Links List 10.23.09

October 26th, 2009 by Valerie Barber

Another reason to virtualize – if you haven’t already. A recent study shows that the total cost of millions of under-utilized servers that do little more than waste energy is $24.7 billion a year. The total cost of unused servers includes hardware, maintenance, management, energy and cooling. Other findings:

• 4.75 million servers worldwide are running without being actively used daily
• 75% of server managers said at least 15% of servers do nothing useful
• 82% admitted they don’t have an adequate grasp of server utilization
• 72% rely on CPU utilization to measure server efficiency

“The problem with CPU utilization is that a server could be busy doing its housekeeping tasks, such as its own antivirus scans, its own backups, its own indexing and defragmenting of hard disks. It will look busy, but it’s not actually adding any business value.”

Sumir Karayi, CEO of 1E

Cloud computing was number 1 on the annual Gartner list of top strategic technologies. Other technologies on the list include “Client computing” which is being reshaped by virtualization, cloud and new models for accessing business applications; Green IT, reshaping the data center and “Virtualization for availability” (as in VMware’s VMotion and Microsoft’s Live Migration for high availability)

For the cloud to be a realistic long-term option, cloud costs need to come down significantly, according to IDC analyst Matthew McCormack. He warns that within three years, cloud costs exceed the costs of running your own cloud. He advises businesses to look at their capital and operational costs over the last five years and take a long-term view before moving to the cloud.

 “It could be useful in the short term financially for companies with sever cost overruns. Your data center would have to be really poorly run for it to be more expensive than cloud in the long run.”

Note – at the recent VMworld conference, Julia attended a panel on cloud computing case studies. The most interesting thing from the panel – not one of them mentioned cost savings as a reason to move to the cloud. These companies found the convenience, DR/HA, leveraging of expert resources and the ability to ramp up and down with ease (pay only for what you use) to be most important factors in using cloud computing providers.

Even though IPv6 has been mandated for the federal government, Gartner analysts believe the move to IPv6 isn’t working out. With everything else to invest in – unified communications, virtualization, VoIP and workforce mobility – and the effects of operating in an economic recession, IPv6 is a low priority.

A new report by TechAmerica predicts that IT spending by civilian agencies will slow to 3.4% annually over the next five years, down from the 8.3% between 2005 and 2010. The Departments of Health and Human Services, Justice and Treasury will see great increases in IT budgets, while the Department of Commerce is expected to see the largest decline. Even with lower budgets, agencies will be under pressure to continue to meet White House objectives for improved services, data transparency, cyber security and move toward virtualization and cloud computing.

Richard Stallman, a developer and prominent activist for free software, wrote a letter to the European Commission for Competition urging them to require Oracle to divest MySQL, writing:

“If Oracle is allowed to acquire MySQL, it will predictably limit the development of the functionality and performance of the MySQL software platform, leading to profound harm to those who use MySQL software to power applications…We recognize that Oracle’s acquisition of Sun may be essential for Sun’s survival. However, Oracle should not be allowed to harm consumer interests in the database market by weakening the competition provided by MySQL.”

You’ve probably seen all of the dogs dressed up and of course the kids are cute, but here’s a truly transformative Halloween costume.

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