Strayer University

Assignment 3: Virtualization Across the Board

Dennis R. Roque

CIS512: Advanced Computer Architecture
Professor Amir Afzal

4 March 2013

Table of Contents 1. Compare & contrast the AMP & SMP architectures 3 2. Determine if hardware virtualization helps businesses and organizations in terms of: 3 Cost management 3 Systems performance and scalability 4 Systems management and administration 4 3. Determine if software virtualization helps businesses and organizations in terms of: 4 Cost management 4 Systems performance and scalability 4 Systems management and administration 5
4. Compare and contrast VMware, Microsoft, and Citrix in terms of:…………………………………….5 Market adoption 5 Technical architecture 6 Technical support 8 5. Determine which vendor you would recommend for a virtualization strategy and explain why: 8
References:……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………9

1. Compare & contrast the AMP & SMP architectures While symmetric multiprocessing (SMP) plays an important role in multi-core systems, the packet processing performance curve in an SMP configuration can flatten after only a few cores, yielding diminishing returns as more system resources are allocated to networking tasks. Wind River’s asymmetric multiprocessing (AMP) technologies provide a clean separation of control plane and data plane functions, which enable greater efficiency of multiple processing cores. The data plane cores provide excellent scalability while the control plane is freed from the burden of packet processing. The platform offers flexibility to configure the allocation of cores to the control or data planes to meet a wide range of networking applications. The term "virtualization" was coined in the 1960s to refer to a virtual machine (sometimes called "pseudo machine"), a term which itself dates from the experimental IBM M44/44X system. Hardware virtualization is becoming a dominant trend for IT departments in many organizations. The underlying concept of hardware virtualization is to allow multiple systems or users to share one host (or to have one very large user shared across multiple host systems). 2. Determine if hardware virtualization helps businesses and organizations in terms of:

Cost management Though the concept of hardware virtualization is not new, the process has become much easier and more cost effective. One of the key benefits of server virtualization technology is the significant cost savings associated with the reduction of hardware required in your data center and optimizing the utilization of the resources you do have. With blade consolidation and virtualized solutions like HP ProLiant servers running VMware ESXi5, you no longer need a large number of physical on-site servers to manage a complex IT environment. The decreased costs of procuring and maintaining hardware is one of the largest financial benefits of server virtualization. In short, hardware virtualization can help businesses and organizations with costs.
Systems performance and scalability Hardware virtualization allows for quick deployment of server resources in managed and consistent ways. This results in IT being able to adapt quickly and provide the business with resources needed in an expedited time frame. Virtualization cost benefit analysis shows that virtual servers provide an impressive ability to adapt and grow with minimal expense.
Systems management and administration The modern hypervisor providers are able to provide highly orchestrated operations that maximize the abstraction of the hardware and help ensure maximum uptime. These functions include the ability to migrate a running virtual machine from one host to another dynamically, as well as maintain a running copy of the virtual machine on another physical host in case the primary host fails.
3. Determine if software virtualization helps businesses and organizations in terms of:

Cost management Software virtualization provides ongoing cost savings through continual reductions in capital and operating costs. It also provides low-cost application testing and deployment so you can run applications in and out of their native environments regardless of OS. It also reduces system administration costs by maintaining software standards across multiple VMs.
Systems performance and scalability * Virtualization software performance and scalability has continued to improve. But virtualization software itself requires resources, limiting what's available for the VM. Also, resources are not shared fairly, but are allocated according to preconfigured settings and policies. Most importantly, virtualization is used to achieve better utilization, and over committing resources is the most efficient way make this happen. Instead of just assigning the number of CPUs, many virtualization systems can assign a range of GHz to a specific VM (e.g., 1000–2000 GHz). If a VM has used up its share in a given time slice, it has to wait. And here's the kicker: since the VM is ignorant of this throttling, internal time measurements and calculations of CPU utilization go completely out of whack!

Systems management and administration Managing updates with virtualization software becomes a much simpler task. Update one place; deploy the updated virtual application to the clients. If the update breaks something, just copy the original file back in place. Suddenly, it becomes possible to have a library of updated software for versioning and roll back functionality. Moving users from one software platform to another takes much time and consideration for deploying, and impact on end user systems. By running a virtualized software environment, the migration can be as simple as replacing one file with another.
4. Compare and contrast VMware, Microsoft, and Citrix in terms of: *
Market adoption * Virtualization technology has a long history of success in the industry. It has been so successful, that it is a way of life on mainframes and midrange systems. Now that it is available on industry standard systems as well, the industry has been focusing a great deal more attention on it. Large organizations have adopted this technology, but the mid market lags behind. Some mid market companies are based upon the use of Internet and IT technologies and are heavily involved in the use of virtualization technologies today. Others are focused more on manufacturing, healthcare, providing services and are not as focused on technology. These companies are likely to lag behind the technology adoption curve. This difference, of course, means that some mid-market companies will be quick to adopt new technology and others will adopt the same technologies long after they've become mainstream tools. Another important point to consider is that virtual machine software, the software needed to create and support virtual servers and virtual desktops, is a tool not a solution in itself. There are more reasons but it’s enough to say that the except for the mid-market virtualization is doing just fine in the IT market.
Figure [ 0 ]
Technical architecture The VMware Infrastructure virtualizes the entire IT infrastructure including servers, storage and networks. It aggregates these heterogeneous resources and presents a simple and uniform set of elements in the virtual environment. With VMware Infrastructure, IT resources can be managed like a shared utility and dynamically provisioned to different business units and projects without worrying about the underlying hardware differences and limitations. Figure [ 0 ] With Centrix XenDesktop and XenApp the user and process perspectives should be looked at to get a full understanding of an integrated solution. The user perspective demonstrates the processes a user must accomplish before their applications are delivered into their virtual desktop. If there are too many user interactions, the solution will not be successful from the user’s pointFigure [ 0 ] of view. When an organization’s XenApp environment is integrated into a new XenDesktop architecture, the user workflow is shown in figure 1. Because of the tight coupling of XenApp and XenDesktop, a user is only required to authenticate, launch and work in order to receive their standard desktop fully customized with the proper applications. Users must authenticate to the system through Web Interface or the Citrix Receiver. Upon entering credentials, users will be presented with a list of available virtual desktops. When a user receives a list of their desktops they will select the icon and their virtual desktop will be connected to the end point. If the user only has one available virtual desktop, the system can be configured so the virtual desktop automatically connects to the end point. Once they receive the virtual desktop, they can begin working in their personalized virtual environment. The application delivery happens automatically. One of the benefits of having XenDesktop and XenApp so tightly integrated is that many of the processes required for desktop and application delivery occurs automatically with little user interaction, which was shown in the previous section. Once the virtual desktop’s Citrix Receiver has received the list of available applications through the previous process, the Figure [ 0 ] next process does not begin until the user selects their application. Remember, at this point XenApp-delivered applications are not present on the virtual desktop. This helps keep desktop in a fresh and fast state. The application enumeration process is shown in the following figure 2. * Technical support VMware offers technical support for VMware Workstation on a per-incident basis. Choose from economical one, three or five incident packs. You'll have access to a technical engineer through email or by telephone who will respond to you within 12 business hours and documentation, Knowledge Base articles and discussion forums through the VMware web site. VMware highly recommends that you take advantage of VMware's online knowledge base, documentation and discussion forums before purchasing per incident support. These complimentary resources may lead directly to the answers needed. Centrix has a toll free number Customer Care department and it is available for customer use Monday through Friday 10 AM to 10 PM EST for live technical support. In addition to live technical support, you can contact our support team via chat or email. Of course, do not hesitate in going to the complete documentation available to our clients.

5. Determine which vendor you would recommend for a virtualization strategy and explain why:

With strategies that are as budget friendly as FREE, there are no more excuses. I choose The Heterogeneous Hybrid Strategy, using VMware as my vendor of choice. Although VMware vSphere is a very complete, integrated strategy that has some state of the art technology, it is not very friendly to the heterogeneous strategy. It can be done in doses, but I may be losing some vSphere functionality. This is a trade off that must be decided by each company. VSphere is not a budget challenged discussion, it is a performance and optimization discussion, but to go league leader in virtualization, that is a chance I am willing to take for virtualization across the board.

References:

*
Kalinsky, D. (2005, September). Who’s Afraid of Asymmetric Multiprocessing? RTC Magazine. Retrieved March 1, 2013 from: http://rtcmagazine.com/articles/view/100404

SMP Distribution. (2010) Virtualization Cost Benefit Analysis. SMP Distribution.
Retrieved February 28, 2013 from: http://www.smpdistribution.com/virtualization-cost-benefit-analysis/ * * Kusnetzky Group. (2013). Why is the adoption of virtualization technology slow in the mid market? Kusnetzky Group. Retrieved March 1, 2013 from: http://kusnetzky.net/analysts-take/why-is-the-adoption-of.html *
Hill, B. (2012, March 12). Intro to Virtualization: Hardware, Software, Memory, Storage, Data and Network Virtualization. Petri IT Knowledgebase. Retrieved March 1, 2013 from: http://www.petri.co.il/intro-to-virtualization.htm *
Compuware Corporation. (2012).Virtualization and Cloud Performance: Virtualization's Impact on Performance Management. Compuware Corporation. Retrieved March 1, 2013 from http://javabook.compuware.com/content/cloud/why-virtualization-has-impact-on-performance-management.aspx * *
Wind River Systems. (2011). Wind River Linux 4 Update Pack 2 Product Note. Industry Cortex. Retrieved March 1, 2013 from: http://www.industrycortex.com/datasheets/profile/752094407/wind-river-linux-4-update-pack-2-product-note Srivastava, S. (2012, June 04). Five Factors to Remember when Selecting a Virtualization Solution. Compare Business Products. Retrieved February 28, 2013 from: http://www.comparebusinessproducts.com/virtualization/five-factors-to-remember-when-selecting-a-virtualization-solution Srivastava, S. (2012, June 18). Virtualization Explained. Compare Business Products. Retrieved February 28, 2013 from: http://www.comparebusinessproducts.com/virtualization/virtualization-explained Lai, E. (2008, June 9). VMware, Microsoft or Citrix -- who's winning the app virtualization war?. COMPUTERWORLD. Retrieved March 1, 2013 from: http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9095438/VMware_Microsoft_or_Citrix_who_s_winning_the_app_virtualization_war_

Bednarz, A. (2010, June 07). VMware vs. Microsoft vs. Citrix. Network World. Retrieved March 1, 2013 from: http://www.networkworld.com/news/2010/060710-tech-argument-citrix-vmware-microsoft.html?page=1

VMware. (unk). VMware Workstation 9 Per-Incident. VMware. Retrieved March 2, 2013 from: http://store.vmware.com/store/vmware/en_US/DisplayProductDetailsPage/ThemeID.1120800/productID.82469900

Centrix Corp. (unk). FAQ. Centrix Corp. Retrieved March 2, 2013 from: http://www.centrix.com/faq.html

VMWARE. (2006). VMware Infrastructure Architecture Overview. VMWARE. Retrieved March 2, 2013 from: http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi_architecture_wp.pdf

Citrix. (2009). Simplifying Application Delivery to the Virtual Desktop. Citrix. Retrieved March 2, 2013 from: https://support.citrix.com/servlet/KbServlet/download/19583-102-665094/SimplifyingAppDeliveryVirtual%20Desktop%20-%20Reference%20Architecture.pdf

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[ 1 ]. Wind River Systems. (2011). Wind River Linux 4 Update Pack 2 Product Note. Industry Cortex. Retrieved March 1, 2013 from: http://www.industrycortex.com/datasheets/profile/752094407/wind-river-linux-4-update-pack-2-product-note [ 2 ]. SMP Distribution. (2010) Virtualization Cost Benefit Analysis. SMP Distribution.
Retrieved February 28, 2013 from: http://www.smpdistribution.com/virtualization-cost-benefit-analysis/
[ 3 ]. Hill,B. (2012, March 12). Intro to Virtualization: Hardware, Software, Memory, Storage, Data and Network Virtualization. Petri IT Knowledgebase. Retrieved March 1, 2013 from: http://www.petri.co.il/intro-to-virtualization.htm
[ 4 ]. * Compuware Corporation. (2012).Virtualization and Cloud Performance: Virtualization's Impact on Performance Management. Compuware Corporation. Retrieved March 1, 2013 from http://javabook.compuware.com/content/cloud/why-virtualization-has-impact-on-performance-management.aspx
[ 5 ]. * Kusnetzky Group. (2013). Why is the adoption of virtualization technology slow in the mid market? Kusnetzky Group. Retrieved March 1, 2013 from: http://kusnetzky.net/analysts-take/why-is-the-adoption-of.html
[ 6 ]. VMWARE. (2006). VMware Infrastructure Architecture Overview. VMWARE. Retrieved March 2, 2013 from: http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi_architecture_wp.pdf
[ 7 ]. Citrix. (2009). Simplifying Application Delivery to the Virtual Desktop. Citrix. Retrieved March 2, 2013 from: https://support.citrix.com/servlet/KbServlet/download/19583-102-665094/SimplifyingAppDeliveryVirtual%20Desktop%20-%20Reference%20Architecture.pdf
[ 8 ]. VMware. (unk). VMware Workstation 9 Per-Incident. VMware. Retrieved March 2, 2013 from: http://store.vmware.com/store/vmware/en_US/DisplayProductDetailsPage/ThemeID.1120800/productID.82469900
[ 9 ]. Centrix Corp. (unk). FAQ. Centrix Corp. Retrieved March 2, 2013 from: http://www.centrix.com/faq.html