Views from the other side

/ / @Mike_Colson, Cloud Tiering Appliance, EMC, ScaleIO, ViPR, vSpecialist / Leave a Reply

For those of you who have read my few blog posts know that I have had several jobs within the IT industry. As my first week as a vSpecialist at EMC is coming to a close I am reflecting on just how different the vendor side really is. Let’s start with WOW.

EMC has a robust product set, that isn’t to say they touch on everything that I think they should, but that might be asking too much. But I think the solution sets are vast enough and cover so much that I will have plenty to learn and talk about with customers for the foreseeable future.

Just to highlight some of the cooler things than I learned about in week one that I am sure to be posting about more in the very near future.

ViPR – is what I believe will be the standard bearer in SDDS (Software-Defined-Datacenter-Storage) currently it supports EMC and NETAPP storage but as more API’s are testing and brought into the fold the single pane storage management and self-provisioning tool will be the SDDC admins best friend. Ranking storage by tier and providing user self-service storage provisioning guidelines and capability.

ScaleIO – this is a very recent purchase by EMC but the possibilities seem to be limitless. Seemingly infinitely scalable storage in an itty bitty package. This could be the scaled storage solution for the datacenter that marks a transformative time in SAN and storage management.

Cloud Tiering Appliance – while I had at least heard about ViPR and ScaleIO before Cloud Tiering Appliance or CTA is one of those jewels in the rough. Where ViPR provides management and provisioning, it doesn’t manage the file locations or automated storage level tiering of data. Cloud Tiering Appliance picks that ball up and runs it into the endzone. While it is only file level management, the ability to provide your virtual hosts a single mounting point for a file and allowing the appliance to manage any multi-vendor storage tiering on the backend and automation of this process is something that large dispersed organizations are sure to want.

There are a lot of great products, and solutions within EMC, I have only scratched the surface. But as I learn more I am only too eager to share. The future of IT is bright and with great knowledge comes great responsibility to educate. Check out the links below for more on EMC’s platfolio.

ViPR – http://www.emc.com/data-center-management/vipr/index.htm
ScaleIO – http://www.scaleio.com/
CTA – http://www.emc.com/archiving/cloud-tiering-appliance.htm & http://www.emc.com/collateral/software/white-papers/h10777-vnx-cloud-appliance-wp.pdf

Intro to Cloud 101

/ / Cloud 101, What is Cloud? / Leave a Reply

I along with so many IT professionals hate the term “Cloud” because it tends to be used for everything under the sun anymore. I wanted to take this post to go into what cloud actually is  and what types of cloud are out there. This is Cloud 101 first day syllabus stuff, and will be a part of a series on cloud technologies that I have been working on researching and testing. So let’s get into it and if anyone has any questions please let me know.

What is “Cloud”?

 I will leave the first use of the actual word up to MIT’s Antonio Regalado who blogged about it here. But what is “cloud” in the context of a technology? Is it the concept of hosting your data in a public data center? Or is it the idea of having applications and data available from anywhere at anytime via mobile or traditional clients? 

There are differences of opinion here because of the differences in types of cloud. Public, Private, Hybrid are the current topology defined categories. But with in Public cloud for example there is Single Site, Co-located, Shared Resource, and Dedicated Resource topology possibilities. The quick answer is Cloud is a combination of resources that provide resilient access to applications and data. 

Public Cloud: Hosted computing resources in a data center that your organization doesn’t own or operate. Support options will be available for touch support or full managed for the servers and vm’s in the environment. 

Single Site, Multi-Site, Co-Located: When researching Public Cloud providers or Hosted Solution Providers, make sure you determine if your cloud will be hosted at a single site or multiple sites or if it will be in a co-located data center. Single Site provides you with a just that a single data center that hosts your cloud, this may be all your organization needs, if the data center is capable of 5 9’s (99.999% uptime). But the reality is you will have redundant redundancy with multi-site providers. Some cloud providers are co-located or co-lo’s this means that they rent space in a larger hosting companies data center to get their multi-site redundancy. A co-lo tends to be a bigger data center with better pipes (bandwidth for incoming and outgoing connections) vs a single site instance that a smaller cloud provider may own. Then the question of SLA’s (Service Level Agreements) needs to be discussed, what guarantees are you getting from the Cloud provider that your data will be available and secure? A good cloud provider will offer credits back for any downtime outside of that expressed in the SLA’s as maintenance. 

Pros: 
  • Public Cloud gets the IT budget burden of hardware and virtual platform licenses out of your organizations budget
  • Can reduce the cost of Application delivery and overall OPEX

Cons: 
  • Security this isn’t really a negative it is just like any other IT initiative if you properly plan your security and implement smart policies you can achieve a secure cloud environment
  • CAPEX initial migration can seem like a large investment ROI needs to be examined and OPEX should be included in that analysis
  • Change Management is needed more than in a private environment to ensure that your organization didn’t impact the SLA’s and to ensure that your provider is living up to their end of the agreement
  • IT Department push back this is the biggest issue the fix is to help the IT team understand the goal and direction of the organization and how cloud plays into that

Private Cloud: Your organization utilizes its internal IT resources to provide access to applications and data. Typically this is a multi-site approach with secondary data centers or branch offices being used for redundancy. 

Pros:
  • CAPEX investments have already been made in most situations with fewer dollars a cloud vision can be realized
  • Ownership the organization owns the hardware and software that is implemented in the cloud, this means that it can be depreciated and written off over time as well
  • The other piece of ownership is that the organization has direct control over the assets and personnel who work in your environment this is the old adage of an enemy with-in can wreak more damage than an enemy at the gate. Knowing the staff in your IT environment is a valuable security measure. 

Cons:

  •  CAPEX & OPEX the organization is still paying for the IT personnel and resources as well as power and cooling for the data center
  • Cost of application licenses that are sometimes included in public cloud offerings.


Hybrid Cloud: Is exactly what it sounds like, your organization maintains both a public and private cloud presence and there are applications in both locations. This allows for secure data to be maintained in the private cloud and public data to be provided in the public cloud. Data and Applications can easily maneuver between the two environments. 
Pros:
  • Best of both worlds, managed environments with lower CAPEX
  • Maneuverability and redundancy for critical environment applications
  • Lower OPEXCAPEX for fail-over site than dual on-premises or dual public cloud solutions 

Cons: 

  •  Cost essentially this boils down to having your cake and eating it too. Your organization has the costs of both on premises and a public cloud hosting site. 

Solutions vs Products

/ / IT Sales, Solutions, VARs / Leave a Reply

Buy My Widget It’s On Sale This Month Only

For some people it’s really easy to talk about products, Value Added Resellers (VARs) abound with the latest gadget or license for whatever hardware or software they are pushing this quarter. It’s another thing all together to step back and talk solutions. 
Vendors are a different story, they sell the specific products. I have been approached by several large vendors in the past, been asked to join their sales engineering teams, and have politely declined. I just don’t like being restricted to talk about a single product or the latest in blinky lights. Selling solutions is a different gambit all together; I enjoy talking to customers about their road map and strategizing their way forward. This lets me present multiple products and some off the wall solutions that they have never heard of.
I focus on how my customers can make money off of the IT strategy we put into place vs. how I commoditize the solution I put in front of them. The idea isn’t for me to make vast sums of cash to swim around in like Scrooge McDuck in Duck Tales but rather that we both make money and come out ahead. If I put a bad solution in place the customer doesn’t do business with me anymore and I don’t make revenue off them and lose a referral. On their side they lose money on a bad solution and the subsequent costs to replace it. You compile bad with bad and you don’t get good. That’s why I don’t talk single solution. I want the decision making process to be open with the customer and let them choose the path that makes the best sense for them while I guide them by presenting the solutions that meet the problems they face.
Think of EUC as a great example. I have worked on several solutions be it VMware, Citrix, Unidesk, or even Microsoft. At the end of the day the solutions were chosen by the customer because they fit a unique need. For some, View’s single vendor and replica set up is preferred. For others 3D graphics are the requirement which led them to Citrix. Still others require low video latency which led them to Microsoft, or prefer the single pane broker and app management solution of a Unidesk. Each customer’s requirements helped shape the engagement and their decision was reached from presenting the options and allowing for a technology bake off, achieving the end result. Sure this process adds to the sales cycle and may mean that the products your company sells may not win. But the customer will trust that you have their best interest in mind which is the goal, and that means you win.
Ok, this is my last sales based blog for a while I will get back to virtual solutions next time. Duck Tales references will continue however until moral improves.