I was speaking with a consultant friend of mine about transformation and he was asking about the determinants of success, this was following on from a conversation that I had in which you might deliver a project but fail to meet your key performance indicators – your determinants for success.

It stems from the following transformation means many things to many people, key performance metrics can mean many things to different stakeholders and indeed success can be internalised within a business line but not the wider group.  Transformation could be me migrating an application from a legacy data warehouse platform on an unsupported version of Solaris to a new Big Data solution, but often in such scenarios the financial savings are not direct in nature, we take out a suite of legacy costs (which should not be discounted) and introduce a different range of services or cost resulting from the replacement Big Data solution.

Therefore defining what your key performance metrics are and what those mean is crucial. In the example above to HR, I might have reduced their spend on Solaris by $40,000 a year in IT charges, to the Solaris team, I might have enabled a physical server and some associated costs to be cancelled, but to group IT, the costs might be neutral.

The level of cost transparency you have not only in the re-charge but the direct PnL charges need to be in place so that at the right level you can align projects, and goals with outcomes, a financial SQL query if you like, to achieve this target what do I need to transform or take out.  At the same time we need to recognise that decommissioning a platform, application or service should create opportunities for savings as we scale up those changes. If we transform enough legacy platforms, for example we got rid of AIX or Solaris entirely from the estate does that enable the move to Cloud more transparently with the associated opportunities to reduce costs across the stack.

Transformation, the move to Digital adoption of DevOps and Agile are all admirable activities where the legacy IT consumers should be headed often the drive is to maximise change for lower direct initial costs but that can have unintended costs either from outages, unplanned behaviour or simply things like the teams not being ready.

The best example of this was the internal cloud team that broadcast private cloud is available for SQL servers, but when you deployed an instance it wasn’t supported by the SQL team as they hadn’t updated their processes and adapted their working pattern to manage the ‘loss’ from an internal charge back model, for years we’ve said it’s x number of days for a SQL instance, you’re now saying its 90 minutes, how do I as the line manager cover my resource costs?

What we need is the following:

• Application analysis and cleanse from the enterprise architects aligned to roadmaps – what applications are core, what can be decommissioned and what we can buy in
• Infrastructure transformation – consolidation of platforms, removal of legacy, drive usage of long term legacy platforms strategically to lower the cost with developed roadmaps to migrate those applications as we near the end of the platform lifecycle. Changes to the operating model – raise the temperature of the data centre, cloud first, virtual first and physical last.
• Digitise applications – adopt fewer more resilient feeds which align to business processes so that our applications can be answering the client first to drive engagement and raising revenues, in banking this could mean I can credit check on the phone before pressing apply and having the downstream teams spend ages on admin tasks when the client doesn’t met our credit criteria.
• Agile and DevOps – what steps can we take on our current infrastructure and application estate to drive adoption of Agile ways of working which can drive DevOps mentalities and free our teams to be doing more with less, changing platforms or adapting the same underlying base code to meet distinct market or subsidiary needs. Can I have a global application instance which then has subsidiary feeds and components which then adapt our offering at the client end accordingly? So our subsidiary business might want its own branding, it’s own credit rating and back office tasks is fine, but do they need to be separate application instances or merely components which workloads flows through to achieve the business objective.

Crucially we need to understand the drivers that are set at the top table ‘take x million of the run rate’ and understand how that is impacting the decisions the teams are making without adjusting our operating model or ensuring that the teams in the middle implementing the changes have the right financial, technical and managerial skills to achieve that. I can absolutely reduce your spend on networks, I’ll capitalise over 12 years and transfer the cost the support contract without appreciating that the total cost actually increases. We need the right teams operating at the right levels, it’s only when you ask the question I’ve got this, we need to achieve that how would you do it that you get the answer you need, one which might drive the outcomes the business want and deliver the end goals that IT might have.

The cloud first model makes sense, that we buy in the capacity, user experience and service we need gives the flexibility and agility that can drive rapid response to customer needs and ability to chase revenue opportunities that previously the on-boarding cost meant economically unviable, what we do need to consider is the diversity in providers, operating standards and recognising that just because we buy it in, does not absolve us from design decisions (understanding operating models), can reliqunish influence outcomes or behaviour than a third party but also that our responsibilities to our clients remain whether it’s data recovery, regulatory requirements like the right to be forgotten or data ownership. Cloud is an empowerment tool to success and a disintermediates the traditional business model now Danny from Benfleet can offer the same scale as the established SME but the differentiator therefore falls back to traditional business operating models – brand, functionality, and price. Avoiding price and the race to the bottom will be the challenge as usual where we have loss leaders as a route into our business, not as an operating model by default.

Discover 2016 is in London next week. There is full coverage at www.hpe.com/discover which I will be sure to be checking out, and pending my schedule I may well try and turn up on the day.

• Version 2.50 supports all new HPE ProLiant Gen9 platforms.
• Version 1.63 supports all new HPE ProLiant Gen8 platforms.

You can upgrade the version of HPE Intelligent Provisioning without affecting data, this is done by downloading the ISO and booting from the ISO, it runs the update and reboots.

It lets you:

• Perfom an assisted OS install (and configure the array if necessary)
• Run maintenance/diagnostics

The steps therefore for a new server build out would be:

• Configure ILO
• Download the latest appropriate Intelligent Provisioining ISO and run the update
• Download and run the latest Service Pack for ProLiant (currently April 2015)
• Run Service Pack for ProLiant and bring the server firmware up to date
• Boot the server and run the Array configuration utility F5 – configure the array, set the boot order and reboot
• Run F10 to boot into Intelligent Provisioning and perform OS install – select custom install to specify the server name and specifics (including drivers/management software if you want)
  • If the install fails due to language settings try leaving language US English
• Complete OS install and configuration
• Re-run the Service Pack for ProLiant to install any missing components

• Check ILO/IMM works ok and that you know the local administrator password – for post conversion/roll back
• Verify server health (nothing is alerting that might potentially stop the server from booting)
• Delete temporary files if possible – c:\windows\temp and c:\temp also IIS logs/middleware logs
• Defrag the hard drives beforehand – you don’t have too but it’s nice to do and shouldn’t take long
• Set the hardware management agents and non essential services to manual
• ipconfig /all >c:\ipconfig.txt – Captures networking information to a text file.
• Download pspcleaner referenced here.

At this point some fundamentals of approach.  I always wanted to do the conversion in as few reboots as possible, so at a high level it’s the following:

Before P2V steps:

1. Disable server monitoring including hardware monitors/backups
2. Log on as local administrator (verifying password)
3. Verify accessiblility of IMM/ILO (use online tools to reset password if required)
4. Install VMware vCenter Converter Standalone
5. Set HP/IBM hardware agents to manual
6. Clear down space – log files/temporary files etc
7. Using command prompt: ipconfig /all >c:\ipconfigbfc.txt
8. Defrag server – defrag c: -a -v defrag d: -a -v
9. Set the flag (converter-worker.xml) to ssl value = false
10. Restart VMware services
11. Run conversion

Conversion steps

• Remove networks – we will add network cards later
• Advanced Options – Select power on destination machine
• Advanced Options – Select install Vmware Tools on the destination virtual machine
• On completion of the P2V shut down the physical server and start a ping against primary network card

Post conversion steps

• Log in to the server locally using administrator account
• Say no to the message apply settings and reboot
• In vSphere system settings add network card(s) and remove audio/usb
• Select edit settings and options, click VMware tools now click enable ‘Check and upgrade VMtools during power cycle’
• Click ok and shut down the virtual machines
• Power on the server – if VMware tools is out of date the server will boot, install VMware tools and reboot.
• Run PSPCleaner to uninstall the HP agents/software
• In a command window run:
  • set devmgr_show_nonpresent_devices=1
  • devmgmt.msc
• Uninstall hidden devices
• If you see hpetdev_v.dll – high precision event timer identifier is needed, click cancel, look for unknown devices in system devices, right click and select update driver, install from a list or specific location, click next and don’t search select High Precision Event Timer
• If you get any obscure errors from Compaq/HP agents – it’s the wbem key you want to examine: current control set services wbem
• Remove network cards and let them reinstall
• Configure IP address(es)
• Clear event logs
  • You can do it with this command:
    • wmic nteventlog where filename=’SysEvent’ cleareventlog
    • wmic nteventlog where filename=’AppEvent’ cleareventlog
  • This means when the server comes up any alerts can be investigated

The server should now be accessible from the network and ready for verification.

The script below does a lot of the service stopping and creates text files for route, IP and page file size. Just copy it into a text file and save as .cmd

@echo off
echo Pre-Checks and Virtualisation process script
echo Stopping services and changing startup to manual
echo.
wmic pagefileset list >c:\temp\pagefile_bfp2v.txt
echo.
echo Set Compaq/HP services startup to manual (if they exist)
echo.
route print >C:\temp\routeprint.txt
sc config cqmghost start= demand
sc config cpqnicmgmt start= demand
sc config cqmgserv start= demand
sc config ProLiantMonitor start= demand
sc config cqmgstor start= demand
sc config cpqrcmc start= demand
sc config cpqRCMc3 start= demand
sc config sysdown start= demand
sc config cissesrv start= demand
sc config sysmgmthp start= demand
sc config cpqvcagent start= demand
echo.
echo Set Emulex, IIS & Cluster services to manual (if they exist)
echo.
sc config “hbsa service” start= demand
sc config hpwmistor start= demand
sc config iisadmin start= demand
sc config w3svc start= demand
sc config cluster start= demand
echo.
echo Stopping IBM services if they exist (ignore erorrs)
sc config “ati hotkey poller” start= demand
sc config tier1slp start= demand
sc config wmicimserver start= demand
sc config cimlistener start= demand
sc config twgipc start= demand
sc config ibmsa start= demand
net stop tier1slp
net stop cimlistener
net stop wmicimserver
net stop twgipc
net stop ibmsa
echo.
cls
echo Deleting temporary files and Patrol history
echo.
erase “C:\Program Files\IBM\Director\log\”*.* /q
erase “C:\Program Files\IBM\Director\data\”esntevt.dat /q
rd C:\WINDOWS\Temp /s /q
md c:\windows\temp
echo.
echo Copy HP ILO uninstall vbs/HP WMI vbs script
cd\
cd temp
md compaqfolder
cd compaqfolder
copy c:\cpqsystem\uninstall\*.* /y
pause
cls
echo.
echo.
echo
echo Performing defragmentation of C, D and E drives, please be patient
echo.
echo Performing defragmentation of D: drive
echo.
defrag d: -f -v
echo Performing defragmentation of C: drive
echo.
defrag c: -f -v
echo Performing defragmentation of E: drive
echo.
defrag e: -f -v
echo.
cls
ipconfig /all >c:\temp\ipconfig.txt
netsh interface ip show config >c:\temp\netsh.txt
echo Command finished. Please run the VMware vCenter Converter Standalone Client tool.
pause
echo.

Infrastructure transformation means different things to different target audiences, if we take the infrastructure or IT stance.

I’m talking about change which is significant enough to deliver enhancement and enablement to the end user community typically with some outages or service disruption.

My approach has always been the baby step approach, fix the fundamentals and everything else follows:

• Analyse the infrastructure and businesses in scope
• Identify ideal platforms that can be test cases for transformation
• Command and control the transformation or change
• Understand our successes and what could be done better which should feed back into analyse the infrastructure in scope

Command and control is something that is very much to my heart and is stated in terms of communication and methodology:

• A unified line of communication throughout the transformation process; outages, failures are all controlled, declared and resolved transparently.
• Involve the stakeholders and clarify roles and responsibilities – do it right, do it once
• Clarity in how we ‘undo’ the change/transformation

Red/yellow/green so we have a dashboard reference point of what is or is not complete

In summary:

• Create ocumented and repeatable steps which are easily replicated, that are transparent and includes no assumptions.
• Avoid ackronyms and complexity where possible to embed civility  and partnering in communication

23-26th June

I will be watching the coverage online, what I’ll be looking out for is announcements on the journey towards innovation in OpenStack, DevOps and empowering both business and IT to bring together the right combination of technology and technology services to deliver an end to end solution for transformation and enhancement.

Do check out the agenda here and the available training or certifications that are on offer and consider that attending these events is not only an investment in technical aspect of your career, it’s the people you meet, the connections you make and the ability I always find to ask questions which I might not feel comfortable asking directly of my colleagues/service provider.  The ability to grab someone and say, I’m having this problem have you seen it before?

The official coverage lives here:

• Red Hat Summit blog: http://summitblog.redhat.com/
• Red Hat Blog: http://www.redhat.com/en/about/blog

The high level bullet points for you:

• HP Helps Customers Accelerate the Move to All-Flash Data Centers – further enhancements of their HP 3PAR StoreServ offering, which brings new levels of scale and performanace at a lower operational cost.
• HP Unveils Developer Focused Testing Solution to Help Businesses Accelerate Application Delivery – this is about creating testing solutions to meet customer requirements end to end, very cool.
• DreamWorks Animation Selects HP to Automate Its IT Infrastructure – leveraging HP experience and best practice to further automate and enhance DreamWorks IT infrastructure for a more agile and scalable, this will be transformational in terms of the ability to adjust the IT landscape around not only your business but projects and programmes.
• Updates to HP Helion Portfolio Help Customers Unlock Value of a Hybrid Infrastructure – illustrating their further commitment to bringing and enhancing Cloud and Hybrid business solutions to their customers.

There were also further announcements to enhancements to HP OneView 2.0 which will be a welcome to their customers, I’ve heard great things from colleagues about it, so it will be interesting to speak to them about these enhancements.

HP Discover is in London this year in December – www.hp.com/go/discover to keep updated and register.

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2015/06/08Introducing-Apple-Music-All-The-Ways-You-Love-Music-All-in-One-Place-.html

Introducing Apple Music — All The Ways You Love Music. All in One Place.

June 8, 2015

Apple today unveiled Apple Music, a single, intuitive app that combines the best ways to enjoy music — all in one place. Apple Music is a streaming music service, a worldwide live radio station broadcasting 24 hours a day, and a new way for music fans to connect with their favorite artists. Apple Music combines the largest and most diverse collection of music with the expertise of world-class experts who have programmed playlists for your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Mac, PC, Apple TV, and Android phones. Apple Music will be available starting June 30 in over 100 countries. “We love music, and the new Apple Music service puts an incredible experience at every fan’s fingertips,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice president of Internet Software and Services. “All the ways people love enjoying music come together in one app — a revolutionary streaming service, live worldwide radio, and an exciting way for fans to connect with artists.”

Read more: apple.com/pr

I love the concept and handled effectively this could be brilliant for both Apple and the artist, creating a community and broadcast platform from which I can communicate with my marketplace as a muscian is a powerful and compelling offering.

I love the offering which extends to new artists that brings diversity to the marketplace in terms of music choice and revenue opportunities for Apple and it’s partners.

The subscription model which extends to family members is very cool, as is the Beats 1 radio, I can’t wait to hear it.

Apple’s move into Music end to end, combining a digital platform for artists, a delivery mechanism (Beats 1) and subscription model extends the scope for revenue and engagement with music fans and critically creates opportunities not only for Apple but the marketplace as new services come online.  What I’m waiting for is the agregator code/service model which lets have a unified but varied content distribution mechanism for these new platforms, how do I broadcast content to Apple and Spotify?  How can I have the content the same but not.

http://finextra.com/news/fullstory.aspx?newsitemid=27445

Apple Pay will launch in the UK in July, with eight of the country’s biggest banks, a host of merchants, and Transport for London all on-board. The UK will be the second country to get Apple Pay, which launched in the US last October, enabling users to make online and instore payments with their iPhones and Apple watches. HSBC, Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds Bank and Santander are among the banks backing the service, while Boots, Nando’s and Waitrose lead a host of merchants that will accept iPhone-based payments. In addition, users of public transport in London will be able to pay for journeys with a tap of their handsets.

It’s interesting to see Apple launching their payments offering and I love the support of Waitrose and Transport for London, it’s very smart, as is being able to pay for your journey on the tube.

I tell you what I mean.  This is what I want as a reseller, a fix IT guy, a nonsense removal device for all those SMB’s where they have their own Exchange server, their own file server, their own everything in a box when they have five employees on site and a few people working remotely on their own pc. They’re not sure quite why they have that, but that’s what the nice independent server sales man said they needed.

I want a Cloud in a box like the WEDG but with the backing of enterprise grade applications and possibilities to hook into market standard Cloud applications and service providers.

I want to switch on a HP MicroServer or similar device. Then a wizard appear. Click next (to define any network specific values) then it say right you want to setup a cloud caching device it then talks me through:

• Using an existing account and downloading all the settings and caching any pre-subscribed services, establishing the backup and maintenance jobs etc. This enables me to move to another server seamlessly.
• Or just set me up a new existence a new domain name, a new online platform and identity

A new existence means, I choose the domain name, I choose the services I want with a tick box and then enter my credit card and purchase information then it creates everything for me:

• My email
• My internal SharePoint/collaborative calendars and working environments
• My web presence a page with company name that I can then mess around with will do – a wordpress as a service would be ideal
• Create two local shares
  • Apps – for streaming or installing apps which are cloud based
  • Data – with cloud and offline, cloud stores cloud replicated data, offline is local storage only

Then it needs to:

• Set up the backups and then offers – cloud backup services if I want them
• Set up the maintenance schedule – the maintnenace, the security patching and firewall/virus scan settings
• Register with the cloud for management – power off, rebuild OS and decommission (securely return to factory standards for recycling)

Close the wizard and let me work. When I want a new share or new email account, all I need to do is go to the cloud and click new account, it will then sync with my cloud server so that everything is in sync.

This could be based on Linux with Google Apps, or with a version of Windows and Microsoft’s Cloud. But the key is, it’s a cloud maintained headless user experience, I don’t need a server admin or server grade licenses. This device is an offline cache and distribution node for cloud based services, a place for example to store my pst files offline without using up all my data or store my temp files but not necessarily connect every device or every folder to the cloud. How cool would it be if I logged into my cloud account to shut my server down before there’s work done on the building without messing about with ILO, vpn or needing to know any of that.

There will be scenarios where having your own applications, your own services like SharePoint or Exchange make sense, for the SMB which thinks they need a server or wants what a server can bring them, increasingly I wonder if this hybrid model might not only fulfill the immediate requirement but create revenue positions and opportunities for Google, Microsoft and others alike.