Avastu Blog: Sustainable Global Clouds

DeepLearningTrucker Part 1

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Sun, 2 Jul 2017 16:38:00 +0200

Avastu Blog is migrating to IdeationCloud.com; 1st Jan 2009 live

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 20:20:00 +0100

YOU DON'T HAVE TO DO ANYTHING. WITHIN 2 SECONDS YOU WILL BE REDIRECTED TO THE NEW HOME OF AVASTU BLOG. PLEASE DO UPDATE AVASTU BLOG'S URL to : http://www.ideationcloud.com on your website.

I will send out emails personally to those who are using my link(s) on their sites.

Thanks much for your co-operation and hope you enjoy the new site and its cool new features :-)

Not like the site is unlive or something..on the contrary, its beginning to get a lot of attention already. Well most of the work is done, you don't have to worry about anything though:

What won't change

Links/Referrals: I will be redirecting the links (all links which you may have cross-posted) to IdeationCloud.com - so you don't have to do anything in all your posts and links. Although, I would urge however that you do change the permalinks, especially on your blogs etc yourself
This blog is not going away anywhere but within a few months, I will consider discontinuing its usage. I won't obviously do double posting, so we'll focus on a lot on Wordpress postings from now onwards
I'll contact you personally as well in a combined email post explaining it all
The quality of frequency of my blogging: You find me on the Cloud, it just wont land here
Mad blogging on: Virtualization, Cloud Computing, as you've always wanted and hopefully enjoyed it.

What will change is:

IdeationCloud will focus on a lot of things especially on Visualization, Ideas - you know, the real stuff
Participatory work must happen, its not just about my ideas: I will launch a lot of tools for online analysis and eventually would want you all to get and play with it, together.
Visualization tools
Polls and Surveys
Independent reports
And lots of cool stuff

Why am I moving out of blogger?

Well it was a great place to hang around but it just didn't give me enough tools to play around with, I wasn't able to optimize it appropriately. Those are big things if you want to keep your audience, I mean , YOU!

So the ideationcloud is hosted at (mt) (MediaTemple) and we'll try to optimize it to the fullest and publish a lot of customized

Hope to see you a lot often at the new site!

Cloud Security: Eliminate humans from the "Information Supply Chain on the Web"

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 12:48:00 +0100

My upcoming article, part - 3 data center predictions for 2009, has a slideshot talking about the transition from the current age to the cloud computing age to eventually the ideation age- the age where you will have clouds that will emote but they will have no internal employees.

Biggest management disasters occur because internal folks are making a mess of the playground.

Om's blog is carrying an article about Cloud security and it is rather direct but also makes a lot of sense:

I don’t believe that clouds themselves will cause the security breaches and data theft they anticipate; in many ways, clouds will result in better security. Here’s why:

Fewer humans – Most computer breaches are the result of human error; only 20-40 percent stem from technical malfunctions. Cloud operators that want to be profitable take humans out of the loop whenever possible.
Better tools – Clouds can afford high-end data protection and security monitoring tools, as well as the experts to run them. I trust Amazon’s operational skills far more than my own.
Enforced processes – You could probably get a co-worker to change your company’s IT infrastructure. But try doing it with a cloud provider without the proper authorization: You simply won’t be able to.
Not your employees — Most security breaches are committed by internal employees. Cloud operators don’t work for you. When it comes to corporate espionage, employees are a much more likely target.

So where are the risks?

Source and here's Guardian's post.

OS Virtualization comparison: Parallels' Virtuozzo vs the rest

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 19:11:00 +0100

Virtuozzo's main differentiators versus hypervisors center on overhead, virtualization flexibility, administration and cost. Virtuozzo requires significantly less overhead than hypervisor solutions, generally in the range of 1% to 5% compared with 7% to 25% for most hypervisors, leaving more of the system available to run user workloads. Customers can also virtualize a wider range of applications using Virtuozzo, including transactional databases, which often suffer from performance problems when used with hypervisors. On the administration side, customers need to manage, maintain and secure just a single OS instance, while the hypervisor model requires customers to manage many OS instances. Of course, the hypervisor vendors have worked hard to automate much of this process, but it still requires more effort to manage and maintain multiple operating systems than a single instance. Finally, OS virtualization with Virtuozzo has a lower list price than the leading hypervisor for commensurately sized systems.

Source

Seanode fixes Storage dilemma for Cloud Service Providers

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 19:07:00 +0100

Boston, December 16, 2008 – Seanodes, the creator and leading developer of Shared Internal Storage solutions, today announced that cloud services provider Aenigma has developed a new multi-tiered storage infrastructure backed by Exanodes™ software to increase the reliability and performance of its High Availability Application Hosting Platform for as little as one-twentieth the cost of a similarly configured Fibre Channel SAN.

Delivering Software as a Service Aenigma provides an alternative to on-premise software deployment offering all the benefits and advantages of high availability and enterprise-grade business tools such as Microsoft Project Server, Office Sharepoint Server and Exchange Server on demand, at a competitive price. As a member of the VMware Service Provider Program Aenigma provides companies with on-demand Virtual Infrastructure, which can support any operating system, Windows or Linux and any compatible software stack they need. This “pay as you go” model reduces clients’ operational and capital expenses, improves access to the latest business applications and eliminates the security risks inherent in collaboration between third parties.

The company has chosen Exanodes to serve as an all-around solution that provides Aenigma with both shared internal storage as well as external storage through iSCSI arrays. The versatility of Exanodes allows Aenigma to provide multiple storage tiers as part of its network architecture to improve the reliability and performance of the system by separating data by its value to enable high performance computing on one level with non-persistent data stored to another.

The solution, featuring VMWare ESX Dual Quad Core Servers with more than 10 virtual machines per server and several 1 TB disks embedded in the multiple storage servers as if they were a powerful shared storage pool, has been tested against a leading FC-SAN offering with the Exanodes system showing high reliability and robust performance between a tenth and a twentieth of the price of the box. Exanodes delivers on its ability to provide cost-correct capacity expansion capabilities while eliminating the need for traditional external RAID storage and its associated costs.

“Our Application Hosting Platform is designed to bring enterprise-class business tools to companies that may not have the means to do so in-house but still need access to critical applications,” said Geoff Wiener, Managing Director of Aenigma. “By renting time on the platform to run these applications, organizations benefit from a shared pool of computing resources and software that reduces costs and complexities they might otherwise face. Likewise, Seanodes pools storage resources to provide us with a high-performance clustered storage system that is economical and easy to manage – a perfect complement to our network infrastructure.”

Because access to customer data is a critical component to Aenigma’s business model, the company is building a “dual-site” data center – duplicating the entire infrastructure – to answer customer needs. Exanodes clusters are deployed at each site to ensure the best performance, availability and integrity of Aenigma’s customer data in close proximity to the customer Virtual Machines. The data is then replicated between sites onto local Exanodes clusters for rapid recovery in the (unlikely) event of a single site failure. Maintaining multiple copies of critical customer data at each site and between sites ensures that Recovery Time and Recovery Point Objectives and SLAs can always be met.

“Aenigma needed a solution that enabled them to provide the utmost in data protection without incurring significant infrastructure costs that would effectively eliminate their ability to provide hosted applications at a cost-correct price,” said Frank Gana, Business Development Director at Seanodes. “What we were able to provide them with was the ability to leverage underutilized disks of ESX servers in conjunction with external iSCSI arrays built out of commoditized severs to receive a high level of reliability, efficiency and performance at a fraction of the price of FC-SAN products. By using the storage capacity of commoditized servers with cost-correct external storage, we have developed an ideal solution for Hosted Services infrastructures.”

About Seanodes

The inventors of Shared Internal Storage (SIS), Paris-headquartered Seanodes is changing network storage technology. Seanodes’ SIS platform Exanodes™ radically alters the economics and possibilities in data storage and application processing. Seanodes has earned multiple awards from industry analysts and media for its outstanding technology that virtualizes storage assets to convert unused internal disks and Direct Attached Storage (DAS) into a shared storage array. Founded in 2002, Seanodes is headed by storage industry veterans from two continents and backed by a number of private equity firms. More information can be found at www.seanodes.com or by calling 866-580-5515.

About Aenigma

Aenigma is a Hosted Services Provider based in London, UK specializing in providing High Availability Virtual infrastructures and Software as a Service enablement for mission critical applications. With a track record of successful delivery of Hosted Solutions to Defense, Investment Banking and a range of customers for Independent Software Vendors, Aenigma assimilates best of breed technologies suited specifically to this purpose and provides seamless on-demand access, anywhere. Privately funded Aenigma was founded in 2005 by experts in data centre optimization and Systems Architecture from around the world. Aenigma has become the leading Enterprise Project Management hosting company in the UK. For more information visit www.aenigmacorp.com or call +44(0) 208 286 8928

Data Center spendings in 2009: Which storage vendor will you invest with?

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 12:25:00 +0100

Surveys will start being published on my site and I'll make more customized surveys with cool flash animations. For now, I'm content with the simpler version of LinkedIn surveys.

Click here to join

Which hypervisor, in your opinion, is more secure?

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:02:00 +0100

Choose wisely and let us know here

Top 5 VMware Virtual Appliances

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 23:41:00 +0100

EWeek's labs picked up some neat collection of VMware's virtual appliances. Although I don't seem to read anywhere what the criteria might have been, it is important to note that these appliances are a security/application centric collection, I haven't been visiting the marketplace for some time so do go there and check out some stuff there. They have a huge collection out there.

Here's EWeek's top 5

Consumers look at VDI but prefer to wait for Client Hypervisors

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 13:15:00 +0100

Search my older post and you'll find that I had already suggested VMware and other vendors to go for several versions of hypervisors. VMware has taken the stride towards mobile devices, which is definitely a good thing but that market is a flooded market.

Desktop PCs are in need for some rationalization. I have, some times, hard time convincing customers why they should move towards VDI- while many are lately wondering if Cloud Apps, hosted via their internal, on-premise Cloud Infrastructure or Off Premise Clouds - a typical hosted scenario. Either ways they just don't care anymore, so is the case of the Clouds. Clouds don't care either. That makes it a perfect match, especially the new beast we all want to comprehend, the beast which only the likes of Microsoft has understood rather well, the SMB market.

SMB's are typically the "I don't care, you fix it and fix it now" kind of folks. Taming that market segment is a real pain. They are sometimes hard to understand, they almost always want it immediately fixed and have more demands than your enterprise customers. Also, not to forget, they invest carefully and want value for every penny that is invested.

So a real tough nut to crack, when you have an Amazon like Cloud, that lets these customers do it all "self and auto", then you can really free yourself from all those enervating contacts and let them buy capacity and space themselves. Just like those airports, buy your own ticket, print it yourself, go whenever you like, check in and all we want to do is make sure that you are frisked before you embark that plane.

Similar kind of "checkpointing", will not only accelerate the pace of the commoditization in these contractionary times, but alos ensure that the "do-it-yourself-dude!" model will also save you all the trouble of understanding them. No point!

While this article goes talking about what VDI is not good at, I think it is more important to organize your "Consumer Space" with all versions: VDI, Thin Clients, Web Apps, Clustered Apps etc. That helps the "Clouds Don't Care" model.

An excerpt:

Cheaper alternatives to desktop virtualization

For independent consultant Anil Desai, VDI presents a dilemma. It promises to address security problems such as lost laptops and give IT better control over remote workforces. But he doesn't see virtual desktop technology as the best way to solve these and other business problems.

He said there are more cost-effective ways to reduce security risks and gain control over user devices with existing technologies. There is the ability in Windows to restrict access to the USB drive or to improve manageability with remote management tools that lets IT cut physical visits to desktops and use the Remote Desktop Protocol, just as VDI uses.

Another example is the alternative of Windows Server 2008 Terminal Services for resource, hardware and management consolidation versus using VDI. Terminal Services in Windows Server 2008 lets IT run a single application in a virtual environment, in turn centralizing application management, he said.

Then there's the overall cost for a virtual desktop infrastructure versus buying desktops. "When you see how much infrastructure, power and server resources go into a VDI solution versus getting desktops that have come down so much in price, I just don't see the justification for that kind of investment," Desai said.

Desai said he is backing the concept of a client hypervisor and is waiting to see what the big three -- VMware, Microsoft and Citrix -- will do in this area. "It can reduce potential application conflicts and speed up deployments on many operating system platforms," he said.

Clouds don't care, they really shouldn't. It ain't worth the trouble!

Source

Understanding VMware Infrastructure Client Connectivity

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 19:55:00 +0100

Ed has some good tips. Last time I spoke to Ed, I got to understand that he's on to a lot more things such as writing a book and some toolkit. Mike Hoesing has beaten him to it there since his book on Virtualization Security is already up there on Amazon. I am looking forward to Ed's book as well though.

Anyways, like I said, last when I spoke to Ed was about pushing the virtualization security initiative here in the EMEA. I have spoken to several little and bigger players, including our own large team ("our" as in my employer) of some 500+ security experts,who are doing lots RA's for firms across the globe.

Anyways here's Haletky's article:

The roles and permissions within the VI Client do not necessarily map to users and groups within the service console or management appliance. Roles and permissions are quite a bit different actually and do not always map one to one.

When you directly connect the VI Client to a VMware ESX or VMware ESXi host you will use a local username and password to log in. But after that, all actions depend on your roles and permissions within the VI Client. The VI Client does not run any command as the user to which you logged in. Instead it runs those commands you are entitled to run as the root user. Since the root user is also the super user, it can run any command available to the system. This translation happens automatically as the vmware-hostd daemon runs as the root user.

The same happens when you log in using the VI Client to VMware vCenter Server. VMware vCenter Server uses the vpxuser to contact the vmware-hostd daemon which in turn runs all the necessary commands as the root user.

For a direct connection, a user must exist on the VMware ESX or VMware ESXi host, but for an indirect connection, no user must exist on the hosts. This implies that when you use vCenter there is no real need to manage multiple user account systems. Unfortunately, in reality you often have to have users on your VMware ESX and VMware ESXi hosts to perform support actions.

Source

DynamicOps Adds Desktop Automation, Multi-Vendor Capabilities

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 19:50:00 +0100

New features of VRM include:
Extensions that support key virtual desktop components included in Citrix XenDesktop™ and VMware’s virtual desktop infrastructure.
Microsoft’s Hyper-V support.
The VRM Infrastructure Organizer, for fast, efficient mapping of an organization’s virtual assets into its existing shared infrastructure.
VRM automates the management of virtual servers and desktops, from the time they’re created until they’re decommissioned. Innovations such as VRM’s desktop extensions help IT organizations deliver high value and competitive advantages to their customers.
"Desktop virtualization is taking off, and large scale deployments see high rates of change. These deployments need management tools to be efficient and economical," said Rachel Chalmers, research director, infrastructure, the 451 Group. "DynamicOps' VRM can let desktop groups choose best-of-breed point products while retaining overall control of their environment."
VRM desktop extensions support Citrix XenServer™ and key components in Citrix XenDesktop, including Citrix Provisioning Server™, and Desktop Delivery Controller. In addition to its current support for VMware’s ESX server and Virtual Center, early in 2009 DynamicOps will release additional extensions for VMware’s just-announced VMware View 3 virtual desktop stack.

Press

Tripwire gets Beaver to flash their jewels!

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 19:45:00 +0100

It's Saturdays and I'm sure Stephen won't be upset at me for that title :-) good luck at Tripwire, Stephen!

"Stephen is the perfect fit for Tripwire as we continue to extend our leadership in the virtualization market, seeking new and different ways to address the growing customer needs in the market," said Dan Schoenbaum, COO of Products for Tripwire. "We are excited to have Stephen on board to help us further expand and execute on our corporate strategy to address our clients' growing virtualization needs."
Stephen is co-author of two books on virtualization, "Essential VMware ESX Server" and "Scripting VMware Power Tools: Automating Virtual Infrastructure Administration." In addition, he is Technical Editor of "VMware ESX Server: Advanced Technical Design Guide" and a contributing author to "How to cheat at configuring VMware ESX Server." A respected expert on virtualization technology, Stephen is a frequently requested speaker at venues such as VMworld, the VMware Virtualization Forum and the VMware Healthcare Forum. Stephen is an active community expert in VMware's weekly online show, "Community Round Table Panel," and is one of the most active participants and a moderator on the VMware Community forum. In addition, Stephen will be a host on Tripwire's new blog, "The Virtual Black Hole" that will launch December 15th, 2008.

Source

VMware and HP to collaborate to manage Mixed Environments

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 19:43:00 +0100

As a first step in the companies' expanded relationship, VMware would work with HP to integrate HP BTO software with VMware vCenter Lab Manager, which provides self-service access to a library of pre-configured virtualized application environments, allowing teams of users to check out systems on-demand while IT maintains administrative control. With Lab Manager, organizations can reduce hardware costs, automate manual provisioning tasks, and accelerate application development and test cycles.
In addition, VMware and HP would jointly develop and bring to market enhanced virtualization management offerings for VMware vCenter and HP BTO customers based on the HP BTO application and infrastructure discovery technologies (HP Discovery and Dependency Mapping) to better manage their VDC-OS environments. A VDC-OS enables businesses to efficiently pool all types of hardware resources (including servers, storage and network) into an "internal enterprise cloud" that acts like a single, giant computer. A VDC-OS can also safely and automatically move workloads to external clouds when additional compute capacity is needed. A VDC-OS is highly elastic, self-managing and self-healing, enabling businesses large and small to benefit from the flexibility and efficiency of the "lights-out" datacenter.

Source

STOTServer upgrades for VMware's VCB

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 19:41:00 +0100

STORServer introduced an upgrade to its STORServer Agent for VMware Consolidated Backup, designed to increase usability and performance. Highlights of these upgrades include a new license server and online help system.

Introduced in September 2007, the STORServer Agent for VMware Consolidated Backup integrates IBM's Tivoli Storage Manager and VMware Consolidated Backup. To address the challenges of protecting VMware environments, the Agent improves the usability of Consolidated Backup by providing centralized management, reporting and scheduling of virtual machine backups and eliminates cumbersome pre- and post-processing integration scripts.

The Agent includes an easy to use graphical user interface for the management and reporting of virtual machine backups; a scheduler; and a database containing client configurations, logs and scheduling information.

Source

Symantec integrate VCS to VMware's vCenter for DR/HA

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 19:36:00 +0100

“VMware is pleased to see Symantec deliver solutions like VCS for high availability that integrate with and complement the value of VMware virtualization for customers and reinforce the importance of a strong partner ecosystem that helps differentiate VMware virtualization,” said Shekar Ayyar, vice president of infrastructure alliances at VMware. “We look forward to continued collaboration with Symantec to enable support for VCS for VMware users and improve the experience for joint customers through initiatives such as the TSANet-based cooperative support agreement announced today.”

The collaborative support initiative between Symantec and VMware through TSANet delivers highly trained support expertise to solve customers’ high availability needs. Already a global member of TSANet, Symantec has now joined a cooperative support community for virtualization established by VMware earlier this year to promote collaboration to deliver mission-critical support for joint enterprise customers. Coordinated response, information exchange and reduced response times will improve the support experience for mutual customers.

Symantec’s VCS is a complementary solution for VMware environments that protects mission-critical applications from unplanned downtime. By taking an application-centric approach to HA/DR, VCS delivers comprehensive protection from failures regardless of where or how they occur. VCS is fully integrated with VMware vCenter, supplementing key VMware capabilities such as VMware VMotion™ for reducing planned downtime and Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS) for active workload management.

Together, VCS and VMware Infrastructure give customers excellent protection from downtime, whether planned or unplanned. VCS is part of the VCS family of HA/DR solutions available for heterogeneous physical and virtual environments, delivering a common HA/DR platform across the modern data center.

Press

NetWrix's Compliance initiative for Virtual Environments

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 19:33:00 +0100

NetWrix has some cool things going with their Change reporter for both VMware and Microsoft's SCVMM. VMware was launched recently.

Change auditing is an important process for controlling the management of your virtual environment, to limit unauthorized changes and errors in VI3 inventory. Erroneous and unauthorized changes usually occur every day in organizations in which many IT professionals manage different aspects of virtual infrastructure. Such changes can cause failures and outages in your virtual infrastructure and significantly contribute to virtual machine sprawl.

NetWrix Change Reporter for VMware Infrastructure 3 audits all changes and enforces controlled change management processes across your virtual environment. This freeware tool sends a daily report pointing to every change made to your ESX servers, folders, clusters, resource pools, virtual machines, and their hardware (*), including previous and current ("before" and "after") configuration values.

NetWrix Change Reporter for VMware Infrastructure 3 can be used to:

* Overview configuration changes on a daily basis to improve internal IT governance.
* Prepare reports for your IT compliance auditors, such as SOX, HIPPA, GLBA, and others.
* Audit the creation of new virtual machines to prevent uncontrolled virtual machine sprawl.

Source

HP dead serious about Open Source Virtualization for SMBs

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 17:15:00 +0100

HP today announced the expansion of its virtualized browsing solution across select business desktop products and its plans to introduce Linux as an operating system choice for business desktop customers.

The offerings are designed to help small businesses enhance their productivity and ease their management of technology.

The first-of-its-kind Mozilla Firefox for HP Virtual Solution was developed with Symantec and Mozilla for HP customers. The solution uses the standard release of Mozilla Firefox with a Symantec Software Virtualization Solution layer that allows customers to use the Internet productively while keeping business PCs stable and easier to support.

As customers surf the web, changes made to the PC are contained in a “virtual layer,” separate from the operating system, and do not permanently alter the machine. Customers can therefore reset the browser as needed, instantly returning the PC to its last-known good state.

Previously offered on the HP Compaq dc7900 Business Desktop PC, this virtual protection tool will soon be extended to work with HP Compaq dc7500, HP Compaq dc5800, HP Compaq dc5850, HP Compaq dx2400, HP Compaq dx2450 and HP Compaq dx2390 desktop PCs.

“As companies continue to rely on the Internet as a primary business tool, the need for systems that are more stable and resistant to the effects of interacting on the web has become a top concern,” said Alan Reed, vice president and general manager, Business Desktops, HP. “With HP’s virtual browsing solution, small business customers are equipped with an easy-to-use solution to efficiently manage their PCs, ultimately saving time and costs.”

“We’re pleased that more people will be able to experience the exceptional features offered in Firefox,” said Margaret Tallman, Business Development, Mozilla. “With Mozilla Firefox for HP Virtual Solutions, HP business customers will receive all the same key security attributes offered within Mozilla Firefox’s standard version, including instant website ID, password manager, anti-malware, anti-phishing, one-click private data clearing, pop-up blocker.”

Ken Berryman, vice president, Endpoint Virtualization, Symantec, said: “This solution is a key milestone as application virtualization is now mainstream technology that makes PCs more efficient, stable and capable of meeting today’s changing business demands. Delivering application software virtually allows businesses to provide a more productive and less expensive computing experience.”

Press

FSF sues Cisco

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 17:12:00 +0100

Today, the FSF let Cisco Systems know in no uncertain terms that line had been crossed. The complaint centers on the Linksys brand routers, and the firmware used on those products.

Brett Smith, the licensing compliance engineer at the FSF said that in 2003, the FSF was notified that the Linksys WRT54G used GPL/LGPL licensed code in its firmware, but customers weren't getting the source code that these licenses required Cisco supply. He said that initially, Cisco seemed willing to work with the FSF to put procedures in place so that its products -- at the time, and in the future -- would comply with the license terms the firmware used.

Over the course of five years, a compliance plan never materialized. As the FSF investigated the Linksys WRT54G complaint, it was receiving license violation reports regarding other Cisco products. Smith says that new issues were being brought up before the older ones could be addressed, resulting in "...a five-years-running game of Whack-A-Mole."

Ostatic

Data Center Container Move: Microsoft's James Hamilton to join Amazon!

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 17:02:00 +0100

I am assuming that it was not just the experimental excel sheet that John put up on his blog that prompted Amazon to get him over to their shop. Amazon, with its clear strategy to go to the EU are sure to be racing ahead.

Motto: The time to hire smart and hard-working folks is...NOW!

The word on the street is that James Hamilton - one of the chief nerds that has helped Microsoft plan its containerized data center strategy for its forthcoming Azure compute cloud - is leaving to take a job at Amazon.

And perhaps not coincidentally, this is happening at the same time as the local papers in Oregon are reporting that Amazon is looking to build a new data center near the cheap electricity generated by hydroelectric dams along the fast-moving Columbia River.

Hamilton, who has one of the smarter blogs dealing with data center issues, has spent a decade at Microsoft Research and a decade at IBM before that. Back in 2006, Hamilton was one of the earlier proponents for modularized data centers, taking the concepts of rack computing all the way out to the data center walls and cramming it all into shipping containers.

Technically, Hamilton is the architect for Microsoft's Data Center Futures projects and was previously the architect on Microsoft's Windows Live Platform team. He also worked on Exchange hosting services and Windows NT. Before coming to Micrsoft, Hamilton was at IBM as the chief architect for IBM's DB2 Universal Database product and is notable in that he created IBM's first C++ compiler.

According to a report in Tech Hermit, Hamilton is taking a job at Amazon, which is branching out rather successfully (so far at least) from online retailing to utility computing with its EC2 compute and S3 storage utilities.

El Reg

Nortel may file for bankruptcy!

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 17:26:00 +0100

Nortel Networks Corp.'s contemplation of a bankruptcy filing comes after years of strategic missteps, accounting scandals and failed restructurings that have reduced the company, once one of Canada's flagships, to a shadow of its former self.

Nortel once boasted a stratospheric market value of $250 billion, when speculators overestimated demand for fiber-optic networks to carry Internet and video traffic around the world. That bubble burst in 2000, and Nortel has spent the better part of a decade trying, unsuccessfully, to get back on its feet.

WSJ

I really, really hate my typos :-|

EU lets Amazon EC2 in!

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 17:24:00 +0100

In a move that will extend the Web's biggest cloud to encompass much of the globe, the company that began as an online bookstore is opening its commercial server hosting platform to the EU.

The basic Amazon EC2 cloud services platform is now open to customers in the European Union. While this will bring Amazon's managed hosting alternative closer to potentially thousands more customers, they'll be paying slightly higher fees than in the US.

Instance charges -- the flat rates for each guest operating system hosted within the EC2 cloud -- will be 10% higher for EC customers than for those in the US. Prices will range from 0.11 cents (in US currency) per hour for the smallest virtual CPU to 0.88 cents per hour for the highest capacity virtual CPU, compared to 0.10 cents and 0.80 cents, respectively, in the US. Data transfer rates, however, will be identical, with input rates at 0.10 cents per GB, and declining output rates starting at 0.17 cents per GB for the first 10 TB, down to 0.10 cents after the first 150 TB.

Under the EC2 system, a customer either builds a virtual machine instance (what Amazon calls an AMI) or copies one from a library of AMIs custom-built to perform certain tasks. For now, European customers will have the Linux- and Unix-based AMIs available to them, which were the basic types Amazon offered while EC2 was still in beta. EC2 emerged from beta late last October, with the intention of adding Windows Server 2003-based AMIs soon thereafter.

Source

Virtualization Security Survey: Hurry, 8 days left!

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 16:21:00 +0100

Folks interested in the survey.

Please join and let us know what you think!

JoliCloud and Netbooks: End of the PC, Laptop era in sight?

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 09:39:00 +0100

Michael is running this story about an ex-CEO of Netvibes, who plans to provide a much robust and feature richer netbook, quick-boot OS with all you may need to get on the Cloud.

Avastu advisory for investors

Wait till 2010, there are a lot more little start-ups, many names I can't reveal as they are still in stealth mode. Many of such start-ups will also fail as they only end up picking up one end of the spectrum and running with it. A typical downmarket/upmarket tussle, where you will, have to not only rely on better and more complete products but also ones that have following characteristics:

Heterogeneity
Interoperability
Embedded functionality
Un-brickability (From hardware perspective)
Unbreakability (Not tampered with)
Security

So continuously listening to:

Real-Time Analysts
Bloggers
Web

Will be your best bet in this world.

Here's Mike's story:

There are a ton of other features as well, including a planned application platform for third party developers, but the company has asked us to keep our reporting to a minimum until they are ready to release Jolicloud into private beta. Which should, Tariq promises, be very soon.

For competition, check out Good OS, which is another stripped down operating system that’s perfect for low end PCs. Good OS is different, though, in that the company is targeting device manufacturers to add it as a dual boot option. Jolicloud is going straight to the consumer to encourage them to try it out.

As a heavy tester of Netbooks, I can say that Jolicloud is a huge step forward in terms of usability. Netbooks are so different from normal laptops and desktops that they need their own tailored operating system. Until now that appeared to be Windows XP, which is the OS of choice for Netbook manufacturers. But I expect those manufacturers will take a long look at Jolicloud and consider licensing it, or copying it, soon.

TechCrunch

Virtualization Security: What do we know about it?

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Tue, 9 Dec 2008 19:54:00 +0100

Despite a downturn in the global economy, many organizations are paying a lot of attention to GRC (governance, security and compliance). Virtualization is penetrating in the markets and it is not a trend that is about to stop. The reason why virtualization is penetrating is due to the flexibility it offers organizations, but this flexibility comes at a cost, like any other freedom: vulnerability or exposure to risks. Without a solid control of your people, processes and technology, in this fast and dynamic changing world, your business could be dissolved in no time. Cloud Computing, where virtualization will be a key building block, for Data Centers worldwide, will only increase that "data in transit" challenge where it will cross borders and boundaries. When we lifted the curtain, we forgot that we suddenly were talking to whole world: naked!

So the intention of this survey is to gauge your experiences, challenges and understanding of the security dilemma, that could cost us dearly, if we didn't act this time around! Please help me fill out this survey, I am curious what your thoughts and experiences are.

Thanks,

Tarry Singh
CEO/Founder
Avastu : Real-Time Analysis
Blog: http://www.ideationcloud.com

Click here to take our Online Survey

IBM, Harvard search organic solar power using Cloud Computing

noreply@blogger.com (Tarry Singh) — Tue, 9 Dec 2008 10:13:00 +0100

According to IBM, the software will be programmed to "...discover and isolate organic molecules that when combined can convert more sunlight into electricity and thus produce solar cells much more inexpensively." Stanley Litgow, IBM's vice president of Corporate Citizenship and Corporate Affairs, and the president of the IBM International Foundation, said "IBM believes that this important new study powered by World Community Grid could provide the planet with a smarter solution to the problem of low cost solar technology. This project marks an expanded direction to help our society by reducing our dependence on fossil fuels to make a lasting impact by hopefully finding new sources of clean energy."

The team's effort will be capable of computing "in 2 years what would've taken 22 years to run on a regular scientific cluster," according to Alan Aspuru-Guzik of Harvard University's Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology. The software will investigate "thousands of compounds for electronic properties without the power of World Community Grid," said Guzik. Each iteration will require approximately 100 days of computing time.

Source