Robin Wauters

Quest Software today announced the availability of the newest version of Quest vWorkspace, an award-winning desktop virtualization solution for simplifying the provisioning, management and use of virtual desktops. In addition to its support of the VMware platform, vWorkspace also now supports VMware Linked Clones, which reduce shared storage disk space requirements.

Other new features enhance the end-user experience and expand desktop platform choices.

vWorkspace manages, provisions and brokers connections, transforming the desktop infrastructure into an on-demand service with optimized user experience for LAN and WAN. New features in vWorkspace optimize the end-user experience and drive down the cost of delivering desktops. They also reduce the impact on backend resources, including storage. Key new features include:

• Flash multimedia acceleration – Now speeds flash media embedded in Internet Explorer for enhanced user experience by redirecting the flash content to play quickly and seamlessly on the desktop system.
• Support for VMware Linked Clones – Adds support for VMware Linked Clone technology for rapid provisioning of virtual desktops from a master image under the automation and control of vWorkspace. This “single image management” technology dramatically reduces the storage space required for virtual desktops.
• Extended platform support – Extends its platform-agnostic approach by offering new support for Windows 7; Windows 2008 and 2008 R2; Windows Vista; System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 R2; and Parallels Virtuozzo Containers (x86 and x64).

Platform Computing today announced that CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, has advanced its current Platform LSF grid infrastructure to pilot the world’s largest cloud computing environment for scientific collaboration.

Using Platform’s private cloud management and HPC cloud-enabling software solutions, Platform ISF and Platform ISF Adaptive Cluster, CERN believes the cloud project will allow them to deliver increased computing performance and offer better infrastructure services to its 10,000 researchers from 85 countries. The scientists are working at the new high energy frontier in particle physics to explain fundamental mysteries of the universe such as why particles have mass and the nature of all the “missing mass” in the universe.

Founded in 1954, CERN is one of the world’s largest and most respected scientific research facilities. At CERN, complex scientific instruments are used to study fundamental physics, or the basic constituents of matter that reveal how the universe works. In addition to the center’s renowned research into particle physics, CERN is also known for its global network of collaborative scientific research partners and technological innovation, including the HTTP networking protocol that led to the creation of the World Wide Web, and the construction of the world’s most powerful particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and now the advancement of cloud computing.

At CERN, massive amounts of scientific data are processed and must be distributed to researchers in near real time. As a result, CERN’s cloud infrastructure has to provide the capacity necessary to support production and analysis of more than 15 petabytes of data per year, processed by 60,000 CPU cores, allowing scientists to manage workloads themselves as opposed to a centralized IT management department at CERN’s laboratory near Geneva. Because CERN uses Platform’s LSF grid and workload management solution to enable the extensive scalability to analyze its vast research data, the laboratory chose to partner again with Platform to explore how to more effectively utilize their resources in a virtualized cloud environment.

Platform ISF and ISF Adaptive Cluster provide an open, low-cost common platform for CERN’s scientists, allowing the management of both virtual and physical servers in the cloud. In addition, scientists can manage their own application environments and control projects dynamically for maximum flexibility and efficient workload processing in a more cost-effective manner than with a centralized IT management department.

Citrix Systems has announced a new version of its virtualization management solution for Microsoft Hyper-V.

The new Citrix Essentials 5.5 for Microsoft Hyper-V will now include Citrix StorageLink Site Recovery, a powerful set of tools that make end-to-end business continuity accessible, affordable, and easy to deploy. Citrix will make the solution available in both an Express edition, to provide customers an easy way to test and deploy disaster recovery, and as part of a full-featured Platinum edition.

As virtualization becomes more broadly deployed in corporate datacenters, companies of all sizes are increasingly moving mission-critical applications into virtual machine environments, enhancing the need for proven and reliable disaster recovery systems. Site recovery solutions for virtual environments, however, have remained complex and expensive to implement.

Now, with the new StorageLink Site Recovery capability from Citrix, customers will be able to setup, test and manage disaster recovery services, including utilization of storage hardware for replication, through a single console, using a set of intuitive operations. In addition, new features in StorageLink Site Recovery allow customers to test “what-if” disaster recovery scenarios, ensuring confidence that systems can be restored in the event of an outage. Customers can also choose to integrate recovery services directly with their existing systems management applications, making it easier than ever to protect key assets. In total, StorageLink Site Recovery provides customers with a comprehensive end-to-end solution that orchestrates the implementation, management, testing nd failover processes – at significant savings when compared to alternate solutions.

As a result of this collaboration, Microsoft Hyper-V and System Center customers are able to minimize risk in introducing disaster recovery services by gaining immediate access to StorageLink Site Recovery Express, which is part of Citrix Essentials 5.5 for Microsoft Hyper-V Express edition. This edition allows recovery of unlimited Microsoft Hyper-V virtual machines on up to two host servers at no additional charge. Organizations that require protection for more than two host servers can easily upgrade to the broader Platinum edition of Citrix Essentials 5.5 for Microsoft Hyper-V.

The new StorageLink Site Recovery technology available in the Citrix Essentials 5.5 for Microsoft Hyper-V offers advanced virtualization management capabilities that extend the benefits of Microsoft Hyper-V and System Center. These capabilities include dynamic provisioning services for deploying physical and virtual workloads from a single consolidated image, workflow management to automate IT processes, and lab and stage management for automating the lifecycle of software development processes. StorageLink Site Recovery adds disaster recovery services to these existing capabilities.

StorageLink Site Recovery is available immediately with Citrix Essentials 5.5 for Microsoft Hyper-V Platinum edition.

The StorageLink Site Recovery Express edition will be available for download on December 23, 2009, as part of Citrix Essentials 5.5 for Microsoft Hyper-V Express edition.

Customers can download Citrix Essentials 5.5 for Microsoft Hyper-V Express edition free of charge.

Citrix Essentials 5.5 for Microsoft Hyper-V Platinum edition is available for download at the following suggested list price.

• Express edition – available as a free download
• Enterprise edition – $1,500 per physical server
• Platinum edition – $3,000 per physical server

Virtual Computer has announced an update pack to its NxTop desktop virtualization solution that will enable broad scale adoption.

The NxTop Release 1.2 update pack performance improvements and feature enhancements include:

• Overall system performance that exceeds 90 percent of native using standard PC benchmarks that simulate corporate workloads. This includes 98 percent of native performance on networking, full multi-core processor support, three-second suspend/resume of the platform, and improved battery life for laptop users. The result is an end-user computing experience running on NxTop that is nearly indistinguishable from a native machine.
• New client-side installation options to ease adoption of the NxTop solution. This includes a non-destructive dual-boot feature that allows NxTop Engine to be installed alongside a native Windows operating system. This mode can be used effectively with contractors or for simple trials of the technology in real-world situations with end-users.

The NxTop 1.2 update pack will be released to customers this week via the NxTop customer portal.

RingCube Technologies, provider of the managed virtual workspace, has announced that it has become a member of the Microsoft System Center Alliance.

The RingCube vDesk solution enables enterprises to provide unmanaged workers such as contractors, consultants and outsourced workers with a secure managed virtual workspace that workers can use with their own PCs, while keeping applications, confidential data and network traffic completely isolated. Rather than providing each unmanaged worker with a dedicated PC, vDesk integrates with Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager 2007 to extend its provisioning, policy enforcement, and disaster recovery capabilities to unmanaged worker PCs using vDesk virtual workspaces.

The aim of the System Center Alliance is to create, nurture and grow a strong partner ecosystem around the System Center suite of systems management products. Together the member solutions provide sophisticated and effective IT and systems management functionality.  Based on successful customer deployments, RingCube demonstrated that it has built an architecturally sound workspace virtualization layer that delivers a solution for unmanaged workers and leverages Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager.

Joining the Microsoft System Center Alliance is an example of RingCube’s ongoing collaboration with Microsoft.

vDesk is available through RingCube. Pricing starts at $200 per user.