Virtualization.com
News and insights from the vibrant world of virtualization and cloud computing
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:
VHD Images for Microsoft Hyper-V:
At Computex Taipei 2008, VMware announced new relationships with original design manufacturers (ODMs) ASUS, Gigabyte, Inventec and Tyan, adding to VMware’s current relationship with Supermicro announced in February 2008.
The relationships aim to enable channel partners and system builders to make virtualization available to a broader range of customers by certifying a wide range of one-, two- and four-socket server systems as well as blade servers for the VMware virtualization platform. The vendors are certifying their server systems for the VMware ESX and ESXi hypervisor, with certified systems expected to be available later this year.
“Working with the ODM community, we are helping our channel partner and system builder ecosystem bring new options for offering the transformative business advantages of VMware virtualization to a broader range of customers. Organizations of all sizes will benefit from these new relationships, particularly small and medium businesses looking for cost-effective ways to get more value from their investments, better protect their systems and data, and improve staff productivity,” said Brian Byun, vice president of global partners and solutions at VMware.
VMware ESX and ESXi are certified on server systems from Supermicro and available immediately. VMware ESX and ESXi are expected to be certified and available on server systems from ASUS, Gigabyte, Inventec and Tyan by the end of the third quarter of 2008.
[Source: ChannelWeb]
StackSafe, a provider of pre-production staging and testing solutions for IT Operations teams, announced today the external infrastructure connectivity upgrade to its staging and testing solution, StackSafe Test Center, which it recently unveiled at the DEMO 2008 Conference.
The solution creates a virtual copy of the software infrastructure, and thanks to this upgrade, the virtualized Test Center environment can now be extended to interact with non-virtualized system components that reside outside of the Test Center environment.
“Virtualization technology offers the potential to deliver time-stressed, resource-thin IT operations staff a low risk way to test and assess the impact of making changes to the IT production environment,” commented Richard Ptak, Founder and Analyst, Ptak Noel & Associates. “StackSafe’s Test Center provides a validation environment that resolves a number of existing application deployment issues.”
According to the company, complex software infrastructure environments may include components that cannot be virtualized into StackSafe Test Center. These include physical storage tiers, large databases, hardware-based network topologies, or distributed components not owned by the IT Operations team. By enabling the inclusion of these components in the test scenarios, users can now have a more complete view of the impact of changes across the entire end-to end IT service.
The addition of external infrastructure connectivity adds the following features:
As part of StackSafe Test Center’s subscription licensing model, the updated release of Test Center is generally available to current Test Center users at no charge.
Catbird, virtualization security specialist and developer of the V-Agent virtual appliance, announced (PDF) today the industry’s “first and only” Virtual Infrastructure Security Assessment (VSA).
Catbird’s VSA helps IT administrators identify and close the potential gaps in security and compliance created in the move from “P to V”. The 30-day assessment includes a security analysis, reports with actionable intelligence and a plan to mitigate risk and protect critical virtual systems, networks, desktops and processes.
The VSA aims to identify the scope and magnitude of the virtualization compliance gap through qualitative and quantitative analysis of the new architecture’s impact on change control, separation of duties, network visibility and segmentation, and secondary validation.
Catbird’s V-Security assessment starts by establishing a scope based on existing controls and best-practices on the physical infrastructure. Once the scope is defined, the team deploys Catbird’s V-Security to passively monitor the networks and check specific assets identified in the scope of work.
Catbird VSA clients receive their first report within 24 hours of setup. For the next four weeks, Catbird’s V-Security monitors and tests all network segments for gaps in security, integrity, management control, configuration and availability. Daily dashboard reports provide snapshots of the test results, which are then aggregated into a comprehensive report presented in an actions workshop by the assessment team. The final report identifies compliance and protection gaps, and contains explicit recommendations based on common best security practices to immediately correct each identified issue.
Catbird’s Virtual Infrastructure Security Assessment is delivered through its partners.
Ceedo today launched Ceedo Enterprise, which allows IT administrators to create, deploy and remotely manage desktop workspace environments enabling a number of scenarios including: application portability, remote management, business continuity, and disaster recovery.
Ceedo’s technology, which the company claims has already been deployed on over four million devices worldwide, uses virtualization to generalize the installation process of standard Windows applications without requiring packaging. Ceedo Enterprise includes a Setup Virtualization Engine which uses the original standard setup files of an application to automatically perform the virtualization process.
According to the company, deploying Ceedo to enterprise notebooks and desktops enables IT administrators to manage enterprise applications instantaneously and remotely — even install new software and update user files. Installing Ceedo to a USB device enables installed applications to work together and become portable for use on any Windows PC. Ceedo can be deployed from a Web server enabling a complete working application workspace to be delivered to employees or contractors in field.
Ceedo Enterprise Clients are $89 per seat perpetual license, although the company also announced that discounts are available for large volume purchases.
[Source: Marketwire]
2X, provider of Thin Client and Server Based Computing Software, and Virtual Iron have announced a strategic alliance to provide a complete Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) and Application Publishing Solution.
The 2X / Virtual Iron virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) solution hosts individual Windows desktop PCs inside virtual machines running on servers in the data center. According to the join press release, this thin-client architecture is significantly easier to secure, maintain and support and it enables an organization’s complete Windows desktop environment to be securely accessed and serviced centrally.
The joint solution enables a fully isolated, customizable and secure environment where users are able to work with standard desktop operating systems and applications. Virtual desktops can be user-customized and provisioned on demand instantly, providing performance and user experience that are comparable to a desktop personal computer. This allows enterprises to replace physical desktops with virtual desktops for many usage scenarios such as call centers, offshore development, and secure, remote access.
[Source: Marketwire]