Chuck's Blog

Top Ten Vblock Questions -- So Far!

So, I've been in front of lots of customers since the VCE Coalition announcement, and a lot of them focus primarily on the Vblock itself.

I thought I'd share the questions I'm getting -- and how I'm answering them.

Note: in addition to customer/partner focused questions, there's been a whole lot of snarky sniping from various competitors and others who may have a different agenda.  All part of the fun.  I'll try and cover their concerns later, but -- for now -- we'll focus on the people who pay the bills!

Is 2010 The Year Of Widespread Desktop Virtualization?

Many of think this could be the case.  It looks like a "perfect storm" cloud be shaping up in the industry to fundamentally change this piece of the IT landscape.

The thought is timely, given VMware's recent VMware View 4 announcement.  Check out the details from VMware here, or see Chad's excellent writeup here.

So, let's look at the enablers -- and the inhibitors -- and how they might play out in the very near future.

Getting To Good: Vblock + Acadia Customer Reaction

So, I now have been in front of 6 different senior IT audiences since Tuesday's announcement.

Note: this might give you a sense of how frequently I have the privilege of interacting with customers.

I've been able to present the case for VCE, focusing on Vblock and Acadia, and I"m starting to see a consistent pattern in the reaction -- at least so far.

Thought I'd share it with you, because I think we're going to see more of this going forward.

The VCE Coalition: Redrawing The Landscape

So, everyone has had a bit of time to digest yesterday's news.

And -- as expected -- there are those that are recognizing that the lines in our industry have been redrawn in a subtle but important way.

Put differently: there's a new "stack" to consider.

Behind The Vblock

 One of the most interesting parts of today’s VCE announcement is the Vblock – pre-integrated infrastructure for virtualization at scale.
 
Today, I thought I’d go behind the scenes, and interview one of the primary architects behind the Vblock – Jim Dowson (EMC Distinguished Engineer & CTO, Global Services).
 
I had the pleasure of hearing Jim and Phil Harris of Cisco (CTO, Strategic Alliances) present the Vblock in detail to one of our partners, and wanted to share some of their insights with you.

Introducing Acadia

There's a lot to talk about in today's VCE announcement, but one aspect that deserves closer inspection is Acadia, the joint professional services company being announced today.

The good news: there's a lot of good thinking that's gone into Acadia.  The challenge: if our competitors are going to take an unfair swipe at something, it's a likely target.

So, let's get started: what is it, why does it exist, how is it different, etc.?

In a word, it's all about enablement.

Introducing www.privatecloud.com

I wanted to let everyone know that one of the projects I've been working on is now available for your perusal.

Privatecloud.com is a joint effort between the VCE coalition to create a portal into the industry-wide private cloud discussion.  If you've been trying to follow all the different conversations, you know how hard it can be.

We've invested some editorial resources in assembling the best discussions and content, and putting it all in one place.

Yes, you'll see the collective views of EMC, Cisco and VMware on the topic, but you'll also get a healthy dose of alternative points of view as well.  I've written a number of pieces for the site, as have others.

And, just to set expectations, we're not going to attempt to be a tech-detail-heavy site (others cover those angles far better); instead, we're going to try and focus on how people are using the technology, rather than the technology itself.

If you've got a moment, please drop by www.privatecloud.com and let us know your thoughts.

Thanks!

Announcing The VCE Coalition

So, today's the big day -- I finally get to talk about something I've been working on for some time: the bringing together of three industry leaders to accelerate the transition to fully virtualized environments and private clouds.

Thankfully, I can stop being coy, and start to speak publicly about this important industry development: what it means for customers, and what it means for the industry.

There are so many interesting angles on this I'm sure I'll have no shortage of blog material for some time to come. 

And -- this being my blog -- I get the luxury of telling the story from my personal perspective.

Questions And Answers

Occasionally, I get pinged by a journalist to answer industry-level questions for specific publications. Sometimes the material gets used, sometimes it doesn't.

This time, I thought the questions were deep enough -- and broad enough -- that some of my readers might be interested in the dialog.

I've posted the questions I received through the email, as well as my personal take on what the responses might be.

Let me know if you'd like to see more of this sort of material, or not, as the case may be ...

Can You Trust Your Cloud?

The recent SideKick brouhaha has been an object lesson putting a sharp spotlight on this topic.

Much has been said on this topic, so I won't recap the obvious.  The online service had a really bad day. 

Much finger pointing, lessons all around.

However, as we debate various cloud models, a key aspect between public and private clouds has been highlighted here, and that's around notions of control, transparency and accountability.

Simply put, enterprise IT is always accountable for what happens -- whether it's in the data center, or in the cloud somewhere.