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IBM, Virtual Bridges and Canonical Introduce New Linux-server Based Virtual Desktop

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Virtual Bridges, IBM and Canonical announced today the immediate availability of the newest version of a Linux-server based virtual desktop with the release of Virtual Bridges’ VERDE 2.0 software.

The Open Virtual Client desktop is a combination of IBM’s Smart Client desktop software, Canonical’s Ubuntu Linux servers and Linux desktop, and Virtual Bridges’ VERDE Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI )offering.

VERDE 2.0 delivers several industry firsts, including:

· Addresses both private cloud and  public cloud requirements.

· Meets both the needs of the connected user and the disconnected user.

· Simultaneously and seamlessly manages both Windows and Linux desktop sessions.

With today’s announcement, VERDE 2.0 goes beyond virtualizing the desktop to give users significant new functionality: providing them software access when the users are disconnected from the Internet. VERDE 2.0accomplishes this by integrating a lightweight, client-side hypervisor based on a new Self-Managing Auto Replicating Technology (SMART) protocol. The SMART protocol synchronizes a replicated cache running on the client-side hypervisor with the managed image on the server, the same image that is used to populate VDI sessions.

The Open Virtual Client desktop offers users of private or public clouds the ability to lower costs by deploying a Microsoft-alternative in either the whole organization or for particular user segments, and this can be done smoothly over time. Because VERDE supports both Linux and Microsoft Windows guest sessions, organizations can broadly realize the benefits of VDI , whether they move to Linux desktops or not. They can also gain additional cost savings that come from moving some user segments to Linux desktops. Introducing thin clients, where appropriate, can further increase cost saving opportunities.

The IBM Open Collaboration Client Solution (OCCS) includes open standards-based email, word processing, spreadsheets, unified communication, social networking and more, providing users with exceptional productivity application alternatives. IBM’s smart work client software is based on IBM Lotus Symphony, IBM Lotus Notes and Lotus applications. IBM Lotus Symphony supports the Open Document Format (ODF) standard, the basis for global document interoperability.

VERDE provides protection aginst viruses, malware and other damage while users are disconnected. If a session is corrupted by malware, the user can restart the session and the session is launched from the write-protected replicated cache of the managed image, on the local disk. This ability eliminates costly help desk intervention and makes the environment malware-resistant.

VERDE 2.0 offers the simplest licensing in the industry with a complete offering available for one simple, paid-up, per seat price. All of the components are included in this hassle-free licensing model. VERDE 2.0 is available from partners as an Open Virtual Client bundle. The VERDE 2.0 solution is also available directly from Virtual Bridges and its partners. VERDE pricing is $50 per seat for 1000 seats or more.

IDC: Virtual Server Management Software Revenues to Reach $2.3 Billion in 2013 Thanks To Large-Scale Deployments

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The ramp up of large-scale virtual server implementations around the world will drive tremendous demand for a newly defined competitive market – virtual server management software – for distributed systems (principally Windows, Unix, and Linux platforms), according to new research from IDC.

IDC says the worldwide distributed virtual server management software market had revenues of $871 million in 2008 and will approach $2.3 billion in 2013; a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 21.3% over the forecast period.

Additional findings from IDC’s research include the following:

  • Many customers have not yet integrated virtual and physical resource management processes or aligned virtual server management activities with IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL).
  • Over the next five years, the distributed virtual server management software market will evolve and mature, creating significant opportunities for new competitors.
  • A strong spirit of “coopetition” will permeate this market over the next several years.

This study, Worldwide Distributed Virtual Server Management Software 2009-2013 Forecast: A First Look (IDC #217485), presents IDC’s preliminary top-down sizing of the worldwide distributed virtual server management software market in 2008 and a forecast of worldwide growth in this market for 2009-2013. This analysis is IDC’s first sizing and forecast for this emerging competitive market. Only top-line total market data is shown in this study. The study specifically excludes software related to mainframe, storage, network, or desktop virtualization management. Vendor market share data, as well as data for geographic regions, will be provided in subsequent IDC publications.

Novell Offers Solution For Workload Management In The “Mixed IT Data Center”

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Novell today announced significant enhancements to its PlateSpin Workload Management solution. The new PlateSpin Recon, PlateSpin Migrate, PlateSpin Protect and PlateSpin Orchestrate enable customers to profile, migrate, protect and manage server workloads between physical and virtual infrastructures in heterogeneous IT environments. Through these new enhancements, PlateSpin Workload Management is the only solution on the market today to support 32- and 64-bit Windows and Linux servers, as well as all leading hypervisors including Citrix XenServer, Microsoft Hyper-V and Virtual Server, VMware ESX and ESXi and Xen integrated in SUSE Linux Enterprise Server.

As data centers increasingly deploy diverse hardware platforms, operating systems and virtualization technologies in heterogeneous environments, the artificial boundaries between physical and virtual machines are being erased by portable workloads – the combination of an operating system, application and data software independent from the underlying physical or virtual platform. PlateSpin Workload Management enables data center administrators to optimize the distribution of workloads to provide the best performance for users and applications across both physical and virtual machines. As a result, customers can transform their IT environment into a more efficient and resilient next-generation data center.

PlateSpin Workload Management has added key functionality that makes PlateSpin a critical component of the day-to-day operation of the next-generation data center. PlateSpin Recon, PlateSpin Migrate and PlateSpin Protect are available now. PlateSpin Orchestrate will be available in the first quarter of 2009.

3Leaf Introduces V-8000 Virtual I/O Server 2.0

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3Leaf Systems today announced the general availability of 3Leaf V-8000 Virtual I/O Server version 2.0, a key component of 3Leaf Virtual Compute Environment. The new software release delivers disaster recovery, streamlined management, and enhanced availability for large x86 server deployments. The company claims the V-8000 version 2.0 software is the first I/O virtualization solution to run on standard off the shelf commodity x86 servers. 3Leaf’s new Virtual Compute Environment solution will be introduced at the Next Generation Data Center/LinuxWorld Conference & Expo in San Francisco.

Powered by V-8000 version 2.0, 3Leaf’s Virtual Compute Environment solution delivers the following features and benefits to enterprise data centers and server farms:

  • Greatly simplified management and provisioning of large-scale server deployments, with asset hierarchies and separation between infrastructure architecture and ongoing operations, bringing true relief to IT departments.
  • Disaster recovery solution that automates service recovery of production server farms and sites to a consolidated recovery site.
  • Boosted operational agility with accelerators such as building composite servers from modular building blocks, application level provisioning without server reboot, and easy drag-and-drop operations.
  • Improved availability and resiliency, with a novel multi-pathing approach that eliminates operating system dependent setup and brings cost-effective I/O high-availability to every server farm.
  • Ease of solution deployment and investment protection with proven software running on standard x86 servers. The V-8000 Virtual I/O Server software runs on a commodity platform available from 3Leaf or commercial channels.
  • Now with a backbone I/O fabric of up to 40Gb/s, servers running the new release will have a wider data path for I/O-heavy operations, especially for heavily loaded hypervisor hosts and where VM migration such as VMotion requires an uninterrupted path.

3Leaf V-8000 Virtual I/O Server version 2.0 is available now. Customers have the option to order a complete system from 3Leaf including hardware and pre-installed software, or purchase the hardware independently and order the software and any installation and deployment services they need from 3Leaf. Pricing begins at US $2,500 per managed server, excluding the hardware platform price.

3Leaf Systems

Microsoft Releases Windows Server 2008 Images For Hyper-V and Virtual Server

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Microsoft has released Windows Server 2008 images for both Hyper-V and Virtual Server (thanks to Andrew Dugdell for pointing that out).

VHD Images for Microsoft Virtual Server:

  • WS08_RTM_x86_EnterpriseVHD.zip (single file)
  • WS08_ServerCorex86_EnterpriseVHD.zip (single file)
  • or download the multi-part image: 2008 VHD Images for VS2005

VHD Images for Microsoft Hyper-V:

IBM Unveils Research Initiative PHANTOM, Aims To Protect Virtual Servers Better

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IBM recently announced a breakthrough in safeguarding virtual server environments and introduced new software to help businesses better manage risk. The company said the advances can provide businesses with substantial improvements in securing information, applications, and IT infrastructures around the globe.

IBM logo

IBM, the company that pioneered the concept of virtualization with its mainframe systems, is tackling the security issue with Project PHANTOM, an initiative that’s so secret that IBM won’t even say what the name means. This is part of the announcement that was made:

IBM’s PHANTOM initiative aims to create virtualization security technology to efficiently monitor and disrupt malicious communications between virtual machines without being compromised. In addition, full visibility of virtual hardware resources would allow PHANTOM to monitor the execution state of virtual machines, protecting them against both known and unknown threats before they occur. It is also designed to increase the security posture of the hypervisor — a critical point of vulnerability; because once an attacker gains control of the hypervisor, they gain control of all of the machines running on the virtualized platform. For the first time, the hypervisor — the gateway to the virtualized world and all that lays above it — can be locked down.

Ars Technica had a call with the people at IBM. The company was still not willing to talk in any detail about it, but I did learn some important information that answers the questions I raised in my original post, which I’ve included below in its own section.

For starters, PHANTOM is not one particular technology, but rather a widespread research initiative within IBM that will eventually result in a range of products, services, best practices whitepapers, etc.. The initiative was started two years ago as a collaboration among various hardware and software groups within IBM, and has since expanded to embrace some third parties whose identities IBM isn’t revealing just yet. The internal groups involved in the initiative include IBM’s X-Force Threat Analysis Service (a division of IBM’s Internet Security Systems), IBM Watson research center, and the server platform groups behind the z- and p-series servers, among others.

IBM stressed to me that the initiative will produce results for a wide variety of hardware/software combinations, including x86 systems, Windows, Linux, POWER, and others. So the scope of PHANTOM, broadly defined, includes all virtualization platforms, products, and services.

Clearly, whatever else it is, PHANTOM is also extremely ambitious. It’s also still mostly under wraps, so we’ll have to wait for more announcements before giving further details.