MAC virtualization software sales jump 50% September 22, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: MAC, Parallels, VMware
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Sales of Mac virtualization software from market leaders VMware and Parallels have shot up more than 50 percent this year, outpacing the 41 percent growth in Mac hardware sales experienced by Apple in the most recent quarter, according to market research firm NPD.
More here.
Igel releases Remote Management System 3.0 September 22, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: Igel
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IGEL RMS 3.0 is a pillar of the IGEL Universal Desktop strategy that gives a great user experience and the lowest deployment costs by being able to deliver many different server-based applications using their native access protocols or “Digital Services”. It does this by allowing each different Digital Service in a Universal Desktop to be remotely controlled using IGEL Remote Management Suite 3.0. These changes can be made individually to a Universal Desktop or deployed to many thousands of desktops with drag and drop simplicity using profiles. There is no need to create different scripts or firmware images for each terminal and this is what makes IGEL RMS 3.0 so powerful and able to deploy subtle individual changes to users, even in large thin client environments.
New Digital Services that can now be remotely controlled by IGEL RMS 3.0 include VMware Virtual Desktop Manager 2.1, Citrix XenDesktop Appliance mode, Ericom® PowerTerm® WebConnect client, the native SAP GUI and Firefox web browser. This is in addition to the existing ability to control ICA/RDP, VoIP and terminal emulation. More
What is Red Hat doing in virtualization? September 22, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: Qumnaret, Red Hat
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When you think Red Hat, you think Linux. Maybe, if you’re a developer or a CTO, you also think JBoss. Red Hat, itself, now wants you to think virtualization.
A full analysis by cio.com here.
Microsoft getVirtualnow – Xendesktop live demo on Hyper-V September 21, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: Hyper-V, Provisioning Server, XenDesktop
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Robin Brandl (Microsoft Technology Evangelist for Citrix) being interviewed by Joey Snow (Technet Edge) during the Microsoft getVirtualnow event. A live demo of XenDesktop running on Hyper-V using Citrix Provisioning Server and Microsoft App-V.
Xenocode licenses to Novell September 20, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: Xenocode, ZENworks
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Xenocode, a next-generation virtualization company, today announced the licensing of its best-in-class application virtualization technology to Novell. The recently announced Novell ZENworks Application Virtualization solution leverages Xenocode’s virtualization technology to allow customers to deploy their applications inside a “virtual container” requiring no installation or configuration. Virtual application deployment eliminates application conflicts and compatibility problems on Windows desktops, allowing organizations to run legacy applications on Windows Vista and deploy multiple versions of applications side-by-side in isolated “sandboxes.”
Full article.
VMware other top exec to leave … September 20, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: VMware
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VMware Inc said on Friday that a senior executive in charge of product development is leaving after seven years with the company, the latest in a string of executive departures in recent months.
Company spokeswoman Mary Ann Gallo said that Vice President of Product Development Paul Chan will leave on Oct. 3.
Full article on eweek.com
VMworld 2008 – Session notes … September 19, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: VMworld
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Looking for sessions notes from VMworld 2008. Here are some (thank you Scott Lowe):
- PO2061: VMware VirtualCenter 2.5 Database Best Practices
- PO1644: VMware Update Manager Performance and Best Practices
- TA2644: Networking I/O Virtualization
- TA2659: Managing ESX in a COS-less World
- VD2422: Offline VDI
- BC1693: Architecting DR Solutions with VMware SRM
- TA2668: VMware ESX Architectural Directions
- BC2621: Fault-Tolerant VMs in VI: Operations and Best Practices
Citrix signs Lean-On as distri for Denmark September 19, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: Citrix, distribution
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Citrix signs Lean-On as additional distributor for Denmark, complementing DNS and Four-Leaf
Microsoft Technet Magazine October … all about virtualization September 19, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: App-V, DR, HA, Hyper-V, MSCVMM, Technet
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Topics:
- An introduction to Hyper-V in Windows 2008
- Manage your virtual environments with VMM2008
- Getting started with Microsoft Application Virtualization
- Achieving High-Availability for Hyper-V
- Backup and Disaster Recovery for server virtualization
- Essential tools for planning your virtual infrastructure
Full magazine here.
TEST: High Availability – Disaster Recovery solutions for virtualization September 19, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: Datacore, SANmelody, Marathon Technologies, Vizioncore, Stratus Technologies, Avance, everrun VM, vRanger Pro, Scalant, V/OE
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Now that HA/DR/fault-tolerance has become a hot topic with the integration of HA in XenServer 5 and in the (near) future VMware FT in VI4 we remembered a test by Infoworld on 3rd party solutions for always on virtualization.
The following products were analyzed:
- VizionCore vRanger Pro
- DataCore SANmelody 2.0
- Scalent V/OE 2.5
- Stratus Technology Avance 1.3
- Marathon Technologies everrun VM 4
Marathon on VMware’s FT: sort of fault tolerance but … September 18, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: everrun VM, FT, Marathon Technologies
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Marathon Technologies specialist in component level fault tolerance, high availability and system level fault tolerance evaluated the newly announced VMware FT function:
No component-level fault tolerance. The most common failures that result in unplanned downtime are component failures such as storage, NIC or controller failures. Yet VMware Fault Tolerance doesn’t do anything to protect against I/O, storage or network failures. …
2. Complexity on top of complexity. In order to use VMware Fault Tolerance, you’ll first have to install both VMware HA and DRS. No small feat in and of themselves. Then, because VMware FT requires NIC teaming, you’ll also have to manually install paired NICs. Then you’ll need to manually setup dual storage controllers (with the software to manage them) because it requires multi-pathing. And to top it all off, you’re required to use an expensive, and often complicated, SAN.
3. Limited CPU fault tolerance. With VMware FT, you’ll need to setup what VMware refers to as a “record/replay” capability on both a primary and secondary server. If something happens to the primary server, the record is stored on the SAN and then restarted on the secondary server. Two things to point out here. First, the whole thing depends on the quality of the SAN. Second, in the words of the VMware engineer who presented at VMworld, “this can take a couple of seconds.” So what happens to your application state in those couple of seconds?
4. For VMware virtual environments only. VMware FT will only work in VMware environments. It won’t work with other hypervisors, and most importantly, you can’t use for business critical and mission critical applications that you want to keep on physical server platforms (i.e., non-virtualized environments which still represent the vast majority of customer use cases). Oh well, only the vast majority of critical applications run in physical environments anyway.
Hyper-V & MSCVM2008 in video September 18, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: Hyper-V, MSCVMM
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Microsoft Hyper-V Server, a stand alone version of Hyper-V (minus all the usual Windows capabilities), will be available for free by early October. More details are here: http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2007/nov07/11-12HyperVPR.mspx
System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 will also be available by early October (but not for free). More details are here: http://www.microsoft.com/systemcenter/virtualmachinemanager/en/us/default.aspx
Solidcore Systems – S3 September 18, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: change, S3, Solidcore Systems
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Solidcore Systems, specialist in change audit and configuration control, today announced its S3 Control software reconciles and validates VMware change events in real time with HP’s change management solution
IBM slashes storage for VMware VDIs September 18, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: IBM, storage, VDI, VMware, VSO
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IBM has developped a component that slashe storage with up yo 80% compared to the standard VMware VDI solution. This technology, the Virtual Storage Optimizer (VSO), uses an algorithm developed by IBM Research, and will form part of IBM’s Virtual Infrastructure Access (VIA) services, in which IBM experts virtualize clients’ IT infrastructure.
IBM’s VSO leverages the snapshotting capability of VMware’s VDI to create an ultra-efficient storage system. It takes the same approach as incremental backup — a master image of a clone is created and stored on the back end, each user gets a personalized workspace with all relevant applications, and only changes made by users are saved. (personal note: This sounds like Citrix Provisioning Server)
TEST: Citrix XenDesktop hits VDI high … September 18, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: Citrix, XenDesktop
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Citrix XenDesktop 2.0 leverages streaming applications, server virtualization, and swift tools for a scalable and manageable virtual desktop infrastructure solution.
The Infoworld testteam, have concluded their analysis of XenDesktop 2.0 with an impressive score of 8.3 out of 10. XenDesktop scores a 9 when it comes to manageability, a 7 on performance, 8 on setup and an impressive 9 both on scalability and value.
Full test analysis here.
Peeking at HA with XenServer 5 September 17, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: XenServer
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XenServer 5 contains a lot of technology from Marathon Technologies, but what is actually in it that makes the high availability embedded in Xenserver really good. Get an insight here.
VMworld 2008 – Keynote Session – Steve Harrod September 17, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: Steve Harrod, vApp, vCenter, vCompute, VDC-OS, vNetwork, vStorage
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Summary of the keynote given by Steve Harrod on September 17th:
- Virtual Infrastructure 4.0 itself has not been announced, yet the major components have already been introduced:
- Virtual Datacenter OS consists out of:
- the hardware/interaction layer:
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- vCompute – platform that interacts with the hardware, with vCompute the hardware specifications have been adapted to:
- 8 virtual CPUS
- 256GB per VM
- 40 GB/s network throughput
- up to 64 nodes per cluster
- up to 4906 cores to manage
- full support for DPM
- vStorage – new features have also been announced on the level of storage. VMFS and storage vMotion will be extended with stroage thin provisioning and linked clones
- vNetwork – the network layer functionalities have been improved with virtual distributed networking and support for 3rd party solutions
- vCompute – platform that interacts with the hardware, with vCompute the hardware specifications have been adapted to:
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- the application layer:
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- vAPP: gives applications priorities and SLA levels (hello legal disagreement with Microsoft?)
- VMware FT: high availability with 2 vMs in sync (like Marathon Technologies everrun VM)
- Security (shouldn’t that be vSecurity?): VMsafe APIs on the way
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- the management layer
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- Virtual Center becomes … vCenter with chargeback, performance optimization, orchestration and many other modules
- vCenter server component will be available for Linux (as virtual appliance)
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VMworld 2008 – Vendor announcements September 17, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: VDM, Vizioncore, Catbird, Cisco, Tidal Software, Altor Networks, Devon IT, CA, BakBone, vConverter, vSecurity, Platsepin, Forge 2.0
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Todays vendor annoucements:
- Tidal Software Announces Enterprise Job Scheduling for VMware enabling resource utilization
- Altor Networks Announces Interoperability With Cisco Nexus 1000V Virtualization Switch
- Devon IT confirms certification for VMware VDM (or should that be VMware View)
- Computer Associates will provide integrated virtualization management through VMware Ready
- BakBone Netvault now also has a VMware Plugin
- Vizioncore releases vCoverter 4.0 for P2V and V2V
- Catbird launches vSecurity 2.0
- Platespin released Forge 2.0
Open Source Code in VMware September 17, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: Citrix, GPL, Open Source, VMware
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Let us be honest, since the takeover of XenSource by Citrix, open source server virtualization has seen the light to the general public. Suddenly open source is hip, cool, …. and the Xen project proofs that it works
Yet Paul Maritz indicated during a Q&A session at VMworld, that they have been thinking about ‘opensourcing’ the hypervisor, that way supporting virtualization tools made by others. Yet on the short term it is clear that ESX won’t be opensourced and be made available under GPL.
This also means that un the short term other hypervisors such as Hyper-V won’t be support. Microsoft on the other hand is already supporting Hyper-V and ESX.
As you can expect when it comes to Open Source / GPL … you have people in favor and against, Matt Assay posted an article regarding the use of ‘open source technology’ in VMware, without VMware returning it to the people onder GPL. One thing is for sure there is ‘open source code’ within ESX. Why this is not publicly confirmed by VMware is a mystery. Furthermore VMware has released a statement in its 10Q statement. The 10Q statement starts with:
Our use of “open source” software could negatively affect our ability to sell our products and subject us to possible litigation.
A significant portion of the products or technologies acquired, licensed or developed by us may incorporate so-called “open source” software, and we may incorporate open source software into other products in the future….We monitor our use of open source software in an effort to avoid subjecting our products to conditions we do not intend.
Although we believe that we have complied with our obligations under the various applicable licenses for open source software that we use such that we have not triggered any such conditions, there is little or no legal precedent governing the interpretation of many of the terms of certain of these licenses, and therefore the potential impact of these terms on our business is somewhat unknown and may result in unanticipated obligations regarding our products and technologies.
Based on these paragraphs, I must start believing that VMware is afraid from Open Source, why should one be afraid from Open Source when you know that Open Source coded is developped by the people that want a stable solution with correct code.
When you develop a solution, you must always be aware that there might be developpers that are better than you. Why not provide these developpers with the code and let them optimize, correct, .. the code, this will result in stable code, less calls to the helpdesk, which results in increased profit, which leads to happy shareholders.
One thing is for sure Citrix plays a more correct game when it comes to Open Source, there is clearly feedback to the community when it comes to the hypervisor. As Simon Crosby stated it earlier … the hypervisor is the engine everything around it (management, … makes it the car.
Addition: there is even that rumour again about VMware acquiring Red Hat, which also popped-up earlier July. No idea if its thru.
Tripwire releases Tripwire Enterprise 7.5V for security and compliancy September 16, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.add a comment
Tripwire announced the newest version of its flagship product, Tripwire Enterprise 7.5V. Designed explicitly to give visibility into the security and compliance of virtual IT systems, the latest version of Tripwire Enterprise allows IT to manage systems to internal and external policies – across the heterogeneous data center – from a single point of control.
More info here.
Third Brigade introduces free firewall for cloud security September 16, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: security, Third Brigade
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Third Brigade has announced a free host-based firewall for securing virtual machines and cloud computing. As the foundation for re-establishing consistent security policy on cloud computing resources, the Third Brigade Deep Security Firewall enables tighter security policy to be applied on systems that have moved from internal (private) to external (public) computing clouds.
More info.
VMworld 2008 – Industry News in the shadow of VMworld September 16, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: Alive, application management, Appsense, BMC, Cisco, compliancy, Configuresoft, Datacore, DMTF, Elastra, Environment Manager, health monitoring, Integrie, iQ2850 iSCSI, iQstor Networks, NX-OS, OVF, Reflex Security, security, service manaement, Virtual Iron, Virtualization Management Center, VMAN, vmSight, VN-Link
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What has happened besides the Keynote Session at Vmworld, today in the world of Virtualization:
- DTMF has announced VMAN (Virtual Manaement Initiative and released OVF (more info here)
- Cisco has announced the Vitual Switch …
Cisco announces the VN-Link initiative. VN-Link is delivered through the virtual switch Nexus 1000V, software built on NX-OS, that plugs into ESX (4) and that can be configured through the familiar Cisco CLI. Availability is foreseen for 1H2009, you can enroll for a beta program here. Furthermore the solution will be open to 3rd parties, more information to come in the second keynote tomorrow.
- iQstor Networks’ iQ2850 iSCSI storage system has been certified for use with VMware Infrastructure
- vmSight Partners with Virtual Iron for Virtual Infrastructure and Service Management (add. info)
- Appsense release Environment Manager 8 for VMware (add. info)
- Configuresoft announces free utility to assure compliance of VMware ESX Deployments (add. info)
- Datacore will unveil four new important features within SANmelody/symphony
- Elastra joins VMware Ready program to deliver enterprise cloud application management (add. info)
- BMC and VMware will be expanding their partnership in automation and control
- Integrien previews Alive with features for VMware to remotely monitor the health of the VI (add. info)
- Reflex Security Inc. will release Virtualization Management Center (VMC) (add. info)
VMworld 2008 – Keynote Session (Paul Maritz) September 16, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: vApp, vClient, vCloud, VDC-OS, VMware View, vStorage
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The main points of todays Keynot Session by Paul Martiz at VMworld in Las Vegas:
- cloud, cloud, cloud … cloud-fever
- IT moves from client-centric to decentralized environments with increased flexibility of the applications and services (including moving around places). Which requires to be managed as one big … cloud. In order to support VMware will (as already posted yesterday:
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- Virtual Datacenter OS
- vCloud (video)
- vClient
- Cisco announces the Virtual Switch for Virtual Infrastructure (Personal brain-jump: what is the difference between vLANs and a virtual switch
- vStorage:, disaster recovery collaboration with the major storage vendors
- vApps: describes collections of appliances and their service level properties. This metadata enables the VDC OS to provide service levels to this collection of apps.
- Virtual Center will be rebranded to … vCenter (focus on the v
)
- VClient: bare metal hypervisor for desktops
- vCloud with vAPP: an applicaiton has an SLA of a 7 seconds, SLA is not met, applicaiton moves to an external cloud. When increasing the load, a new VM is started and users are diverted.
- VMware View is the new name for VMware VDM
VMworld 2008 – Fusion 2.0 September 16, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: Fusion, VMware
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Fusion 2.0 is out, more info here
VMworld 2008 – FalconStor releases NSS Virtual Appliance September 16, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: FalconStor, NSS Virtual Appliance, VMware
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FalconStor Software, Inc., the provider of TOTALLY Open data protection solutions, has announced FalconStor Network Storage Server (NSS) Virtual Appliance for VMware ESX, enabling customers to transform their existing direct-attached storage into an iSCSI virtual SAN appliance for VMware environments. The FalconStor NSS Virtual Appliance has been validated by the VMware Ready Virtual Appliance program, assuring customers of its full compatibility with VMware.
Symantec announced new back-up agent for Hyper-V September 16, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: back-up, Hyper-V, security, Symantec
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Symantec announced a new Backup Exec 12.5 agent supporting Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V, as well as support for upcoming releases for Windows Essential Business Server 2008 and Windows Small Business Server 2008. Backup Exec 12 and Backup Exec System Recovery 8 were the first backup and recovery products certified for Windows Server 2008 when they were released in February 2008.
Backup Exec version 12.5 introduces a new Agent for Microsoft Virtual Servers which substantially improves the speed, flexibility and simplicity of backup and recovery for Hyper-V virtual systems. Backup Exec understands the structure of the Hyper-V environment and presents the same logical structure in the backup administrator GUI, so backup administrators can manage backup and recovery functions for their physical and virtual systems via the consol
More info.
VMworld 2008 – VI4? – Beta videos September 16, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: VI, VMware
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VI4 probably will be introduced today or very soon on VMworld 2008, here are some beta videos already:
VMware Fault Tolerance
http://download3.vmware.com/vdcos/demos/FT_Demo_800×600.html
VMware DVS
http://download3.vmware.com/vdcos/demos/DVS_Demo_800×600.html.html
Host Profiles
http://download3.vmware.com/vdcos/demos/Hostprofiles_Linked_VC_800×600.html
MDOP 2008 RTM September 16, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: MDOP, MED-V
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The entire MDOP 2008 R2 suite of products has officially reached RTM status! New and existing customers can get App-V 4.5 starting today, and will be able to get the other MDOP 2008 R2 components the first week of October!
MDOP2008 has the following improved/new features:
- better localization support (10 languages)
- Asset Inventory Service 1.5
- Advanced Group Policy Management 3.0
3Tera partners with Citrix on cloud computing September 15, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: 3Tera, AppLogic, Citrix Cloud Center, Cloud Computing
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3Tera, announced today a partnership with Citrix Systems, Inc. to make enterprise grade cloud computing solutions available to customers of all sizes in external hosted clouds, or as a platform that can be deployed in corporate data centers behind customer firewalls. By combining the new Citrix Cloud Center (C3) solution with 3Tera’s award winning AppLogic™ Cloud Computing Platform, the companies are elevating the benefits of virtualization to a new level – from physical servers and virtual machines to entire virtual data centers and applications running in the cloud. The initial focus of the collaboration between the companies will center on the new Citrix XenServer Cloud Edition, a key component of the Citrix C3 product family.
XenServer Cloud Edition offers the full benefits of the proven Xen-based virtualization technology enhanced with advanced cloud infrastructure capabilities specifically defined by 3Tera. 3Tera will also embed XenServer Cloud Edition in future versions of its AppLogic Cloud Computing platform.
PERFMAN 7.2 for cross-platform performance management. September 15, 2008
Posted by Roel Gydé in Uncategorized.Tags: capacity planning, PERFMAN, performance management
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PERFMAN announced the availability of PERFMAN 7.2, the latest release of the company’s highly regarded cross-platform performance management and capacity planning software. New features in the latest release include Virtualization Planning Tool and VMware Sprawl Reporting, complementing the product’s existing abilities to monitor and manage VMware environments and providing PERFMAN customers with a comprehensive virtualization lifecycle management solution. The latest release also provides enhanced LPAR modeling for optimizing the use of logically partitioned CPUs. More information about PERFMAN is available at www.perfman.com.
