Digital Walkabout

Flttr - an #inspired look at "the next big thing" in social networking ;)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BeLZCy-_m3s&feature=email - a wry look at social compute/networking, lazy microblogging, and the effect greater levels of connectivity have on our collective attention span. The implications on privacy had me in stitches. ;)

The Googlephone is coming

http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/personal_tech/article6924233.ece

Google is gearing up for an all-out assault on the mobile-phone market that will include a new, Google-branded handset and the first comprehensive Google phone service with unlimited free calls. Now, a single company will control everything from the software in users’ phones to the services they use to make calls and surf the web.

Rumours suggest the Google-branded phone will be built by a third-party supplier, possibly HTC, and will incorporate a Qualcomm processor.

Googlephone will leverage Google Voice, which gives US users a free phone number and allows unlimited free calls to any phone in the country — landline or mobile. International calls start from a couple of cents (just over a penny) a minute. Google Voice also uses voice recognition to turn voicemails into emails, can block telemarketing calls automatically and offers free text messaging.

Google sounded its intentions two weeks ago when it purchased a small company called Gizmo5, which had developed technology to connect Google Voice with voice-over-internet (Voip) networks such as Skype. Now Google has the means to offer a complete, end-to-end phone service, with which consumers can make and receive calls between the Googlephone and other phones or computers anywhere in the world, and often for nothing.

The First Full-Function, Cloud-Based Desktop as a Service

http://govcloud.ulitzer.com/node/1197776

Sun Microsystems today announced the availability of a new cloud-based Desktop as a Service for educational institutions. Sun and Ashbourne Technology Group are now offering a secure, cost-effective computing solution delivered anytime, anywhere via the Internet that provides a rich, virtual desktop experience for all leading Operating Systems, including Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, Linux and Solaris to nearly any client device, including Sun Ray thin clients and other platforms with Java-based browsers.

Chrome OS - Google's push to drive the desktop into the Cloud

Google released details about Chrome OS, the company’s  Cloud operating system due in 2010. As a Cloud OS, Chrome OS aims to eliminate the traditional desktop platform, and get users on the web quickly and efficiently.

The primary questions that emerge from the development of Chrome OS include:

• What is Google’s eventual goal with it?
• How will it affect Microsoft?
• What impact will it have?

These are driven by the Google Business Model: Revenue = Amount of Time on the Web. It is easy to understand in this framework what Google sees in creating an OS based entirely off the browser/runtime (after all, Chrome itself is more than a traditional browser; more on that here). The more time we spend browsing the web, the more money Google makes. It’s that simple. Thus, Google’s primary goal is to get us on the web more - which is what Chrome OS does: its interface is 100% web, thus you are always browsing if you’re using Chrome OS. Every app is a web app. Plus, Chrome OS loads in seconds, getting you on the web faster.

In order for Google to accomplish its goal of getting users onto the web more, it had to eliminate time sinks and anything that distracts someone from surfing the web on the computer.

Google is looking to launch on netbooks next year, yet hopes to have a strong presence on notebooks and desktops everywhere within the next five to seven years, along with that the influence of Chrome OS is powerful enough to push all future operating systems to be more web-centric.

Microsoft is greatest obstacle standing in the way of a web-centric computing experience. The two have been locked in battle for years, but Google is now reaching into territory that the technology behemoth has dominated for decades.

Here’s the rub: Microsoft is well aware of the Google business model, and how Chrome OS and its price point (free) aren’t in its best interests. Thus, Microsoft won’t play to Google’s game, leaving Google with the option to hollow out, or fundamentally alter, Windows. This would be equivalent to eviscerating Microsoft, and leaving it to wither away into oblivion. Thus, Google is setting the stage for is biggest battle with Microsoft yet. The result of its Chrome OS bet will directly affect the fate of computing, the operating system, and the web.

Google’s intent is nothing short of a paradigm shift, one where the web is synonymous with the computer. It’s a process that will take years, yet Google is patient and cant wait for the Internet to become more accessible (and for WiMAX to provide access in almost any location). The Chrome browser/runtime had been a significant push for a web-centric world - taking the browser beyond the sandbox, HTML and the dot.com world - yet Chrome OS is far more ambitious.

Google cares more about the browser/runtime becoming the OS, than about Chrome OS being the choice of the devices of the world. When companies and people adopt its standards, Google wins. It’s the same philosophy behind Google Wave: provide a free, open-source software and focus on changing how we think of communication. In the case of Chrome OS, the focus is on changing what we expect when we start up a computer.

These are early days, and we will have to wait to see if Google will succeed in its ambitious plan. However, it has a track record that cannot be ignored, and Google has already been instrumental towards society’s embrace of the web. Prepare for the next era of the web, sparked by the fundamental philsophies behind Google Chrome OS.

AT&T Unveils Network-Based 'On Demand' Computing for Companies of All Sizes

http://vmblog.com/archive/2009/11/16/at-t-unveils-network-based-on-demand-computing-for-companies-of-all-sizes.aspx

AT&T Unveils Network-Based 'On Demand' Computing for Companies of All Sizes

AT&T today announced AT&T Synaptic Compute as a Service(SM), its latest innovative global cloud-based service, designed to give companies of all sizes simple on-demand access to scalable computing capacity.

Using technology from VMware and Sun Microsystems, AT&T's Synaptic Compute as a Service provides companies with a self-service approach for using IT solutions that are reliably delivered by AT&T over its highly-secure world-class network cloud.

Customers can use the service to quickly address demands for variable computing processing power and expand capacity to scale with their business requirements. In turn, AT&T delivers computing processing capacity that can scale to meet a business's immediate demand, along with management of the network, server, hardware and storage.

"As companies increasingly move to cloud-based environments, AT&T Synaptic Compute as a Service provides a much-needed choice for IT executives who worry about over-building or under-investing in the capacity needed to handle their users' traffic demands," said Roman Pacewicz, senior vice president of Strategy and Application Services, AT&T Business Solutions.

"AT&T is enabling customers to extend their internal IT environments to the cloud by using their unique strengths in global network capabilities to offer cloud services that are compatible with customers' private VMware environments," said Paul Maritz, president and chief executive officer, VMware. "We are excited to contribute our technology to enable this and to work with AT&T in our VMware vCloud(TM) initiative that is focused on integrating and connecting private and public clouds, using the VMware vSphere(TM) virtualization platform and the VMware vCloud API."

AT&T is also working closely with Sun to use the Sun Cloud Open Cloud Platform, Sun Cloud APIs, cloud reference architecture and design expertise to create an environment to make it easy for developers to build and deploy value-added services.

"Sun is committed to helping our customers and partners deliver public and private clouds that are cost effective, open and interoperable," said Dave Douglas, senior vice president, Cloud Computing, Sun Microsystems. "AT&T's network and operational excellence coupled with Sun's Open Cloud Platform and Sun Cloud APIs delivers a revolutionary cloud offering. We're excited to be working with AT&T to bring an enterprise-class, highly scalable offering that delivers choice and flexibility to market."

AT&T will introduce the service in the fourth quarter of 2009. The service will be deployed in the U.S. and will be accessible by customers connecting to the Web anywhere. In time, AT&T plans to add the service to select global IDCs to meet customer demand internationally.

Other service features:

• A Web portal to order, provision and manage server capacity, or to program the APIs.
• The convenience to pay only for the capacity used and receive a monthly bill that can, if desired, be paid with a credit card.
• Multiple storage options including disk capacity for each virtual server's operating system and space to share files between virtual servers, as well as the ability to connect to AT&T Synaptic Storage as a Service.
• Round-the-clock monitoring of the Synaptic Compute as a Service platform by AT&T support teams.
• A service level agreement that covers availability of the platform that runs the customer's virtual servers.
• No upfront fees, no long-term obligations and no termination fees.

AT&T Synaptic Compute as a Service is the latest addition to the AT&T family of Synaptic Services to be delivered in little more than a year. AT&T's Synaptic portfolio is part of its umbrella strategy to drive innovation across enterprise networking and computing environments through hybrid public and private cloud platforms. The AT&T network is the lynchpin for integrating these technologies, and delivering enterprise class network-based security and application management capabilities. In addition, AT&T believes its "infrastructure as a service" platform over time will accelerate the deployment of applications generated by developers working within the AT&T network cloud.

By unifying -- also known as "federating" -- with the AT&T service, customers will be able to seamlessly manage all their IT resources across the enterprise and develop applications all from one location and move application workloads where and when they are needed. Customers will be able to handle their business needs all in the same way whether they will be running internally in their own datacenter or in AT&T's cloud.

With AT&T Synaptic Compute as a Service, customers can program their application to routinely expand capacity during a block of days each month to handle their firm's book closing. Transportation firms can increase computing power daily for processing driver schedules, route changes and other logistics. Companies can program the service to respond to spikes in Web traffic from holiday sales or events, sports programs, short-term campaigns, emergencies and more. Also, IT architects can use the service to build environments for safely testing new applications, or installing system upgrades without impacting the entire enterprise.

For more information on AT&T Synaptic Compute as a Service go to http://www.synaptic.att.com.

AT&T offers cloud-based computing capacity

AT&T upped its cloud portfolio Monday when announced it was working with VMware and Sun to develop its own cloud computing service.' Much like other cloud computing offerings, AT&T's Synaptic Compute as a Service aims to give users scalable on-demand computing capacity that they can increase or decrease depending on their immediate needs and without the need to invest heavily in on-site infrastructure. The service's key features include a Web portal for ordering and managing service capacity; disk capacity for every virtual server's operating system; and 24-hour network monitoring and management by AT&T's support staff.

The 2009 Handbook of Application Delivery: Download now

The service utilizes VMware's vSphere virtualization platform and its vCloud API to help AT&T connect and integrate its own cloud with the public Web. AT&T also says that it is also using Sun's hardware software and reference architecture to "create an environment to make it easy for developers to build and deploy value-added services." Sun, along with IBM, was one of the first companies to offer a computing-on-demand service that treated computing power more like a utility and that was a precursor to today's cloud-based offerings. AT&T's cloud computing service is the second cloud-based offering the company has launched this year. This past May the company kicked off its first cloud-based storage system that allows enterprises to store data in the AT&T cloud rather than making capital investments in their own storage capacity.

Cloud computing services use Internet technologies to deliver IT-related capabilities directly to users. As a recent Network World FAQ noted, cloud computing is "an approach to building IT services that harnesses the rapidly increasing horsepower of servers as well as virtualization technologies that combine many servers into large computing pools and divide single servers into multiple virtual machines that can be spun up and powered down at will."

HP acquires 3Com, challenges Cisco

Hewlett-Packard reached an agreement to acquire 3Com, for $2.7 billion in a deal that will help improve H.P.’s business in China, expand its network gear business, and position it to challenge the market leader in networking, Cisco Systems.

Under chief executive Mark V. Hurd, Hewlett-Packard has been beefing up its network equipment offerings to compete more aggressively against Cisco to sell data-center gear to corporations. But so far, H.P. has mostly supplied smaller equipment used in office networks, both wired and wireless.

Per Ann Livermore, EVP at HP, they had been "missing networking for the core of the data center.... That’s where Cisco is strong, and before, HP couldn’t attack that.”

That move came shortly after Cisco linked up with EMC and VMware in a partnership which tightly integrates storage alongside easy-to-manage virtualized data-center bundles called V-Blocks.

The 3Com acquisition broadens the networking technology HP can fold into its data-center offerings. "Our extensive product line and innovative technology together with HP's breadth and scale will expand our global opportunity," said 3Com CEO Bob Mao.  

Red Hat releases Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor and Virtualization Manager for Servers

REVH (Redhat Enterprises Virtualization Hypervisor) is a stripped down version of RHEL 5.4, with the following characteristics (partial list):

   Support for Intel VT / EPT and AMD-V / RVI

   Support for up to 64 physical CPUs (up to 256 core)

   Support for up to 1TB physical RAM

   Support for up to 16 vCPUs

   Support for up to 64GB vRAM

   Support for memory overcommit (page sharing only, depending on Linux Kernel Same-page Merging)

   Support for physical NICs bonding and multipath I/O

   Support for NFS, iSCSI and Fibre Channel

   Support for RHEL (from 3 to 5) and Windows (2003, 2008 and XP) guest operating systems. 

For Windows guests Red Hat offers paravirtualized (network and block) drivers based on the VirtIO standard, which are certified by Microsoft thanks to the SVVP certification.

Red Hat reports that KVM can handle up to 600 virtual machines within a single host.

 

REVMS supports the following capabilities:

   Virtual machines live migration (across NFS, iSCSI and FC shared storage)

   Virtual machines high availability.

   Virtual machines dynamic resource management.

   Hosts maintenance mode (when the host is put in maintenance REVMS uses live migration to move virtual machines elsewhere)

   Hosts power management (the System Scheduler can use live migration to relocate the VMs on low activity hosts and power down the unnecessary servers)

   Virtual machines thin provisioning (the REVMS component called Image Manager allows to over commit storage

   Virtual machines snapshots (snapshots can be scheduled and used as recovery points)

   Virtual machines templates

   Role based access control and support for Microsoft Active Directory for the management console

   APIs 

 

More details are available here:

http://www.virtualization.info/2009/11/red-hat-releases-enterprise.html

Google Spanner

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/10/23/google_spanner/

Google’s massively global infrastructure now employs a proprietary system that automatically moves and replicates loads between its mega data centers when traffic and hardware issues arise.

The distributed technology was first hinted at — in classically coy Google fashion — during a conference this summer, and Google fellow Jeff Dean has now confirmed its existence in a presentation (PDF) delivered at a symposium earlier this month.

The platform is known as Spanner. Dean’s presentation calls it a “storage and computation system that spans all our data centers [and that] automatically moves and adds replicas of data and computation based on constraints and usage patterns.” This includes constraints related to bandwidth, packet loss, power, resources, and “failure modes”.

Dean speaks of an “automated allocation of resources across [Google’s] entire fleet of machines” — and that's quite a fleet. Google now has at least 36 data centers across the globe — though a handful may still be under construction. And as Data Center Knowledge recently noticed, the goal is to span a far larger fleet.

According to Dean’s presentation, Google is intent on scaling Spanner to between one million and 10 million servers, encompassing 10 trillion (10¹³) directories and a quintillion (10¹⁸) bytes of storage. And all this would be spread across “100s to 1000s” of locations around the world.

“What we are building here...is warehouse-sized compute platforms,” Gill said. “You have to have integration with everything right from the chillers down all the way to the CPU.

Hybrid Clouds emerge - Unisys

http://www.infoworld.com/d/cloud-computing/unisys-unveils-software-running-private-clouds-442?source=IFWNLE_nlt_daily_2009-11-02

Unisys announced Monday software and services that will enable organizations to deploy and run their own internal private clouds, as part of its strategy to offer customers a variety of cloud computing options.

The private cloud offering addresses the requirement of organizations that prefer a private cloud for mission-critical applications that use sensitive data, so they can retain greater control over their own and their customers' information, Rich Marcello, president for Consulting and Integration Solutions at Unisys Technology, said in a telephone interview on Thursday.

In a poll of customers conducted in June by the company, 72 percent said security was their biggest concern about moving workloads to the cloud. Although there is no technical reason for this, some customers are still not convinced that an external cloud is reliable or robust, and are likely to move in stages, Marcello said.

The new Unisys Secure Private Could Solution, which will be available from next month, follows the company's introduction earlier this year of technology and services for a managed cloud service on shared IT infrastructure that is hosted by Unisys. The company also plans to launch next year a hybrid cloud that combines private and public cloud capabilities.

Customers will be able to run many of their applications unchanged in a private cloud, and Unisys is also offering these companies services to help move their workload into the cloud, Marcello said. Customers can also use their own hardware, or buy hardware from Unisys, he added.

Organizations of any size can set up their private clouds with an up front investment of $50,000 for the management server, software, and services, Marcello said. The software will include provisioning, virtualization, and management software that provides for features such as a self-service portal, he added. Ongoing maintenance will involve extra fees for hardware and software support and updates.

Unisys' Stealth technology, that cloaks data through multiple levels of authentication, encryption, and bit-splitting into multiple packets, is also available for private clouds though at an extra price, Marcello said. He did not however expect customers to deploy Stealth on private clouds, as they would have their own firewalls and other security mechanisms in place. Stealth is a key component of Unisys' managed cloud service.

Unisys has also announced that its managed cloud service will support new platforms including Microsoft's .Net, IBM Websphere, and Oracle software platforms from this month, so that customers can move their applications that were developed on these software stacks unchanged to the cloud. When the service was launched earlier this year it supported only Java, Marcello said.

The company has also added disaster recovery as a service for customers of its managed Secure Cloud Solution. This new service provides business continuity and disaster recovery services on a subscription basis, it added