Virtualization

Want your life encapsulated on a virtual machine that travels from phone to phone? Sounds good to BlackBerry and iPhone users. Get ready IT departments: Virtualization's going mobile.

You can explain cloud computing to the CFO in terms he'll get, like "pay as you drink". But beware: What the CFO may like best about cloud is the ability to grab power back from IT.

The revolutionary aspects of Azure have barely been touched on by all the commentary about the new cloud computing offering.

Virtualization and cloud computing lead Gartner's Top 10 list of strategic technologies for 2009. But as for a client virtualization, make sure you understand the whole picture.

Cloud computing has reached the silly season for hype, but look closer: some companies are already cashing in on its power to revolutionize the way IT deals with infrastructure.

The next generation of VMware products, whether they're called VI4 or VDC-OS, will make integration of security, storage, networking and other disciplines easier. Waiting until then to train the people responsible for that integration is just asking for trouble, or delays or both.

Cloud omputing experts, including VMware co-founder Mendel Rosenblum, say virtualization will become mainly an underpinning to cloud computing. So why aren't VMware and Microsoft making it easier to mix and match virtualization products in a way that's absolutely necessary in the cloud?

Abetted by ThinApps, VMware vApps may make application management and provisioning a lot easier, but will require even more attention to security in depth, real-time monitoring and auditing after an incident.

Microsoft's recent marketing shenanigans have been entertaining, but now it's time to go back, fix licensing issues, get products to work together and quit wasting customer time on childish stunts, even if they're funny.

While much is still unclear about VMware's vision of the future, the company painted a more complete picture of the VMsafe program at last week's VMworld show, adding detail about how third-party security tools will work with VMware's security APIs.