Written by VMware experts Jason Langone and Andre Leibovici, this book is a complete guide to planning and designing a solution based on VMware View 5
Secure your Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) by having firewalls, antivirus, virtual enclaves, USB redirection and filtering and smart card authentication
Analyze the strategies and techniques used to migrate a user population from a physical desktop environment to a virtual desktop solution
A learn-by-example based approach that focuses on key concepts to provide the foundation to solve real world problems
Book Details
Language : English
Paperback : 300 pages [ 235mm x 191mm ]
Release Date : June 2012
ISBN : 1849681120
ISBN 13 : 978-1-84968-112-4
Author(s) : Jason Langone, Andre Leibovici
Topics and Technologies : All Books, Enterprise, Virtualisation
2011 was a great year in the world of virtualization and technology in general. For me there were a few companies that really stood out as leaders and innovators in 2011. These companies, from my experience, have all been fantastic to work with from both the partner and the end-customer perspective. All of these companies have exhibited fantastic customer support, and all of them made an impact for me in 2011.
Now that we have the foundation, an intro to CloudStack
CloudStack is an IaaS solution that is similar to VMware vCloud Director at first glance. For a more detailed breakdown on their respective capabilities and where they fit in the market, please refer to the first article in this series. By using concepts found in public clouds, such as the volatility of instances in AWS, and marrying them with a sound IaaS design, we can design a robust, flexible, and affordable cloud in our own organization. If done correctly our own internal cloud could utilize an affordable public cloud provider (e.g. AWS) should the need arise as well.
CloudStack keeps things pretty simple as there are only three types of servers:
Management Server – Provides the web UI and API access as well as performs the management of the hosts, instances, storage, etc. [mandatory]
Host – A physical server running a hypervisor meant to host instances in the CloudStack environment (VMware vSphere, Citrix XenServer, or Linux KVM) [mandatory]
The concepts discussed in this article can apply to VMware vCloud Director, CloudStack, or other IaaS platform. This article is meant to provide design considerations in the planning stage of rolling out an IaaS solution. Garbage in, garbage out, so let's think smarter.
Citrx CloudStack as an IaaS layer managing a vSphere, et al. environment
VMware Cloud Foundry as a PaaS layer on top of the IaaS
This first article touched on, “abstracting the Operating System” due to an, “increasing importance of the apps that an organization uses and the decreasing importance of the operating system.” This is an important concept to understand as it is a cornerstone of designing a cloud solution. This article will discuss why the abstraction of the underlying operating system instance from the application or service provided is a concept of paramount importance. This will be covered in even greater detail.
The concept of volatility, as discussed in this article, is not something proprietary to a CloudStack or VMware vCloud Director-based solution. It is a consideration that should be made when designing your internal IaaS solution as well as how external IaaS providers will be leveraged.
Werner Vogels' presentation at AWS Gov Summit 2011 discussed the advantages of instance volatility, such a significantly lower price per instance and the importance of time-to-market. Casey Coleman, the keynote speaker, also discussed how her agency is realizing very significant cost savings by adopting the use of cloud computing in various forms (IaaS, PaaS, SaaS).
This event will feature a select handful of up to 8 vendors with booth space downtown. Unlike previous Federal VMUGs, this event will go from breakfast until early afternoon (with #vBeers to follow). The day will be broken down into two halves, so those that cannot break free for a full day of virtualization can come to the half that makes the most sense to them.
The Super Federal VMUG will also have:
Solutions Row - Table and Booth exhibits from a select handful of Federal vendors
Technology Table Talk - A demonstration table setup to showcase the technologies discussed throughout the day
Tech PowerPlay Sessions - Sponsoring vendors get a rapid 15 minutes of presentation time (in addition to their booth) to deliver their message and value. Right to the point discussions.
Guest Speakers - Hand-selected speakers from the Federal space
Food - Delicious, delicious, food.
Ask the Experts - our very popular, "Ask the Experts" session returns; ask vExpert and VCDX caliber professionals your tough VMware-related questions
While I was researching the Citrix Startup Accelerator program for various reasons, I decided to go through the entire list of companies in the Citrix Startup Accelerator portfolio to see what type of company and solution were getting accepted. Two companies quickly floated to the top of the pile for me, and the one I'm reviewing in this article is a company called Nukona
According to Nukona's website, they provide, "enterprise app distribution, policy management and governance – designed to scale." Wait, doesn't this sound like VMware Horizon?
What is VMware's Project Horizon?
To anyone that follows Vittorio Viarengo, VP of End User Computing at VMware, you have probably heard about VMware Project Horizon. VMware Horizon is assumed to provide:
An AppStore whereby published apps, SaaS apps, published desktops, etc. can be distributed
Identity management across multiple domains (internal AD, external LDAP, SaaS provider's, etc.); my guess is that VMware's Tricipher acquisition finally proves its worth here
Support for any [major] device such as Win-based desktops/laptops, Apple iPads, and Android-based tablets
This sound fantastic! The problem is, when Viarengo talks about Horizon, he's talking futures. There's nothing wrong with talking futures in small doses and ensuring your current and potential customer base understands corporate direction, but the old addage, "sell what's on the truck" should be king (and what helps field reps most).
"View 5 looks great and all, but man, Horizon is going to be great, make me 4 inches taller, and heal my bad knees. I'm just going to wait for now."
I can't wait for Project Horizon personally, and now, maybe some of the goodness is already here, thanks to Nukona.
This series of upcoming articles here at ThinkVIRT is my attempt to educate server virt admins and engineers (primarily VCPs) on an alternative Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) platform to VMware's, and one that is poised to emerge as a leader in the space. That platform is CloudStack. I'm not saying that CloudStack is the end all be all solution for every organization, but I do believe it is worth taking a look at due to its flexibility and it's adoption and inclusion in some high-profile and mega-scale cloud implementations by Zynga, KT, and Edmunds. I've been fortunate enough to mentor and career coach some virtualization folks much smarter than me, and I think it's important for the VCPs of the world to start to diversify their scope. The great news is that seasoned VMware engineers have sharpened their skills with the most feature-rich hypervisor on the market, VMware ESXi/vSphere. It's great news because all the other hypervisors are typically less feature-rich, meaning someone that can design a server virt solution with VMware vSphere, can likely design a XenServer solution once they learn the vernacular and the limitation points.
MicroStak(R) VDI simplifies the VDI equation by combining a modular 2U hardware appliance to an integrated software stack. This allows organizations to focus on what matters most in a VDI solution – a positive end user experience.
Many thanks to Tedd Fox for tweeting about the availability of the SlideRocketapp for the Apple iPad. To those that follow me on Twitter (@langonej), you will know that I cutover to using SlideRocket a few months ago (paid subscription). My very first attempt to use SlideRocket for a customer presentation was in an offline (no WiFi, no 3G) secured building with some very high profile Government officials. Fortunately (a big fortunately), I had the presentation also loaded in Keynote, so I plugged along without hiccup.
I’ve tweeted about my displeasure for a lack of offline support for the Apple iPad and for Android-based tablets (I love my Asus Transformer). Unfortunately, VMware has only release an Apple iPad version today.
Seeing a tweet from Christian Reilly yesterday about new product development from MeLLmo, the makers of Roambi, I decided to post a solution I developed at MicroTech based on the Roambi platform. Regular readers of this site or my Twitter feed will know that I’m deeply immersed in the world of VDI these days. Last year it occurred to me that there was no great dashboard for executives, directors, telework coordinators, power administrators, or integrators to monitor what is actually going on in their VDI. I focused on a solution that coupled the important metrics of a VDI to the emerging preferred platform of executives and decision makers, the tablet, or in this case, the Apple iPad.
Enter VDIRecon™ from MicroTech.
What is VDIRecon™ from MicroTech?
VDIRecon is a VISUAL DASHBOARD for your VDI environment. It’s perfect for C-level executives, decision makers, Telework Coordinators, VDI administrators, and other individuals needing a high-level overview of a VDI environment from their tablet device.
VDIRecon has the ability to collect across multiple VDI environments which is perfect for organizations supporting multiple groups with their own standalone VDI or for desktop providers supporting a multitude of tenants. The intelligence and data are dynamically updated to ensure accuracy. All updates are encrypted and any data at rest on the tablet device, for example, an Apple iPad, is encrypted.
With a deep understanding of the various zero clients available, as well as efficient avenues through major product contract vehicles, such as SEWP, pricing, procurement, and delivery can be an expedited and painless experience, from the zero client experts.
This week at VMWorld 2011, I had the honor of being on SiliconAngle.TV, hosted by Stu Miniman (@stu). The session was about the current state of the VDI market as well as some forward-looking thoughts. I was extremely happy to sit alongside VDI Legend, Andre Leibovici (@andreleibovici) for this discussion as we talked about what Andre is seeing from a former VMware and now EMC perspective, and what I’m seeing from a MicroTech perspective. The video is posted below, but some of the topics discussed were:
I had a great time on the program and would like to thank Stu for having us and orchestrating a fun conversation, and Andre for his wealth of knowledge.
One of the biggest differentiators for VMware View, in my opinion, is the ability to do a hardware solution through the use of PCoIP zero clients. I’ve written about how devices such as the EVGA PD02 PCoIP zero client are starting to change the competitive zero client landscape, primarily dominated by Wyse in the Commercial market. Now, EVGA has both a commercial and US Federal friendly zero client for cheaper than anyone else on the market.
Since December of last year I have been using a tablet device as my primary computing device (other than my iPhone) on a daily basis. With this new tablet-focused approached, walking into meetings is no longer encumbered with a hefty laptop bag full of a few thousand dollars worth of gear. Now, I walk around with a tablet in hand and a VGA/HDMI output adapter in my suit coat pocket, as well as my Dagi stylus.
This much more streamlined method of computing allows me to do my most major functions, both internal and customer-facing, including:
Read email with complex attachments
Give presentations, potentially with animations
Whiteboard from a computing device as a means of interacting with an audience
As someone who has been almost primarily focused on VDI for quite some time it has come to my attention that there is an under-served VDI market – service providers (SP’s). Service Providers and organizations needing to adopt a SP-style VDI solution have unique requirements that aren’t found in a typical VDI solution. I am now on almost weekly calls with a customer, OEM, or SI looking to provide this capability. It’s important to note that SP VDI (or, desktops-as-a-service, DaaS) is not traditional VDI.
The unique requirements of multi-tenant VDI include:
Multi-tenant management
Multi-tenant network segmentation
Multi-tenant storage
Multi-tenant provisioning
Contrary to what your favorite vendor sales rep may tell you, the two major VDI players, Citrix and VMware, do not have an out-of-the-box multi-tenant VDI solution. There are lots of people throwing the word, “cloud” around for various reasons and I often hear it applied to VDI conversation. Citrix even has a whitepaper that covers multi-tenant VDI, “Citrix Reference Architecture for Multi-Tenant Desktop as a Service,” whereby the cover using a solution of Citrix XenApp and Microsoft Remote Desktop Services.
