Realizing the promise of server virtualization: a service-centric approach to server management

Quoting from Enterprise Network & Servers:


Driven by the compelling value proposition, a number of IT organizations have started pilot implementations of virtualization technology in an attempt to realize higher infrastructure ROI. Virtualization is still an emerging technology and the industry has not yet reached a level of maturity, with deep experience in the system, processes and tools, to tackle the challenges of managing wide-scale virtual infrastructures. As a result, some organizations are hesitant to move from pilot to the production stage because of a lack of technical expertise and process maturity, inadequate integration of virtual infrastructure management with standard operating processes, poor visibility and inconsistent performance monitoring practices. Virtualization represents an organizational and operational paradigm shift where IT administration is required to deal with near real-time changes in the infrastructure driven by application demands and powered by the fluidity of virtualized platform. IT administration, accustomed to managing the more static “physical” infrastructure, can perceive the dynamic nature of virtualization technology as a source of uncertainty.

To date, the challenge of managing virtualized infrastructure has been to cost-effectively meet application service level objectives (SLOs) in an environment where an increasing number of business-critical applications are competing for the shared infrastructure. A service-centric performance management solution can tackle a number of these challenges to help facilitate this transition from pilot to production stage. The key service-centric capabilities include: Performance Management, Automation, Capacity Planning, Predictive Analysis and Change Management. These capabilities can be applied across the entire management lifecycle to realize the full potential of virtualization…

Read the whole article at source.