Virtualization - Battle of the Tools?

I remember about 12-months ago presenting to a large audience on Virtualization. Only memorable because I referenced “Virtual Machine Sprawl is coming” and it received an unintended laugh. But they were laughing at me rather than considering the relevance of the statement. It really doesn't matter your preference for managing large numbers of physical servers, OS instances, or application containers, you need to be in control. So interesting to see Virtual Machine sprawl all over the technical press and IT Managers debating the consequence of large scale DC virtualization. Performance differences exist in the hypervisor solutions but probably not significant enough to differentiate between the leading brands considering the x86 processor advances. So for me, it's down to the tools for managing the virtualized environments and to determine if you believe it's worth paying extra licensing fees? Vmware appears ahead but for how long? With the OS vendors providing alternatives it's a fascinating landscape.
- InsomniacsAnonymous

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(N.B. As an employee of Sun Microsystems, the opinions expressed here are purely my own and not necessarily that of Sun or any other party).
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Posted by 142258 [Virtualization] ( October 27, 2006 05:35 AM ) Permalink | Comments[0]

Insomniacs go online!

Another late night, but blame this one on a Starbucks I had about a hour ago.... so I'm wired. I've always viewed blogging as an engineer's answer to therapy. “Write it down, vent, you'll feel better”. But I'm trying to justify the blogging time to the wife, kids, boss, and myself. I'll be lucky to blog once a week. I can't put it on my timecard but then I guess I don't need to as it's in the dark hours. Wait a minute it's work related, or is it? Anyway, I'll let you know if I feel better at the end. Insomniacs go online! Yes, it's really true. Insomniacs launched their own website at www.iSlumber.com

Apparently, 65 million Americans struggle to get a good night sleep. Once logged onto the site, you're encouraged to take a simple multiple choice survey, which can be used to create your own Sleep Log. Maybe they mean Sleep Blog? Gosh, I'm not alone... I feel better already. Thank you America! - InsomniacsAnonymous

Posted by 142258 [Sun] ( October 19, 2006 11:10 PM ) Permalink | Comments[1]

InsomniacsAnonymous

I want to send out a big thank you to HP and Dell. I'll explain why in a second, but first the blog name. I'm sure most of us can only find time to read and write blogs during the dark hours. It turns out there are three types of insomnia including transient, acute (short-term), and chronic. Goto http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insomnia for details. Acute insomnia is the inability to consistently sleep well for a period of three weeks to six months. However, after this time, the person does not experience insomniatic episodes. Insomnia is considered to be chronic, the most serious, if it persists almost nightly for at least a month, and sometimes longer.” So which one are you? I've worked for Sun for >4-years and seriously can not remember an early night. This tends to be more of an industry and cultural problem than specific to any one company. Anyway, it's gone midnight so I'll be brief. I was at a party last weekend full of Silicon Valley types and the usual question came up “and who do you work for?”. Historically, the Sun Microsystems answer typically guarantees a pitiful looking respondent expecting to deliver a therapy session for depression. Well, you can imagine the look on their faces when I explain it's a company full of amazing technical and professional talent. Obviously talking about amazing people is less interesting than discussing companies in crisis and the conversation changes direction to HP and Dell. So it's a big thank you to HP and Dell for taking all the headlines these past 4-6 weeks, the party chat is much more enjoyable. Sustained Chronic Insomnia..... that's what we have. Thank you America!

Posted by 142258 [Sun] ( October 11, 2006 12:18 AM ) Permalink | Comments[0]