does an empty Standard Edition Server or Enterprise pool (that is to say, Director) offer?" By empty, I mean no users are assigned to it.

After you understand the value a Director can offer, you'll be able to decide whether to deploy a Director in your organisation. If you decide to deploy a Director.

A Director behaves differently depending on whether the user is connecting internally or externally.  Therefore, it's best to describe the Director's value proposition in terms of those two scenarios.

Internal Users Connecting to Communications Server

From the perspective of the end-user, if the user is internal, the client, when signing in the user, needs to locate the user's home pool. If the client is configured manually using the FQDN of the user's home pool, a Director is not necessary.

If the client, Office Communicator, is configured for automatic configuration, it will issue a DNS query for the SRV record.  If the internal DNS server is configured to return the FQDN of the Director, the client will contact the Director and attempt to sign in. Because the Director pulls information from Active Directory directory services to determine on which pool each user is homed, the Director can determine the user's home pool from its local database and redirect the client to the correct pool. In this scenario, the Director behaves very much like a DNS server. It points the client to the user's home pool and disconnects. The client then attempts the sign-in request again, this time using the correct server. The result is a double authentication: once by the Director and again by the user's home server.

A key point is that the Director gets out of the communication path between the client and the user's home pool. It's a good thing that the Director doesn't remain in the communication path between the client and the user's home pool because otherwise the Director becomes a bottleneck. If the Director went down, all pools would become inaccessible when the clients queried DNS for the SRV record.

The Director offloads the task of directing client sign-in to the appropriate home pool where the user is signed in. If a Director wasn't deployed in a multi-pool Communications Server environment, the burden of redirecting client sign-in requests to the correct pool would have to fall to one of the existing pools because every pool provides the same functionality as a Director. So, why dedicate a pool to just redirecting users to their home pool when any pool with users homed on it can perform this function? The only justification for doing this is that this improves the pool's performance, particularly during "rush hour" times of the day when a large majority of the user population signs in to Communications Server such as in the morning when employees arrive at the office. Such impact could affect the overall performance of the pool. Users homed on this pool could experience slower response and dropped connections. However, this is only a problem if the pool is operating at near capacity. Realistically, most IT organisations overprovision servers to avoid this problem.

In the majority of cases, deploying a Director for internal use only is unnecessary.

External Users Connecting to Office Communications Server

If the user is external, the user's client signs in through the Edge Server. The Edge Server's next hop should be the Director assuming a Director is deployed. The Director, not the Edge Server, validates the user's credentials and authenticates the user before forwarding the SIP connection to the user's home pool. Unlike the internal user scenario, the Director remains in the communication path between the client and the user's home pool as well as the Edge Server. Because the Director has a trusted connection (MTLS) to the user's home pool, the user's home pool trusts the Director to have properly authenticated the user, and therefore does not re-authenticate the user. Because the Director proxies the client's connection to the user's home pool, there is no double authentication.

The Director in this scenario behaves differently than in the internal user scenario. The Director offloads the task of authenticating the user and proxying the request to the correct pool. The Director serves as a buffer against attacks originating from the Internet. If a DoS attack was mounted, the Edge Server and Director would be under fire; however, the internal pools would be isolated and protected from such attacks.

VDI ROI Analysis for XenDesktop by Forrester

The analysis firm Forrester has released a cost analysis of XenDesktop 4.0 used for VDI, commissioned by Citrix in March.

For the analysis Forrester used the San Jose Campbell Union High School District case study, which had 2,500 physical desktops and 500 laptops.
The school replaced this environment with only 500 virtual desktops and 200 virtualised applications, accessed by 2,500 students and hosted on 40 physical server along with another 100 virtual servers for the back-end.

Interestingly, the virtual desktops boot up and down every 90 minutes, according to the classes schedule. This makes the case study slightly different than the average corporate environment where the workforce mostly uses its virtual machines non-stop.

The Citrix solution, inclusive of software licenses, hardware equipment, implementation costs and administrative costs, costed $1.03M (risk-adjusted present value).

Forrester says that the school achieved a Return of Investment (ROI) of 170% in just five months, equal to more than $1.7M in cost saving:

The analysis includes detailed financial assumptions (like the cost of staff salary) to model the cash-flow trend.

Thanks to alessandro perilli for this information.

Google Migration made easier with IMAP and PST Migrator

Customers moving to Google Apps are migrating email, calendar and contacts data from several different legacy systems, and many are doing so from mixed sources including data stored on end user machines and company servers. With this in mind, Google are constantly trying to make it easy, fast and painless for you to migrate data in each of these scenarios.

Google have launched Google Apps Migration for Microsoft® Exchange last March to help Microsoft Exchange administrators perform centrally-managed migrations from Exchange servers. In May they announced Google Apps Migration for Microsoft Outlook, which allows end-users to move their data from PST files and Outlook profiles. Customers are also migrating from other systems such as Novell® GroupWise®, hosted Exchange and sometimes even from previous Gmail accounts. Google have announced that they are extending support for these migrations going forward with the introduction of new features to Google Apps Migration for Microsoft Exchange:

• IMAP support – Administrators can use the tool’s new IMAP capabilities to migrate email from systems like Novell Groupwise to Google Apps, or even migrate data between Google Apps accounts.
• PST support – Administrators can migrate PST files on behalf of users in their domain once they have aggregated users' data files in one location.
• Better support for hosted Exchange – Administrators can now migrate data from hosted Exchange by running the migration tool on local servers, without requiring the Exchange hosting partner to run any special software on their end.

Office 2010 and Windows 7 Better Together

Office 2010 works with many different Operating System Windows versions, however innovations in Windows 7 are seamlessly integrated with Office 2010 to help you work more efficiently. Here are just a few of the ways that Office 2010 and Windows 7 are better together:

Fast access to Office 2010 programs and files

You can put your Office 2010 programs in Windows 7 taskbar by drag and drop program's icon to taskbar, then using the program icon in taskbar to open new Office 2010 document.

Also you can use Windows 7 Jump Lists to access Office 2010 files and files you use every day, to see the Jump List display all your recent Word documents, right click Work icon in your taskbar.

Create Outlook 2010 attachments in an instant

This can be done easily by drag and drop your document from Jump List to your e-mail, tasks and calendar items.

View Multiple Office 2010 documents with Snap

The new Windows 7 Snap feature allow you to easily compare two documents by drag one document to the left side of your screen and the other to the right, and Windows 7 will automatically adjust the window size to align the documents for side-by-side view.

Stress-free presentations with PowerPoint 2010

Showing your PowerPoint 2010 presentation is much easier in Windows 7, just press Windows Logo Key+P and Windows 7 will present all display options.

Put Office 2010 at your fingertips with Windows Touch

You can now set aside that mouse and keyboard and use your fingers to flip through your documents in your laptop and touch enabled PCs running Windows 7 with the new touch-navigation capability.

Keep your Office 2010 files in sync with Windows 7

If you work with your Office 2010 documents over a network using Windows 7 you can keep offline copy of your documents locally and when connect to network all the files you worked on offline will automatically be synced with their network versions.

Consistence design across Office 2010 and Windows 7

The consistence use of Ribbon across Windows 7 and Office 2010 makes it easy to discover features and be more efficient.

Backup Exec 2010 R2

Backup Exec 2010 R2 is a release that represents Symantec’s ongoing commitment to product quality, platform support and ease of doing business.  Whether you are just joining the Backup Exec family or if you are just curious about why now is a great time to upgrade your existing Backup Exec installation, Backup Exec 2010 R2 is THE place to start!

So…what’s new in R2?

Backup Exec 2010 R2 focuses on three major themes:

PROTECT SOONER:

Backup Exec 2010 R2 has taken great strides to ensure that their customers are able to not only install and/or upgrade with confidence, but to also ensure that they are able to begin protecting your data as soon as possible post installation and/or upgrade.  Symantec have created several tools based on customers direct feedback in usability studies, forum posts and beta program participation.

Typical installation
Backup Exec 2010 R2 now includes a “typical” installation choice that allows you to accept the most common Backup Exec defaults in order to get installed and running as quickly as possible.  Through research in Symantecs support database they realised that many customers shared a common set of installation parameters and as such they are now offering the "typical" installation to meet the needs of the most common Backup Exec.

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Improved backup wizard
Symantec have also completely redesigned the in-product backup wizard to ask realistic questions including: What to back up?  Where to store the backup?  When to run the backup? How long to keep the backup?  Through their customers' participation in usability studies Symantec realised that by asking the “real” questions of data protection they could guarantee an easier backup job creation process and a more comprehensive backup overall that is more of a tailored fit to your environment.

Upgrade “roll back”
Finally, Backup Exec 2010 R2 also now has the ability to “roll back” in the event of an incomplete upgrade.  Symantec customers have spoken loud and clear about how important an easy and successful upgrade process is to their environment but also that a means to “reverse” or “roll back” the upgrade in the event of an incomplete installation and/or migration of Backup Exec data. 

PROTECT SMARTER

Backup Exec 2010 R2 now contains many new features to ensure that you are aware of when your maintenance contract is up for renewal, that you are up to date on the latest Backup Exec news and also that you are using the correct Backup Exec database and/or application agent to protect your mission-critical business data. 

Renewal Assistant
In order to remain current on Backup Exec maintenance, Backup Exec 2010 R2 introduces a new integrated “Renewal Assistant” to the home screen of the product.  The Renewal Assistant uses an active internet connection and Backup Exec maintenance serial numbers (found on your licensing certificate) to connect to symantec’s maintenance database.  The maintenance database will then in turn populate Backup Exec with renewal reminders that are useful to facilitate the maintenance renewal process.

Integrated RSS Reader
In order to stay updated on the latest Backup Exec news, technical forum posts, ideas and events, Backup Exec 2010 R2 now includes the “RSS Reader”, located on the Home screen.  This very rich RSS reader not only keeps you up to date on Backup Exec news but it also allows you to track any item on the Symantec CONNECT website:  http://www.symantec.com/connect/

Backup Recommendations
Very often we see customers that are not properly protecting Microsoft Exchange, SQL, SharePoint and Active Directory via provided backup API’s but rather are using either the incorrect agent or are taking the Microsoft application offline and protecting it in a “flat file” state- all the while having to disconnect users from the application.  In order to ensure that you are getting the most out of Backup Exec and taking advantage of the enormous time and space saving single-pass backups with Granular Recovery Technology (GRT) and a true application-consistent backup, Backup Exec 2010 R2 now provides “Backup Recommendations” in a small section of the job log as well as in a specialized report that may be run independently of a backup job.

PROTECT MORE

In Backup Exec 2010 R2 Symantec support many new and updated applications/databases/platforms including:

• Microsoft SharePoint 2010
• Microsoft Exchange 2010 SP1
• Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2
• VMware vSphere 4.1
• Mac OS X Snow Leopard
• Microsoft Exchange 2010 SP1
• Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2
• VMware vSphere 4.1
• Mac OS X Snow Leopard (10.6)
• Symantec Enterprise Vault 9
• NetApp ONTAP 8.0
• EMC DART 6.0
• OST support for Data Domain DDOS 4.8 with Boost Technology (via the Backup Exec 2010 Deduplication Option)

Intel buys McAfee

Source: BBC

Intel will pay $7.68bn (£5bn) in cash.

Under the terms of the deal, Intel said it would pay $48 per share in cash for McAfee, almost 60% higher than its closing price on Wednesday.

McAfee, one of the world's biggest security technology companies, should help Intel protect its microprocessors from computing threats, such as malicious software.

The deal is likely to slightly reduce Intel's net earnings in the first year.

Intel has recognised that online security is not just about a few hacked bank accounts, stolen company secrets or a lone PC kept virus-free.

These days the internet reaches nearly everywhere: from smartphones to the power grid, your television to the transport system. Online threats now pose a systemic risk.

Microsoft recently launched its own suite of "Security Essentials" to keep computers safe. Apple says it has built security into its very system. Intel's deal with McAfee is yet another attempt to ensure that consumers don't lose trust in our interconnected world.

But Intel will take it one step further. The McAfee deal will see the integration of security into hardware, into the chips powering much of our computer-driven world. It also bolsters Intel's attempts to become more than a chip maker as it develops its own consumer devices and offering of IT services.

An Intel company statement said that the acquisition reflected that security was now a fundamental component of online computing.

It added that today's security approach did not fully address the billions of new internet-ready devices, including mobile and wireless devices, TVs, cars, medical devices and cash machines.

The president and chief executive of Intel, Paul Otellini, said in the past, energy efficiency and connectivity had defined computing requirements.

In future security would become the "third pillar" that people demanded, he said.

McAfee's president and chief executive, Dave DeWalt, said cyber attacks were a growing menace.

He said: "The cyber threat landscape has changed dramatically over the past few years with millions of new threats appearing every month."

Both boards of directors have unanimously approved the deal, but the deal still requires McAfee shareholder approval and regulatory clearances.

McAfee, also based in Santa Clara, is one of the world's largest security technology companies with about $2bn in revenue last year.

Citrix XenDesktop 4.1 SP1

Citrix recently released Service Pack 1 for XenDesktop, Burton Group, a Gartner subsidiary, named it the first enterprise-ready solution for VDI on the market.

So what’s new in the update that gives it this status?

SP1 contains upgrades to the Virtual Desktop Agent (VDA) that improve the reliability of virtual desktops with almost 50 fixes, but the two key new features are related to the connection broker component, the Desktop Delivery Controller (DDC):

• Role-based access control (RBAC) model for administration delegation
• Change logging for administrative tasks

On top of that, now Citrix provides enterprise support agreements (minimum 3 years) for all XenDesktop 4 Platinum Edition components.

Biggest Gotcha’s when designing VDI environments

We get heavily involved with designing and implementing VDI environments for our clients from technical concept through assessment to POC and implementation, and over the course of this time we have come to see some of the biggest challenges that our clients have faced when it comes to the design of their VDI environments.  So we thought we would list the top 10 issues here:

1. Storage Design
2. Using VDI Defaults
3. Little Server Cache
4. Lack of desktop image optimisation
5. Predicting user access times
6. Anti-Virus Protection
7. Improper Desktop Sizing
8. Lack of Application Virtualisation Strategy
9. Not managing user profile and their access requirements
10. Not calculating user bandwidth requirements.

Need help with designing your VDI strategy and deployment, come talk to us!

Windows 7 Direct Access

I am privileged enough to visit organisations of all shapes and sizes across many vertical markets and discuss technology strategies, IT strategies and more tactical deployments of technologies to address an urgent need to support the business.  An area that comes up time and time again is the ability to provide flexible working and secure remote access. Bearing in mind that many of these organisations are looking to transition to Windows 7 and standardise their domain on Windows 2008 R2, many of them don’t know of the functionality of direct access.

With Microsoft’s release of Windows 7, users now have more flexibility than ever before to work remotely—and your IT staff can better manage security and compliance across desktops anywhere, anytime.

VPNs have several limitations, too. It’s one more application for users to learn, initiate and break. And that requires more troubleshooting and support, time that could be better spent on strategic initiatives. VPNs also make it tough to troubleshoot PCs remotely, since both computers must be available when the VPN session is running.

This is where Direct Access, a new feature available with Windows 7, changes the game. Now through Active Directory, users simply need Internet access to connect quickly and securely to your corporate network. A secure IPsec connection is created, giving the user access to your internal network just as if they are working from the corporate office.

Think about DirectAccess as a clientless VPN—there are no additional tools for your users to learn. And IT staff can work on any machine from anywhere in the world as long as users are connected to the Internet—they don’t even need to be logged in!

Direct Access is just one of the many new features of Windows 7 that allows users and IT professionals to be more productive and efficient everywhere. Interested, you should be your probably entitled to it!  Call us to discuss it further.

Multiple Account Sign-In in Google

Good news for users of multiple Google accounts (i.e. one for work and one for personal): now you can sign in to more than one of them from the same browser window.

The feature has been in testing for several weeks, but now appears to be publicly available by going to the Google Accounts page and enabling multiple sign-in (it’s turned off by default).

Before you can turn it on, Google wants you to be aware of a few caveats, most notably that not all products support multiple sign-in and offline mode for Gmail and Google Calendarwon’t work.

Still, this is a convenient addition to those of us with multiple Google accounts that previously had to keep multiple browser windows open (or have multiple systems running) to deal with the problem. Once enabled, you can switch between accounts via a pull-down menu that appears next to your e-mail address atop the Google service that you’re using.

Drag and Drop with GMail

Saving dozens of e-mail file attachments to your computer just became a lot easier.

Google has added a new feature to Gmail: the ability to save file attachments by simply dragging-and-dropping them onto the desktop. If you hover over the file icon or the “Download” link for any attachment, you’ll notice the new text prompting you to drag the file to your desktop to save.

We just tried out the new feature, and we have to tell you: It’s really as simple as it sounds. There is one caveat to saving file attachments via drag-and-drop, though: The feature is only available in Google Chrome.

Google has been adding more drag-and-drop functionality to Gmail in recent months. Back in April, Google launched the ability to add attachments to e-mails via drag-and-drop. In May, Google gave Gmail users the ability to add images to e-mails via drag-an-drop.

It is Listening that makes “Social” technologies a hit with users

Communication is a two way thing – right?  Many people like to talk, and some too much but very rarely do people actually listen to the needs of the customer.

Well, listening to clients who are in the midst of introducing “Social” capabilities to their businesses, we are hearing that they are finding that the simple act of demonstrating that they are listening, and want to hear, wins a lot of respect for the Brand.

Most organisations have figured out that the price of not listening is crippling. There are exceptions. A company like Apple can afford not to listen. I am not saying that it does not listen – they happen to work hard at understanding customer needs. But let’s say that one of the Apple products were to have a battery die or screen go blank or software freeze in my house. The response (aside from my own, ignored, whine) is “Hurray! NOW can I upgrade to the new ….. – fill in the blank Apple product!”

Traditional ROI is not the way to measure value. Instead of comparing support costs before Social and after Social look at the change in sentiment. How much less vituperative, surly, nasty, testy and pugnacious your angriest customer is. See how many fewer acrimonious posts they send, or Tweets. See how many more advocates you have for your products and services. Look at the insights in new product features and process improvement opportunities.

With the denouement of human agents in the customer interaction – the slow but inexorable transition from Carbon-based over to Silicon-based (human to computer) interactions, we have lost the connective tissue that gave the enterprise the pulse of the customer.  Introducing listening, analysing, responding/engaging in the customer processes restores some of what we have lost and are yet to lose.

Thinking of adopting social media for your company but don’t know where to start – contact us to see how we can listen and get it right for you.

How to know when your data centre needs an overhaul

With today’s data centres approaching the limits of their infrastructure and energy and space resources, CIOs are faced with ever-changing business demands, widespread resources, and the need to support business growth. Given these dynamics, how can you not only succeed in the present but also better prepare yourself for the future?

Before your infrastructure reaches its breaking point, consider investing in data centre transformation. Data centre transformation closely aligns technology with business goals and processes, increasing efficiency and quality of service while removing technology-related barriers to business growth. For example, technologies such as virtualisation often result in reduced real estate requirements and energy needs, lowering operational costs across the organisation. When it’s time to consider data centre transformation, the signs are unmistakable. Here are three to look for:

1. Increased Complexity
Within the data centre, servers, storage and networks proliferate as lines of business are added and as new business services are provided. In turn, your data centre's infrastructure steadily grows more complex. Ultimately, you may be managing multiple, redundant data centres and infrastructure, creating operational inefficiencies and dragging down essential applications. Mergers or acquisitions only add a layer of complexity. Initiatives such as consolidation and virtualisation will help mitigate risk and eliminate redundancy as you handle data across disparate and complex environments.

2. Rising Energy and Operational Costs
Aging data centres and infrastructure have considerable energy requirements and unnecessary operational costs, imposing capacity limits that affect uptime and flexibility. Poorly managed real estate and underutilised technology also lead to inefficiencies and high energy costs. Organisations need integrated approaches to control and reduce energy usage in real-time in order to improve efficiency under any workload, extending the capacity of existing facilities. Power monitoring and reduction technologies will optimise data centre space and increase energy efficiency. This results in reduced operating costs while maintaining flexibility to respond to shifting business demands.

3. Limited Capacity
As infrastructure technologies are continually added to the data centre, physical capacity is stretched to its limit and performance issues can arise. Additionally, more resources are spent on management and maintenance instead of supporting innovation and growth. This can jeopardise the ability to meet new business demands and successfully perform in a competitive environment. Data centre transformation leverages consolidation, virtualisation and a converged infrastructure to reduce an organisation’s hardware foot print and create a more efficient environment by lowering space requirements.

Unlike taking the traditional approach, which focuses on each project singularly and serially, the transformational approach builds an effective next-generation data centre through integrated projects over time. Step by step, projects achieve their own specific objectives while helping reduce costs, mitigate risks and support business growth and innovation. The transformational approach considers the long-term success of your data centre, fostering continual improvement and yielding much higher returns.

Gartner's UC Magic Quadrant Released for 2010

Source: Gartner (July 2010)

In 2010, vendor consolidation in the UC market continued with, most notably, Nortel being acquired by Avaya, and Cisco acquiring Tandberg. From a product perspective, Cisco and Microsoft maintained their strong leads, while Avaya continued to strengthen its portfolio. Product functionality overall increased, particularly in the areas of conferencing, mobility, server virtualization and session management. Additionally, we saw the emergence of complete UC suites from single vendors. Although the full suites are not yet competitive with best-of-breed portfolios, they suggest the direction for market leaders. Nonleading vendors will increasingly focus on niche market approaches and on best-of-breed capabilities. Most enterprises continue to leverage their existing strategic communication partnerships, and should expect to have two or three different UC vendors to complete their portfolio. Each vendor has at least one strength, for instance, in e-mail, telephony or networking, and each vendor seeks to expand its footprint within the enterprise. A common vendor strategy is bundling their lesser-known or weaker UC features with their stronger products. Another common strategy is the increased use of discounting and other incentives to allow new products into accounts.

Most enterprises take a longer-term approach to UC. They start by defining their strategy and longer-term direction. They then determine the most effective way to deliver this, while controlling costs, retaining control over their accounts and leveraging existing investments. Often, the UC initiative focuses on a particular project, and as some projects are completed, others are initiated. In this way, UC evolves as a process of continuous and incremental improvement. A strategy for accomplishing this is described in "Focus on UC Projects, Not on UC Technology," "Developing an Enterprise Unified Communications Road Map" and "Developing a Vision for Unified Communications." "Market Share: Enterprise Unified Communications Infrastructure, Worldwide, 2008" describes vendor market shares.

While most solutions today support key standards such as Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), an important distinction is the extent to which they federate and integrate with third-party products. Some solutions are intended primarily to enhance and operate within their own specific environments; although these solutions do work with third parties, their interoperation is often limited. Other products are clearly designed to interoperate in multiple environments, thus are more flexible. Currently, there is no best approach, and no vendor offers everything an enterprise needs for communication. Companies must make decisions by evaluating the emerging options based on their own objectives, and on how the options fit with the business's longer-term strategies.

The adoption of UC in enterprises by enterprises continues to increase; however, actual penetration as a percentage of market, and, in some cases, usage rates across an enterprise, remain low. This is the result of multiple technical and organizational issues, including:

• Enterprises have large investments in communication infrastructures that must be preserved; this leads to a slower evolutionary approach, rather than to the faster revolutionary "rip and replace" approach.

• Many applications and products are complex to deploy and may require organizational changes.

• The business case frequently is based on a soft ROI or a strategic investment, such as productivity improvements, rather than on hard ROI, such as cost savings. As a result, in a conservative economy, deployments occur slower, perhaps as part of a broader technology update.

Gartner expects these barriers to be resolved slowly, and during the next several years UC will become an accepted part of enterprise communication road maps and investments. As UC technologies and products are deployed, the challenge will shift from technology issues to organizational and change management.

Several vendors offer strong UC solutions, but were not included in this Magic Quadrant, because the inclusion criteria require that vendors have strong on-premises solutions in at least three of the six key technology areas. In the area of conferencing, Polycom offers strong solutions in conferencing, but does not offer solutions in other technology areas; Tandberg, which also offers a strong conferencing solution, is now part of Cisco. In the area of UM, Applied Voice & Speech Technologies (AVST) offers a best-of-breed UM solution. Finally, service providers, such as AT&T, Google, Verizon and BT, were not included in this document because they do not offer an on-premises solution. UC service solutions are described in the "Magic Quadrant for Unified Communications as a Service, North America."

You can read the whole report here:

http://www.gartner.com/technology/media-products/reprints/microsoft/vol10/article19/article19.html

Questions for your CIO

The relationship between the CIO and the Board of Directors is fraught with risk and misunderstanding.  While many CIOs have presented to the Board of Directors, these interactions are can be problematic.

CIOs feel the need to explain IT and their initiatives to an audience.  Given the average duration of a board presentation is about 30 minutes, there is not enough time to explain the detail.  This leads to CIOs feeling that either the board either does not seem to understand or seem to care about the point.

Addressing this situation requires recognising and tailoring your message to your audience.  Relative to the board it involves answering the following four questions:

• What is the objective you are trying to achieve?
• What is the plan you have to achieve that objective?
• What are the measures you and we should use to assess progress and success?
• Do you have the organisational capability to deliver the objective based on the plan?

These questions are common to many executive initiatives and are not particularly unique to IT.  They should not be, because board executives build their confidence in a decision or direction based on their expert judgment.

Expert judgment is the way in which we all take in new information, by comparing it with what we know and seeing if it fits.  Board members use their extensive experience and connections as their basis for judging the quality of your decision and action.  These questions support expert judgment by saying simply what you are trying to do, how you are going to do it, how you know you are making progress.

If your answers do not seem reasonable, then you will get questions and challenges.  If they fit in the minds of the Board, then you have confidence that you have the right objectives, the resources to reach the objectives and you know what success looks like.

XenDesktop 4 SP1 is the First Enterprise-Ready SHVD Platform

Source: Gartner

Citrix has become the first vendor to meet all requirements in the Burton Group Server Hosted Virtual Desktop evaluation criteria.

The evaluation criteria was developed over a five month period. During that time, Gartner worked with numerous early server-hosted virtual desktop (SHVD) adopters, as well as the key vendors in the space. In the end, vendors were supportive of the criteria in spite of the fact that not one met all of their requirements. The reason for the support was simple – customers were telling vendors they needed the same elements that Gartnet identified in the criteria.

Gartner evaluate and score SHVD platforms across three stratifications:

• Required: absolute necessities
• Preferred: important features that result in better experience, operational management, and improved TCO
• Optional: use-case driven features needed in select deployment scenarios

The assessment is broken down across major areas of focus such as user experience, management, and security.

The initial XenDesktop 4 release lacked:

• Role-based access  controls (RBACs) for delegation of administrative duties
• Administrative change logging capabilities to provide an audit trail for all administrative actions
• Enterprise-class support (3 year minimum) for all products in the XenDesktop 4 Platinum portfolio

Among other improvements, the above three shortcomings were addressed in XenDesktop 4 SP1 release. You can read the updated support policy here. Burton Group extensively tested the above features in their lab to ensure that they met their requirements, and the result was a platform that Gartner can recommend for large-scale enterprise environments.

The XenDesktop 4 SP1 scorecard is shown below.

As you can see, while meeting their essential requirements, XenDesktop 4 SP1 meets 76% of our preferred features and there is still room for improvement. Areas Gartner would like to see improved include:

• Management consolidation: Citrix must reduce the number of consoles required to manage the XenDesktop environment
• Management complexity for very large environments: In Citrix’s reference architecture, each XenDesktop 4 Desktop Delivery Controller (DDC) runs 5,000 desktops. Citrix recommends that organisations build separate management domains to horizontally scale XenDesktop management, placing greater challenges on areas such as configuration management.