Enterprise Strategy Group X Data Center Strategy and Best Practices

Riverbed evolves its Steelhead product family to better address performance, consolidation needs of global organisations | ITWeb

cwhitehouse — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 14:03:22 +0000

“In an effort to simplify management, increase resource utilisation and reduce costs, organisations have been actively consolidating and virtualising IT environments into centralised data centres,” said Bob Laliberte, senior analyst at Enterprise Strategy Group. “While these consolidation efforts provide numerous benefits, it is imperative that organisations ensure that these consolidated IT environments are adequately protected and available. Furthermore, these consolidation efforts can introduce inherent performance over distance challenges. Riverbed’s enhanced Steelhead product family enables organisations to centralise virtually all applications, driving down operational overhead and costs, yet still maintain high levels of availability and improve end-user satisfaction.”

via Riverbed evolves its Steelhead product family to better address performance, consolidation needs of global organisations | ITWeb.

The Next Generation of IT Folk – They Don’t Care What Your Grandpa Did

Steve Duplessie — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 19:14:29 +0000

From 1965 to yesterday, the definition of IT has really been “to automate the knowledge worker tasks of days gone by.” It’s never really been “to enable the intellectual power of all those who have come before, and all those who are about to join us.”

That’s about to change.

The same way the next generation user doesn’t give a rat’s behind about your “you can only use laptop ABC with software XYZ’ on it” mandate, the next generation of IT people are not going to care one bit about “we’re an (IBM,Oracle, EMC, Pick Your Poison) shop.”

The next generation is fearless.

They don’t care about “folders” and “structure.” They don’t care about “inboxes” or “outboxes” – which were designed to AUTOMATE some function that used to be manual and physical – back in 1975. We used to TYPE a DOCUMENT then make a MIMEOGRAPH of it and put it in the FOLDER which was stored inside the FILE CABINET. Now we do the electronic version of the same things. How very “Mad Men” (stolen analogy from John McKnight, super genius). What’s next, slapping the admin’s butt (electronically, of course)? Scotch and cigarettes at 9:30AM?

When’s the last time your 17 year old did any of that?

Guess who your next CIO is? The kid who was born in the cloud. The kid who gets his information from a Twitter stream, blog roll, or web page. Not a newspaper or a TV. The kid who pushes and pulls value socially. Not mono-directionally. Old school IT vendors still try to control the “message” and selectively hear the responses. Old school IT still tries to control what you get, when, how, and where. How very Mayberryesque.

I’ll talk more about the Social Enterprise later – as it is a massively disruptive, completely fascinating movement (and you all know how I enjoy those!).

We WILL NOT consume IT apps/services/value the way that we have for the last 50 years any longer. So why do we continue to attempt to deliver them the same way?

IT isn’t going to need a meteor to make us extinct. We’re doing just fine on our own. We’re going to implode at this rate. And it won’t take decades. It will take a few years.

Things change. Adapt or perish. Peyton Manning will not play forever. People might actually vote for Newt Gingrich. Newt might actually be the antichrist. The Soviet Union might fall. Greece has the financial controls of my 8 year old daughter.

Stuff happens. Whether you like it or not, stuff happens.

The bigger truth: it’s time for our CIOs to realize that they can lead the new wave, or get run over by it.

You can read Steve’s other blog entries at The Bigger Truth.

Business Process Improvement – The Most Important Consideration for Justifying IT Purchases in 2012

Bob Laliberte — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 22:50:39 +0000

For a number of years ESG has been conducting an annual IT spending survey to better understand users’ buying intentions for the coming year. The ESG research team is busy putting the final touches on the 2012 IT Spending Intentions Survey, which should be ready at the end of January, but I’ve taken a look at some of the data that I can share with you now. In addition to determining whether organizations will be spending more or less, and on what technologies, the report also explores how organizations justify their IT purchases to the business. As one might expect, these considerations could change dramatically based on the macro-economic environment.

For example, in 2009, reducing operational and capital expenses topped the list, followed by business process improvement. However, over the last few years, as the capital markets opened up, reducing capital expenses has continued to fall from its second place spot in 2009 all the way to the fifth place in 2012. And while reducing operations expenses maintained the number one spot from 2009 – 2011, the gap between it and business process improvement has dwindled. In fact, in the 2012 survey, Business Process Improvement became the most important consideration for justifying IT purchases to business management teams.

This is reflective of organizations transforming their data centers to deliver more business value–the goal being to deploy IT solutions not because they make IT staffs’ life easier, but because they can deliver real business value. How the solution can improve upon an existing business process to enable an organization to process more transactions, service more customers, or reduce a customer’s wait time is becoming more important to business managers than how much money it will save.

This does not mean that pricing doesn’t matter–it most certainly does–but it does point to the fact that IT is becoming much more closely aligned to the business. I have even started seeing the term Business Technology (BT – not sure how British Telecom feels about this) used instead of Information Technology (IT). Ultimately, this is good thing–by placing the business and business processes first, IT should be able to deliver real benefits and competitive advantages to the business. Vendors need to recognize this shift as well and demonstrate how its solutions will enable organizations to improve business processes as well as demonstrate its economic value and return on investment.

You can read Bob’s other blog entries at Data Center Continuum.

EMC ProSphere

Vinny Choinski — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 20:13:44 +0000

End-to-End Cloud Storage Resource Management

This ESG Lab Validation report documents the results of hands-on testing of the EMC ProSphere storage resource management solution. Testing explored how ProSphere can help simplify management, identify problem areas, and ensure application performance in otherwise complex storage environments. The report focuses on the easy deployment, agent-less discovery, and end-to-end storage environment visibility elements of ProSphere.

Background

Organizations need to be able to respond to rapidly changing market dynamics, customer requirements, and competitive threats. Many are building out private cloud infrastructures in order to achieve the requisite level of agility. One of the foundational technologies of a private cloud is server virtualization, so it shouldn’t be a surprise to learn that increasing the use of server virtualization technology has been the top IT priority for the last two years in a row according to ESG research.[1] This, in turn, is driving increased growth in networked storage environments, which are critical to enabling virtualized deployments to be highly mobile and available. In fact, ESG research indicates that the increased use of SANs was the number one impact server virtualization has on storage environments.

This rapid growth in server virtualization and SAN deployment is affecting the management of these increasingly complex and abstracted environments. In most cases, organizations end up changing management tools and processes. And this goes beyond just the server environment to include storage and network environments (see Figure 1).[2]

Figure 1. The Impact of Virtualization on Management Process and Tools

As organizations continue to evolve their environments and deploy highly virtualized cloud infrastructures in production, easy to deploy, simple to use management tools that provide end-to-end configuration and performance visibility will become increasingly critical.

EMC ProSphere

EMC ProSphere is an end-to-end storage resource management application designed for quick, easy, and cost-effective deployment to enable a rapid return on investment. With ProSphere, storage professionals can create a detailed view of their storage infrastructure from the host, through the SAN, to the backend storage environment.

Figure 2. EMC ProSphere

ProSphere is designed to be deployed in a VMware environment as a virtual appliance or vApp. For ease of deployment, it’s packaged as an OVF template the can be downloaded from the EMC support website. To further simplify and reduce the management burden, it leverages an agent-less discovery and data ingest paradigm. ProSphere gets its performance data, alerts, and end-to-end visibility using standard protocols like SNMP and SMI- S for switches and arrays and WMI, SSH, or vCenter for physical and virtual hosts.

ProSphere is designed to be easily deployed as a virtual appliance in a VMware environment.
The discovery and data ingest processes are agent-less, leveraging SMI-S, SNMP and manufacturer APIs.
ProSphere can be integrated with Microsoft AD and the LDAP protocol.
Customers with active EMC ControlCenter support contracts can use ProSphere at no cost.
EMC ControlCenter performance data can be imported into ProSphere.
Administrators can manage multiple ProSphere instances without logging into each site separately.

ESG Lab Validation

ESG Lab performed hands-on evaluation and testing of ProSphere at an EMC facility in Hopkinton, MA. Testing was designed to demonstrate how EMC ProSphere intuitively provides end-to-end resource management for storage environments. Also of interest were ease of use and implementation as well as agent-less host, SAN, and array data collection.

The configuration used for ESG Lab testing is shown in Figure 3. On the left side of the figure are the three VMware virtual machines that made up the EMC ProSphere operating environment. These VMs consist of the Historical Database, Discovery Appliance, and the Storage Resource Manager. On the right side of the figure are the test bed objects that were discovered and monitored during the ESG Lab testing. EMC VMAX and CLARiiON arrays were discovered, as were Cisco and Brocade SAN switches. The host environment consisted of physical and virtual Windows servers as well as Solaris 9 and Solaris 10 servers. A LAN with multiple VLANs provided connectivity between the ProSphere environment and the objects being monitored.

Figure 3. The ESG Lab Test Bed

Getting Started

Getting started with EMC ProSphere begins with obtaining and installing the OVF template packaged code to bring the environment to the initial login screen. This was accomplished by downloading the ProSphere application software from the EMC web support portal[3] and installing the application into an existing VMware environment.

ESG Lab Testing

ESG Lab began testing ProSphere by copying the downloaded OVF formatted application code to the test VMware vSphere environment. ESG Lab used the “Deploy OVF Template” option to select and install the ProSphere application. Figure 4 shows the summary of entries including hostnames, networks, and other common system configuration settings that were selected as part of the template-driven install process. The settings were confirmed and the “Finish Install” tab was selected. The ProSphere installation process completed in approximately 30 minutes and resulted in the creation of a virtual application with three virtual machines.

Figure 4. Install from OVF

ESG Lab used the vSphere client to verify the creation of the application. Figure 5 shows the ProSphere application (ESG-ProSphere) and the three associated virtual machines (Discovery Appliance, Historical Database, and Storage Resource Manager). “Power on” was selected at the virtual application level to start the three virtual machines in the correct order.

Figure 5. vSphere View

Next, ESG Lab performed an upgrade of the ProSphere application using VMware Studio as shown in Figure 6.

Figure 6. Update After Install

In preparation for the ProSphere vApp upgrade, ESG Lab configured a CD/DVD drive to the VMs. This enabled access to the ISO formatted upgrade image. VMware Studio was then launched from a browser for each VM to conduct the upgrade.

Finally, ESG Lab connected to the ProSphere vApp using the browser-based GUI to validate login access and confirm proper operation. Figure 7 shows the Administration view from the ProSphere user interface. From this view, user account and security certificates can be added and managed. The Administration view also enables integration configuration for LDAP and Microsoft Active Directory.

Figure 7. ProSphere GUI

Why This Matters

Even in a fairly static environment, managing storage can be difficult. Introducing virtualization at the host and storage levels can make efficient, proactive management seem almost impossible. Storage management tools are of little use if they add more management complexity than the storage itself. Traditionally, storage management application deployments have been extremely complex, time-consuming, and costly to roll out.

ESG Lab found that as part of the ProSphere redesign, EMC placed a heavy emphasis on ease of deployment and rapid time to value. The ability to rapidly deploy will enable organizations to recognize value from the software on the very first day and, in highly dynamic environments, every day after that. Deployed as a vApp in VMware vSphere environments, EMC ProSphere is ready to leverage protection capabilities already built into your virtual environment such as snapshots, vMotion, and VMware High Availability.

Configuration and Discovery

Configuration is the process of setting up ProSphere to ingest data for performance analysis and storage environment alerting. Discovery is the process of identifying and ingesting performance and operating metrics as well as configuration data for the storage environment components or objects including hosts, switches, and storage arrays. With ProSphere, this process does not require an agent on each discrete object. It enables the administrator to create custom end-to-end views of the storage environment.

ESG Lab Testing

ESG Lab launched the ProSphere user interface and selected the Discovery icon to start the discovery configuration process. The first step in setting up each discovery job was defining its access credentials. Access credentials are a set of properties that define how ProSphere will connect to an object on the network. These property sets contain permission settings for security and define the connection type used for data discovery. Any access credential can be designated as global. Standard global access credentials can be defined and used for similar object types to streamline the discovery process by allowing a discovery job to automatically find and pick an appropriate, previously defined global credential. This process separates the creation and management of access credentials from that of discovery jobs. Server administrators can manage their credentials within the ProSphere environment while storage teams can then use those credentials to manage discovery jobs and meet security requirements for access management.

As shown in Figure 8, the Access Credentials tab was selected from within the discovery view. ESG Lab leveraged this configuration tab to set up discovery permission for a number of objects in the environment. Discovery access was defined for EMC storage arrays; Brocade and Cisco SAN switches; and Windows, UNIX, and VMware hosts.

Figure 8. Access Credentials

Next, ESG Lab configured a number of different discovery jobs. As shown in Figure 9, ESG Lab configured a job to discover an EMC storage array. First, the scope of the job was set by selecting the object type and where on the network to look. In this case, the hostname of the server running the EMC Array SMI-S was selected, along with the object type of array. Then the previously-defined access credentials were selected for the new discovery job. The last step was defining the discovery schedule.

It should be noted that a range of IP addresses can also be used for discovery to help simplify the process in large dynamic infrastructures such as rapidly growing virtual environments. This option also allows for excludes to be set for objects that a user does not want to include in discovery.

Figure 9. Discovery Jobs

Figure 10 shows the results of a successful discovery job for host type objects. Here, ESG Lab selected the “Discovered Host” tab from the objects list view. Also available are switches, arrays, and fabric level object views.

Figure 10. Object List

Finally, ESG Lab configured groups of objects. As shown on the left of Figure 11, ESG Lab configured three groups (ESG Lab Windows Servers, ESG Lab ESX, and ESG Lab Physical Hosts). The groups were used to create more manageable views. Large environments could have hundreds or thousands of servers, making the objects list view difficult to use when searching for a specific object of interest. Groups can also be used to view objects with inter-dependencies such as a group of servers or the server, switch, and storage that support a specific application.

Figure 11. Groups

Three group classifications are available in ProSphere. The three groups are defined as system groups, simple groups, and smart groups. System groups are automatically created by the application to group objects by type. Simple groups can be created and used for a collection of objects that rarely change. Objects must be manually added to simple groups. Smart groups can be used to dynamically scan and group objects based on user-defined parameters. With smart groups, objects can be properly grouped for analysis based on business requirements such as mission-critical application or utilization for bill back purposes.

Why This Matters

ESG Lab found that setup and configuration of EMC ProSphere was intuitive and straightforward. By leveraging industry-standard protocols like SMI-S and SNMP, the need to install and manage individual agents on each object under management is eliminated. This agent-less discovery paradigm greatly improves ease of management and reduces the possibility of missing critical components in rapidly evolving storage environments.

ESG Lab believes the ease of use and intuitive approach of the ProSphere GUI, along with its agent-less discovery process, can greatly shorten the time spent managing, tuning, and re-architecting storage environments. Features like smart groups can help automate management by dynamically grouping objects for analysis as business-related storage resources are added and changed.

Monitoring, Alerting, Troubleshooting, and Analysis

Performance monitoring is the ability to select, view, and analyze detailed information for objects in the storage infrastructure. ProSphere can create end-to-end topology views and detailed performance charts. Alerting is the ability to monitor SAN and storage objects in the infrastructure by setting thresholds and notification. Combined, performance monitoring and alerting help accelerate the identification and remediation of performance bottlenecks and component failures.

ESG Lab Testing

ESG Lab explored the performance capabilities of ProSphere by selecting a virtual machine in the storage environment and analyzing the supporting components from the host through the storage. Figure 12 shows a topology view from the virtual machine on the left side of the figure all the way through the SAN in the middle to the storage hosting the VM datastore on the far right. The high level overview was created by selecting specific objects of interest from the host object list. ESG Lab used a drill-down process from this view to analyze detailed information of each component. Hosts, switches, and arrays in the topology view can be expanded into a detailed view by clicking on the desired icon.

Figure 12. Topology View

In addition to simply selecting items from the object lists, ProSphere has sophisticated search capabilities. ESG Lab used the intelligent filtering feature of the search functionality to quickly and easily set views into different objects without having to scroll through the entire list to find a specific object.

Intelligent search functionality becomes more important as the environment grows organically or through the federation of multiple ProSphere sites. Geographically separated ProSphere implementations can be federated through synchronization, a process that creates a synchronized data set between sites. The search feature can retrieve data in a federated environment eliminating the need to log in to each site and enabling users in different locations to perform analysis and troubleshooting of remote environments.

Next, ESG Lab reviewed the performance metrics of the VM selected in the topology view. As shown in Figure 13, ESG was able to analyze and review resource utilization, response times, and performance characteristics for the virtual machine. Similar views are provided for physical hosts as well.

Figure 13. Host Performance

As shown in Figure 14, ESG Lab also monitored performance data on the EMC array containing the datastore for the selected VM. ESG Lab noted a number of storage performance metrics (e.g., response time, IO, and throughput) that can be used to quickly analyze the health of the supporting array.

Figure 14. Array Performance

Lastly, ESG Lab used the alerts tab to configure thresholds and then monitor storage and switch metrics in the test environment. As shown in Figure 15, utilization levels were set to flag warnings and critical conditions when a defined percent was exceeded. Alert levels can be set for the following metrics:

Switch port link utilization
Symmetrix port utilization
Symmetrix host director utilization
CLARiiON SP utilization
CLARiiON SP % dirty pages

Figure 15. Alerts

Setting up and monitoring thresholds allows for easy, at-a-glance identification of performance issues in the storage environment. A quick review of the alerts page will show if a switch or array component in the environments has exceeded defined parameters. ProShpere can then be used to view storage component mapping and identify and analyze physical hosts or virtual machines that might be impacted by changes in SAN performance.

Why This Matters

ESG research indicates that storage scalability and performance are significant challenges for a growing number of organizations, especially those that embrace virtualization technology. These companies are continuously challenged to cost-effectively meet the performance requirements of applications.

ESG Lab found that by leveraging the end-to-end visibility and threshold alerting available in ProSphere, identifying and remediating storage infrastructure issues was quick and easy. The ability to view a virtual storage group from the host to the array it sits on, combined with automated threshold alerting for the associated storage components, helps paint a clear picture for accurate analysis and diagnosis.

ESG Lab Validation Highlights

The installation process for ProSphere was quick, easy, and intuitive. ESG Lab downloaded the application images from EMC’s website, moved them to the VMware environment, and easily navigated through the OVF template install process, which took about 30 minutes.
ESG Lab validated the efficiency of the agent-less discovery process driven by ProSphere. Without installing a single agent, ESG Lab was able to easily set up and discover over 100 physical and virtual hosts, four storage area networks, and six storage arrays. This was accomplished by leveraging SMI-S and SNMP for storage and switch objects and WMI, SSH, and vCenter connectivity for physical and virtual hosts.
With ProSphere, ESG Lab confirmed that EMC can offer a comprehensive topology view from the host to the LUN on the supporting array, enabling end-to-end visibility of resources for the storage or system administrator.
ESG Lab confirmed the ability to set up alerting for switch and storage components in the monitored environment. Thresholds can be set that notify the administrator when critical or warning conditions occur in the environment, allowing corrective action to be quickly taken to remediate the condition.

Issues to Consider

It should be noted that currently, the historical database cannot be pruned. Best practice should dictate monitoring disk capacity for this application component. Also, to avoid corruption, the historical database requires an orderly shutdown. EMC recommends that ProSphere be started and stopped from the vApp level to maintain database consistency.
Special attention should be paid to best practice recommendations when using VMware snapshots in federated ProSphere environments. If one site in a synchronized environment is rolled back to a snapshot, an error will be returned when users try to access discovered object detail. To avoid this, each site must be rolled back to a corresponding snapshot.
Since EMC ProSphere was in its first GA release at the time of the validation, ESG expects the application to gain new features over time and hopes to see mixed object group views at the dashboard level.

The Bigger Truth

In an effort to respond more quickly to changing business needs, IT is transitioning to highly virtualized and cloud environments. To ensure a successful transition, storage administrators need to leverage management software that was specifically built for these new data center paradigms. This software should include comprehensive management of the networked storage environment and provide visibility into the virtual server environment, as these previously siloed technology domains are now more tightly integrated and interdependent.

ESG Lab validated that EMC ProSphere’s efficient architecture enables it to be deployed easily, accelerating the time to deliver value for organizations transitioning to cloud environments. It is able to provide end-to-end views and the performance information required to ensure applications will run in an optimized environment while meeting demanding SLAs.

ESG Lab believes EMC has made it easy for clients currently running ControlCenter to test and then migrate to ProSphere thanks to its ability to ingest ControlCenter performance data. EMC has also allowed ControlCenter clients with active maintenance contracts to deploy ProSphere at no cost.

As organizations evolve their highly virtualized infrastructures into scalable cloud solutions, they will need management solutions that can adapt to these dynamic and agile environments. By designing and architecting management software for the Cloud Computing Era, EMC enabled ProSphere to effectively manage and optimize cloud storage environments.

Appendix

Table 1. ESG Lab Test Bed Detail

[1] Source: ESG Research Report, 2011 IT Spending Intentions Survey, January 2011.

[2] Source: ESG Research Report, The Evolution of Server Virtualization, November 2010.

[3] https://powerlink.emc.com

ESG Lab Reports

The goal of ESG Lab reports is to educate IT professionals about emerging technologies and products in the storage, data management and information security industries. ESG Lab reports are not meant to replace the evaluation process that should be conducted before making purchasing decisions, but rather to provide insight into these emerging technologies. Our objective is to go over some of the more valuable feature/functions of products, show how they can be used to solve real customer problems and identify any areas needing improvement. ESG Lab’s expert third-party perspective is based on our own hands-on testing as well as on interviews with customers who use these products in production environments. This ESG Lab report was sponsored by EMC.

Got enough WAN for your Virtual Desktop implementation?

Bob Laliberte — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 23:13:16 +0000

For quite some time virtual desktops have been growing in popularity, first as a means to effectively deliver desktops for call centers, support desks, etc., and now it has become an increasingly popular strategy for dealing with an ever growing “bring your own device to work” problem. That is, how does your IT staff support the wide range of different devices – PCs, Macs, tablets, and smartphones from multiple different vendors — that are infiltrating the workplace? The answer is – you don’t.

Indeed, more organizations are looking to deploy desktop virtualization solutions to deliver a consistent image, complete with all applicable business applications to any device an employee chooses to leverage in order to solve this problem. It enables IT to provide greater levels of flexibility to its employees and yet still maintain control over the data, especially sensitive data, which will still be housed in the centralized data center. However, with most pilots done in a limited data center environment, organizations need to be more aware of the impact this may have on the network, especially if they are planning on deploying it in any remote or branch offices. Like any centralized application, if not done correctly, poor performance and availability issues will lead to user frustration and eventually abandonment, potentially wasting a great deal of money (think about some of the problems with the initial centralized SharePoint deployments, etc.).

In 2012 this may be even more of an issue, as ESG research indicates that, while 25% of respondents to our Remote Office/Branch Office Technology Trends survey indicated that they have already deployed centralized virtual desktop solutions at ROBOs, another 42 % plan to do so over the next 18 months. So now is the time to ensure that your virtual desktop initiative will not be hindered by the WAN. With the proper insight (network management tools) and testing (make sure the POC includes at least one typical ROBO location), problems can be averted. In some cases the WAN link you already have may be adequate, in others, you may need more. In those cases, I would recommend investigating optimizing the WAN link before simply ordering more bandwidth as over time it could save a significant amount from your operational budget. It should be noted that while WAN optimization technology wasn’t originally designed to optimize virtual desktops, many vendors have recognized the need and are rapidly adding support for different desktop virtualization vendors and their specific technologies. The key will be knowing which WAN links need additional support and then matching the appropriate WAN optimization vendors to your desktop virtualization solutions in advance of the formal rollout in order to increase your chances for success.

You can read Bob’s other blog entries at Data Center Continuum.

IT Skill Set Mismatched to Cloud Initiatives

Mark Bowker — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 15:32:52 +0000

Anyone with an IT career is always keeping a watchful eye on the hottest technology and looking for ways to enroll in training and advance their career. I did this successfully years ago with Microsoft certification and have witnessed many IT professionals build a stable career by growing their knowledge and subject matter expertise on the latest hot IT topic or trend. Now is a good opportunity for IT professionals to switch into high gear and understand the potential advancements they can make with cloud computing initiatives. Many companies are feeling the pressure to adopt and architect cloud into their IT strategies but lack the IT leadership and internal skill set to make cloud computing a success. I recently read an article in Forbes, How Cloud Computing is Changing Many Job Descriptions, and it further verifies how IT needs to adapt to new consumption models and develop the IT skills that match. This is a good note for IT vendors to take as they innovate solutions and heavily market “The Cloud.” IT vendors that can help develop new IT skill sets, create new positions and advance careers have a significant opportunity ahead in this new computing era.

You can read Mark’s other blog entries at Liquefying IT.

Research Brief: Remote Knowledge Worker Trends

Jon Oltsik — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 18:08:32 +0000

Recent ESG research indicates that the remote worker population will grow significantly over the next three years. Why? Organizations see ROI on remote worker programs in terms of cost reduction, higher employee morale, and improved productivity. While these are attractive benefits, ESG believes that today’s laissez-faire remote worker programs have plenty of room for improvement from both a business and technology perspective.

Next-Generation Cisco WAAS

Bob Laliberte — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 18:37:56 +0000

Cisco recently unveiled its next-generation Wide Area Application Services (WAAS) solutions, delivering a significant upgrade over its previous versions. The improvements address the demand for a WAN solution capable of scaling to deliver web-based software applications and rich media content across networks with improved performance. In order to realize market traction, Cisco will need to drive awareness of WAAS’s new capabilities to its customers and educate its sales and channel partners on the improvements.

Overview

As organizations continue to consolidate data centers and deliver rich media and web-based applications to a growing number of geographically dispersed remote and branch offices, Cisco has announced its next generation of Wide Area Application Services (WAAS) appliances. The next-gen WAAS includes:

Improved performance and scalability—Cisco, which designed the next-gen WAAS specifically to improve scalability and performance, claims these new solutions provide up to five times the bandwidth (10 Gb ingest, 2 Gb WAN-side), four times the virtual services support, and up to three times the number of TCP connections as the previous generation. It is all contained in a smaller footprint, which Cisco claims is easier to deploy.
Second-generation family of appliances—Cisco’s Wide Area Virtualization Engine (WAVE) family of solutions has been expanded to include a greater range for both the branch office and the data center. The family includes 294, 594, and 694 appliances for remote and branch offices (ROBOs), and 694, 7541, 7571, and 8541 appliances for large ROBOs and data centers.
Better network management capabilities—Cisco’s Network Analysis Module (NAM) and WAAS offer organizations visibility into network performance via the WAAS Central Manager, providing improved optimization and troubleshooting capabilities.
Optimized video and desktop virtualization—Cisco WAAS v4.4 software, announced in October, brings together application intelligence with data redundancy elimination (DRE) to enable a greater number of video and virtual desktop sessions from a single system without decreasing performance. Its Context-Aware DRE enables unidirectional traffic, such as VDI screen refreshes, to be stored on the WAAS appliance at the ROBO, minimizing round trips to the data center. Cisco WAAS v4.5 software, made available in November, enables Cisco WAN optimization to natively accelerate virtual desktops using Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop and provide an enhanced virtual desktop experience.

These next-generation Cisco appliances are managed via the Cisco WAAS Central Manager and support integrated reporting. All products are currently available.

ESG Analysis

Data continues to grow, and new IT initiatives—such as widespread use of video and desktop virtualization—are expanding their presence in global organizations. There will be more pressure on wide area networks to deliver the requisite performance at scale. Hence the need for next-generation WAN optimization solutions that can address:

Future desktop virtualization deployments—In terms of the future steps organizations will take to improve their ability to deliver applications and services over the WAN, their plans to deploy desktop virtualization technology fall just behind their plans to upgrade network equipment. ESG research[1] indicates that as many as 25% of respondents are already using desktop virtualization in their remote offices (see Figure 1), and more than 40% report they will be adding it within the next two years. Ensuring the sufficient performance of these environments will be critical to the adoption rate and eventual success of these projects. Cisco recognizes this and has added functionality to enable better performance, like the Context-Aware DRE. In October, Cisco announced a strategic alliance partnership with Citrix to jointly test, validate, support, and verify WAAS as a Citrix-ready solution. The WAAS software v4.5 release, validated as a Citrix-ready solution, natively interoperates with Citrix encryption and compression to provide the best user experience for Citrix XenDesktop and Citrix XenApp over the WAN. These are all efforts meant to enable its customers to reduce the bandwidth necessary to deploy virtual desktops over a WAN.

Figure 1. Use of Desktop Virtualization In ROBOs

Increased use of video and VoIP communications—In order to better communicate and collaborate with employees, partners, and suppliers, organizations are increasing their use of VoIP and video. Corporate communications, training, and educational videos are being broadcast globally. However, for these communications to be effective, there needs to be adequate network performance. This is not always the case. In fact ESG research indicates that managing latency-sensitive voice and video applications is a top-five network-related challenge (see Figure 2). The second-generation Cisco WAAS appliances are designed to improve the performance of unified communications over a WAN. Also, with up to 150,000 TCP connections, WAAS enables organizations to greatly scale delivery, providing an improved end-user experience to a much larger audience. This is important: ESG research shows that user dissatisfaction ranks as the top business challenge organizations face in delivering applications and services over a WAN.

Figure 2. Biggest ROBO Networking Challenges

Networking challenges resulting from data center consolidation—Centralizing the resources of remote and branch offices and distributing them over a WAN enhances flexibility, but it also demands greater data-center-to-data-center connectivity, which can create network challenges. According to ESG research (see Figure 2), the top networking challenges facing IT organizations supporting ROBO locations are WAN performance management (37%), monitoring and managing WAN traffic (34%), and identifying, prioritizing, and accelerating application traffic on the WAN (32%). In terms of delivering corporate applications and IT services over a WAN, organizations predominantly struggle with poor application performance, slow file transfer speed, and the cost of WAN bandwidth. Cisco’s NAM and WAAS solutions provide network and application performance visibility on WAAS Central Manager for improved traffic visibility, baselining, and monitoring. These tools allow users to assess (and optimize) application performance and network utilization.

To Do

Cisco has long been a market leader in unified communications and networking, but WAAS demonstrates Cisco’s rededication to and presence in the WAN optimization space. In order to realize market traction, Cisco must first:

Look for opportunities to bundle the technology. Cisco needs to leverage its strength and marketing muscle to focus on new opportunities derived from voice, video, and desktop virtualization solutions. In fact, if Cisco can leverage its partnerships with EMC, NetApp, and VMware, it could potentially deliver WAAS as part of a turnkey VDI solution with VCE Vblock platforms or NetApp FlexPods. By embedding WAAS technology into larger solution bundles, Cisco could greatly accelerate WAAS sales.
Amplify its WAAS marketing message. Cisco must ensure that all go-to-market channels fully understand and can articulate the value of WAAS. As the leading provider of network infrastructure, Cisco has an enviable advantage, and it needs to exploit that advantage even more. With new performance and scalability capabilities, this second-generation WAAS should be very competitive in proof-of-concept evaluations. Publicizing customer wins will help to validate the technology and accelerate the sales process.

The Bigger Truth

Cisco’s next-generation WAAS offerings mark a significant step in Cisco’s presence in the WAN optimization space. ESG research indicates user satisfaction is the top impact organizations have faced when it comes to the delivery of applications and services over a WAN, due in large part to the growing number of latency-sensitive applications being transmitted over these networks. An outcome of Cisco’s combined expertise in rich media and networking, its next-generation WAAS appliances along with the new WAAS software releases address these concerns and offer a scalable, high-quality solution with greater bandwidth and visibility than their predecessors.

Cisco WAAS appliances offer support for both ROBO and data center deployments of all sizes. Cisco’s recent alliance with Citrix positions it favorably to seize marketplace mindshare as organizations continue to deploy desktop virtualization and other rich media content across their networks. If backed by a solid go-to-market campaign, WAAS should generate renewed interest with end-users.

[1] Source: ESG Research Report, Remote Office Branch Office Technology Trends, June 2011.

Riverbed’s RiOS 7 to Address Emerging Initiatives

Bob Laliberte — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 20:59:49 +0000

Riverbed recently announced a significant enhancement to its Riverbed Optimization System, or RiOS, to better address several of the emerging needs for WAN optimization. Ultimately, upgrades like this represent how WAN optimization vendors are evolving their solutions to support a wider range of technologies and environments. Specifically the RiOS 7 provides additional support for Video, Virtual Desktops, UDP, and IPv6, and fully integrates Cascade network management and Skipware satellite optimization software.

Why is all this important? Consider the fact that 30% of respondents to an ESG research study indicated that managing latency-sensitive applications such as video and IP telephony was among the biggest networking challenges facing organizations supporting IT requirements for ROBO locations. This issue will only become more problematic as organizations rely more and more upon communication and collaboration technologies such as video and rich content to bridge geographically disparate branches. In addition to adding native stream splitting over HTTP video support, Riverbed has also included VDI support for Citrix ICA over SSL and earlier this year announced that it would be the first company to join the newly launched Teradici Network Solutions Partner Program with the intent of helping customers better address IT infrastructure performance, including VDI for VMware View environments.

Also, while the majority of application traffic may leverage TCP, there is still a need and market for optimizing UDP traffic, especially in DR environments. The IPv6 is an important checkbox that will help Riverbed compete in government deals and certain geographies, and ensure a future-proof environment for its customers.

According to ESG research, nearly three-quarters (74%) of organizations manage applications and IT services centrally at a corporate site and deliver them over the WAN to remote and branch office locations (ROBOs) rather than managing them locally. This centralization and consolidation of IT leads to greater data center network traffic and enhanced importance of WAN performance. Unsurprisingly, therefore, WAN performance management (37%) and monitoring/managing WAN traffic (34%) ranked one and two, respectively, as the biggest networking challenges facing organizations supporting IT requirements for ROBO locations. In order to meet this demand, Riverbed has integrated Cascade Shark functionality into the Steelhead appliance, in what may be an industry first, enabling on-demand packet capture analysis, branch monitoring, and troubleshooting, without the need for dedicated probe appliances.

So getting to the Bigger Truth – if your organization has an initiative for Video, VoIP, or VDI, looking to enhance its DR environment and is currently a Riverbed customer, you should really take a look at RiOS 7. Not a Riverbed customer but are embarking on any of those initiatives, you should probably look at how WAN optimization solutions and RiOS 7 could help.

See this ESG Brief for more information.

You can read Bob’s other blog entries at Data Center Continuum.

RiOS 7.0 Delivers Significant Enhancements

Bob Laliberte — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 20:18:50 +0000

New enterprise initiatives and applications are driving new requirements for WAN optimization technologies. Riverbed has responded to those needs by delivering enhancements to the seventh version of the Riverbed Optimization System. It now adds expanded support for video and VDI environments, UDP, and IPv6 , in addition to integrated network management and satellite capabilities.

Overview

Riverbed Technology just announced its latest version of the Riverbed Optimization System (RiOS), the software that powers its Steelhead appliances: Cloud Steelhead and Virtual Steelhead. RiOS 7.0 expands support for new applications, protocols, and management capabilities to optimize disaster recovery, unified communications, and virtual desktop environments. With RiOS 7.0, Riverbed broadens its optimization services to include:

Enhanced video delivery. RiOS 7.0 provides end-to-end video optimization with native stream splitting at the edge for live and on-demand content, enabling a number of employees to access a single video stream, enhancing video scalability, viewing quality, and bandwidth across the WAN. These capabilities, offered over hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP), leverage partnerships with video content management solutions such as Polycom, Adobe, Qumu, and MediaPlatform. In fact, Riverbed claims it is the first WAN optimization vendor to deliver Microsoft’s Silverlight over HTTP.
Wider support for Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI). Recognizing the growing enterprise adoption of VDI as a means to centralize critical data and efficiently deliver IT resources, Riverbed has optimized RiOS 7.0 to overcome the performance barriers of delivering desktop virtualization, such as latency, limited bandwidth, and the inability to prioritize interactive traffic. These optimization solutions include Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop, VMware View, and Microsoft RDP and RemoteFX. RiOS 7.0 further optimizes independent computing architecture (ICA) traffic over secure socket layer (SSL) and has introduced optimization support for Client Drive Mapping as well.
User Datagram Protocol (UDP) and IPv6. Enterprise applications have traditionally been dominated by Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)/Internet Protocol (IP) connections, which have been supported by previous generations of RiOS. RiOS 7.0 now offers the flexibility to optimize applications that run on UDP as well, leveraging a packet-by-packet approach. These applications include data replication solutions such as Symantec Veritas Volume Replicator, Aspera, or Signiant. Riverbed has also optimized IPv6 to ensure seamless transition between protocols without compromise.
Integration for satellite optimization and network performance management. RiOS 7.0 is proof of Riverbed’s commitment to integrate acquired technologies into its core WAN optimization products. In this case, the technology-integration effort included Cascade Shark, which provides high-speed packet capture to ensure packet-level information is available when needed for granular, real-time, and post-event forensic analysis. The integration also included Skipware satellite optimization for organizations using the Space Communications Protocol Standards (SCPS). Both capabilities moved from being applications running on the Riverbed Services Platform (enabling organizations to run additional services and applications virtually in a protected partition on a Riverbed Steelhead appliance) to fully integrated capabilities in RiOS 7.0. This helps to streamline deployments and improve network management.

Along with the various optimized solutions and broadened traffic support, Riverbed has enhanced RiOS 7.0’s security package to include authenticated and encrypted traffic, namely Encrypted Lotus Notes, Microsoft Online Services optimization, and end-to-end Kerberos Authentication Support. RiOS 7.0 will be available in December 2011.

Analysis

Organizations continuing to centralize critical applications and consolidate infrastructure from remote locations are challenged with managing traffic and providing adequate performance for latency-sensitive applications across the WAN. RiOS 7.0 represents a significant step in enabling organizations to continue to consolidate by:

Expanding support for important business initiatives. These initiatives include the increasing use of video, VoIP, and virtual desktop infrastructures. Why is WAN optimization important for these initiatives? Consider the fact that 30% of respondents to an ESG research study indicated that managing latency-sensitive applications such as video and IP telephony was among the biggest networking challenges facing organizations supporting IT requirements for ROBO locations (Figure 1)[1]. This issue will only become more problematic as organizations rely more and more upon communication and collaboration technologies such as video and rich content to bridge geographically disparate branches. RiOS 7.0 now offers optimization for delivery of video content with native stream-splitting capabilities over HTTP. This enhancement allows organizations to reduce the bandwidth needed to stream videos to its employees, enabling greater scalability and improved performance from production and content management to delivery and distribution. Riverbed has also included support for Citrix ICA over SSL and earlier this year announced that it would be the first company to join the newly launched Teradici Network Solutions Partner Program with the intent of helping customers better address IT infrastructure performance, including VDI for VMware View environments.
Providing support for UDP and IPv6. While the majority of application traffic may leverage TCP, there is still a need and market for optimizing UDP traffic. In fact, Riverbed competitors have leveraged this capability to gain a foothold in the market and differentiate themselves. With this release, Riverbed fills that gap in its functionality, making it much more competitive in those accounts with UDP optimization requirements. The IPv6 is an important checkbox that will help Riverbed compete in government deals and certain geographies, and ensure a future-proof environment for its customers.
Improving control over business-critical applications. According to ESG research, nearly three-quarters (74%) of organizations manage applications and IT services centrally at a corporate site and deliver them over the WAN to remote and branch office locations (ROBOs) rather than managing them locally. This centralization and consolidation of IT leads to greater data center network traffic and enhanced importance of WAN performance. Unsurprisingly, therefore, WAN performance management (37%) and monitoring/managing WAN traffic (34%) ranked one and two, respectively, as the biggest networking challenges facing organizations supporting IT requirements for ROBO locations (Figure 1). In order to meet this demand, Riverbed has integrated Cascade Shark functionality into the Steelhead appliance, enabling on-demand packet capture analysis, branch monitoring, and troubleshooting, without the need for dedicated probe appliances. The integration between WAN optimization and a network performance management (NPM) solution marks an industry-first.

Figure 1. Biggest ROBO Networking Challenges

What Next?

The latest rollout of RiOS continues to deliver on Riverbed’s goal to deliver simplicity, speed, and scale across the widest range of industry- and enterprise-critical applications. However, in order to strengthen its market position, Riverbed should continue to:

Drive awareness of new capabilities to the market. Currently most organizations are focused on deploying WAN optimization technology to enable centralization of business applications, so Riverbed needs to amplify its messaging around its expanded use cases. This includes its enhanced video, VDI, and even UDP support. Only by driving greater awareness can Riverbed hope to expand its footprint with existing customers and attract users in new environments.
Educate sales and channel partners on new WAN optimization capabilities. With a market-leading install base, one of the fastest ways for Riverbed to increase traction with RiOS 7.0 is to ensure that all go-to-market channels understand its value propositions and can articulate them to existing and prospective clients.

The Bigger Truth

RiOS 7.0 represents a significant effort for Riverbed. First, it enhanced its solution to optimize two rapidly growing IT initiatives that rely on WANs for connectivity, VDI, and video. Second, Riverbed filled a coverage gap by delivering support for optimizing UDP traffic, and eliminating a point of differentiation for some of its competitors. Finally, by integrating its management solution into the Steelhead Appliance, Riverbed enabled on-demand packet capture and analysis for monitoring and troubleshooting, integral tools for data centers experiencing increased data-center-to-data-center traffic.

Given its reputation, experience in the WAN optimization market, and the enhancements included in RiOS 7.0, Riverbed places itself in a strong position to seize even more market share. If these upgrades are highlighted by an appropriate go-to-market campaign, organizations should quickly understand the value of RiOS 7.0, leading to widespread adoption.

[1] Source: ESG Research Report, Remote Office/Branch Office Technology Trends, July 2011.