The acquisition of 3Tera by Computer Associates signals an intent to move beyond traditional Systems Management, into something that may almost be viewed as Operating System: a layer of software called AppLogic that sits above the virtualization stack, and provides a consolidated abstraction against which composite applications may be built within the Cloud. Essentially the AppLogic layer deals with the nuts and bolts of configuring and connecting virtual machines, all you do is choose from a menu of virtual appliances you want, and use a visual interface to show how the appliances interconnect at a software level.
From 2009 to 2014 Dr Mike Norman was the Analyst at The Virtualization Practice for Open Source Cloud Computing. He covered PaaS, IaaS and associated services such as Database as a Service from an open source development and DevOps perspective. He has hands-on experience in many open source cloud technologies, and an extensive background in application lifecycle tooling; automated testing – functional, non-functional and security; digital business and DevOps. in 2014 he moved on to become Cloud Services Architect at JP Morgan Chase.
Citrix/Novell Partnership SLES and PlateSpin
In a slightly strange “didn’t they already have Xen in the kernel” kind of way, Novell has certified Suse Linux Enterprise Server as a “perfect guest” running on Citrix XenServer, allowing joint support of the combined solution. The deal is asymmetric (it wouldn’t really make sense to run XenServer on SLES) but it reflects an open approach characteristic of the way Novell operates, in embracing the reality that customers will want to use one of a number of possible hypervisors, and that Novell has to get along with everyone. In return Novell is starting to push it’s PlateSpin Recon product through the Citrix channel.
SMBs – Desktops in the Cloud, or Symantec Endpoint Virtualization?
Whilst new SMBs may be dabbling with online application suites, the bulk of the established SMB workload, however, is done in desktop applications, typically Microsoft Office, running in various flavours of Windows with a Windows Server. This is definitely not in the cloud, and there are lots of very good reasons why it won’t be, and less radical solutions are likely to offer more benefit.
Red Hat’s Spice and VMware View’s PCoiP – aligned against Microsoft
Red Hat’s emerging VDI offering is based on its acquisition of Qumranet in 2008, more specifically a technology known as Spice which is designed to replace RDP and ICA as the protocol between the server and the client. Spice was made Open Source at the end of 2009.
Virtualizing Linux on IBM Mainframe – Now more affordable than ever!
IBM has reduced the price of its Mainframe/Linux platform, providing an IBM price point and feature benchmark against which to compare the consolidated offerings which are starting to emerge from competing vendors, such as the Acadia group (Cisco, EMC, or VMware) and HP/Microsoft.
2009 – the “Long View”: Hadoop and Cloudera
In the long term, 2009 is likely to be known as the year that a commercial framework emerged around the Open source Hadoop framework for map-reduce.