I’m watching today’s Cloud Infrastructure Launch from VMware. Here’s what I’m seeing (all times Central):
- 10:59 AM Central: Awaiting start of event
- 11:06 Paul Maritz just took the stage
- 11:08 Paul is talking about the integration between the cloud and IT and the consumer
- 11:09 Finally, someone realizes that existing applications actually, you know, matter! Paul talks about delivering a more modern infrastructure; cost of hardware doesn’t matter, it’s cost of operating that infrastructure that matters.
- 11:10 And then Paul talks about implementing new enterprise apps – SaaS… so much for existing apps J
- 11:11 End users are holding in their hands an increasingly eclectic set of devices = BYOD model. We just heard the phrase “Post-PC era” from VMware again. Need to empower and secure an increasingly mobile workforce… this I definitely agree with.
- 11:12 The IT Transformation Journey – Paul indicates that this is VMware’s roots. Virtualization eventually becomes IT as a service. The “IT production” era included VMware VI3 with, in 2009, 30% of server workloads were running on virtualized infrastructure. The “Business Production” era was entered with vSphere 4 and moved the bar to 40% of server workloads running virtualized.
- 11:14 By the end of this year or early 2012, this will move beyond 50% — virtualization will be the norm, not the exception.
- 11:16 VMware wants to accelerate that journey and believes that is happening. Continue to move toward the IT as a service norm. They also want to “amplify” the service and save on both low level hardware cost and accelerate the pace of change.
- 11:17 Paul just announced vSphere 5. They are calling the “amplification” piece a “Cloud Infrastructure Suite”.
- 11:18 In addition, VMware is also announcing a product called the Cloud Infrastructure Suite (“giant automated computer”). This suite is an integrated set of infrastructure components which is anchored on vSphere 5. It also includes vCenter SRM for Business Continuity, vCenter Operations for Monitoring and Management, vShield Security for Security and Edge functions – topped off by vCloud Director which includes policy, reporting and self-service functions.
- 11:22 “Highly automated, low touch” is the goal.
- 11:23 Maritz: Customers should also be able to purchase infrastructure on a rental basis and be able to easily slide apps from internal data centers to cloud providers. Apps should behave the same way regardless of location. Equally important: Apps should be able to slide back into an internal data center.
- 11:25 Steve Herrod is now taking the stage to describe new features in vSphere 5 and more.
- 11:26 Steve is showing a graph displaying virtualized workloads:
- Steve mentions how much ESX has scaled over the years from small 1 vCPU to 8 and more. vSphere 5 supports 32 vCPUs, 1 TB RAM PER VM, 36 network adapters and a whole lot more.
- VMware SRM 5: New HA and FT capabilities, but SRM is the big talk. VMs are replicated between primary and secondary sites. They now enable replication right in the software and don’t rely on array-based replication which means that sites can be truly different from a hardware perspective. After failover, seamlessly move back to primary site. Automated failback.
- 11:30 VMware SRM could be used for disaster avoidance in preparation for a looming disaster.
- 11:31 On to amplification: vCloud Director includes an iPad app so that a virtual machine can be requested. Preconfigured vApps (VMs) can be provided via this portal.
- 11:33 Features for IT: Agility… Set it and forget it mentality. Simply monitor for performance and security. Don’t worry about placement.
- 11:35 IT can simply create different pools for resources, each with SLAs, security policies, DR options, etc. The “consumer” can choose the pool based on need. VM is placed automatically based on policy needs.
- 11:36 vCloud Director 1.5 includes linked clones.
- 11:37 vSphere 5 includes “Profile Driven Storage” and “Storage DRS” – bring different kind of storage together into pools. Storage DRS can now make guarantees around storage and automatically move VMs to a location that can satisfy requirements.
- 11:39 vSphere Storage Appliance 1.0: For SMBs – for those without advanced IT functions. Bring separate systems together to make separate storage systems in servers appear to be one larger virtual store. No high cost shared storage to maintain.
- 11:40 Autodeploy in vSphere 5: Uses PXE to grab image and configuration and build new systems. Save a ton of time and automate large deployments.
- 11:42 vSphere 5 Network and Storage I/O controls. A VM might come online that eats up a lot of I/O resources. Place I/O limits and make sure important workloads remain important.
- 11:43 Security and isolation. Leveraging Intels new TXT capabilities. vShield Edge – virtual data centers. Trust zones within a data center. Automatic firewalling around apps. vShield App 5 with Sensitive Data Discovery – by knowing that, for example PII or PCI data is in a VM, helps admins better protect systems.
- 11:45 “New IT Stack”: — More than 1 million engineering hours, hundreds of additional capabilities, two million QA hours, more than 2,000 partner certifications
- 11:46 Rick Jackson, CMO, now taking the stage… licensing
- 11:47 vSphere 4 licensed per processor with restrictions around cores per processors. vSphere 5 completely removes physical licensing constraints – no more worries about CPUs and core counts! Amount of vRAM pooled across entire environment will now be a licensing component.
- 11:50 Jackson believes that this will be a simpler model that will help to accelerate adoption.
- 11:51 Previous packaging was confusing (editions). They are moving from six to five packaging and have eliminated the vSphere Advanced edition. Advanced customers will get Enterprise. Ok… this isn’t that impressive, but at least it’s a start!
- 11:52 A plug for VMworld.
- 11:53 Event is over. Virtual show starts at 10 AM Pacific.