virtualization.info Editors

Red Hat officially launched publi beta program for RHEL 5.1, introducing some notable l improvements in virtualization area:

• Support for virtualization on Itanium2 architectures (both para-virtualized and fully-virtualized guests)
• Support fro 32bit fully virtualized guests on AMD and Intel 64bit architectures
• Support for hot-migration of fully-virtualized guests

Red Hat didn’t include new 0.200.0 build of its Virtual Machine Manager, the (still inadequate) solution for enterprise management of virtualization hosts.

Note that Red Hat is still omitting to mention Xen, which is used as virtualization engine, for unclear reasons.

Beta release of RHEL 5.1 is only available to the subscribers of Red Hat Networks.

Ten days after release of its companion VirtualCenter 2.0.2, VMware finally releases ESX Server 3.0.2.

While this version should be aimed at bugfixes only, it brings in some extended support for:

• New guest operating systems including:
  • Microsoft Windows Server 2003 SP2
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 5 (without paravirtualization)
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 4.5
  • Novell Netware 6.5 SP6
  • Sun Solaris 10 Update 3
• Additional backup software from third-party vendors including:
  • CA BrightStor ArcServe 11.5 SP1
  • CommVault Galaxy version 6.1 SP4
  • IBM TSM Storage Agent version 5.3.3
  • Legato NetWorker 7.3.2 Jumbo Update 1
  • Symantec Backup Exec version 11d
  • Veritas NetBackup Exec version 6.0
• New versions of management agents including:
  • Dell Open Manage 5.2
  • HP Insight Manager Agents 7.8
• New hardware including:
  • Dell Poweredge 2970
  • HP P800 SA controller

VMware also updated its Consolidated Backup module (VCB) to version 1.0.3, introducing several major features like:

• Support for iSCSI Storage
• New Backup Software Support
  • Legato Networker version 7.3.2 Jumbo Update 1
  • Veritas NetBackup version 6.0
  • Symantec Backup Exec version 11d
  • Tivoli TSM Storage Agent version 5.3.3
• New VCB Proxy Operating System Support
  • Windows 2003 SP2
  • Windows 2003 R2 SP2

Download both ESX Server 3.0.2 and VCB 1.0.3 here.

Quoting from CRN:

…

source close to the server virtualization software giant confirmed that the road show has started, and is expected to last two weeks, after which the long-anticipated VMware IPO will probably happen.

The road show is the time when a pre-IPO company’s executives present the company to analysts, fund managers, and perspective investors in order to generate interest in investing in the company.

VMware’s IPO price is expected to be between $23 and $25, according to its S-1 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission about a month ago.

…

Hope Hayes, president of Alliance Technology Group, a Hanover, Md.-based solution provider and VMware partner, said the main concern she has is the likelihood that a VMware employee who gets stock options might leave.

…

Going public also brings new pressures on a company, Hayes said. “It will be interesting to see how the company changes now that it has pressures from quarterly reports to deal with,” she said…

Read the whole article at source.

Update: Roadshow webcast is available here. IPO documentation is available here.

Vizioncore just announced opening of public beta program for one of its younger products: esxReplicator.

In this new 2.1 version Vizioncore introduced some interesting features like capability to test failover and fixed interval scheduling.

Download this beta here.

On IBM Redbooks department website a new residency program appeared: Running VMware ESX Server on IBM System i, IS-7727-R01.

The vague description seems to state VMware is going to support System i (AS/400) architectures in future:

With future release of i5/OS, VMWare ESX Servers will have the capability to do VMotion on the System i platform. Shared storage between VMWare ESX Servers, which will be new in a future release, enables this. VMWare VMotion technology provides the virtualization flexibility of servers, storage, and networking to move an entire running virtual machine instantaneously from one server to another.

In this residency, you help to produce an IBM Redbooks document that includes the following topics:

• Planning of VMotion for the System i platform
• Implementation of applications using VMotion on the System i platform
• Best practices for VMWare ESX Server implementation on the System i platform such as backup and recovery, number and size of Network Server Description, and storage

Note that this Residency program has to complete within November 16th, which possibly means the related Redbook will be published somewhere in 2008.

After introducing to 3rd party virtual switches this may be another remarkable change VMware is going to introduce in ESX Server.

Update: Massimo Re Ferrè, Architect at IBM, provided virtualization.info clarifications about this Residency program, pointing to the following IBM announcement:

IBM announced that the System i integration with iSCSI attached BladeCenter and System x servers has been enhanced to provide virtual storage support for VMware ESX server 3.0.1.

…

This support will enable System i customers to install ESX server on an iSCSI attached BladeCenter or System x server and use the System i disks for all of the storage for the ESX server, extending the value of the i5/OS storage management.

Support will be delivered via i5/OS PTFs. This support will be made generally available on September 14, 2007.

With an expected move Quest, controlling both companies, is slowly formalizing relationship between Vizioncore and Invirtus:

Vizioncore Inc., the market leader in management tools for virtual infrastructure environments, and Invirtus, a pioneer of virtualization management utilities, today announced a strategic partnership in which Vizioncore will OEM all Invirtus technology, collaborate with Invirtus on technology development initiatives and will be the exclusive source for distribution of the technology through the Vizioncore partner channel. This agreement will allow Invirtus to focus on the development of products while leveraging Vizioncore’s sales and distribution channel.

…

All pricing and availability of the newly branded Vizioncore solutions from Invirtus will be announced at VMworld, 11th – 13th September, Moscone Center, San Francisco…

After Invirtus silent acquisition, first step of this strategy took place with migration of Scott Herold from Vizioncore to Invirtus.

At a point in future, Quest may decide to merge with both companies (and others expected to be acquired as well) and emerge as a new strong virtualization player.

Quoting from the The Street:

The initial public offering of 33 million shares in the virtualization software maker will come down Aug. 14 at a range of $23 to $25 each, according to the company.

…

“We feel that this August has the potential to be a hit month” for IPOs, IPO analyst Ben Holmes, of MorningNotes, wrote Monday to clients, noting that “strong deals” such as VMware tend to focus investors on the IPO market. “VMware is, in our opinion, one of the strongest IPOs in registration.” …

Read the whole article at source.

Quoting from the official announcement:

Virtualization Industry Challenges is an up-to-date research analysis detailing major challenges that companies usually have to face once they decide to adopt virtualization technologies. The report exposes the limitations of existing commercial offerings, and the hidden shortcomings of existing technical approaches.

In its first edition, Virtualization Industry Challenges recognizes the ten most relevant issues as:

• Support
• Licensing
• Capacity Planning
• Reliability
• Provisioning
• Efficiency
• Scalability
• Security
• Accountability
• Responsibility

For each challenge, the report also lists companies providing products and solutions in that area to help customers focus their attention in the right direction.

Virtualization Industry Challenges Report is available free of charge online here: https://virtualization.info/challenges.

Interest in VMware-Cisco relationship increased since the surprising announcement that networking giant’s CEO will deliver one of VMworld 2007 keynote.

Cisco just invested $150 million in VMware, and its working with virtualization leader since 2004 on its VFrame product. But there’s something bigger, from a technical point of view, that John T. Chambers will unveil during its speech.

VMware will allow 3rd party vendors to develop their virtual switches for ESX Server virtual network, and Cisco is expected to be the first company announcing such product (Virtual Catalyst?).

With this move VMware hopes to address enterprise customers needs, which are greatly unsatisfied with current unmanaged virtual switches, and Cisco hopes to pioneer the new market of virtual networking.

First details about this new feature were disclosed at VMware TSX conference earlier this year, but without timeframes. A keynote during VMworld, which expects over 10,000 attendees this year, is for sure the best opportunity to make the announcement.

In April 2005 VMware delivered a presentation at Perforce User Conference to describe how software development was working and which problems company had at that time. The presentation, suddenly emerged from the Net, is now unveiling a lot of interesting informations about virtualization leader software lifecycle model.

In particular:

• every major release (e.g.: Workstation 6.0) was set for delivery every 18 months
• every minor release (e.g.: ESX Server 3.1) was set for delivery every 9 months
• every cumulative bugfixes release (e.g.: VirtualCenter 2.0.1) was set for delivery every 3 months

But the most interesting information is that VMware has 40% of code shared among major products, which at that time were: ESX Server, Virtual Center, GSX Server (now Server), Workstation and ACE.

The presentation also shows how VMware branching model works:

The virtualization.info Virtualization Industry Roadmap helps recognize how VMware is not respecting such delivery schedule anymore for all kind of releases:

• Workstation 5.0.0 (04/2005) –> 6.0.0 (04/2007)
• ESX Server 3.0.0 (06/2006) –> 3.1.0 (expected 3/2007)
• ESX Server 3.0.0 (06/2006) –> 3.0.1 (10/2006) –> 3.0.2 (expected 01/2007)

Despite that VMware may stick with 18 months timeframe for enterprise product, releasing ESX Server 4.0 next summer, as expected to counter-attack release of Microsoft Windows Server Virtualization (codename Viridian):

• ESX Server 2.0.0 (12/2004) –> 3.0.0 (06/2006) –> 4.0.0 (06/2008)

Read the whole presentation at source.