Punching Clouds

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve all heard about those highly publicized talks about IBM possibly acquiring Sun.  Well, the talks fell through, and in a move that would make Howie Mandel frown, IBM said “No Deal”.  Then came an unforeseen move from left field: Oracle, the database giant, could not let that glowing ball drop.  Sun was up for grabs, and Oracle made the catch.

My take on this is that Oracle is interested in Sun’s virtualization portfolio. Sun had been working on the development of several virtualization products:

• xVM – Xen based hypervizor
• Ops Center – Enterprise Management Solution
• VDI – Connection Broker
• VirtualBox – Desktop Virtualization

But let’s not forget what other technologies Oracles gets control of:

• Java
• Solaris
• MySQL
• OpenOffice

Oracle released its own virtualization platform in November 2007.  Their free Xen based hypervizor didn’t make much of an impact in the industry.  But now that Oracle owns Sun, it will probably combine its efforts with Sun’s existing products.  Does this spell competition for VMware’s market share?  Perhaps.  After all, Oracle was once a VMware partner, and they seem very serious about becoming a competitor in the field of virtualization.  In light of this acquisition, it seems that their gloves are off!

Check out the article posted by the New York Times for more information on the financial details of this acquisition.

It’s no secret that Microsoft’s PowerShell is one of the premiere scripting languages on the market.  It can be used for a multitude of functions and automated tasks in Windows, Microsoft, and VMware virtualization environments.  Below is a series of videos, narrated by Don Jones,that shed light on how to use PowerShell to automate the creation of Windows users.  Like previous posts, my goal with sharing these videos is simple: less time managing VMware, and more time living it up! Don is is the author of some of the best scripting books out there and a frequent contributor to TechNet Magazine.  Take a gander as he explains the nuts and bolts of PowerShell and provides a walkthrough for the automation of Windows user accounts. His advice can come in handy for migrations, deployments, etc.  Watch Don get loose!  And learn from one of the best as you get your PowerShell on!  And if you’re craving more from Don, you can find some links to his published books at Punching Clouds SkyHigh Books Store.

Automate user Provisioning with PowerShell Part 1

Automate user Provisioning with PowerShell Part 2

Creating Custom Profiles with Windows PowerShell

If you’re curious about Microsoft’s Hyper-V but haven’t had time to attend a Microsoft Official Curriculum (MOC) class, then you may be interested in this series of insightful webcasts.  Microsoft released these videos in an effort to provide everyone with a chance to see their Hyper-V in action.  So, take a look, and you’ll get a glimpse of Microsoft’s Virtualization efforts and the performance potential of Hyper-V – trust me, this is only the tip of a very deep iceberg.

Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V Installing, Configuring & Managing Part 1

Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V Installing, Configuring & Managing Part 2

Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V Understanding VM Integration Components

Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V Exports and Snapshots

Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V PowerShell Management

Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V Configuring Failover Clustering

Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V Failover & Migration of VMs

Cisco Systems and VMware, Inc made a joined announcements about the release of the Cisco Unified Computing System. This is Cisco’s next-generation data center platform, designed mainly to improve IT responsiveness to rapid changing business demands.  The Unified Computing System will accelerate the delivery of new simple, reliable, and secure services with end-to-end migration support of virtualized and non-virtualized systems.  With this release, Cisco officially extends its presence in data centers beyond routing, switching, and Voip technology and hardware. The company will now be a major competitor in the x86 server market, and their customers will be able to implement a complete technology solution that will cover all angles of the data center. The Unified Computing System is powered by the industry’s best virtualization platform developed by VMware, and it may become the backbone of future cloud computing architectures.  See what VMware President and CEO Paul Maritz has to say about the benefits of the collaboration between the two companies. Read the official announcement made by VMware, which describes how VMware contributes to make the Cisco Unified Computing System an extremely powerful solution. Watch Cisco’s own John Chambers, Chairman and CEO, talk about the vision and business benefits of this new product.

Today I came across a pretty cool post in Youtube about security and virtualization.  It’s from the BlackHat 2008 conference in Las Vegas. Kelly Jackson Higgins, a Senior Editor for DarkReading.com, interviewed a dude that seems to be a true bad ass in security!  Chris Hoff, The aforementioned bad ass and chief security architect of Unisys, explores some interesting topics related to security in the virtualization space.  Check out the video below, paying close attention to what he says about VMware VMsafe.