Virtualization/Applications

Jump straight to an abstract:

• Solving the I/O Bottlenecks in NextGen Data Centers and Cloud Computing
• Virtualization I - Who, What, Why, When?
• Virtualization II - Effective Use of Virtualization

The Abstracts

Solving the I/O Bottlenecks in NextGen Data Centers and Cloud Computing
Anil Vasudeva
Download

Virtualization brings tremendous advantages to cloud computing and data centers of all sizes – large and small. But unfortunately the rapid proliferation of virtual machines (VMs) per physical server, in its wake, creates a highly randomized I/O problem, raising performance bottlenecks and data management problems. To address this I/O issues, the CIOs and storage administrators have begun the adoption of a slew of newer technology solutions - ranging from faster and larger memories in cache, SSDs for higher IOPS, high bandwidth (10GbE) virtualized networks using NPIVs and shared storage systems along with embedded intelligent software to optimally manage the VM workloads – all in order to meet various SLA metrics of performance, availability, scalability and costs.

Learning Objectives

• This presentation provides a simple and illustrative view of the impact of Server Virtualization on existing storage I/O solutions and the ensuing needs for best practices.
• It delineates the roles, capabilities and cost effectiveness of emerging technologies in mitigating the I/O bottlenecks so the IT infrastructure implementers can achieve their targeted performance from their storage systems under various workloads, in virtualized data centers.
• The audience will obtain a clear understanding of the issues related to Server and Storage Virtualization so as to ask incisive questions of their suppliers of IT Infrastructure Equipment, Server and Storage Virtualization and Data Storage Management software allowing them to manage their infrastructure implementation in order to achieve targeted results in performance, availability, costs and data management in their virtualized data centers 

Virtualization I - Who, What, Why, When?
Walt Hubis
Download

Storage Virtualization is one of the buzzwords in the industry, especially with the near-ubiquitous deployment of Storage Networks.  But besides all hype, there is a lot of confusion, too. Companies are using the term virtualization and its characteristics in various and different forms. This tutorial describes the reasons and benefits of virtualization in a technical and neutral way. The audience will understand the various terms and will receive a clear picture of the different virtualization approaches. Links to the SNIA Shared Storage Model and the usage of the new SNIA Storage Virtualization Taxonomy will help to achieve this goal.      This tutorial is intended for IT Directors, Managers, Storage and System Administrators who have responsibilities for IT infrastructures and storage management tasks

Learning Objectives

• Understand the definition of storage virtualization and its taxonomy 
• Learn about the three categories/methods of storage virtualization and their architectures 
• Understand which storage virtualization techniques apply to various new and existing infrastructures and potential benefits to storage management

Virtualization II - Effective Use of Virtualization
Walt Hubis
Download

The second part of this tutorial builds on the first one, so the audience should have visited part I or already should have a basic understanding of this subject.    Storage Virtualization part II covers practical issues of block virtualization in order to make most effective use of it. Among other topics it describes the implementation step by step and aspects of availability, performance and capacity improvements. The material discusses the role of storage virtualization within policy-based management and describes its integration in the SNIA Storage Management Initiative Specification(SMI-S) and the SNIA Cloud Data Management Interface (CDMI)

Learning Objectives

• Understand the role of virtualization in improving storage availibility, performance and capacity management 
• Learn about potential policy-based management using virtual techniques 
• Understand how storage virtualization fits into the SNIA SMI-S and RESTful Web Services (CDMI) architectures