Has AWS Peaked?

There can be no real arguing against the fact that Amazon Web Services reigns supreme with regard to public cloud. Its recently announced quarterly results show that AWS is not only gaining revenue, but actually making a “small” surplus. OK, maybe not so small: a tad over half a billion dollars, compared to a $57 million loss for the same quarter in 2015. What …

Cost to Build a New Virtualized Data Center, Part 2b

In part one of Cost to Build a New Virtualized Data Center, we discussed the basic software costs for a virtualized data center based on VMware vSphere 6.0, Citrix XenServer 6.5, Microsoft Hyper-V 2012 R2 and 2016, and Red Hat. If you missed that, please click here to review before continuing.

Oracle Expands Its Cloud into Indian Subcontinent

As we have stated before on The Virtualization Practice, Oracle has woken up to the cloud in a very large way. Acquisitions such as Ravello Systems, StackEngine, and Datalogix have the potential to turn this leviathan into a dominant cloud player. Oracle has started to move from a position of catch-up, though acquisitions, into an active development phase. …

Brocade Continues the WLAN Mobile Consolidation Purchase of Ruckus

The WLAN, or wireless LAN, sector is pretty hot at the moment, as user endpoints break free from their previously wired existence. A wireless LAN links devices together over a spread-spectrum or OFDM (orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing) network within a limited area: your home, school, or office building, for example. From their humble beginnings, when they were not very stable, …

Microsoft — The Renaissance Continues

Microsoft’s turnaround over the two years since Satya Nadella became CEO has been nothing short of phenomenal. During the Ballmer years, Microsoft had become increasingly sidelined and irrelevant, focused on aggressive and negative marketing techniques. Anybody remember the painful Microsoft Mythbusters video featuring then–Microsoft executive David Greschler and Hyper-V product manager Edwin Yuen? Not that you can find it anymore; …