IBM on Thursday announced at the OpenStack Summit that it is expanding its support of open technologies by providing advanced OpenStack® integration and cloud virtualization and management capabilities across IBM’s entire server portfolio with IBM Cloud Manager with OpenStack.
As companies increasingly migrate to software defined environments, automating hybrid cloud infrastructure across multiple platforms through open technologies becomes essential. Open technologies can make it easier for businesses to adopt a cloud model and integrate it with their existing IT infrastructure and applications to meet their evolving business needs.
IBM Cloud Manager with OpenStack provides support for the latest operating system release, Icehouse, and full access to the complete core OpenStack API set to help clients ensure application portability and avoid vendor lock-in. It also extends cloud management support to System z, in addition to Power Systems, PureFlex/Flex Systems, System x, or any other x86 environment. The new solution also provides support for IBM z/VM on System z, and PowerVC for PowerVM on Power Systems designed to add more scalability and security to Linux environments.
Monthly Archives: May 2014
Have You Met My Friend, Cloud Sprawl?
By John Dixon, Consulting Architect
With the acceptance of cloud computing gaining steam, more specific issues related to adoption are emerging. Beyond the big-show topics of self-service, security, and automation, cloud sprawl is one of the specific problems that organizations face when implementing cloud computing. In this post, I’ll take a deep dive into this topic, what it means, how it’s caused, and some options for dealing with it now and in the future.
Cloud Sprawl and VM Sprawl
First, what is cloud sprawl? Simply put, cloud sprawl is the proliferation of IT resources – that provide little or no value – in the cloud. For the purposes of this discussion, we’ll consider cloud to be IaaS, and the resources to be individual server VMs. VM sprawl is a similar concept that happens when a virtual environment goes unchecked. In that case, it was common for an administrator, or someone with access to vCenter, to spin up a VM for testing, perform some test or development activity, and then forget about it. The VM stayed running, consuming resources, until someone or something identified it, determined that it was no longer being used, and shut it down. It was a good thing that most midsize organizations limited vCenter or console access to perhaps 10 individuals. So, we solved VM sprawl by limiting access to vCenter, and by maybe installing some tools to identify little-used VMs.
So, what are the top causes of cloud sprawl? In IT operations terms, we have the following:
- Self-service is a central advantage of cloud computing, and essentially cloud means opening up a request system to many users
- Traditional IT service management (a.k.a. ITIL) is somewhat limited in dealing with cloud, specifically configuration management and change management processes
- There remains limited visibility into the costs of IT resources, though cloud improves this since resource consumption ends up as a dollar amount on a bill…somewhere
How is Cloud Sprawl Different?
One of the main ideas behind cloud computing – and a differentiator between plain old virtualization and centralization – is the notion of self-service. In the language of VMware, self-service IaaS might be interpreted as handing out vCenter admin access to everyone in the company. Well, in a sense, cloud computing is kind of like that – anyone who wants to provision IaaS can go out to AWS and do just that. What’s more? They can request all sorts of things, aside from individual VMs. Entire platform stacks can be provisioned with a few clicks of the mouse. In short, users can provision a lot more resources, spend a lot more money, and cause a lot of problems in the cloud.
We have seen one of our clients estimate their cloud usage at a certain amount, only to discover that actual usage was over 10 times their original estimate!
In addition, cloud sprawl can go in different directions than plain old VM sprawl. Since there are different cloud providers out there, the proliferation of processes and automation becomes something to watch out for. A process to deal with your internal private cloud may need to be tweaked to deal with AWS. And it may need to be tweaked again to deal with another cloud provider. In the end, you may end up with a different process to deal with each provider (including your own datacenter). That means more processes to audit and bring under compliance. The same goes for tools – tools that were good for your internal private cloud may be completely worthless for AWS. I’ve already seen some of my clients filling their toolboxes with point solutions that are specific to one cloud provider. So, bottom line is that cloud sprawl has the potential to drag on resources in the following ways:
- Orphaned VMs – a lot like traditional VM sprawl, resulting in increased spend that is completely avoidable
- Proliferation of processes – increased overhead for IT operations to stay compliant with various regulations
- Proliferation of tools – financial and maintenance overhead for IT operations
Download John’s ebook “The Evolution of Your Corporate IT Department” to learn more
How Can You Deal with Cloud Sprawl?
One way to deal with cloud sprawl is to apply the same treatment that worked for VM sprawl: limit access to the console, and install some tools to identify little-used VMs. At GreenPages, we don’t think that’s a very realistic option in this day and age. So, we’ve conceptualized two new approaches:
- Adopt request management and funnel all IaaS requests through a central portalThis means using the accepted request-approve-fulfill paradigm that is a familiar concept from IT service management.
- Sync and discoverGive users the freedom to obtain resources from the supplier of their choosing, whenever and wherever they want. IT operations then discovers what has been done, and runs their usual governance processes (e.g., chargeback, showback) on the transactions.
Both options have been built in to our Cloud Management and a Service (CMaaS) platform. I see the options less as an “either/or” decision, and more of a progression of maturity within an organization. Begin with Option 2 – Sync and Discover, and move toward Option 1 – Request Management.
As I’ve written before, and I’ll highlight here again, IT service management practices become even more important in cloud. Defining services, using proper configuration management, change management, and financial management is crucial to operating cloud computing in a modern IT environment. The important thing to do now is to automate configuration and change management to prevent impeding the speed and agility that comes with cloud computing. Just how do you automate configuration and change management? I’ll explore that in an upcoming post.
See both options in action in our upcoming webinar on cloud brokerage and governance. Our CTO Chris Ward will cover:
- Govern cloud without locking it down: see how AWS transactions can be automatically discovered by IT operations
- Influence user behavior: see how showback reports can influence user behavior and conserve resources, regardless of cloud provider
- Gain visibility into costs: see how IaaS costs can be estimated before provisioning an entire bill of materials
Register for our upcoming webinar being held on May 22nd @ 11:00 am EST. “The Rise of Unauthorized AWS Use. How to Address Risks Created by Shadow IT.
Horses for Sources research lists IBM, AWS, HP as top IaaS players
Research bods Horses for Sources (HfS) have put 10 companies in its winner’s circle for infrastructure as a service – but Microsoft and Google are nowhere to be seen.
The report, compiled by HfS analyst Dr Thomas Mendel, is the latest in a flurry of research articles prognosticating on the market leaders for IaaS, hot on the heels of the ‘race to the bottom’ for Amazon, Google and Microsoft in storage pricing. Yet only AWS made the winner’s circle, with Microsoft in the lesser ‘high performers’ category and Google trailing behind.
In the same week that IDC analyst David Tapper found that IBM was the most lucrative IaaS vendor for US enterprise buyers, IBM has also come up trumps here in terms of execution.
Perhaps surprisingly several companies better IBM in terms of innovation, considering the amount of investment Big Blue puts into its patents arm. Cisco was considered …
Green IT: Does it still matter?
By Adrian Thirkill, managing director, Easynet Global Services UK
Five years ago, you couldn’t move for ‘green’ claims from businesses. In a rush to become the first businesses to go carbon neutral, hoards of companies offset air miles, replanted forests, and invested in wind farms. “We turn our lights off at night!” they whooped. “We put monitors on automatic standby!” they gushed.
All admirable and well-intentioned. But there’s a worrying hint of tumbleweed as environmental policies move to the archives, and environmental commitments fall from the board agenda.
The impact of climate change upon our lives isn’t lessening. It would be glib for me to refer to the recent winter of floods as proof, but the IPCC detailed the likely impact of average temperature increases of 2 degrees or more, and it makes sobering reading. Already, it says, climate change is negatively affecting food supplies, marine ecosystems …
FirstCarbon Delivers Applications Faster Using OutSystems Platform
OutSystems has announced that FirstCarbon Solutions (FCS) is rapidly delivering new software modules for its Sustainability Workbench platform by using OutSystems to develop web and mobile applications. Part of the ADEC Group, a multinational organization focusing on healthcare, sustainability and education, FCS is using OutSystems Platform to deliver innovative business applications within its portfolio that will provide new levels of flexibility, scalability, service, and support to its customers.
FCS President Robert Francisco comments, “FCS is focused on providing the solutions our clients and partners need to improve their business and operations. As software is part of our overall solution that also includes professional services and data management and business process outsourcing, we aim to deliver the best possible technology experience for our customers quickly and efficiently. We want to go beyond a one-size-fits-all approach and provide our customers with more customized, fit-for-purpose applications that are closely matched to their requirements.”
Managing Hybrid Cloud Environments: The New Reality for Delivering ITaaS
IT leaders and practitioners need to know how to embrace shifting business and end-user expectations, and the cloud is a vital part of everyone’s strategy to address this challenge. But how do you go about selecting the right cloud services? How do you manage them without adding new management tools for every platform? Since almost all organizations will end up with a hybrid cloud, it is imperative to know how to manage such an environment seamlessly, allowing for the efficiency and agility promises of the cloud to remain real.
In their session at 14th Cloud Expo, James Urquhart, Technologist & Director of Cloud Management Solutions at Dell, and Jeremy Ford, General Manager of Cloud Services at Dell, will examine the role of IT, the critical decision checkpoints, and approaches to managing hybrid cloud computing environments. Attendees will also learn of deployment choices and constraints, the nuances of managing homogeneous vs. heterogeneous deployment environments, and how to deploy and manage applications in dissimilar environments.
Cloud Fabric Technology to Solve Challenges of Workload Portability
Zerto on Wednesday announced its strategy to create a new infrastructure layer called “Cloud Fabric” that allows organizations to seamlessly move and protect virtualized workloads between public, private and hybrid clouds across leading hypervisors and cloud providers.
Gil Levonai, VP marketing and products at Zerto, stated, “The notion of a Cloud Fabric is a concept that will evolve over time, but certainly includes ability to protect and mobilize production workloads between VMware, Microsoft, Amazon, OpenStack and in a later stage between any cloud or hypervisor. This is vital for both providers and customers to avoid lock-in and to retain their ability to choose any IT environment that fits their business needs.”
Commercial & Open Source Choices for Building Your Private Cloud & Why?
Picking the ideal platform for your private cloud strategy is a critical decision – when do you pick commercial VMware and Microsoft-based solutions? When is an OpenStack solution a good option?
In their session at 14th Cloud Expo, Brent Doncaster, a Sr. Strategist for Product Marketing in Dell’s Cloud Solutions team, and Michael Elliott, an Enterprise Cloud Evangelist at Dell, will reveal how leading organizations are aligning their needs with the various cloud platforms to optimize their agility, efficiency and service quality objectives.
Encryption in Use Deep Dive
Risk-conscious enterprises across the globe have been reluctant to embrace the public cloud model. For many, compliance requirements are the source of the reluctance. For others, concerns about ceding control of their data to a cloud service provider, without the cloud service provider accepting liability for customer data, is the major hurdle. Conforming to data residency regulations, when implementing a distributed services model, present a further complication. Even as these challenges to adoption loom large, the economics and productivity benefits of cloud-based services remain compelling. For these organizations to make the transition to the cloud, a range of elements must be in place, including continuous monitoring of the cloud service provider’s data center, enforcement of appropriate service level agreements, data classification and definition of internal processes to manage cloud-based services. Encryption in use is a critical piece of this puzzle, since it provides a mechanism for the enterprise to extend their boundary of control to their data stored and processed within the cloud service provider’s environment. However, not all encryption in use is created equally, secure, and a generic. A one size fits all approach is likely to fall short in providing a balance between security and functionality.
PDNS Offers “Anchor” Cloud Services to Agile Cloud Consortium
Private Digital Network Services (PDNS) and partners will provide its national, Private Digital Network (PDN) core and a suite of highly sought after services to the Interoperability Clearinghouse Agile Cloud effort. Its partners include Gannett Company Inc., Global Interactive Solutions, ICON Voice, and others. Gannett designed and implemented the PDN to support its national base of 300+ business units, which include well known digital properties such as CareerBuilder.com and Cars.com, and media properties such as DefenseNews and USA Today. Through a joint services agreement, Gannett has enabled PDNS to leverage this high capacity, national, private network asset to provide network and hosted services to commercial and ST/Local government entities. These services are now being extended to the ICH Agile Cloud effort. Applications and services to be provided include high speed, hosted voice/video/data, content delivery, virtual machine and storage provisioning and disaster recovery services.