Business Implications of Virtualization

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Table of Contents 1. Introduction........................................... 2 2. How It Works........................................... 3 3. Types of Hypervisor.................................... 4 4. Challenges responsible for Growth of Virtualization....5 5. Classification of Virtualization.......................6 6. Industry Players....................................... 8 7. Managerial Implications................................9 8. Virtualization Software Offerings.....................12 9. References............................................ 13 Table of Figures Figure 1: Traditional System versus Virtualized system.....3 Figure 2: A Virtual Machine................................4 Figure 3: Virtual Infrastructure...........................4 Figure 4: Issues with IT environment.......................6 Figure 5: Types of Virtualization..........................7 Figure 6: Desktop Virtualization...........................8 Figure 7: Gartner Magic Quadrant...........................9 Figure 8: Condensed Image of Processor Manager............10 Figure 9: Virtualization Software License issue...........12 Figure 10: Virtualization software offerings..............13

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Business POV of virtualization technologies

Transcript of Business Implications of Virtualization

Table of Contents1.Introduction22.How It Works33.Types of Hypervisor44.Challenges responsible for Growth of Virtualization55.Classification of Virtualization66.Industry Players87.Managerial Implications98.Virtualization Software Offerings129.References13

Table of Figures

Figure 1: Traditional System versus Virtualized system3Figure 2: A Virtual Machine4Figure 3: Virtual Infrastructure4Figure 4: Issues with IT environment6Figure 5: Types of Virtualization7Figure 6: Desktop Virtualization8Figure 7: Gartner Magic Quadrant9Figure 8: Condensed Image of Processor Manager10Figure 9: Virtualization Software License issue12Figure 10: Virtualization software offerings13

1. IntroductionVirtualization is one of the sultriest themes for business administrators and also IT supervisors with profits like expanded productivity, expanded resource optimization, all the more computing power and so forth. It is an innovation arrangement that addresses various business drivers, essentially cost savings, which influence pretty much all commercial ventures. However, what precisely is the technology all about?

Virtualization is innovation for supporting execution of PC system code, from applications to entire OS in a software present environment. As a result such a type of Virtual Machine (VM) environment digests accessible framework assets (memory, storage, CPU core(s), I/O, and so forth.) and presents them in a consistent manner, such that "guest" software can't recognize VM-built execution from running with respect to bare physical hardware. It is a structure/approach of asset allotment between various execution situations by utilizing methods like time/resource sharing, simulation/emulation and so forth.

A virtual machine (VM) provides a software environment that allows software to run on bare metal. Such an environment is known as a hypervisor. It is isolated and very efficient replica of real OS. The hypervisor has functionality that looks like hardware to the guest operating system. It allows multiple operating system instances to run concurrently on a single computer; it is a means of separating hardware from a single operating system. CPU, processors, storage and memory are shared and it also has provision for desktop migration.

Figure 1: Traditional System versus Virtualized system

Figure 2: A Virtual Machine

2. How It WorksVirtualization platform transform or virtualize the hardware resources of an x86-based computerincluding the CPUs, network controllers, PCI slots, hard disks to create a fully functional virtual machine as shown in figure 1 that can run its own operating system and applications just like a real computer. Each virtual machine (Figure 2) contains a complete system, eliminating potential conflicts. A layer of software directly is placed between the computer hardware and OS of the host. Various resources of the server are dynamically allocated. Thus multiple OS can successfully run on a physical hardware. The hypervisor has provision for making sure that the compatibility between the device drivers with the software is maintained. Thus fully functional multiple OS sharing underlying single physical resource is possible using virtualization.

Virtualization also helps the IT company share physical resources across entire infrastructure. This property ascertains maximum efficiency. There is also a provision for application sharing thus reducing the licensing cost hence facilitating greater flexibility in the organization and results in lower capital and operational costs.

Figure 3: Virtual Infrastructure

A virtual infrastructure as shown in Figure 3 consists of the following components:i. Bare-metal hypervisors to enable full virtualization of each x86 computer. ii. Virtual infrastructure services such as resource management and consolidated backup to optimize available resources among virtual machines

3. Types of HypervisorType 1Bare-MetalType 2Hosted

Type 2 hypervisors don't perform as well as the type 1 hypervisors and that's because that operating system layer is in between the virtualization layer and the physical hardware so there's greater overhead in using type-2 hypervisors which really means you cant get as many virtual machines on the same piece of hardware and another way of saying that is that the consolidation ratio with type 2 hypervisors is much lower than the consolidation ratio with type 1 hypervisors so in other words you can't get as many virtual machines on the same piece of hardware if you use a type 2 hypervisor as you can with type 1 hypervisor.So Type 1s are to be used in the data center. That's where you have a dedicated physical server. You load these virtualization products or these hypervisors on that server and then you consolidate as many physical servers as virtual machines onto those virtual hosts using the type 1 hypervisor that's because you're going to get the best performance with those type 1 hypervisors.On the other hand, Type 2 hypervisors are still very useful because if you just want to run a couple of virtual machines lets say on your laptop or your desktop PC the type 2 hypervisor is the way to go. You could run in exchange for a machine or a web server or a Linux experts machine inside Windows using these type 2 hypervisors so there's tremendous benefits in the type 2 hypervisor. But it's meant for a desktop or a laptop system that already has an operating system, you already have applications may be your email your web browsing, your Microsoft Office applications. They can all be loaded along with the type 2 hypervisor that's going to give you access to run more virtual machines.

4. Challenges responsible for Growth of VirtualizationOn average, applications use a modest percentage of computing resources available to it on the host machine. The table below gives resource consumption for a set of common applications

Table 1: Resource Utilization with some common set of Applications

Thus there are a variety of challenges in the IT environment today that give rise to the virtualization technology.

Figure 4: Issues with IT environment

A. Low Infrastructure UtilizationTypical x86 server deployments achieve an average utilization of only 10% to 15% of total capacity. Organizations do this to avoid any risk arising out of simultaneous running of contradicting apps on single system. However, this leads to wastage of lots of computing power and thus leads to requirement of more servers.

B. Increasing Physical Infrastructure CostsThe operational expenditure to support growing physical infrastructure have steadily increased. This has given impetus to the concept of BYOD i.e. Bring your own device. To enable business continuity on all such devices is only adding up to the already increasing costs.

C. Increasing IT management CostsMore infrastructure means more support staff to carry on manual tasks associated with server maintenance. Hiring costs and salaries also add up to the bill. D. Insufficient Failover and Disaster ProtectionBusiness critical applications cant afford to be down. Each downtime costs company thousands of dollars in revenue and probable loss of clients. These downtimes are increasing with the rise in security attacks and terrorism.

E. High Maintenance End-User DesktopsOverseeing and securing enterprise desktops present various difficulties. Controlling a distributed desktop environment and authorizing administration, access and security approaches without impeding clients' capacity to work viably is mind boggling and lavish.

5. Classification of VirtualizationFigure 5: Types of VirtualizationVirtualizationServer VirtualizationApplication VirtualizationResource VirtualizationDesktop Virtualization

A. Server VirtualizationIt is the most common type of virtualization. In this type, we create virtual servers over a single physical host server using hypervisor software to optimize computing power of the physical server and reduce wastage.

B. Desktop VirtualizationThe remote manipulation of a computer desktop is called desktop virtualization. For example, here you can see three racks of servers. On top of these servers, you load VMware vSphere as a hypervisor. Then on one of the server, you load VMware View Manager. This acts as a connection broker where all kind of devices connect. End users connect to their virtual machines using the view manager.

Figure 6: Desktop VirtualizationDrivers for desktop virtualization

Source: Entperprise and SMB Hardware Survey, North America and Europe, Forrester Research

C. Resource VirtualizationThe virtualization of system resources is known as resource virtualization. Storage Virtualization: pooling of multiple physical storage resources into a single storage resource that is centrally managed. Storage virtualization is commonly used in file systems, storage area networks (SANs), switches and virtual tape systems. Users can implement storage virtualization with software, hybrid hardware or software appliances. Network Virtualization: process of combining hardware and software network resources and network functionality into a single, software-based administrative entity, a virtual network.

D. Application VirtualizationThe hosting of individual application on alien hardware/software is called application virtualization. For example, a program like Microsoft Word executes on a server located in the data center, but the graphical output is displayed on a remote client device. The end-user is able to interact with it via keyboard and mouse. Types include: Portable application Cross-platform virtualization Emulation or Simulation

6. Industry Players Gartner magic quadrant is a tool for understanding the relative position of various market players in an industry. Companies are measured on two broad capabilities i.e ability to execute and completeness of vision and accordingly they are classified under four categories namely:

Figure 7: Gartner Magic QuadrantFrom the magic quadrant it is quite clear that Challengers: These players have ability to execute but lack on completeness of vision parameter. Oracle with its application driven virtualization falls into challengers category. Oracle products have high degree of reliability, high availability/disaster recovery feature and support to openstack.

Leaders: They have perfect strategy and roadmap of their product offering, they also have clear formulation high growth technologies such as cloud (private/hybrid/public). VMware and Microsoft are clear market leaders, scoring very highly on parameters such as viability, pricing, customer experience and operation. VMware in 2013 introduced vSphere 5.5, virtual SAN, storage VMotion, Server Caching etc. with increased focus on end user computing. Microsoft with its enhance version of Hyper-V has grown by manifolds in virtualization space. Microsoft has a very advantageous position as it can be released as a package with Windows server 2012.

Visionaries: These players typically have differentiated approach or technological prowess but lack in execution front. In virtualization industry, none of the company falls into this category.

Niche Players: These players have focused on very specific product niches and have not capitalized on their entire market yet. Parallels, Citrix, Red Hat and Huawei fall under this category. Red Hat is used in Linux cluster and open stack implementations, Parallels is used in high-density deployments, Citrix with Xen server and Huawei are used in desktop virtualization.7. Managerial ImplicationsThis research was done in the college laboratory consisting of 20 computers. The computers were having only one OS installed in them earlier. Using virtualization techniques, 3-4 OS were installed on each of them. A study was made on the condensed picture of processor performance of each computer and then the average picture was made from the data available which is shown in the Figure 3 below.Figure 8: Condensed Image of Processor ManagerAfter VMwareBefore VMware

As it is visible here, that the performance of processor manager increases and thus the machines become more efficient. This clearly proves that virtualization results in better performance and efficiency.Likewise, heres a data which shows the cost impact of virtualization on one of VMwares clients.

Thus, broadly we have following benefits of virtualization:a. Cost Efficiency: Lower hardware spending due to accelerated server consolidation and increased server utilization rates.

b. Scalability/Agility: Lesser dependence on hardware and quick response to changing customer demand enables enterprise to be more agile and scale up the business.

c. Business Continuity: Easier software migration leading to better disaster recovery mechanisms, thus keeping business online 24X7

d. High Availability: Like above point, better disaster recovery mechanisms provide lesser downtime and hence high availability to serve customers

e. Security: Centralized and consolidated control gives access to version updates/patches from the centralized system only, thus keeping all systems up to date and less prone to security threats.However, there are a number of risks that companies have to mitigate while they try to achieve above benefits by using virtualization. For example, as per a report Key Trends in Software Pricing & Licensing Survey 2013-14, 85% of organizations were found to be out of compliance with their software license agreements due to use of the software in virtualized environments. Below infographic gives a concise picture of the problem. Figure 9: Virtualization Software License issue

There is also an increasing risk of security that is associated with virtualization much like cloud computing. There is a loss of network visibility inside the virtualization systems. Classical network tools can't regulate the traffic between guests. This makes it difficult for network security teams to comprehensively monitor for malicious or inappropriate traffic flows. To improve security in virtualized environments, following recommendations should be implemented by organizations: Up-to-date hypervisors to mitigate security threats. Even bare metal hypervisors require physical security.

Maintain security for each component, from hypervisor and host OS to guest OS, storage and applications.

Restrict and protect administrator access to the virtualization solution

Carefully plan security for a virtualization solution before installing, configuring and deploying it

8. Virtualization Software Offerings

Figure 10: Virtualization software offerings

9. Referencesi. VMware. Capacity Planner.http://www.vmware.com/products/capacity-planner/ii. http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/partners/academic/vmware-academic-isca126-soundararajan-wp.pdfiii. 2013-14 Key Trends in Software Pricing & Licensing Survey: http://resources.flexerasoftware.com/iv. http://fcw.com/microsites/2011/data-center-optimization/agencies-address-security-concerns.aspxv. F. Hao, T.V. Lakshman "Enhancing Dynamic Cloud-based Services Using Network Virtualizationvi. Dr. Rao Mikkilineni & Vijay Sarathy, Cloud Computing and Lessons from the Past, Kawa Objects, Inc.vii. Virtualization: From the Desktop to the Enterprise, Chris Wolf, Erick M. Halter.viii. http://www.virtualizationadmin.comix. http://www.virtualization.orgx. Norbert Skubch, Roland Klausnitzer (2012). Trends in Virtualization and their Implications