latoga labs

With loads of rhetorical flying around the internet on cloud computing these days it’s refreshing when clients start showing the “that just makes sense” sign. A few days back I was visiting a client discussing desktop virtualization, this particular client was a member of the desktop team at his company. Desktop virtualization discussions always migrate into the sacred territory of the data center. While discussing the data center components of desktop virtualization, this desktop architect had his “that just makes sense” moment.

While talking about the ESX hosts and the server VMs compared to the desktop VMs, the realization occured that it doesn’t matter what machine you run the VMs on:

“…in theory desktop VMs and server VMs could run on the same physical server.  All those server resources are just there to run a work load, regardless of what the workload is…”

This is where I leaned back in my chair, smiled and said “That’s cloud computing”.

What was glorious about this moment is that here was a desktop architect realizing the power of an internal cloud back in the data center.  Seeing a sign like this tells me that my next 6 months is going to be very busy indeed.

I’ve been discussing destkop virtualization a lot lately with customers, so when I can across this Dilbert cartoon it brough the paradigm shift caused by virtualized desktops to the forefront.  (More desktop virtualization discussion in the future…once I find the time to write again…)

I heard an interesting rumor this week that Microsoft is planning on updating their licensing model in the near future for Microsoft Office to introduce a virtualization version. The way it was described to me is that if you want to migrate your physical desktops to virtual desktops and run Microsoft Office on them, you will need to purchase a special Office Virtualized Edition.

What I haven’t heard is if this will be an additional license fee for Office or not (the way it was described to me made it sound like it was an additional cost to upgrade your current office to run it on a virtualized desktop).

(Note: I’ve pinged numerous contacts familiar with Microsoft licensing and no one else has heard this…)

Since I am in discussions with a number of my clients about desktop virtualization, I’ve gotten some exposure to the ins and outs of Microsoft licensing.  I know that many large enterprises have been pushing Microsoft for a per user licensing model for software applications, and this could very well be just that.  Or is this a sign that Microsoft is concerned that virtual desktops could cut into their profit margins and they are taking a proactive stance to prevent that?

After all, if I have 6000 call center workers spread out around the world in three different time zones and they all need to have MS office on their desktop, today I have to pay Microsoft for 6000 Office licenses.  With virtual desktops I can run 2000 virtual desktops in a data center that all my call center workers access and only have to pay for 2000 Microsoft Office licenses (as one center shuts down another center spins up and re-uses the same virtual desktop).

Microsoft isn’t going to sit by and lose all that revenue.  So hearing about this doesn’t surprise me.  It also won’t surprise me if Microsoft ends up charging more for the Virtualized Edition.  Which leads one to wonder if this is truely a new licensing version or just a virtualization penalty?  Time will tell…

I have been doing quite a bit of work lately on Desktop Virtualization, obviously with VMware View.  As a number of analysts and non-analysts had predicted, 2009 is definitely the year that desktop virtualization is taking off.  Partially because of the technology has reach a level of maturity where it is usable for most use cases and partially driven by the cost savings potential that it can provide.  As I have indicated in previous posts, there are real conversations happening within corporate desktop IT discussing getting rid of corporate owned laptops or desktops all together.

While reading Chris Wolf’s descriptiong of the demo he saw of PCoIP at VMworld in Europe, it struck me that the sizing metrics used to describe dekstop virtualization tend to vary.  Chris mentioned in his post:

“…with a virtual desktop consolidation density ranging from 30-60 VMs (densities commonly found by our clients piloting or running VDI today).”

While there are times when we need to simplify measurements to keep complexity in check, it can be misleading to talk about virtualization densities without mentioning the units for that density.  I’m assuming that Chris was referring to VMs per Server, that would make sense given the number.

I would have to argue that this is the wrong unit to use for desktop virtualization, the proper unit that should be used for desktop virtualization density is VMs per Core. As the number of Core’s per CPU socket keep increasing and as the size of servers, measured in number of sockets, keep increasing in the data center we should be measuring virtualization density in VMs per Core.   This is the best metric to guage technology advancements against.

When talking with my customers about VMware View deployments, we are always talking about the density in VMs per Core and cost of solution per desktop for a given use case (common population).  The cost can be impacted by playing around with how you package those cores in the data center. As long as the server can contain as much memory as needed by the total number of VMs your golden.  And the memory limitations won’t be as great of a limitation for much longer.

The use case is the other key aspect.  When looking at a desktop virtualization solution, I have found that you need to keep the solution contained to a single use case which describes a single virtual desktop size.  Call center desktops have their own unique size (hard drive space, memory, and hard drive usage) while a knowledge worker desktop has a different unique size.  Each use case’s different size will impact the costs and ROI/TCO model.

So, when analyzing virtual desktop solutions, keep in mind your sizing metrics and keep your use case scopes focused.  Like any solution, desktop virtualization should be taken in bites and these two suggestions will help keep in that task.