Virtualization is definitely at the forefront of consideration for implementation in many IT organizations. The benefits touted include partitioning, server consolidation, server containment, agility of resource planning and optimization, to note a few. My experience suggests the adoption of virtualization ranges from small business with 2-3 servers to multi-sited conglomerates with thousands of servers and desktops, and the industry vertical is as diverse as the size of the data centre. Also I might note a VM (virtual machine) is production worthy! I have worked with many an enterprise class, mission critical application running in a virtual environment and with great success.

Recognize a virtualization candidate As senior managers we are ever so cognizant of the increasing demand on operations regardless of size of our company. So how do we know if our IT organization is a candidate for virtualization technology?

Some basic questions would be:

• What are my growth projections over the next few years? Do I have space constraints? Is this an opportunity for consolidation?
• What of the growing costs of IT operations? What pressure am I under to contain hardware costs? Are infrastructure costs prohibiting growth? Is this an opportunity for server containment?
• Are resource costs and ability to manage application deployments and upgrades efficiently a challenge for my IT organization?
• What of business continuity- are there demands for disaster recovery?
• Do we have storage (SAN) requirements now – if not when will we?
• Are the test/dev demands growing?
• With strong management tools now available, there is also a sense to migrate from UNIX systems to x86, as virtualization adds stability and functionality to the x86 server. Is this a viable option?

• The rising costs of maintaining PCs
• Security demands
• The ever increasing number of PC configurations and system images and the issues around the growth of the distributed workforce and providing access and support.

Oh yes, another benefit to hit the rationalization of late is the “green” initiative. With fewer machines, less AC and of course more electricity savings!

What is the next step?

I do believe most system administrators are somewhat aware of the principal of virtualization and could generate a list of ideas for potential deployment. Effective training of a few resources is critical to the success of the project and is always a worthy investment. Include Linux skills in the education process.

In parallel strategic planning is critical and productive, and should be the greater aspect of your investment. I have witnessed an adoptive approach to virtualization that takes one physical machine and or a composite set of machines to evaluate and hence migrate to a virtual machine (VM) or machines. This can be executed on a gradual basis. Remember to assess your architectural considerations, such as memory, bandwidth and CPU capacity as well include storage, network and security infrastructures in your planning. There are best practices, and many knowledgeable support groups to help guide you.

Most importantly, the ROI has been noted to be very aggressive and typically realized in a six-month timeframe. Ron McGrath, CIO at Rogers Communications, speaking at the Communitech CIO conference in February, expounded on the impressive benefits Rogers has experienced in this process.

Virtualization is a fairly intuitive technology and I do believe it will be come a defacto standard within any IT organization, given careful planning.