How to wrangle your virtual machines

Source: Computerworld

Author: Robert L. Scheier

IT wants fewer, more comprehensive virtualization management tools. But for now, specialized vendors tackle different challenges.

Virtualization cuts hardware, power and real estate costs by combining multiple servers, networks and storage arrays into virtual pools. But for users like Pat O'Day, chief technology officer at hosting and managed services provider BlueLock LLC, managing those resource pools means wrestling with multiple applications.

"There's a backup console, the SAN has a console, antivirus has a console -- everything has its own console," says O'Day. Buying all of those applications and training staffers to use them is costly and makes it hard to tune a virtualized environment to meet changing needs.

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