Endpoint & Application Virtualization

While mobile first design points at a progress, it can also drive business application design in the wrong direction.

This video captures the state of server virtualization and the impact it is having in adjacent IT initiatives. I also step through desktop virtualization, network virtualization, and storage virtualization and the potential economic impact these strategies have on the business.

Virtualizing Tier-1 Application Workloads with Confidence

This ESG Lab report documents the results of independent, hands-on testing of Exchange Server 2013 and Microsoft Windows Server 2012 with improved Hyper-V virtualization. Testing was focused on the performance scalability of Exchange Server 2013 in a Hyper-V virtualized environment, as well as the ease of deployment and manageability.

It’s challenging to absorb everything Microsoft at the cadence they would like IT pros to keep pace with, but here are four areas to pay close attention to: Cloud OS, Azure, storage, and Configuration Manager. Microsoft Management Summit was an excellent event for those who attended, now Microsoft needs to crank up the volume for the world to hear. Too many IT pros keep saying “I didn’t know Microsoft did that!?!?!”

A Simple, Fast, and Affordable VDI Solution from VMware and Tintri

This report documents the results of ESG Lab’s hands-on testing of VMware Horizon View 5.1 with the Tintri VMstore platform. Testing focused on performance in the context of the end-user experience in a 1,000 seat virtual desktop environment. In addition, the ease of deployment, manageability, and cost-effectiveness of the Tintri solution in VMware environments were also examined.

Oracle Database Appliance blossoms into more than just a database appliance with ODA X3-2

Several barriers have delayed IT’s progress in migrating to cloud computing environments. One of the biggest barriers is application migration. This is a major barrier because IT may no longer have all the information needed to migrate applications. Migration might also be a barrier due to the complexity associated with performing a successful migration. Application migration requires detailed knowledge of all the moving parts in an application, its dependencies, and its behavior with regard to usage and workloads. What if a service could automatically solve most of these problems and move an application to the cloud in minutes? Enter AppZero, which solves the challenge of migrating to the cloud.

In order to better gauge current usage of, interest in, and familiarity with desktop virtualization technology, ESG surveyed North American IT decision-makers responsible for overseeing their organizations’ desktop and mobile computing strategies.

In order to assess IT spending priorities over the next 12-18 months, ESG recently surveyed 540 IT professionals representing midmarket (100 to 999 employees) and enterprise-class (1,000 employees or more) organizations in North America and Western Europe. All respondents were personally responsible for or familiar with their organizations’ 2012 IT spending as well as their 2013 IT budget and spending plans at either an entire organization level or at a business unit/division/branch level.

If we all fundamentally believe that data is the reason for IT—and what pearls of wisdom we can glean from it (along with what riches, both literally and metaphorically we can take from it), then where we differ is how we act in our "worship" of said data. And in that respect, we can differ wildly. (Sound familiar?)

VDI is one of many different application delivery models. A comprehensive desktop and application delivery strategy must include a variety of delivery models that can span a wide variety of end-users and device types. Companies that pigeonhole themselves into a single delivery model risk being able to take advantage of the vast array of benefits desktop virtualization has to offer.

One reason organizations sign up for an online file sharing (OFS) service is to extend their storage capacity by moving files to the cloud. Some organizations opt for a hybrid cloud deployment, placing a portion of the organization’s files in the OFS provider’s cloud platform, but keeping other files and infrastructure components in their own data center. A handful of OFS providers support a hybrid cloud approach. This brief examines the pros and cons of a public cloud versus a hybrid cloud model for online file sharing.

Free cloud storage services are the latest thorn in the collective side of IT departments. Employees are signing up for individual online file sharing and collaboration (OFS) accounts with cloud storage providers and using them for online storage and file sharing of company files. This places company data outside the control of IT and, subsequently, exposes organizations to the risk of data leakage and data breaches. ESG surveyed IT professionals to find out about the steps organizations are taking to uncover and control rogue OFS accounts. 

VMworld continues to be a fantastic industry trade show, and it acts as a central rallying point for the IT community. Many of the attendees share that VMworld is the only event they are able to attend during the year, and they tend to use the time wisely by attending sessions, going to popular hands-on labs, and browsing the expo floor.

Licensing, partnering, customer loyalty....can VMware maintain momentum and advance its customer base?

Citrix VDI-in-a-Box simplifies deployment and streamlines time to value.

Dell's software capabilities deserve more attention than what the company is producing on the hardware ends of the wire.

Microsoft Windows 8 is entering the market at an exciting time and looking to rally the developer community.