A topic that is way under-covered in the blogosphere is definitely Citrix XenServer so I figured I would add XenServer to the list of topics I cover from time to time. This week I want to cover Open vSwitch, a virtual switch that can be enabled inside XenServer 6. Now for those of you that don't know, Open vSwitch were introduced with
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Posted by Elias Khnaser on 04/03/201211 comments
Dell announced today the acquisition of Wyse and while there is no denying the move was a brilliant business move I cannot help but feel sad, I am almost as sad as when HP bought Compaq back in the day. I guess I am sad because I have been using Wyse devices for a very long time and I am always fearful when larger companies buy smaller companies that are market leaders, and the reason for that is that I fear the new thin client division of Dell will be limited in its agility and innovation. That being said, I hope I am wrong because it would be a pity.
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Posted by Elias Khnaser on 04/02/20125 comments
I know a lot of you have been pushing back on the upgrade to vSphere 5 until update 1 was released. Today, I am happy to tell you the wait is over -- go ahead and start planning that upgrade. Many of the customers I spoke to said they would rather wait for an update 1 release before going through an upgrade to vSphere 5 because it was a major release. While I can understand the logic behind it and their prudence in waiting, VMware has historically done a pretty good job from a quality assurance perspective with its releases. But some of us are old school, and I don’t blame you. So what’s new and improved with update 1? Take a look.
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Posted by Elias Khnaser on 03/26/20127 comments
On March 9, Citrix released a minor upgrade for XenDesktop. The new version puts the software at revision 5.6. While this is not a major version, it packs some really cool features that make it worth an upgrade. Here's a look at nine of them:
Citrix Personal vDisk Technology
The star feature without a doubt is the integration of technology from the RingCube acquisition, which Citrix completed last year. XenDesktop 5.6 now fully integrates Personal vDisk into all the appropriate consoles: Desktop Studio, Desktop Director, and Provisioning Services Console.
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Posted by Elias Khnaser on 03/19/20121 comments
In part 1, we covered virtual and physical machine requirements for virtualizing demanding apps. In part 2, we looked at memory, networking and storage needs. In this last part, I want to cover how to configure the virtual machine for optimal virtual hardware in order to sustain these tier-1 applications. It is important to know what your options are when deciding on the virtual hardware configuration.
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Posted by Elias Khnaser on 03/12/20122 comments
Tweaking remote protocol from any vendor is an art that we all continuously strive to master. Properly configuring your remote protocol can make all the difference in the world from a user experience perspective. Fellow blogger Rex Remus just released MindFlux, a nifty little tool aimed at helping IT professionals configure PCoIP with greater control.
The thing that I like about MindFlux is the ability to deliver multiple profiles to users and training them to switch profiles depending on the situation. What comes to mind right away is to create two profiles, one which can be labeled "Office" and another which can be labeled "Remote." When users are in the office, they can apply the appropriate profile and when they are outside the office they can, from a drop-down menu select an alternate profile which is customized for remote connectivity, tweaking the PCoIP parameters and optimizing them in a WAN situation. From a user perspective, it is a bit inconvenient to apply the profile as you have to disconnect and reconnect. Even so, given that they have to disconnect from the office session and reconnect remotely anyways, the concept shouldn't be too difficult to grasp with some minor training.
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Posted by Elias Khnaser on 03/07/20127 comments
Last time we covered the compute tweaks and configurations necessary when virtualizing tier-1 applications. Let's now examine the rest of the stack:
Memory
I am often asked if memory speed matters when making a purchase, whether it will increase performance. I get asked that a lot, especially for VDI, and my answer is a resounding "No!" I would much rather go for more memory than to go with less memory at a higher speed level.
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Posted by Elias Khnaser on 02/29/20122 comments
Lately, I have been fielding many questions regarding how to virtualize tier-1 applications. While many organizations have gone down the route of server virtualization, many have also shied away from tier-1 applications for many reasons. Some still have pre-conceived opinions dating back to the early days of server virtualization where the technology was not ready to tackle these types of workloads. And then there are those organizations that have attempted to virtualize tier-1 applications and have been unsuccessful for the simple reason of not possessing the right knowledge to do so.
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Posted by Elias Khnaser on 02/27/20122 comments
The last few months I have seen an uptick in interest in mobile device management solutions in the enterprise. It seems like every other customer I am in front of is asking about this technology and in almost every case the customer needs help identifying the criteria by which to evaluate the different solutions out there. It makes a great topic for this week, so here is the criteria I'd use:
What type of platform is it?
The objective here is to understand what type of platform the vendor being considered offers. Is the platform one that can manage the phone natively or is it one which deploys a virtual container on the phone? I have found that some enterprises like the idea of managing the phone natively, but others prefer a complete separation of personal and work. The latter is obviously a clearer, more well-defined delimiter. Meanwhile, the native phone management provides for some technical challenges in that you have to be able to clearly distinguish between personal data and enterprise data.
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Posted by Elias Khnaser on 02/13/20124 comments
Last week, I talked about what it takes to transform an enterprise datacenter to a private cloud. This time, let's focus a bit on the essential first step of preparing for a private cloud.
In order to reach a true private cloud, an organization has got to overcome the barriers of server virtualization and tackle the most challenging of physical servers yet to be virtualized. A good private cloud strategy would be to start with a cloud readiness or fit assessment. This assessment, while broad and detailed, will also include the level at which you are virtualized -- and you'll want to be at 100 percent, if possible.
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Posted by Elias Khnaser on 02/08/20121 comments
I received a flood of e-mails from my last blog comparing enterprise datacenters to private clouds. I also received queries about the differences between a highly virtualized enterprise datacenter and a private cloud. So, before I continue, let me step back and explain the differences.
The traditional enterprise datacenter of today is built by adding more compute, more storage and more networking. If you take a closer look at how we acquire and build these resources, you will notice that we buy these components individually for the most part and then put them together. We also tend to scale them out separately: You need more storage, you add more disk; you need more compute, you buy more servers; etc. That process is slow and is very labor intensive, but we have done for so many years that it has become part of our DNA, and we don't notice it anymore.
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Posted by Elias Khnaser on 02/06/20125 comments
One of the most frequently-asked questions I get when from CXOs is: How do I turn my datacenter into a private cloud? In the next couple of blogs, I'll outline how we can take a current traditional datacenter and transform it into an on-premise internal, or private, cloud. Many people make the mistake of claiming that they have an internal cloud already just because they have gone through server virtualization, and while server virtualization is the essential, inevitable first step to building an internal cloud, it is merely the beginning.
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Posted by Elias Khnaser on 02/01/20122 comments