Year: 2006

Quoting from the Nova Development official announcement:

Running Windows on the Mac will get even easier this month, as Parallels Desktop™ for Mac software will be made available at thousands of retail stores nationwide.
Distributed by Calabasas, Calif.-based Nova Development as the exclusive retail publisher, the rollout begins immediately and continues through next month. Parallels Desktop for Mac will be available at The Apple Store, CompUSA, Staples, Office Depot, Fry’s Electronics, Amazon.com, and numerous other software outlets.

Until now, Parallels Desktop for Mac had only been available for purchase online…

Quoting from the Microsoft official announcement:

Microsoft Corp. and XenSource Inc. today announced they will cooperate on the development of technology to provide interoperability between Xen™-enabled Linux and the new Microsoft® Windows® hypervisor technology-based Windows Server® virtualization. With the resulting technology, the next version of Windows Server, code-named “Longhorn,” will provide customers with a flexible and powerful virtualization solution across their hardware infrastructure and operating system environments for cost-saving consolidation of Windows, Linux and Xen-enabled Linux distributions.
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Microsoft anticipates providing a beta release of Windows Server virtualization by the end of 2006 and plans to release the solution to manufacturing (RTM) within 180 days of the RTM of Windows Server “Longhorn,” which is targeted for the end of 2007…

(if you missed what WSV is you probably would check the virtualization.info Windows Server Virtualization Q&A)

A document that absolutely worth to read is the FAQ XenSource prepared about this announcement. Among many interesting answers:

Q: How will customers access the technology?
A: The technology will be made widely available via commercial license.

Q: Will the code be commercially licensed code or open source code?
A: This will be commercially licensed code.

I read tens of articles about this announcement, with most dissimilar interpretations, from all major IT news portals. The most funny sounded like if you can’t beat them, ally with them.

What we really have here is Microsoft clearly trying to impose a de facto standard in server virtualization without adhering VMware standardization proposal, which would declare the competitor as a recognized market leader. Following this path it’s quite probable Windows Server Virtualization will be able to run VMware virtual machines as well.

One challenge in next years virtualized datacenters will be handle portability of virtual machines among hosting platforms. Offering Windows Server Virtualization for free and granting interoperability will greatly increase chances customers will evaluate Microsoft solution when it will be ready without fear to loose their investments.

VMware seems to back my interpretation since, while I’m writing, a new post appeared on The Console, the company management blog, where Brian Byun, Vice President of Products and Alliances, ironically highlighted some interesting aspects of the announcement and pushed once again the need for standardization.

It’s pretty rare VMware comments so fast and so directly a Microsoft move. It means something.

Update: While VMware slammed the agreement, HP publicly endorsed it, considering it a good thing for the whole industry.

Christine Martino, Vice President Open Source and Linux at HP, granted an interview to eWeek about this topic but refused to comment the VMware position.

There’s so much to read along the lines…

Second update: SWsoft added some very interesting details to the story which help figure out what’s going.

Virtual Strategy Magazine published an interview with David Greschler, Co-Founder of Softricity, about what last version of SoftGrid is.

Good timing indeed since just today Microsoft announced acquisition of Softricity is complete.

Read the whole interview at source.

Quoting from the Microsoft official announcement:

Microsoft Corp. today announced it has completed the acquisition of Softricity Inc., a leading provider of application virtualization and dynamic streaming technologies.
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With the closing of this acquisition, Softricity becomes a wholly owned subsidiary of Microsoft, and integration of Softricity’s technologies into the Microsoft software delivery and engineering processes begins. Microsoft will soon make available the SoftGrid® application virtualization platform at a reduced price in the streamlined form of two core offerings: SoftGrid for Desktops and SoftGrid for Terminal Services. Both products will include the Softricity ZeroTouch™ Web-based access and self-service portal functionality.

In addition, Microsoft’s Systems Management Server (SMS) 2003 customers will be able to acquire Softricity’s SMS connector as a free download. Support for existing Softricity customers will continue uninterrupted via existing sales and services teams and partners. Microsoft will provide additional details on the delivery of Softricity offerings that support Windows Vista and Windows Server “Longhorn” at a later date.

It seems Microsoft is going to apply a price to application virtualization and streaming like it did with server virtualization after Connectix acqusition. Now customers have to expect a new VMware (maybe Altiris) to impose on the market and drive the software giant to offer the technology for free.

I personally believe application streaming could fit the new Microsoft Live strategy, permitting customers to choose how to work with Live applications: less features with browser delivery, full package with application streaming delivery.
Is the new application name going to be something like LiveGrid?

Quoting from the Novell official announcement:

Novell today announced the worldwide availability of SUSE® Linux Enterprise 10, the next-generation platform for the open enterprise. SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 from Novell® includes SUSE Linux Enterprise Server and SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop, providing a secure and reliable foundation for enterprise computing from the desktop to the data center
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“We also look forward to showing the world the capabilities of SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 in August at LinuxWorld, as we address the pressing needs of today’s IT executives by being first to deliver fully supported Linux innovations such as Xen virtualization, exceptional performance and scalability, application-level security, and improved desktop usability.”
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With SUSE Linux Enterprise 10, Novell has greatly simplified pricing for enterprise customers. SUSE Linux Enterprise Server subscriptions are now available in two forms – for either mainframe or non-mainframe servers. In addition, customers can choose basic, standard or priority support. Subscriptions start at $349 per server, and there is no additional cost for virtual server images.

It seems Novell preferred to not put too much emphasis on Xen inclusion. Possibly because with this first release they just support their own OS inside Xen domains.

Download it here.

The virtualization.info Virtualization Industry Roadmap has been updated accordingly.

Kuniyasu Suzaki released a new version of its Xenoppix live CD project:

Xenoppix (Xen3.0.2 + KNOPPIX 5.0.1) CD is released. It uses isolinux + mbootpack instead of GRUB, because the combination expands bootable machines. It enables Xen to boot on EFI (iMac CoreDuo). LCAT (Live CD Acceleration Toolkit) is applied to make fast boot. It was effective on Dom0, DomU and HVM.

Read the complete announcement here. Download it here.

TextDrive seems to be the first company (advice if I’m wrong) to offer hosting on Sun OS partitioning technology: Solaris Containers (betterr known as Zones):

TextDrive’s On-Demand Container Hosting combines premium quality Sun hardware with the performance of Open Solaris and the flexibility of zone containers. You get root access to your own Container, guaranteed system resources, a fully maintained operating system and packages highly optimized for the platform.
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We use Sun Fire servers with multiple AMD Opteron 285 (2.6 Ghz) dual core chips, and 4GB of RAM per core. The Opteron 285 is AMD’s fastest dual core chip. Each server has network interfaces dedicated to public, private and storage interconnects (see here) and are attached to network switches dedicated to each of those functions. Each server has a series of mirror pairs of ZFS-based storage accessed over the network. This ensures that your data is always consistent and always available…

With ZFS availability it seems a very interesting offering. Check yourself here.

Thanks to Hack the Planet for the news.

Quoting from the ZDNet:

Initially, Novell will support only SLES 10 in Xen virtual machines. The operating system includes a Yast management module that enables people to launch, kill or reconfigure different virtual machines.
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IBM is supporting use of Xen on its System X line of x86 servers, said Dan Frye, the vice president of open systems development who oversees Big Blue’s Linux Technology Center. The company has worked hard to improve Xen, which plays to IBM’s strength in selling powerful servers juggling multiple tasks.

Xen will be remain in the prototype stage at customer sites for about the next year, and early adopters should start using it the year after that, Fry predicted. That means Novell’s half-year lead over Red Hat likely won’t give it a major benefit.

“I don’t think it’s a significant advantage,” Frye said.

Xen will be updated significantly with the Service Pack 1 (SP1) for SLES, expected in late 2006 SP1. That version will officially support Windows, SLED 10 and SLES 9, Novell said…

Read the whole article at source.

Quoting from the IBM official announcement:

Building upon the company’s commitment to providing clients open solutions based on Linux and virtualization technologies, IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced its extensive portfolio of middleware and systems platforms will support Novell’s new SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 offerings. The new SUSE Linux Enterprise offerings incorporate the open source Xen™ virtualization software to help businesses increase server utilization and lower management costs.

IBM will support Xen technology as part of the Virtualization Engine portfolio on the company’s Intel and Opteron processor based server and IBM BladeCenter systems…

Quoting from the Egenera official announcement:

Egenera Inc., a leader in datacenter virtualization architecture, today announced that it has been chosen by AlwaysOn as one of the Top 100 Private Company award winners. Egenera was selected by the AlwaysOn editorial panel based on a set of five criteria – technology innovation, market potential, customer adoption, media buzz and investor value creation.
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The AO100 was selected from over 1,000 companies, peer-nominated by leading venture capitalists, investment bankers and industry analysts. The AO100 consists of private companies at all stages of development, from early- to late-stage…