VMware Reveals New Offerings At VMWorld 2006 49
Nirav Mehta writes to mention a Techworld article about this past week's virtualization announcements at VMWorld 2006. VMWare had several new offerings in the event's third year. From the article: "VMware has released details of ACE 2.0, which is due for release towards the middle of 2007. The product, which was demonstrated in alpha at VMworld this week, allows administrators to distribute pre-packaged virtual machines to users in a secure manner. This means, for instance, that contractors can be allowed to attach to the enterprise network using their own laptops but only via the ACE VM. The new version was created, according to VMware, because users asked for greater control over the VMs, especially when, for instance, large numbers of remote users need to attach to the enterprise network. Other areas due for improvement include security and integration with enterprise management tools. "
Re:Still Waiting... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Workstation 6 will be free????? (Score:3, Informative)
Interesting bits from the show not mentioned (Score:2, Informative)
Most interesting comment - During Partner Day, Karthik Rau (the Vice President of Product Management) during his presention made a comment that 'Windows Vista may be the last OS of it's type', which drew a gasp from partners around me. Hyperbole? Well, we'll see.
Market Penetration - had some discussions with partners and pretty much everyone agreed that VMware will saturate the enterprise market in just a few years (5? 7?). The benefits are just too compelling esp for DR. Sure, not every workload is suitable for virtualization (maybe 20% of workloads out there are better left running physical) but that means that 80% of servers ARE suitable for virtualization. Anyone in an IT position should at least be looking a good look at this stuff if you don't know it already.
VMware ESX 3.0 - bigger and better. Lots of places with more info about ESX 3.0, but the HA and DRS are probably the key improvements (basically, machine automated VMotion). I guess the 4-way vSMP is cool too. And the support for NAS and iSCSI. And the improved snapshots. And so on...
Vmware Lab Manager - this is SLICK for dev/test/QA. Formerly known as Akimbi Slingshot before they were bought out by VMware, Lab Manager lets you suspend a set of machine states and store them all in a library, and you can pull them all out at the same time right on your network and the don't interfere with anything because they have a 'network fence' option which lets you keep all the network settings. All set up for self-service - no admin required (a developer can web-browse to the Lab Manager and grab machine sets themselves). Will probably use a ton of storage, but very neat.
VMware and Hardware Assist (Intel VT/AMD Pacifica) - the first generation of HW assist from either vendor doesn't help VMware much - VMware's Binary Translation (BT) method of capturing kernel calls is so heavily optimized that doing the same thing with VT/Pacifica will actually be slower. So VMware won't actually use VT/Pacifica much. (Hardware assist IS useful for Xen though)
However, the next round of hardware assist, which concentrates on optimizing virtualized memory performance, WILL be of benefit to VMware. Don't know when those chips will be out.
Oh, for the big night out (Wednesday) they closed off a big section of Universal Studio's Theme park for us. No lineups for rides! (Well, really short ones). Not every ride was available but heck it was fun esp. with all the alcohol.
Met lots of cool guys from all around the world there (Germany, Ireland, Sweden, and of course Americans and Canadians)...but sure wish there were more hot chicks (in my dreams!)
Not having been in LA before, the weather there is AWESOME. I wanna live there! Shame about the housing prices...
Now, if only my flight would finally come at 7 am.... Oh my aching back...