virtualization.info Editors

Quoting from the Devon IT official announcement:

Devon IT and Mainline Information Systems today announced a virtual desktop and thin client terminal bundle using VMware ESX. This comprehensive virtualization solution is available through Mainline Information Systems with IBM eServer xSeries Systems or IBM BladeCenters.
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With VMware Virtual Desktop Infrastructure in place, anytime someone needs a new computer, it is easy and inexpensive to create a desktop with a thin client. The new user can use remote desktop protocol (RDP) to connect to a virtual XP machine. This bundled solution is available for under $1000 per desktop…

Quoting from Webwereld:

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VMware is expected to announce within two weeks the date of its first customer conference to be held in Australia.

Paul Harapin, VMware Australia/New Zealand managing director, said local interest in virtualization technology is so strong customers “contact us constantly”.
Harapin said adoption rates have been high and as a result virtualization maturity in Australia is on par with the US.
A little over a year ago VMware had three staff in Australia, Harapin said, and numbers have increased ten-fold since then…

Read the whole article at source.

Ron Oglesby wrote a very long and detailed article about VMware Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) initiative, exposing scenarios where it fits better than Microsoft Terminal Services / Citrix Presentation Server solutions:

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In this article, we’ll quickly go through an example use case that a VDI solution will fit almost perfectly and the types of use cases where it doesn’t fit. (When VDI doesn’t fit it’s generally for cost reasons. I mean it would be great to have multi-node clusters for every server on the network but we don’t do it because of cost.) Once we look at the history of SBC and when to use VDI, I’ll then draw a “pie in the sky” VDI solution from the bottom level (the VMs) all the way to the top level (the management tools). I’ll note the components of the solution that are already available and, more importantly, describe in detail the components do not exist yet that are being looked at by numerous vendors…

It’s worth to read.

A new no-critical security flaw has been published by Secunia:

A security issue has been reported in VMware, which potentially can be exploited by malicious, local users to gain knowledge of sensitive information.

The problem is caused due to missing return code checks of the “chmod()” call in vmware-config.pl when setting permissions for SSL key files. This may potentially result in insecure read permissions being set on the key file.

Read the VMware original advisory and patch your systems as soon as possible.

As you probably read everywhere on the net yesterday the worldwide famous Winternals (and its freeware arm Sysinternals) has been acquired by Microsoft.

Its creators, Mark Russinovich and Bryce Cogswell, will conseguently be part of the company and Mark will occupy the top role of Technical Fellow.

In this new position he will guide and influence Microsoft in several areas included virtualization, as he suggested on his Sysinternals blog:

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That’s what makes being acquired by Microsoft especially exciting and rewarding. I’m joining Microsoft as a technical fellow in the Platform and Services Division, which is the division that includes the Core Operating Systems Division, Windows Client and Windows Live, and Windows Server and Tools. I’ll therefore be working on challenging projects that span the entire Windows product line and directly influence subsequent generations of the most important operating system on the planet. From security to virtualization to performance to a more manageable application model, there’s no end of interesting areas to explore and innovate…

Read the whole post at source.

Few months ago Acronis announced its last bare-metal backup solution, TrueImage 9.1, with a new feature called Universal Restore, able to serve as P2V migration tool when restoring an image inside a virtual machine.

Now Symantec announces some notable changes in its well known LiveState backup solution, including a new add-on module called Restore Anywhere, clear answer to Acronis Universal Restore:

Symantec Corp. today introduced Symantec Backup Exec System Recovery , which incorporates functionality from Symantec LiveState Recovery with new, simplified deployment, delivering comprehensive, disk-based Windows system protection. As a stand alone solution, Backup Exec System Recovery complements Backup Exec for Windows Servers, which is optimized for data protection.
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Flexibility is also enhanced by allowing administrators to perform system restorations even if there is no hardware available by restoring recovery points to virtual environments in VMware (P2V). When new hardware is available, or existing hardware is repaired, the servers can easily be restored from a virtual machine back to a physical machine without impacting business continuity (V2P)…

I expect Microsoft to announce something similar even without launching a new product, since a backup feature, CompletePC Backup, recently introduced in upcoming Windows Vista saves the physical computer image in .vhd format (used by Virtual Server 2005 to store virtual machines).

Quoting from the Virtual Iron official announcement:

Virtual Iron Software, a provider of software solutions for creating and managing virtual infrastructure, today announced the appointment of Matthew Connon as vice president of business development.
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Connon joins Virtual Iron from Fast Search & Transfer Inc., a $100 million, publicly-traded, enterprise search software company, where he was most recently vice president of OEM sales. At Virtual Iron, Connon will lead the company’s efforts to expand its OEM and reseller relationships with strategic global partners and global consulting firms…

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.