Well it's Friday and I'm wrapping up my week here in California, at the Almaden Research Center.The weather has been slightly milder than what we have back in Tucson.

This is my final installment of my 3-part series covering the IBM Systems Journal's [fifteen articles about IBM Service Management].You can go back and read the earlier parts of this series[Part 1,Part 2].

From a technology-oriented to a service-oriented approach to IT management

Companies are challenged with shifting from a technology/resource-oriented to a service-oriented approach to IT management. This involves new processes, a new reportingstructure for the IT staff, new tools and technologies, and new data to be captured.A top-down approach is recommended for large organizations, but a bottom-up approachmight be easier to implement for small and medium sized businesses.

IT service management architecture and autonomic computing

IBM has been promoting the concept of Autonomic Computing since 2001. A self-managed resource can have an autonomic manager with sensor and effector. The sensor is used to monitor status, a knowledge basecan analyze and plan for appropriate modifications, and execute these through theeffector. The Autonomic Computing Reference Architecture (ACRA) aligns with the Information Technology Service Management (ITSM) model well, with the CMDB acting asthe knowledge base for the autonomic managers. See my earlier post[Self tuning guitars and storage].

Evolving standards for IT service management

Changes to the IT infrastructure must be closely managed to avoid disruptions.IT organizations recognize that standards-based solutions enable interoperability,with less risk, to connect internal and external applications. Standards can be formally developed by standards bodies like ISO, IETF, W3C, OASIS, and DMTF; or be de facto standards that become widely used by companies, which can then laterbe adopted by standards bodies. SML and SDD are emerging standards that are incompatible with the current set of Web Services-based protocols, like WSDM, but work isunderway to try to determine a unifying standard to support all of these under ITSM.

Prospects for simplifying ITSM-based management through self-managing resources

An ideal computing system would take over a great deal of its own management.Today's IT systems are brittle, difficult to understand, and dangerous to change.The savings from automating some tasks are dwarfed by the irreducible costs of humandecision making, agreements and approvals built in formal processes. A true self-managing, scalable IT system would consist of a number of nearly-identical boxes,with a web interface to define high-level policies and provide information on utilization and performance. As the system needs to expand, it can automatically place the order. When the new boxes arrive, they are placed and connectedinto the data center, and the system configures and provisions them appropriately.

IT Autopilot: A flexible IT service management and deliver platform for smalland medium business

Using an airplane analogy, the pilot performs manual steps to get the plane safelyoff the ground, then turns it over to the autopilot for normal operations. The ITAutopilot intends to do this for IT service management in small and medium business (SMB)that may not have a large dedicated IT staff, using an SOA approach that isloosely coupled, stateless, and adhering to Web Services standards. The IT Autopilotemploys workflow-based controls, the autonomic computing MAPE model, and customizedpolicies to address SMB requirements. It could be deployed as an appliance, similarto IBM System Storage Productivity Center.

You can read all the articles in their entirety online [IBM Systems Journal, Volume 46, No. 3].

technorati tags: IBM, Almaden, Research Center, ARC, autonomic computing, sensor, effector, ACRA, ITSM, CMDB, knowledge base, ISO, IETF, W3C, OASIS, DMTF, SML, SDD, WSDM, IT Autopilot, SOA, SMB, MAPE, System Storage, Productivity Center

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Tags:  infrastructure lifecycle

I'm continuing my coverage of IBM Systems Journal's [fifteen articles about IBM Service Management].As storage hardware cost per GB declines 25 percent per year, the cost of labor has grown to nearly 70percent of the total IT budget. This brings new focus on how we do things, rather than what things siton the raised floor. Yesterday, my post summarized[the first five articles].Here is what I got out of the next five articles:

Integrated change and configuration management

IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) best practice covers a variety of disciplines, including incident management,problem management, release management, service help desk, change management, and configuration management.IBM has combined the last two into a single database, and this paper provides insights gained fromimplementing these in practice. A special section talks about how service providers can support multipleclients that must be kept separate from each other.

The process of building a Process Manager: Architecture and design patterns

Business processes coordinate and sequence the work done by a collection of people.Most companies define their business process from scratch, and develop their own applicationsto support their implementation. Process Managers are "out of the box" applications that help customers integrateand automate more quickly than building from scratch. These Process Managers leverage and update informationabout configuration items (CIs) in the configuration management database (CMDB). One of the first developedby IBM was the IBM Tivoli Storage Process Manager.

Integration of domain-specific IT processes and tools in IBM Service Management

ITIL tells you what needs to get done, but it doesn't tell you exactly how to do it. Completing a simplechange request to the IT environment can have a drastic impact on service level agreements (SLAs), utilization of existing storage capacity, and business operations. Sometimes it is important to use multipleProcess Manager applications together. To accomplish this, it is important to launch and land in contextat the appropriate points for smooth transition.

Using a model-driven transformational approach and service-oriented architecture for service deliver management

Companies are considering outsourcing as a way to focus on core competencies. However, the trend is towardselective outsourcing, where the customer controls the IT solution architecture and retains their legacy tools.As a result, service providers inherit the business and IT processes from their clients. IBM Research has developed the model-driven business transformation (MDBT) method that choreographs workflow tools with humanactivities. A "balanced scorecard" allows both client and outsourcer monitor progress towards strategic goals.

Catalog-based service request management

Service providers (outsourcers) are able to bring the latest IT technology, best practices, and skilledservice delivery teams. Unfortunately, unique business processes from each client limits the ability to leveragethese resources effectively. A service delivery management platform (SDMP) catalog serves as a repositoryof atomic services and the delivery teams that can perform them. This allows outsourcers to leverage resourcesacross multiple clients, while still being able to tailor business compositions of these atomic services to an individual client's requirements.

You can read all the articles in their entirety online [IBM Systems Journal, Volume 46, No. 3].

technorati tags: IBM, ITIL, CI, CMDB, Tivoli, Storage Process Manager, SLA, MDBT, outsourcers, service providers, SDMP, atomic services, Systems Journal

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Tags:  infrastructure lifecycle

The latest IBM Systems Journal has [fifteen articles about IBM Service Management], which includes the disciplines for managing storage resources as part of an overall IT data center.As with most journals, these articles are heavy academic efforts, not light summer reading.

However, since I have moved from marketing to consulting, I need to read these kinds of articles to keep up with the industry. I realize many people don't have time to read allof these, so over the next three days, I will give some quick highlights in hopefully more understandablelanguage. Here is what I got out of the first five articles:

An Overview of IBM Service Management

This 10-page article provides a good overview of what the other articles go into greater detail.The role of information has changed, from supporting back-office tasks like payroll andinventory, to enabling growth in the business itself, providing insight and competitive advantage. The challenges are summarized under "Four C's": Complexity, Change, Cost, and Compliance. The recommended approach is to engage with IBM,who has thousands of practitioners with years of experience in ITIL, eTOM, COBIT, CMMI and SOA.

Adding value to the IT organization with the Component Business Model

Many Service Level Agreements (SLAs) are loaded with technological jargon rather than concentratingon intended business results. CIOs must change this, and learn to run IT as a business witha service delivery focus.IBM Process Reference Model for IT (PRM-IT) is the foundationfor the Component Business Model for the Business of IT (CBMBoIT) that can assist with strategic decision making to transform IT into this new role.

An Integration model for organizing IT service management

There are so many ways to implement Information Technology Service Management (ITSM) that it is hard to tell if there are gaps or overlaps between products and offerings. A seamless solution requires common terminology and approaches. An integration model helps to bring all this together, focusedon being consistent with existing practice, with clarity of expression, and practical to implement.

IBM Service Management architecture

Today's systems management tools are fragmented by resource domain--servers are managed here, networksmanaged there, and storage is another story altogether. IBM Service Management intends to integratea portal-based User Interface, a process runtime layer, a configuration management database (CMDB), and all the various operational management products (OMPs) for each resource. For example, IBM TotalStorage ProductivityCenter is an OMP for IBM and non-IBM storage resources.

A configuration management database architecture in support of IBM Service Management

IBM Tivoli Change and Configuration Management Database (CCMDB) holds all the configuration data of IT resources in the data center, including individual "configuration items" (CIs), as well as tracks changes. The database is populated with data from different sources, includingautomatic discovery. Relationships between CIs provides a visual representation of application dependencies.The data model uses a clever combination of Unified Modeling Language (UML) with Java persistent objects.

You can read all the articles in their entirety online [IBM Systems Journal, Volume 46, No. 3].

technorati tags: IBM, Service Management, ITSM, Systems Journal, ITIL, eTOM, COBIT, CMMI, SOA, SLA, CIO, PRM-IT, CBMBoIT, CMDB, OMP, CCMDB, UML, Java, CI

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Tags:  lifecycle infrastructure

[R&D Magazine] recently conducted a survey that prompted readers to identify the world's most successful Research and Development (R&D) companies. The results are in: IBM was recognized as the best R&D company in the world when several different categories were evaluated, including:

• R&D spending as a percentage of revenue
• the number of patents
• new products in development

The survey considered additional information on more than 130 companies such as data on intellectual property, community service and financial growth trends. Readers were also asked five distinct questions, including the following:

• Where would you like to work based on their R&D?
• What companies have the most improved R&D in the past five years?
• What companies are the leaders in R&D?
• Which company's R&D has the strongest influence on society?
• Which company's R&D is the most proactive in high tech challenges?

Since it is often 5-15 years between when a scientist in one of our many research labs comes up with a clever idea, to when it is a market success, it is good to have external recognition for the R&D efforts we are doing right now.Here is a link to a [four-page PDF] of the magazine article.

Take for example IBM's recent breakthrough in Silicon photonics. Supercomputers that consist of thousands of individual processing nodes, typically running Linux on dual-core or quad-core processors, connected by miles of copper wires could one day fit into a laptop PC. And while today’s supercomputers can use the equivalent energy required to power hundreds of homes, these future tiny supercomputers-on-a-chip would expend the energy of a light bulb, so this solution is more "green" for the environment.According to the [IBM Press Release]:

The breakthrough -- known in the industry as a silicon Mach-Zehnder electro-optic modulator -- performs the function of converting electrical signals into pulses of light. The IBM modulator is 100 to 1,000 times smaller in size compared to previously demonstrated modulators of its kind, paving the way for many such devices and eventually complete optical routing networks to be integrated onto a single chip. This could significantly reduce cost, energy and heat while increasing communications bandwidth between the cores more than a hundred times over wired chips.

“Work is underway within IBM and in the industry to pack many more computing cores on a single chip, but today’s on-chip communications technology would overheat and be far too slow to handle that increase in workload,” said Dr. T.C. Chen, vice president, Science and Technology, IBM Research. “What we have done is a significant step toward building a vastly smaller and more power-efficient way to connect those cores, in a way that nobody has done before.”

Today, one of the most advanced chips in the world -- IBM’s Cell processor which powers the Sony Playstation 3 -- contains nine cores on a single chip. The new technology aims to enable a power-efficient method to connect hundreds or thousands of cores together on a tiny chip by eliminating the wires required to connect them. Using light instead of wires to send information between the cores can be 100 times faster and use 10 times less power than wires.

IBM has put out this one-minute video:

YouTube: "IBM Advances the Use of Light Instead of Wires for Chips"

I can't wait for that laptop!

technorati tags: R&D Magazine, IBM, Best, R&D, company, patents, spending, research, development, intellectual+property, Silicon, photonics, supercomputers, core, processors, dual-core, quad-core, multi-core, Linux, Mach-Zehnder, electro-optic, modulator, Cell, Sony, Playstation3

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Tags:  linux marketing green

Dave Winer in his post[Complete New Yorker archive on a hard disk] talks about this new offering from Pexagon. According to [J&R website]:

Over 4,000 issues of your favorite magazine now sit, ready for you to search and savor, on an 80GB incredibly lightweight and travel-friendly drive. This high-performance, brushed-aluminum Hard Drive measures only 3x5-inch and can easily fit inside a purse or briefcase so show it off to your tech-savvy friends and co-workers. Plus, there is plenty of extra room on the drive for future updates. Simply install The Complete New Yorker Program (installation CD provided), then connect the drive to a USB port on your Computer and have instant access to every article, poem, short story, and cartoon including every advertisement that has appeared in the magazine since 1925.

System Requirements: Windows 2000 or XP, Mac OS X 10.3 or higher, USB 2.0 port, CD-ROM drive, 750 MB of free hard drive space, 1024 x 768 minimum screen Resolution

The 750MB of disk space required on your system probably contains the indexing/metadata search system to find articles by subject, title or author. Linux is not listed, and if 750MB of disk space are required to run the program, then perhaps this system won't work with Linux at all.

The system claims that there is extra room on the disk to ingest future issues of the magazine. I wonder why they didn't put the indexing/metadata search software on the drive itself, so that it would be self-contained, rather than having a separate installation CD.

I think this is a sign of our times. The New Yorker magazine has taken the archives that they keep anyways, and made them available in bulk, in a handy disk drive delivery system. I know several people who keep boxes and boxes of back issues of all kinds of magazines, and this certainly is an improvement.

technorati tags: Dave Winer, New Yorker Magazine, archive, disk, drive, Windows, OS X, Linux, metadata, index, CD[Read More]

Tags:  disk lifecycle

Registration for [IBM Pulse 2008] is now open! This is the first ever global conference to cover not just Tivoli Storage software, but also the rest of Tivoli portfolio,Maximo and Tivoli Netcool products, and disciplined service management and governance practices and procedures.

Join us on May 18-22 in Orlando, Florida. You'll learn how IBM service management solutions can give you the visibility needed to see all aspects of your business and manage it against objectives, control to secure assets, and automation to drive business agility for competitive advantage.

Leverage this opportunity to meet with fellow clients, IBM partners, industry analysts, and IBM experts in an environment dedicated to the latest technology, trends, and best practices in service management. Whether youl are in network and service operations, IT, the executive office, line of business or services sales, IBM Pulse offers keynote presentations, in-depth seminar sessions, exhibitions and hands-on labs.

But wait, there's more!

• One-on-one meetings with IBM executives and industry experts
• Presentations by more than 100 customers sharing their real-world experiences and lessons learned
• An evening of "Speed Training" (a la [speed dating]) for technology consulting: Ask specific questions of our technical subject matter experts – and get answers instantly

I realize this conference is five months away, however one of my pet peeves is learning about a conference, especially a first-of-its-kind conference like this one, at the last minute, and not having time to plan accordingly. Travel budgets are tight for lots of people, so as an added incentive there is a $600 US dollar discount per person if you register before February 1, 2008. So don't wait! Sign up today!

technorati tags: IBM, Pulse, Tivoli, Maximo, Netcool, service management, governance, May, Orlando, Florida, keynote, speed training

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Tags:  infrastructure

Continuing my business trip through Canada, an article by Richard Blackwell titled [The Double Bottom Line] yesterday's Globe and Mail newspaper caught my attention.Here is an excerpt, citing Tim Brodhead, president of the J.W. McConnell Family Foundation in Montreal:

The bottom line for any business is making a profit, right?

But how about considering a different, or additional bottom line: helping make the world a better place to live in.

That's the radical proposition underlying the concept of "social entrepreneurship," the harnessing of business skills for the benefit of the disadvantaged.

Young investors, in particular, now want their investments to produce both financial and social returns, he noted.

Until recently, "we could either make a donation [to a charity] and get zero financial return, or we could invest and get zero social return." People now want more of both, but rules governing charities and business make that tough to accomplish.

One stumbling block is the imperative - entrenched in corporate law - that managers and directors of for-profit companies have a fiduciary duty to maximize profits. That structure is a brick wall that limits the expansion of social entrepreneurship, Mr. Brodhead said.

Some companies have embraced the new paradigm of a double bottom line, even if they are uncomfortable with the "social entrepreneur" label.

This fiduciary duty to maximize profits is discussed in the 2003 documentary[Corporation]. However, some organizations are now trying to aligntheir goals, finding ways to benefit their investers, as well as society overall. For example, organization [ONE.org] helped launch [Product (RED)]:

If you buy a (RED) product from GAP, Motorola, Armani, Converse or Apple, they will give up to 50% of their profit to buy AIDS drugs for mothers and children in Africa. (RED) is the consumer battalion gathering in the shopping malls. You buy the jeans, phones, iPods, shoes, sunglasses, and someone - somebody’s mother, father, daughter or son - will live instead of dying in the poorest part of the world. It’s a different kind of fashion statement.

Another example is IBM's recent press release [IBM Plans Investment Increase in Sub-Saharan Africa]:

The company, which has operated in Africa for nearly six decades, expects to increase its investment by more than $US120 million (more than R820 million) over the next two years. In the coming year, IBM expects to hire up to 100 students from Sub-Saharan universities to meet the growing demand in services, global delivery and software development.

"The Sub-Saharan African market is poised for double-digit growth flowing from the development and expansion of telecommunications networks, power grids and transport infrastructure," said Mark Harris, Managing Director, IBM South and Central Africa. "Private and public sector investment in the region is transforming the ability of the market to participate in the global economy."

A recent IBM Global Innovation Outlook (GIO) [report on Africa] indicates that the economies ofdozens of African nations are growing at healthy rates, the best in the past 30 years, with 5.5 to 5.8 percent averageacross the continent. This supports last month's news that [Top IBM thinkers to mentor African students]:

Hundreds of IBM scientists and researchers will mentor college students in Africa. Called Makocha Minds (after the Swahili word for "teacher"), the program will reach hundreds of computer science, engineering and mathematics students.

Makocha Minds is an off-shoot of IBM’s Global Innovation Outlook, an annual symposium of top government, business and academic leaders that uncovers new opportunities for business and societal innovation. "African students need to be trained in entrepreneurship so that they get out there and not just make jobs for themselves but create opportunities to employ others as well,” said Athman Fadhili, a graduate student at the University of Nairobi (Kenya).

Most of the mentoring will be via email and online collaboration.

Mentoring via email and online collaboration is very reasonable. I have mentored both high school and collegestudents through a partnership between IBM Tucson and the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers[SHPE]. While thekids were all located in Tucson, I rarely am, traveling nearly every week, but I madetime for the kids via email and online collaboration wherever I happened to be.

To make this work, we need to get email and online collaboration in the hands who need them.I got my email thanking me for being a "first day donor" to the One Laptop Per Child "Give 1 Get 1" (G1G1) project,and have added this "badge" to the right panel of my blog. If you click on the badge, you will be takento a series of YouTube videos that further describe the project. According to the email my donated XO laptop will soon be delivered into the hands of a child in Afghanistan, Cambodia, Haiti, Mongolia or Rwanda.

If you missed the "November 12-26" opportunity I mentioned in my post [Innovation that matters: XO laptop], you have a second chance! Wayan Vota indicates on his blog [OLPCnews.com] that the program has been extended to December 31, and has [gone global].

Seth Godin brings the trend of mixing investment with societal benefit to[Christmas shopping] with this list of ["philanthropic gifts"]:

• [Room to Read] -- Help build a school in Southeast Asia
• [Kiva.org] -- Loan to an entrepreneur in the developing world
• [Acumen Fund] -- Encourage entrepreneurs and trade in India
• [Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International] -- Help researchers find a cure
• [Mr. Holland's Opus Foundation] -- Inspire children to learn music
• [Family-to-Family] -- Hunger relief program for families in the US
• [MyTwoFrontTeeth.org] -- Online Holiday Wish Tree

How do these work? Instead of buying your uncle yet another $25 necktie, consider buying a $25 Kiva certificate.The $25 dollar "micro loan" goes to someone in the third world to improve their situation, start a business, geta job, and so on, and you give your uncle a Kiva certificate so that he can track the progress. I think that isvery clever and innovative.

technorati tags: IBM, Canada, Richard Blackwell, Globe Mail, Tim Brodhead, Corporation, ONE.org, Product(RED), GAP, Motorola, Armani, Converse, Apple, Sub-Saharan, Africa, Montreal, Mark Harris, Global Innovation Outlook, GIO, Makocha, Minds, Society, Hispanic, Professional, Engineers, SHPE, OLPC, One Laptop Per Child, G1G1, Afghanistan, Cambodia, Haiti, Mongolia, Rwanda, Wayan Vota, Kiva, Acumen

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Tags:  marketing olpc ipod

Over at StorageMojo, Robin Harris writes in his post[The High-End Storage Melt-Down]:

Expect to hear a lot more about the SMB segment over the next 6 months.

Because the high-end market is sucking wind. NetApp and EMC are both reporting problems in the high-end. HP and IBM don’t break out as much detail but I’m sure they are feeling the chill as well.

With Hulk/Maui coming in Q2CY08, you should hold off on any 2nd tier storage purchases you can. I estimate that H/M will be about 30% per GB less than the current gear.

Robin blames the U.S. subprime mortgage mess, butI disagree with the term melt-down.

IBM doesn't publicly report subset numbers on individual product lines, but we are growing, albeit single-digit growth, on the high-end with our IBM System Storage DS8000 and DS6000 series products. Single digit growth is not "booming", but it is what we expected in this space, so it is not like we are"feeling the chill" as Robin stated.Obviously, if the U.S. market overall is doing poorly, then it must be from something else. IBM's success appears to be from organic growth in our Asia and Europe markets, and taking marketshare away from the top two contenders, EMC and HDS. Here are my thoughts why:

EMC is remodeling its kitchen

Not happy with its status as #1 disk hardware specialty shop, EMC is admirably trying to redefine itself as an ["information infrastructure"] company, buying up software companies and introducing new storage services. [Byte and Switch] reports onEMC's recent acquisitions:

EMC is the latest vendor to pin its colors to the SaaS mast, revealing its plan to offer SaaS-based archiving services during its recent Innovation Day in Boston.

EMC gave another clear indication of its SaaS intentions last month, when it spent $76 million to acquire online backup specialist Mozy.

IBM has offered[Managed Storage Services] foryears through our Global Technology Services (GTS) division. Gartner recognized IBM as the #1 leader in storageservices, with three times more revenues than EMC in this space.

As with a restaurant that is remodeling its kitchen, it can expect a temporary drop inrevenue. If it is done right, customers will come back to a bigger brighter restaurant. If not, the restaurant re-opens as a much smaller lesser version of itself. Recent events this year might incent EMC to get that kitchen done quickly:

• A recent [class-action lawsuit]might result in having EMC's "86 percent male" sales force goes to sexual harassment sensitivity training, takingtime away from selling high-end storage arrays in the field. Analysts consider "high-end" boxes as those costingover $300,000 US dollars. Because of the money involved, there is a lot of competition for high-end storage, so face-to-face time with prospective customers is crucial to making the sale.Anytime any vendor is mentioned in a lawsuit (andcertainly IBM has had its share in the past, as Chuck Hollis correctly points out in the comment below), priorities get shifted, and there is potential dip in revenues.
• Dell acquires EMC's rival EqualLogic. Dell resold EMC midrange storage, like CLARiiON, so this should notimpact their high-end storage sales. While Dell will be allowed to sell EMC until 2011, this new acquisition mightmean Dell leads with the EqualLogic offerings, and that could potentially reduce EMC revenues in the midrange space.

IBM went through a similar phase in the 1990's, redefining itself from an "IT Technology" company, intoa "Systems, Software and Services" company. These transitions can't be done in a quarter, or even a year, theytake several years. IBM lost business to EMC in the 1990s, but is back with a stronger portfolio in the 2000's, and so IBM's kitchen remodeling effort appears to be paying off. We will see what happens with EMC in a few years.

HDS puts on the white lab coats

Meanwhile, HDS appears interested in taking over as #1 disk hardware specialty shop.For years, Hitachi was the stereotypical JCM (Japanese IBM-compatible manufacturer) that made well-engineered"me, too" storage arrays. They would see what innovators like IBM and EMC were doing, and copy them. Recently,however, they seemed to have changed strategy, introducing new featuresand functions on their high-end USP-V device, like[Dynamic Provisioning].

The problem is that customers don't want to feel like [Guinea pigs] in an experimental lab, especially withmission-critical data that they trust to their most-available, most-reliable high-end disk storage systems.Like IBM and EMC and the rest of the major storage vendors, Hitachi has top-notch engineers making quality products, but new features scare people, and so there is a lag in the adoption of new technologies.

In our youth, we might have preferred beer with recent born-on dates, and tequila aged less than 90 days. But as weget older, we switch to drinks like wine and whiskey, aged years, not weeks. The same is true for themarketplace. New start-ups and other "early adopters"might be willing to try fresh new features and functions on their storage systems, but more established enterprises prefer storage with more mature and stable microcode.Storage admins want to leave at the end of the day, knowing that the data will still be there the next morning. In tough financial times, many established companies want the technological equivalent to ["comfort food"], nothing spicy or exotic, but simplehearty fare that fills the belly and keeps you satisfied.

Recognizing this, IBM often introduces new features and functions on its midrange lines first, and position them accordingly. Once customers are comfortable with the concepts, IBM then can consider moving them into the high-end lines. For example, dynamic volume expansion was introduced on the DS4000 and SAN Volume Controller first, and once proven safe and effective, brought over to the DS8000 series. This strategy has served us well.

Well those are my theories. If you have a different explanation of why storage vendors are not doing well in thehigh-end, drop me a comment!

technorati tags: SMB, EMC, NetApp, DS8000, DS6000, HDS, Dell, EqualLogic, subprime, mortgage, USP, USP-V, Dynamic Provisioning, DS4000, SAN Volume Controller, SVC

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Tags:  disk

I'm here at the Los Angeles airport on my way to Canada.

On my post last week[My Blook is Now Available],Cheryl Hagedorn comments:

I've just posted about your blook at Blooking Central http://blooking.blogspot.com/2007/11/inside-system-storage.html

I'll love to hear from you (I post letters from authors!) about how you put the blook together. Many folks have used cut and paste from blog page into word processor. Others have simply backed up their blogs, then cut and pasted. Some folks had the foresight to compose their posts in a word processor before posting!

Anyway, I'd like to know whatever ins and outs you'd like to share. Thanks.

Well Cheryl, I couldn't find any email address to send you a response, so Idecided to post here instead and post a traceback on your blog.

After learning about the Blooker Prize, I had asked our IBM Developerworks team if anyone else within IBM had published a blook, but nobody had heard of anything, so I had to look elsewhere.I got a lot of guidance from Lulu's [Book Publishing FAQs], and Don Campbell's[Five Steps to Publishing Your Paperback Book at Lulu],and how-to articles over at [bookcatcher.com].

Decision 1: Defining the Container

Before you can cut-and-paste anything, you need a container file to put it in. Here were my key decisions:

• Page Size: Novel 6"x9" (15cm x 23cm) to support both perfect-bound paperback and dust-jacket hardcopy editions
• Colors: Full-color covers with black-and-white interior
• Fonts: 10pt Book Antiqua for the text, Courier for the monospaced computer examples,8pt for the "copyright" fine print
• Format: *.doc Microsoft Word file, using [Lulu's ready-to-use templates]
• Software: Office 2003 version of Microsoft Word on Windows XP system
• Front matter: Title, Copyright, Dedication, Table of Contents, Foreword, Introduction
• Back matter: Blog Roll, Blogging Guidelines, Glossary, Reference table, What people have written about me and my blog

According to Lulu, you could use OpenOffice instead with RTF files. I didn't try that. I did tryusing CutePDF to upload ready-made PDFs, that didn't work. I also tried saving text in PDF formaton my Mac Mini running OS X 10.4 Tiger, but Lulu didn't like that either.IBM now offers a free download of [LotusSymphony] that might be an alternative for my next book.

For my blook, the "Blog Roll" serves instead of a more formal [Bibliography]. I could have also includedonline magazines and other web resources.

Decision 2: Chapter Configuration

I reviewed other blooks to see how they were organized. I thought I might organize the blog posts by topic or category, but all the blooks I looked atwere strictly chronological, oldest post first. This of course is exactly opposite as theyappear on the web browser. I decided to keep things simple, with just 12 chapters, one for each calendar month.

Each chapter was separated by a section break with unique footers, starting on odd page number. The footers have the page numbers on the outside edges, so that even pages had numbers on the left, and odd pages on the right. I also added the name of the chapter and the book, like so:

--------------------------------| |----------------------------
40 ................December 2006| |Inside System Storage.... 41

This was a lot of work, but makes the book look more "professional".

Decision 3: Cut-and-Paste

People have asked me why it took three months to put my blook together, and I explainedthat the cut-and-paste process was manually intensive. My posts are either HTML entereddirectly into Roller webLogger, or typed in HTML on Windows Notepad and cut-and-pastedover to Roller later. I have access to the HTML source of each post, as wellas how it appears on the webpage, and tried cut-and-paste both ways. Copying theHTML source meant having to edit out all the HTML tags. I hadn't even looked into the idea of "backing up" through Roller all the entries, but they would probably have been HTMLsource as well.

In turned out that copying the webpage directly from the browser was better, which retains more of the formatting,and automatically eliminates all of the pesky HTML tags. I wanted the printed versions to resemblethe web page version.

Microsoft Word indicates all hyperlinks as bright blue underlined text which I didn't like, so I removedall hyperlinks, to avoid having to pay extra for "colored pages". This can be done manually, one by one, or pasting with the "text only" option butthis removes out all the other formatting as well. (Specifying black-and-white interior on Lulu might have converted all of these automaticallyto greyscale, so I might have been safe to leave them in,which I probably could have done if I wanted an online e-book version with links active, ... oh well)

To indicate where the hyperlinks would have been, I wrapped all the linked text in[square brackets]. I have now gotten in the habit of doing this for future blog posts, soif I ever make another book, it will cut down the work and effort on the cut-and-paste.

Some of the items I linked to posed a problem. I had to convert YouTube videos to flat imagesof the first frame to include them into the book. Older links were broken, and I had tofind the original graphics. I also sent a note to Scott Adams related about the use of one of his Dilbert cartoons.

I decided to also cut-and-paste my technorati tags and comments. For comments I mademyself, I labeled them "Addition" or "Response". A few people did not realize thatI was "az990tony" making the comments as the blog author, so I changed all to say "az990tony (Tony Pearson)" to make this more clear, and now do this on all future blogposts to minimize the work for my next book.

Because I used a lot of technical terms and acronyms, Microsoft Word actually gave mean error message that there were so many gramattical and spelling errors that it wasunable to track them all, and would no longer put wavy green or red lines underneath.

I did all the cut-and-paste work myself, but since the website is publicly accessible,I could have gotten someone else to do this for me.Had I read Timothy Ferriss' book The Four Hour Work Week sooner,I might have taken his advice on [Outsourcing the project to someone in India]. I might consider doing this for my next book.

Decision 4: Numbering the Posts

I decided I wanted to standardize the title of each post. The date was not uniqueenough, as there were days that I made multiple posts. So, I decided to assign eacha unique number, from 001 to 165, like so:

2006 Dec 12 - The Dilemma over future storage formats (033)

Posts that referred back to one of my earlier posts within the book had (#nnn) added so that readers couldgo jump back to them if they were interested. This eliminated trying to keep track of pagenumbers.

Decision 5: Adding behind-the-scenes commentaryOne of the reasons I rent or buy DVDs is for the director's audio commentary and deleted scenes. These extras provided that added-value over what I saw in the movietheatre. Likewise, 80 percent of a blook is already out in the public for reading, so I felt I needed to provide some added value. At the beginning of each month, I describewhat is going on behind the scenes, and then in front of specific posts, I providedadditional context. This could be context of what was going on in the blogosphere at thetime, announcements or acquisitions that happened, what country I was blogging from, orwhat unannounced products or projects that were being developed that I can now talk aboutsince they are now announced and available.

To distinguish these side comments from the rest of the blog posts,I decorated them with graphics. Searching for copyright-free/royalty-free clip-art, graphics, and photos that represented eachconcept was time-consuming. I shrunk each down to about 1 inch square in size, and changed themfrom color to greyscale. (LuLu conversion to PDF probably would have automaticallyconverted the color graphics to greyscale for me, in which case leaving them in full colormight have been nice for an e-book edition, ... oh well)

I did complete each chapter one at a time. So, for each month, I cut-and-pasted all the blog posts,tags and comments, then fixed up and numbered all the post titles, then added all the behindthe scenes commentary, and cleaned up all the font styles and sizes. I recommend you do this at least for the first chapter, so you can get a good feel for what the finished version will look like.

Decision 6: Adding a Glossary

I sent early copies of the books to five of my coworkers knowledgeable about storage, andfive local friends who know nothing about storage.

Some of my early reviewers suggested having an index, so that people can find a specific poston a particular topic. Others suggested I spell out all the acronyms that appear everywhereand put that into the Reference section, rather than on each and every occurrence inthe book itself. Both were good ideas, and my IBM colleague Mike Stanek suggested calling ita GOAT (Glossary of Acronyms and Terms). Acronyms are spelled out, and terms or phrasesthat need additional explanation have a glossary definition. For eachitem, I put the post or posts that uses that term. Some terms are covered in dozens ofposts, so I tried to pick five or fewer posts representing the most pertinent.

The glossary was far more time-consuming than I first imagined, with over 50 pages containingover 900 entries. I struggled deciding which terms and acronyms needed explanation, and which were obvious enough. On the good side, itforced me to read and re-read the entire book cover to cover, and I caught a lot of othermistakes, misspellings, and formatting errors that way. Also, I have a large internationalreadership on my blog, so the glossary will help those whose English is not their native language,and will help those readers who are not necessarily experts in the storage industry.

Decision 7: Designing the Covers

Up to this point, I had been printing early drafts with simple solid color covers. Lulu hasthree choices for covers:

• Just type in the text, upload an "author's photo" and chose a background color or pattern
• Upload PNG files, one for the front cover, one for the back cover, and chose the textand color of the spine.
• Upload a single one-piece PDF file that wraps around the entire book.

I had no software to generate the PDF for the third option, so I decided to try the secondoption. My first attempt was to format the front title page in WORD, capture the screen,convert to PNG and upload it as the front cover. I did same for the back cover, with a smallpicture of me and some paragraphs about the book.

I chose a simple straightforward title on purpose. Thousands of IBM and other IT marketing and technicalpeople will be ordering this book, and submitting their expenses for reimbursement as work-related, and didn't want to cause problems with a cute title like "An Engineer in Marketing La-La Land".

The next step was to use [the GIMP] GNU image manipulationprogram, similar to PhotoShop, to add a cream colored background, a slanted green spine, and some graphics that we had developed professionally for some of our IBM presentations.I learned how to use the GIMP when making tee-shirts and coffee mugs for our [Second Life] events, so I was already familiar. For newblook authors, I suggest they learn how to use this for their covers, or find someone who can do thisfor them.

I did the paperback version first, and once done, it was easy to use the same PNG files forthe dust jacket of the hardcover edition, adding some extra words for the front and back flaps.

The adage "Don't judge a book by its cover" seems to apply to everything except booksthemselves. The book cover is the first impression online, and in a bookstore. I have seenpeople pick books up off the shelf at my local Barnes & Noble, read the front and back covers, peruse the front and backflaps, and make a purchase decision without ever flipping a single page of the contents inside.From an article on Book Catcher [SELF-PUBLISHING BOOK PRODUCTION & MARKETING MISTAKES TO AVOID]:

According to selfpublishingresources website, three-fourths of 300 booksellers surveyed (half from independent bookstores and half from chains) identified the look and design of the book cover as the most important component of the entire book. All agreed that the jacket is the prime real estate for promoting a book.

While many struggle to find the right title and cover art, I think it is interesting that Lululets you post the same book with slightly different titles and covers, each as separate projects, and let market forces decide which one people like best. This is a common practice among marketresearch firms.

Decision 8: Finding someone to write the Foreword

With the book nearly done, I thought it would be a nice touch to have an IBM executive write a Foreword at the frontof the book. Several turned me down, so I am glad I found a prominent Worldwide IBM executiveto do it. I should have started this process sooner, as she wanted to read my book in its entirety beforeputting pen to paper. I had not planned for this. I was hoping to be done by end of October,but waiting for her to finish writing the Foreword added some extra weeks. Next time,I will start this process sooner.

Decision 9: Printing Early Drafts

You need to have Lulu print at least one copy to review before making it available to the public,and it doesn't hurt to order a few intermediary draft copies to make sure everything looks right.However, from the time I order it on Lulu, to the time it is in my hands, is over two weeks withstandard shipping, so I needed a way to print drafts to look at in between.

To avoid wear-and-tear on my color ink-jet printer, I went and bought a large black-and-white[Brother HL-5250DN] laser printer. Rather than buying specialty 6x9 paper, I used standard 8.5x11 paperusing the following 2-up duplex method:

• Upload the DOC file to Lulu, and get it converted to PDF
• Download the resulting PDF from Lulu back to your computer
• View the PDF in Adobe Reader, and print it using 2-up "Booklet" mode.

For example, if you print 60 pages in booklet mode, it prints two mini-pages on thefront side, and two more mini-pages on the back side of each sheet of paper, resulting in 15 standard 8.5" x 11" pages that can be folded, stapled, and read like a mini-booklet. My entire blook could be printed on seven of these mini-booklets, saving paper, and giving me a close approximation to what the final book would look like. Eachmini-page is 5.5"x8.5", so just slightly smaller than the final 6"x9" form factor.I fount that 60 pages/15 sheets was about the maximum before it becomes hard to fold in half.

So, if I had to do it all over again, I might have chosen 11pt Garamond (the default), or changedthe default to 11pt Book Antiqua up front, so as not to have spend so much time converting thefonts. I might have left out the glossary. I might have left in all the hyperlinks and graphicsin full color for a separate e-book edition. And I definitely would have looked for an author formy Foreword much earlier in the process.

I didn't plan to write a blook when I started blogging. I have started putting [square brackets]around all my links. I have started putting "az990tony (Tony Pearson)" on all my comments. I hadassumed that people were jumping to all the links I provided in context, but I learned that the blogpost has to stand on its own, so now I make sure that I either paraphrase the important parts, oractually quote the text that I feel is important, so that the blog post makes sense on its own.This is perhaps good advice in general, but even more important if you plan to write a blook later.

Lastly, I decided up front to write blog posts that were 500-700 words long, about the average lengthof magazine or newspaper articles. In my blook, the average is 639 words per post, so I hit thatgoal. I have seen some blogs where each post is just a few sentences. Maybe they are posting fromtheir cell phone, or don't have time to think out a full thought, but who wants to read a year'sworth of [twitter] entries.

Well Cheryl, I hope that helps. If you need anymore, click on the "email" box on the right panel.

technorati tags: Cheryl Hagedorn, Blooking Central, Lulu, Don Campbell, IBM, Developerworks, Book Antiqua, Courier, Garamond, Microsoft, Word, OpenOffice, Lotus, Symphony, PDF, CutePDF, OS X, HTML, Hyperlinks, blook, reference, glossary, Twitter, Timothy Ferriss, fourhourworkweek, outsourcing, India

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Tags:  blook marketing

HealthAlliance Hospital has implemented an IBM System Storage Grid Medical Archive Solution (GMAS) to make patient records available to clinicians anytime, anywhere. IBM has a [Case Study] on this implementation.Here is an excerpt from the IBM [Press Release]:

HealthAlliance Hospital, a member of UMass Memorial Health Care, serves the communities of north-central Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire with acute care facilities, a cancer center, outpatient physical therapy facilities and a remote home health agency. As an investment in continued high-quality patient care, the hospital has implemented a picture archiving and communication system (PACS) from Siemens Medical Solutions so that it can move toward digital health records while eliminating traditional paper and film.

HealthAlliance is now able to make all of their data, including PACS images, available instantly, using the IBM GMAS, a cross-IBM offering comprised of storage, software, servers and services. The GMAS solution provides hospitals, clinics, research institutions and pharmaceutical companies with an automated and resilient enterprise storage archive for delivering medical images, patient records and other critical healthcare reference information on demand.

"Fast, easy access to diagnostic images is a priority," said Rick Mohnk, Vice President and Chief Information Officer of HealthAlliance. "Being paperless not only helps our staff improve their productivity and the quality of patient care, but also lowers our costs and improves our competitiveness. The IBM GMAS has helped us stay competitive and offer the leading edge technology that attracts top physicians to our staff and keeps patients feeling comfortable and well cared for."

Normally when you read or hear the term "grid", you might think of supercomputers, but in this case we are talking about information that is accessible from different interconnected locations. I've mentioned GMAS before in my posts [Blocks, Files and Content Addressable Storage and What Happened to CAS?] but I thought I would provide more detail on the elements of the solution.

Modality

Medical imaging equipment are called "modalities", which is just fancy hospital talk for "method of treatment".These have Ethernet connections designed to write to any storage with a CIFS or NFS interface. For example, press the button on the "X-ray" machine, and the digitized version of the X-ray is stored as a file to whatever NAS storage on the other end.

PACS

[Picture Archiving and Communication System] refer to the application and the computer equipment to manage these medical images, often stored in a DICOM format and indexed with HL7 metadata headers. There are many PACS vendors, GE Medical Systems, Siemens Medical, Agfa, Fuji, Philips, Kodak, Stentor, Emageon, Brit Systems, Mckesson, Amicus, Cerner, Medweb and Teramedica, to name a few. Many PACS providers embedded specific storage as part of their solution, but now are starting to realize that they need to be part of a larger storage infrastructure.

GAM

IBM System Storage [Multi-Level Grid Access Manager] is softwareon IBM System x servers that manages access across the grid of inter-connected hospitals, clinics and imaging facilities. It provides the NFS and CIFS interfaces to the modalities, and places the data into a GPFS file system on DS4000 series disk.

GPFS and DS4000 series disk

IBM [General Parallel File System] has all the Information Lifecycle Management (ILM) capabilities to move data from one disk storage level to another, automates deletion based on expiration date, and can provide concurrent access from multiple requesters.The IBM System Storage DS4000 series disk products can support both high-speed FC disk as well as low-cost SATA disk.For large medical images, the SATA disk is often a good fit. The advantage of GPFS is that you can have policies todecide which images are placed on FC disk, and which on SATA, and then later move these files based on access reference. Images that are accessed the most frequently can be on FC disk, and those that haven't been accessed in a while on SATA disk.

TSM space management

IBM [Tivoli Storage Manager for Space Management] supports moving files out of the GPFS file system and onto tape, based on policies. For example,keep the most recent 18 months on disk, and anything older than that gets moved to tape. This is similar to themigrate/recall technology used in DFSMShsm on the mainframe.

Tape Library automation

Before GMAS, paper and film images had to be retrieved manually from shelves and filing cabinets. The massive amountsof data being stored, and for such long periods of time, makes it impractical to store all of it on disk. With tape automation, any medical image more than 18 months old can be retrieved in minutes. Patients with an appointment can have all of their medical images retrieved in bulk the night before. Emergency room patients can have previous images retrieved while admission clerks check for insurance coverage and perform triage.

Display Screen

Images archived on the IBM GMAS are accessible in numerous ways. For example, all clinicians can access GMAS through hospital record system, which provides complete paperless and filmless access to the patient record including medical images, lab results, radiology reports, and pharmacy records. Medical workers at any location can also access the grid using their Web browsers. This allows each employee to use the display systems they are already familiar with.

Unlike disk-only based NAS systems, IBM's blended disk-and-tape approach makes this a much more cost-effective solution.For more details on IBM GMAS, read this 6-page[Frost & Sullivan whitepaper].

technorati tags: HealthAlliance, IBM, GMAS, Grid, Medical, Archive, Solution, disk, tape, storage, PACS, CAS, Siemens, DICOM, HL7, Grid Access Manager, NFS, CIFS, GPFS, DS4000, FC, SATA, ILM, TSM, HSM, DFSMShsm, paperless, filmless, images, Frost Sullivan, whitepaper

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Tags:  disk lifecycle tape

Today, IBM announced a software/server/storage combo that out-performed both HP and Sun. Here is an excerpt from the[IBM Press Release]:

IBM today announced that its recently introduced E7100 Balanced Warehouse(TM), consisting of the IBM POWER6(TM) processor-based System p(TM) 570 server, the IBM System Storage(TM) DS4800 and DB2(R) Warehouse 9.5, is already lapping the field in performance. The new data warehousing solution is now ranked number one in both performance and in price/performance in the TPC-H business:

• 2 x speed-up over HP system with Oracle 10g and equal number of cores;
• 3.17 x speed up over Sun with Oracle 10g and 38 percent price advantage;
• A new world record by loading 10 terabytes (TB) data at six TB per hour (TB/hr).

"These latest benchmark results further prove IBM's strength and leadership in the business intelligence arena," said Scott Handy, vice president of marketing and strategy, IBM Power Systems. "The E7100 Balanced Warehouse is a complete data warehousing solution comprised of pre-tested, scalable and fully integrated system and storage components, designed to get customers up and running quickly to get to the real benefit of unprecedented business insight and intellect."

Those not familiar with the [IBM Balanced Warehouse], it is the productized version of DB2's ["Balanced Configuration Unit" or BCU] reference configuration. The IBM Balanced Warehouse presents a pre-tested, pre-configured solution for Business Intelligence (BI) applications. These are in the form of "building blocks" thatcan be combined to get to the size you need, with incremental growth as your business expands. Each building block expertly matches the CPU processor and RAM memory of the server, with the appropriate I/O bus, cabling, and capacity of the disk system, resulting in optimal performance.

IBM DB2 software is designed to allow you to combine multiple building blocks into a single system image. This greatly simplifies your data warehouse deployment, and can help ensure success. For example, for a 50TB deployment, you can take a base 2TB building block, add 24 more, each with 2TB of disk capacity, and have a completely balanced environment. IBM clients have built systems over 300TB in this manner with these building blocks.

The IBM Balanced Warehouse is offered in several configurations:

C-class

The [C-class models] are designed for SMB customers, employing an IBM System x server with internal or direct attached EXP3000 disk.

D-class

The [D-class models] are the next step up, offering department-level data marts and data warehouse for larger deployments, employing an IBM System x server with EXP3000 or System Storage DS3400 entry level disk.

E-class

The [E-class models] represent our top-of-the line configurations for our largest enterprise deployments. The [E6000] run Linux on an IBM System x server with System Storage DS48000 disk. The [E7000] run AIX on an IBM System p575 server with DS4800 disk. The new [E7100] mentioned above runsAIX on a POWER6-based IBM System p570 with DS4800 disk.

As I have mentioned before, in my post[Supermarketsand Specialty Shops],companies are looking for complete solutions, preferably from a single vendor like IBM, HP and Sun, rather than buying piece part components from different vendors and hoping the combined ["Frankenstein"] configuration meets business requirements.

The DS4800 is an obvious choice for this solution, providing an excellent balance of cost and performance, in a modular packaging that is ideal for the incremental growth design inherent in the IBM Balanced Warehouse philosophy. To learn more about this disk system, see the official [DS4800 website] for details, descriptions and specifications.

technorati tags: IBM, HP, Sun, Balanced Warehouse, balanced, configuration, unit, BCU, Oracle, 10g, EXP3000, DS3400, DS4800, disk, storage, system, datamart, data, warehouse, Business Intelligence, BI, Frankenstein, supermarket, specialty shop, E6000, E7000, E7100

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Tags:  announcements infrastructure disk

It's official! My "blook" Inside System Storage - Volume I is now available.

This blog-based book, or “blook”, comprises the first twelve months of posts from this Inside System Storage blog,165 posts in all, from September 1, 2006 to August 31, 2007. Foreword by Jennifer Jones. 404 pages. IT storage and storage networking concepts IBM strategy, hardware, software and services Disk systems, Tape systems, and storage networking Storage and infrastructure management software Second Life, Facebook, and other Web 2.0 platforms IBM’s many alliances, partners and competitors How IT storage impacts society and industry

You can choose between hardcover (with dust jacket) or paperback versions:

• Hardcover: http://www.lulu.com/content/1556136
• Paperback: http://www.lulu.com/content/1257852

This is not the first time I've been published. I have authored articles for storage industry magazines, written large sections of IBM publications and manuals, submitted presentations and whitepapers to conference proceedings, and even had a short story published with illustrations by the famous cartoon writer[Ted Rall].

But I can say this is my first blook, and as far as I can tell, the first blook from IBM's many bloggers on DeveloperWorks, and the first blook about the IT storage industry.I got the idea when I saw [Lulu Publishing] run a "blook" contest. The Lulu Blooker Prize is the world's first literary prize devoted to "blooks"--books based on blogs or other websites, including webcomics. The [Lulu Blooker Blog] lists past year winners. Lulu is one of the new innovative "print-on-demand" publishers. Rather than printing hundredsor thousands of books in advance, as other publishers require, Lulu doesn't print them until you order them.

I considered cute titles like A Year of Living Dangerously, orAn Engineer in Marketing La-La land, or Around the World in 165 Posts, but settled on a title that matched closely the name of the blog.

In addition to my blog posts, I provide additional insights and behind-the-scenes commentary. If you go to the Luluwebsite above, you can preview an entire chapter in its entirety before purchase. I have added a hefty 56-page Glossary of Acronyms and Terms (GOAT) with over 900 storage-related terms defined, which also doubles as an index back to the post (or posts) that use or further explain each term.

So who might be interested in this blook?

• Business Partners and Sales Reps looking to give a nice gift to their best clients and colleagues
• Managers looking to reward early-tenure employees and retain the best talent
• IT specialists and technicians wanting a marketing perspective of the storage industry
• Mentors interested in providing motivation and encouragement to their proteges
• Educators looking to provide books for their classroom or library collection
• Authors looking to write a blook themselves, to see how to format and structure a finished product
• Marketing personnel that want to better understand Web 2.0, Second Life and social networking
• Analysts and journalists looking to understand how storage impacts the IT industry, and society overall
• College graduates and others interested in a career as a storage administrator

And yes, according to Lulu, if you order soon, you can have it by December 25.

technorati tags: IBM, blook, Volume I, Jennifer Jones, system, storage, strategy, hardware, software, services, disk, tape, networking, SAN, secondlife, Web2.0, facebook, Lulu, publishing, Blooker Prize, articles, magazines, proceedings, Ted Rall, insights, glossary, early-tenure, mentors, library, classroom, administrator, print, publish, on demand

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Tags:  announcements lifecycle disk infrastructure blook bc green secondlife san tape

For those in the US, last friday, the day after Thanksgiving, marks the official start of the Holiday shopping season. This has been called [Black Friday] as some stores open as early as 4am in the morning, when it is still dark outside, to offer special discount prices. Some shoppers camp out in sleeping bags and lawn chairs in front of stores overnight to be the first to get in.

Not surprisingly, some folks don't care for this approach to shopping, and prefer instead shopping online. Since 2005, the Monday after Thanksgiving (yesterday) has been called [Cyber Monday].USA Today newspaper reports [Cyber Monday really clicks with customers]. Many of the major online shopping websites indicated a 37 percent increase in sales yesterday over last year's Cyber Monday.

On Deadline dispels the hype on both counts:[Cyber Monday: Don't Believe the Hype?"], indicating that Black Friday is not the peak shopping for bricks-and-mortar shops, andthat Cyber Monday is not the busiest online shopping day of the year, either.

Despite the controversy, all of this increased use of the internet could lead to what is now being termed an "Internet Brown-out" in the next few years.Magaret Rouse of [IT Knowledge Exchange] points to this MacWorld article by Grant Gross titled [Study: Internet could run out of capacity in two years]. Here's an excerpt:

A flood of new video and other Web content could overwhelm the Internet by 2010 unless backbone providers invest up to US$137 billion in new capacity, more than double what service providers plan to invest, according to the study, by Nemertes Research Group, an independent analysis firm. In North America alone, backbone investments of $42 billion to $55 billion will be needed in the next three to five years to keep up with demand, Nemertes said.

Internet users will create 161 exabytes of new data this year, and this exaflood is a positive development for Internet users and businesses, IIA says.

The "IIA" above is the [Internet Innovation Alliance], who coined the term "exaflood". They have a [5-minute video] thatexplains that one exabyte is the equivalent to about 50,000 years of DVD quality video.

If the "161 Exabytes" figure sounds familiar, it is probably from the IDC Whitepaper [The Expanding Digital Universe] that estimated the 161 Exabytes created, captured or replicated in 2006 will increase six-fold to 988 Exabytes by the year 2010. This is not just video captured for YouTube by internet users, but also corporate data captured by employees, and all of the many replicated copies. The IDC whitepaper was based on an earlier University of California Berkeley's often-cited 2003[How Much Info?] study, which not only looked at magnetic storage (disk and tape), but also optical, film, print, and transmissions over the air like TV and Radio.

A key difference was that while UC Berkeley focused on newly created information, the IDC study focused on digitized versions of this information, and included theadded impact of replication.It is not unusual for a large corporate databases to be replicated many times over. This is done for business continuity, disaster recovery, decision support systems, data mining, application testing, and IT administrator training. Companies often also make two or three copies of backups or archives on tape or optical media, to storethem in separate locations.

Likewise, it should be no surprise that internet companies maintain multiple copies of data to improve performance.How fast a search engine can deliver a list of matches can be a competitive advantage. Content providers may offer the same information translated into several languages.Many people replicate their personal and corporate email onto their local hard drives, to improve access performance, as well as to work offline.

The big question is whether we can assume that an increased amount of information created, captured and replicated will have a direct linear relation to the growth of what is transmitted over the internet. Three fourths of the U.S. internet users watched an average of 158 minutes of online video in May 2007, is this also expected to grow six-fold by 2010? That would be fifteen hours a month, at current video densities, or more likely it would be the same 158 minutes but of much higher quality video.

On the other hand, much of what is transmitted is never stored, or stored for only very short periods of time.Some of these transmissions are live broadcasts, you are either their to watch and listen to them when they happen, or you are not. Online video games are a good example. The internet can be used to allow multiple players to participate in real time, but much of this is never stored long-term. An interesting feature of the Xbox 360 is to allow you to replay "highlight" videos of the game just played, but I do not know if these can be stored away or transferred to longer term storage.

Of course, there will always be people who will save whatever they can get their hands on. Wired Magazine has anarticle [Downloading Is a Packrat's Dream], explaining that many [traditional packrats] are now also "digital packrats", and this might account for some of this growth. If you think you might be a digital packrat,Zen Habits offers a [3-step Cure].

In any case, the trends for both increased storage demand, and increased transmission bandwidth requirements, are definitely being felt. Hopefully, the infrastructure required will be there when needed.

technorati tags: Thanksgiving, Christmas, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, MacWorld, Nemertes, IDC, whitepaper, UC Berkeley, How Much Info, study, Xbox 360, video, YouTube

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Tags:  bc infrastructure

I hope everyone had a great weekend!

Technology Review has a great 6-minute video showing how the PowerTune system works in the ['self-tuning' guitar].

As with any self-tuning equipment, there are three essential parts.

1. Measurement. In the case of the guitar, small sensors identify the current note based on string tension.
2. Response. Based on the measurement, the self-tuning system either decides that there is no more to do, or to take specific action. In the case of this guitar, the action would be to loosen or tighten the string.
3. Action. The action taken that is expected to get closer to the desired result. In this case, tiny motorsinside the handle turn the thumbscrews to loosen or tighten the strings accordingly.

These are part of a "closed-loop design", as it is called in [Control Theory].After the action in step 3 is taken, goes back to step 1, takes a new measurement, and determines a new response. Thiscould mean that the string is tightened and loosened by ever smaller amounts until it is close enough to the desiredaccuracy, in this case an impressive two [cent].

On the server side, IBM has offered this for years. For example, for z/OS applications on System z mainframes, the[Workload Manager (WLM) offers a "goal mode"] that allows you to set desired results for your business applications, for example, how quickly they respond in processing transactions. WLM measures the response time of the transactions, determines anappropriate response if any, and takes action to shift processor cycles (MIPS) or RAM to help out the workloads with the highest priority, in some cases stealing cycles and RAM away from lesser priority tasks.

For storage, we have IBM TotalStorage Productivity Center. It can scan for file systems over 90 percent full, for example, determine an appropriate response based on policies, and take action to expand the file system to a larger size.This may involve dynamically expanding the LUN that the file system sits on, a feature available on IBM SAN VolumeController, DS8000 series, DS4000 series and N series disk systems.This is the kind of closed loop design that can help eliminate those pesky phone calls at 3am.

But why focus on just storage alone? Combining servers and storage into a higher-level closed loop design is accomplished with [IBM Tivoli Intelligent Orchestrator] and [IBM Tivoli Provisioning Manager]. In thiscombo, Orchestrator measures and responds, and can invoke Provisioning Manager workflows to take action. Workflows are like scripts on steroids. Unlike normal scripts which run on a single machine, workflows can communicate with multiple servers, storage and even networking gear to take the appropriate actions on each of those machines, like install updated software, carve a new LUN, or define a new SAN zone.

The products are well integrated with TotalStorage Productivity Center for the storage aspects.

technorati tags: PowerTune, self-tuning, guitar, closed loop, design, IBM, z/OS, WLM, goal mode, TotalStorage, Productivity Center, LUN, SAN Volume Controller, SVC, DS8000, DS4000, N series, disk, storage, Tivoli, Intelligent Orchestrator, TIO, Provisioning Manager, TPM, workflows, zone

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Tags:  lifecycle disk infrastructure

Last year, I posted about IBM VP Bob Hoey's three[Training Videos]about selling to the mainframe customer.

Well, his team has done it again. Here are the next three in the series:

• [Lesson Four]
• [Lesson Five]
• [Lesson Six]

Of course, not all of our YouTube videos are this silly. Others are focused on serious topics.Take for example this IBM UK Whiteboard session:

This Thursday is U.S. Thanksgiving, so I the blogosphere is probably going to be quiet this week.

I found some interesting posts and articles on Second Life that might be of interest.

[Harvard Offers Classes in Second Life]

Benjamin Duranske of Virtually Blind writes:

The Harvard Extension School is running a course focused on virtual law with a Second Life component. Rebecca Nesson (’Rebecca Berkman’ in Second Life) is teaching the class. The lectures, which look fascinating, are available to at-large participants on Berkman Island [SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Berkman/113/70/24].

You can attend the lectures in Second Life on Monday evenings from 8:00-10:00pm EST (5:00-7:00pm SL time). Videos of past lectures are linked on the course’s web site, where you can also find the syllabus, a wiki, and more.

[Oh, It has losers...]

Roo over at Eightbar writes:

The US version of The Office (which does an excellent job of being almost as funny as the BBC version) is no stranger to life online. It’s fun to spot Kevin, Meredith, Creed, Roy, Pam all on MySpace, and Dwight has a blog. This week they dipped into Second Life. The very same week as CSI:NY; It’s all getting very mainstream.

Of course, the Office’s treatment of SL was as tongue-in-cheek as you’d expect…

Dwight:“Second Life is not a game. It is a Multi User Virtual Environment. It doesn’t have points or scores or winners or losers.”

Jim:“Oh, it has losers.”

Steve Nelson at Clear Ink, the team behind bringing the office into SL for the episode, has [written about the project] and carefully lists the locations and clothing used.

I watched this episode and loved how they were able to blend it in seamlessly without looking out of placeor awkward reference.

[A Press Conference in Second Life]

Matt Hamblen of ComputerWorld writes:

Cisco Systems Inc. has been staging virtual meetings between developers and channel partners in Second Life for more than a year, but this invitation was a first for me. So a presentation announcing the winners of a networking technology innovation contest -- inside a Second Life simulation -- seemed like the place to be.

I'm probably an SL noob (for newbie) by most standards, but I've spent enough time there to know most of the ways to move and how to search out islands and events.

In all, I would say the Cisco event sparked my interest in the SL virtual meeting format, but my attention was focused more on making things in SL work smoothly than on the material presented.

I've had some interesting conversations with event-coordinators looking for advice on setting up events in Second Life, so I suspect that is a good sign that this is still growing momentum.

technorati tags: Harvard, Eightbar, The+Office, Cisco, SecondLife, Second Life, SL, ComputerWorld, Matt Hamblen

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Tags:  secondlife

Wrapping up my week's theme on "Innovation that matters", I would explore how sometimes innovations are inspired by thinking differently in solving problems, and observing howothers solve similar problems in other domains.

Take for example this little Shell Oil[RealEnergy "Eureka"] video webisode. It's about eight minutes long, and helps explain a recent innovation Shellmade to help extract oil from awkward locations. Look for how the engineer was inspired by observing something his son did, that he in turn applied to innovatively solve this challenging problem.

Thinking differently has helped IBM innovate as well. Today, IBM announced it has shippped its 10,000th Storage Virtualization Engine, which coincidentally happens to correspond with today's GA date of SVC 4.2.1 release. From the [IBM Press Release]:

"IBM has been delivering virtualization capabilities for more than 40 years and today we unveil a milestone in the area of data storage virtualization with the shipment of 10,000 storage virtualization engines -- a fact no other storage company in the world can claim," said Kelly Beavers, Director, Storage Software, IBM. "By working across multiple platforms, IBM's storage virtualization helps to lower energy costs and unlocks the proprietary hold that other storage vendors have had on customers for years -- which IBM believes makes storage virtualization the killer application in the storage industry over the next decade."

SVC helps improve flexibility and responsiveness of IT infrastructures, such as creating a single virtual pool of information across the enterprise, enabling IT departments to respond more quickly to business needs and manage resources more flexibly. Benefits including increased resiliency, better application availability, simplified data migrations, and improved resource utilization can all be achieved through storage virtualization and these benefits are increased further when SVC is coupled with server virtualization such as through IBM System p LPARs and VMware ESX Server.

IBM's storage virtualization helps to unlock the proprietary hold that vendors such as EMC, HP and Hitachi have had on customers for years. With IBM SVC, customers can choose any combination of supported EMC, IBM, HP, Hitachi or other devices, virtualize them, and manage and deploy them easily and with greater flexibility and independence than ever before.

You can also read this[MarketWire] article.

I've posted before on IBM's [history of storage virtualization], but there are still a few folks not convinced.Dr. Kevin McIsaac has an article on ComputerWorld[Vendor Claims on Storage Virtualization] that warns against vendor hype. Dr. McIsaac feels"network-based storage virtualization results in a lowest common denominator view of the infrastructure, eliminating the value-added features of the array." This is really not a "network" issue, as this applies equally to Hitachi's USP-V directly cabled to external storage, no network required.IBM BarryW gives his take [Lowest Vendor Neutral Denominator] on his blog.

The concern that adding SVC (or USP-V) in front of other disk arrays adds complexity or eliminates the value-added features of older technologies, can be addressed simply by observing how similar problems were solved by the automobile industry.

• In 1911, the automobile industry introduced the "electric starter", eliminating the value-added features of the "hand crank".Instead of standing in front of the vehicle turning a hand crank over and over until the engine started, the driversat inside the vehicle and turned a small key or pressed a button, and let the "electric starter" do it. Yes, this meant thatcars were more complicated by adding a battery and electric system, but it also made cars easier to start and drive. Despite manufacturers arguing why their hand cranks were better than the hand cranks of other manufacturers, automobile models with hand cranks disappeared by 1920.

• In 1934, the automobile industry introduced the "automatic transmission" eliminating the value-added featuresof the "stick shift" and "clutch pedal". Before, people had to know when to shift gears manually, depending ontheir speed, engine RPM, and steepness of the hill they are driving on, pressing the clutch pedal at the same time, requiring skilled hand-foot coordination. Yes, cars weremore complicated with more equipment under the hood, but it made them easier and safer to drive, with one less thing to distract the driver. Surprisingly cars with automatic transmissions can be more energy-efficient, employing best practices when to automatically shift gears to optimize fuel economy.

  While you can still purchase automobiles with manual transmission, the newer hybrids and electric vehiclesnearly universally all have automatic transmission. Not everyone is skilled enough to drive a car with manual transmission, something to consider when you decide which car to take on a cross-country road trip if you want to share the driving responsibilities with the rest of your group.Not surprisingly, rental car companies like Hertz offer primarily cars with automatic transmission, both forincreased safety, and to broaden the reach to all driving skill levels.

• In 1946, the automobile industry introduced "power windows", eliminating the value-added features of the window-crankon each door to roll the window up or down. Now you just press or pull a lever or button, until the window reaches the desired position. Yes, this means that cars are yet again more complicated,with little motors inside each door panel, but it made them easier to use, with the added safety option to lock out children from rolling down the back windows.

  Some people actually choose manual windowsout of fear of driving their car into a lake or river, assuming a window-crank may make the difference in escaping the vehicle. It is these kinds of highly-unlikely scenarios that cause people to make bad purchase decisions. A betterapproach is to learn how to [escape from a sinking vehicle] properly, and keep the right "window-breaking" tools on hand. I keep a hammer for this purpose, and while you might think that Tucson has norivers or lakes to worry about, we do have flash floods, and I'll take knowledge-plus-hammer over window-crank any day.

So, when a company or industry innovates a new way of doing something, changing the way people think about the problem, it might take a while to take effect. SVC has been well-received in the marketplace, with thousands of delighted clients in production.

technorati tags: Shell, Oil, Eureka, video, webisode, IBM, storage, virtualization, engine, SVC, Kelly Beavers, EMC, HP, Hitachi, HDS, Kevin McIsaac, ComputerWorld, network-based, USP, USP-V, Hu Yoshida, BarryW, automobile, industry, electric starter, automatic transmission, power windows, escape, sinking, car, Tucson

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Tags:  disk

Continuing this week's theme of "Innovation that Matters", today I'll discuss cell phones, and their rolein "cloud computing". Some people call these "cellular phones", "mobile phones" or "hand phones".I have posted about these topics before. Last January, I discussed the[Convergence]represented by Apple's iPhone, and in August, I talked about[Accessing Data in the Clouds], but some recent announcements bring this back up as a fresh topic.

With the [end of the PC era] upon us,IBM researchers John J. Barton, Shumin Zhai, and Steve B. Cousins from the Almaden Research Center wrote aresearch paper [Mobile Phones Will Become The Primary Personal Computing Devices], and USA Today reports that [Social networkers reach out more with cellphones]. Of course, telephones, including those attached to land lines, have always been used for social networking since the late 1800s, to arrange parties, reunions, and other get-togethers, but this article is referring to the new "Web 2.0" meaning of social networking, with services like Facebook, Flickr, MySpace and Twitter.

This is a major game-changer, forcing companies to rethink many of their strategies. For example,John Windsor, on The YouBlog asks the CBS Interactive division[What Business Are You In?]The answer is that CBS is shifting from a content focus, to an audience focus, looking to provide CBS television contentto an audience of cell phone users.ThinkBeta [Me, My Cell Phone and I] presents some interesting statistics. Google CEO Eric Schmidt estimates there are over 2.5 billion cell phones in use today, with 288 million units shipped alone in 3Q07.

That's quite a trend. As a leader in IT innovation, IBM tries to stay one step ahead of the industry, selling off mature technologies to other manufacturers, like typewriters, printers, and most recently laptops and desktop PCs, so that it can focus on newer technologies and market trends. For example, while many people might be aware that IBM designs and fabricates processor chips for all of the major game consoles (Microsoft's Xbox 360, Nitentendo's Wii, and Sony'sPlay Station 3), they might not know that IBM also makes chips for many cell phone manufacturers. IBM[POWER Architecture] blog writes about the IBM CMOS 7RF SOI semiconductor:

IBM has managed to integrate seven Radio Frequency (RF) front-end functions onto this single CMOS chip using silicon-on-insulator (SOI) technology. And this means? For cell phones, according to IBM foundry product director Ken Torino, "Our solution minimizes insertion loss and maximizes isolation which will prevent dropped calls even on the most inexpensive handsets." Currently, cell phone RF front-end functions are handled by five to seven chips and at least two of those are using expensive gallium arsenide (GaA) technologies. The CMOS 7RF SOI should not only reduce costs by eliminating the need for so many chips, but also trim the fat from materials expenditures since GaA tech is somewhat expensive. IBM predicts that manufacturers will first use the chip to reduce on-phone processors to two or three before making the leap to a single chip.

With all this demand, the world will need engineers to develop softwareapplications that work in this new environment. This plays into IBM's strength in the area of grid and supercomputing.IBM and Google announced they have jointly established an Internet-scale computing initiative to promote new software development methods that can help students and researchers address the challenges of Internet-scale applications. From[IBM Internet-scale computing] webpage:

Internet use and content has grown dramatically, fueled by global reach, mobile device access, and user-generated Web content, including large audio and video files. More of the world population is looking to the mobile Web to fulfill basic economic needs. To meet this challenge, Web developers need to adopt new methods to address significant applications such as search, social networking, collaborative innovation, virtual worlds and mobile commerce.

The University of Washington is the first to join the initiative. A small number of universities will also pilot the program, including Carnegie-Mellon University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stanford University, the University of California at Berkeley, and the University of Maryland. In the future, the program will be expanded to include additional researchers, educators and scientists.

The heart of the project is a large cluster of several hundred computers (a combination of Google and IBM systems) that is planned to grow to more than 1,600 processors. Students will access the cluster through the Internet to test their parallel programming projects. The cluster is powered with open source software, including:

• Linux [Fedora]
• XEN systems virtualization (see [XenSource])
• [Hadoop] workload scheduling

The project includes a Web site to encourage collaboration among universities in the program, built with Web 2.0 technologies from the [IBM Innovation Factory].

For more viewpoints on this, read the [Google Press Release],or the reviews at [PC World,Cnet,GridsWatch,BBC News, eWeek,IT Jungle].

technorati tags: cellphones, cell, cellular, mobile, hand, phones, iPhone, cloud computing, end of PC era, John Barton, Shumin Zhai, Steve Cousins, IBM, Almaden, Research Center, primary, personal, computing, device, Web 2.0, CBS, Interactive, Google, Eric Schmidt, Microsoft, Xbox+360, Nintendo, Wii, Sony, PlayStation, PS3, CMOS, 7RF, SOI, GaA, Internet-scale, computing, CMU, MIT, Linux, Fedora, Xen, XenSource, Apache, Hadoop, MapReduce, Eclipse, parallel programming, Innovation, factory, PCworld, Cnet, GridsWatch, BBC, eWeek, ITjungle

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Tags:  infrastructure disk

Continuing my week's theme on Innovations that matter, I thought I would tackle energy efficiency and the recent excitement over the Smart car.

USA Today had an article [America crazy about breadbox on wheels called Smart car]. This car weighs only 2400 pounds, gets a respectable 33 MPG City,and 40 MPG Highway, with a list price of $11,590 US dollars. These have been in Europe for some time now.The "Smart" name comes from combining the S from Swatch, the M from Mercedes and ART. The car was designed byNicholas Hayek, founder of the SWATCH wristwatch line, and manufactured by Daimler, who also makes Mercedes cars.

We have many communities here in Tucson that people drive street-legal golf carts. People don't realize but bothelectric and electric/gas hybrid golf carts have been around for a long time. Some of the nicer golf carts run forabout $7,000 US dollars, with a shelf on the back that can hold two sets of golf clubs, or groceries.Of course, you would never take a golf cart on the highway, so that is where the Smart car comes in, with a 10gallon tank, could easily get you from one major city to another.

Like golf carts, the Smart-for-Two model being sold in the US will hold only two people, which is perfect for manyAmerican families. The standard 4-person or 5-person sedan is too big for most DINKS (Dual Income, No Kids), and other families with kids often opt for the 7-person SUV instead.

It is good to see that energy consumption is finally getting the attention it deserves. IBM recently announced some exciting offerings to help data centers manage their energy consumption:

IBM Systems Director Active Energy Manager V3.1 [AEM]:

A new, key component of IBM's [Cool Blue portfolio] offering, AEM helps clients manage and even potentially lower energy costs. According to Gartner, insufficient power and excessive heat remain the greatest challenges in the data center. With AEM, IT managers can understand exact power/cooling costs, manage the efficiency of the current environment and reduce energy costs. AEM is the only energy management software tool that can provide clients with a single view of the actual power usage across multiple IBM platforms, including x86, blades, Power and storage systems, with plans to extend support to the mainframe.

IBM Usage and Accounting Manager Virtualization Edition V7.1 [UAV]for System p and System x:

UAV gives IT managers more information to manage data center costs. These powerful usage management tools are designed to accurately measure, analyze, and report resource utilization of virtualized/consolidated/shared resources. With UAV, IT managers can better manage costs and justify new systems by determining who is using how much of which resource; assessing the cost of an IT service or application; and accurately charging each user or department. Working with AEM capabilities, it will also allow tracking of energy consumption costs by server and by user. This level of reporting eliminates a key inhibitor to the adoption of virtualization and consolidation and further differentiates IBM systems.

IBM Tivoli Usage and Accounting Manager[UAM]:

This solution -- ideal for heterogenous IT shops -- serves as an accurate measurement tool underlying billing processes and SLA compliance. UAM provides usage-based accounting and charging for virtually any IT resources across the enterprise -- ranging from mainframes to virtualized servers to storage networks and more. The Usage and Accounting Manager Virtualization offerings seamlessly integrate into it.

Whether you are trying to reduce energy consumption in your data center, or in your transportation around town, these innovations can help you stay "green".

technorati tags: Smart Car, USAToday, golf cart, street legal, hybrid, MPG, green, energy, IBM Systems, Director, AEM, UAV, UAM, TUAM, SLA, management, virtualization, DINKS, SUV

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Tags:  green

Continuing my theme of "Innovation that matters", I thought I would cover MapQuest and NeverLost.

When Shawn Callahan on Anecdote wrote[Our need for the knowledge worker is over], he was referring to the fact that we no longer need the term "knowledge worker", because practically everyone isa "knowledge worker" today. He asks "How does knowledge help us to work better?"

It is said that as much as 30 percent of a knowledge worker's time is spent looking for information to do their jobs. This could be information to make a decision, decide between several choices, take specific action, or schedule when these actions should take place. The logistics of planning a business trip, and actually navigating in unfamiliarsurroundings, is a good example of this, and presents some unique challenges.

Before these technologies

Before these technologies, to plan a trip involved finding someone who lives or has been to the destination city,can recommend hotels and restaurants near the meeting facility, and can suggest approximate times it would take to drive from one place to another. I would bring a compass, and would shop for a city map, either before leaving, or upon arrival.

On one trip to Raleigh, I asked a local IBMer who lived in Raleigh for a hotel recommendation. The hotel was nice,but involved a long 45-60 minute commute each day to the meeting facility. When I asked her why she suggested thatparticular hotel, she said it was because it was "close to the airport". I have since learned never to ask for "best" of anything, as this is subject to such interpretation.

On another trip, I was travelling with a colleague in Germany. He asked how I knew which bus to take, and which bus stop to wait at. I pulled out my compass, and told him that based on the schedule, the bus that went in a specific directionmust be the correct one. The entire bus load of people burst out laughing, that we fit the universal stereotype ofmen who refuse to ask for directions. This method works only in Germany, where timeliness is next to godliness. In other countries, time schedules are more of a suggestion.

Sometimes, maps of the destination city were not always easy to find. Now with the Internet and Google Earth, maps are available before leaving on the trip. (See my post on Inner Workings of Storage which discusses how Google Earth works.)

MapQuest

I like using MapQuest, available online at [mapquest.com], and have not yet looked into the similar systems from Google or Yahoo. I map out each leg of my trip that involves driving, walking or trains. These are oftenairport-to-hotel, hotel-to-meeting, meeting-to-airport. Having a feel for the time and distances between locationshelps choose hotels and restaurants, when to leave, and so on.

I even use MapQuest in Tucson. Recently, a route I generated to visit a friend across town took into accountconstruction on Highway I-10 that has been going on for a while, where 8 miles of on-ramps are closed, and routed me around this mess accordingly. This is one key advantage over a static map, either a paper map, or downloaded from Google Earth.

While MapQuest may not always choose the "best" route, it always finds "a route" that works, and generally works for me.

For other reviews of MapQuest, see [Cartography, Cnet's Troy Dreier,EZ Driving, and Misha on HubPages].

NeverLost

A few problems with a MapQuest print-out I have found are:

• It is on paper, which could impact driving, as I have to look away from the road to look at the instructions.
• If it can't find a specific address, it provides generic instructions, and often, this involves airports.
• It often starts with "Head Northeast...", so unless you brought your compass, or can tell what direction you are pointing from Sun, Moon or stars, you may end up leaving in the wrong direction.

Recently, I checkmarked the "Request NeverLost" box on my Hertz Gold profile, and now I seem to get NeverLost innearly every rental. The system is based on the[Global Positioning System] set of satellites,complemented by a CD-based street information and yellow pages data for US and Canada, stored in the trunk.

The NeverLost system knows which way the car is oriented, can tell which direction you are driving, and tell youwith voice prompts to be in the left lane, right lane, and when to make left and right turns. No need for a compassor any knowledge of which way is North, East, West or South.

I also like that it gives you three choices for route: (a) Shortest time, (b) Most use of Highways, and (c) Least use of Highways. This came in handy when I was in Toronto last week. Apparently, the 407 Highway had recently implementedan Electronic Toll Road (ETR) which bills based on license plate. While this system is fine for residents, it isnot designed for rental car companies. Hertz left a note in my car warning me NOT to use the 407 highway, or I wouldbe charged an $8.50 dollar penalty. I chose "Least use of Highways" and proceeded to tour the city of Toronto for90 minutes from the Pearson Airport to my hotel in Markham, a trip that would have only taken 20 minutes otherwise.

Once you enter your destination street address, it can estimate the distance to get there. This is not a quick process, as there is no keyboard, you have to enter each letter using up/down/left/right keys. You can enter thename of the street, hotel or restaurant. To find "Sal Grosso" restaurant in Smyrna, it was at 1927 Powers Ferry Road,but NeverLost said that Powers Ferry only went from 2750-6350. I had to select 2750 and then hope to be close enough.

In Dallas, I tried to find "P. F. Chang's" restaurant, and you have to make sure that the periods and spaces are entered exactly. I ended up looking for restaurants in Grapevine, Texas, and then just going through the list ofall that start with the letter "P".

Another issue is that sometimes it takes awhile to find the satelites in the sky. I get the car started, I hit theenter button to get the NeverLost started, enter the address, and then it starts looking for satellites? Why doesn'tit look for satellites while you spend 3-5 minutes trying to enter the street address?In my case, I take out my MapQuest print-out, head in the right direction, and hope that NeverLost catches upeventually, in time to help me get to the final location.

It is not clear how often Hertz updates the CDrom that contains the street and yellow pages data. About 30-40 percent of the time, it can't find the street address I am looking for, and I have to be creative on howto get me in the general area.

Part of the problems is that I have not read the entire instruction manual, and do not have time to learn itwhen I am in the car driving. I might have to put this on my reading to-do list before my next trip. Some ofmy other colleagues have purchased their own GPS-based systems, like those from Garmin or Magellan, so that theyalways have it available, and they always know how to use it. This has the advantage that you can use it when walking around, or in your own car when you are home, as well.

See the [Official Hertz NeverLost website] for more information.or here for other reviews from[James Martin, and [Thom Hogan].

Despite these few problems, I am impressed on the innovations involved to make this all happen. All of the mapping information was stored, transmitted, searched, and then plotted in a manner that provides specificinformation that you need to get the job done. For now, I will probably use a combination of these to planand travel on my business trips. Wouldn't it be nice if other areas in your life had this kind of support?

technorati tags: knowledge worker, MapQuest, Google, Yahoo, Hertz, NeverLost, Garmin, Magellan[Read More]

Tags:  infrastructure bc

In North America, today marks the start of the "Give 1 Get 1" program.

Children using the XO laptop

I first learned from this when I was reading about Timothy Ferriss' [LitLiberation project] on his [Four Hour Work Week] blog, and was surfing around for related ideas, and chanced upon this. I registered for a reminder, and it came today(the reminder, not the laptop itself).

Here's how the program works. You give $399 US dollars to the "One Laptop per Child" (OLPC)[laptop.org] organization for two laptops: One goes to a deserving child ina developing country, the second goes to you, for your own child, or to donate to a localcharity that helps children. This counts as a $199 purchase plus a $200 tax-deductible donation.For Americans, this is a [US 501(c)(3)] donation, and for Canadians and Mexicans, take advantage of the low-value of the US dollar!

If your employer matches donations, like IBM does, get them to match the $200donation for a third laptop, which goes to another child in a developing country. As for shipping, you pay only for the shipping of the one to you, each receiving country covers their own shipping. In my case, the shipping was another $24 US dollars for Arizona.No guarantees that it will arrive in time for the holidays this December, but it might.

To sweeten the deal, T-mobile throws in a year's worth of "Wi-Fi Hot Spot"that you can use for yourself, either with the XO laptop itself, or your regular laptop, iPhone, or otherWi-Fi enabled handheld device.

National Public Radio did a story last week on this:[The $100 Laptop Heads for Uganda]where they interview actor [Masi Oka], best known from the TV show ["Heroes"], who has agreed to be their spokesman.At the risk of sounding like their other spokesman, I thought I would cover the technology itself, inside the XO,and how this laptop represents IBM's concept of "Innovation that matters"!

The project was started by [Nicholas Negroponte] from [MIT University] as the "$100 laptop project". Once the final designwas worked out, it turns out it costs $188 US dollars to make, so they rounded it up to $200. This is stillan impressive price, and requires that hundreds of thousands of them be manufactured to justify ramping upthe assembly line.

Two of IBM's technology partners are behind this project. First is Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) that providesthe 433Mhz x86 processor, which is 75 percent slower than Thinkpad T60. Second is Red Hat,as this runs lean Fedora 6 version of Linux. Obviously, you couldn't have Microsoft Windows or Apple OS X, as both require significantly more resources.

The laptop is "child size", and would be considered in the [subnotebook] category. At 10" x 9" x 1.25", it is about the size of class textbook,can be carried easily in a child's backpack, or carried by itself with the integrated handle. When closed, it is sealedenough to be protected when carried in rain or dust storms. It weighs about 3.5 pounds, less than the 5.2 pounds of myThinkpad T60.

The XO is "green", not just in color, but also in energy consumption.This laptop can be powered by AC, or human power hand-crank, with workin place to get options for car-battery or solar power charging. Compared to the 20W normally consumed bytraditional laptops, the XO consumes 90 percent less, running at 2W or less. To accomplish this, there is no spinning disk inside. Instead, a 1GB FLASH drive holds 700MB of Linux, and gives you 300MB to hold your files. There isa slot for an MMC/SD flash card, and three USB 2.0 ports to connect to USB keys, printers or other remote I/O peripherals.

The XO flips around into three positions:

Standard

Standard laptop position has screen and keyboard. The water-tight keyboard comes in ten languages:International/English, Thai, Arabic, Spanish, Portuguese, West African, Urdu, Mongolian, Cyrillic, and Amharic.(I learned some Amharic, having lived five years with Ethiopians.)There does not appear be a VGA port, so don't be thinking this could be used as an alternative to project Powerpoint presentations onto a big screen.

Built-in 640x480 webcam, microphone and speakers allow the XO to be used as a communication device. Voice-over-IP (VOIP) client software, similar to Skype or [IBM Lotus Sametime], is pre-installed for this purpose.

The basic built-in communication are 802.1g (54Mbs) that you can use to surf the web usingthe Wi-Fi at your local Starbucks; and 802.1s which forms a "mesh network" with other XO laptops, and can surf theweb finding the one laptop nearby that is connected to the internet to share bandwidth. This eliminates the need to build a separate Wi-Fi hub at the school. There are USB-to-Ethernet and USB-to-Cellular converters, so that might be an alternative option.

For kids who want to learn how to program, the Python, Javascript, Logo and Squeak languages are included.Since the machine runs Linux, it can be modified as needed to fit individual needs of each country.

E-book

Flipped vertically, the device can be read like a book.The screen can be changed between full-color and black-white, 200 dpi, with decent 1200x900 pixel resolution. The full-color is back-lit, and can be read in low-lighting. The black-white is not back-lit, consumes much less power, andcan be read in bright sunlight. In that regards, it is comparable to other [e-book devices], like a Cybook or Sony Reader.

Software includes a web-browser, document reader, word processor and RSS feed reader to read blogs.The OLPC identifies all of the software, libraries and interfaces they use, so that anyone that wants to developchildren software for this platform can do so.

Game mode

With the keyboard flipped back, the 6" x 4.5" screen has directional controls and X/Y/A/B buttons to run games. This would make it comparable to a Nintendo DS or Playstation Portable (PSP). Again, the choice between back-lit color,or sunlight black-white screen modes apply. Some games are pre-installed.

So for $399, you could buy a Wi-Fi enabled[16GB iPod Touch] for yourself, which does much the same thing, or you can make a difference in the world.I made my donation this morning, and suggest you--my dear readers in the US, Canada and Mexico--consider doing the same.Go to [www.laptopgiving.org] for details.

technorati tags: North America, Give-1-Get-1, program, XO, laptop, Timothy Ferriss, Four Hour Work Week, LitLiberation, One Laptop Per Child, OLPC, $100 laptop, IBM, AMD, Red Hat, Fedora, T-mobile, NPR, Nicholas Negroponte, MIT, Thinkpad, T60, notebook, subnotebook, Linux, Windows, OS X, green, AC, hand-crank, human-power, International, English, Thai, Arabic, Spanish, Portuguese, West+African, Urdu, Mongolian, Cyrillic, Amharic, Ethiopia, FLASH, MMC/SD, USB, VGA, webcam, VOIP, Lotus, Sametime, Skype, Starbucks, mesh, network, Nintendo DS, Playstation, portable, PSP, 802.1g, 802.1s, Wi-Fi, Ethernet, Powerpoint, Python, Javascript, Logo, Squeak, back-lit, sunlight, Cybook, Sony, Reader, RSS,

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Tags:  infrastructure olpc disk green

I'm in Atlanta today, on my way back to Tucson, but wanted to talk about IBM's entry-level iSCSI offerings, based on comments on this week's discussion about Dell's acquisition of EqualLogic.

Analysts were quick to comment on this when the news broke.Tony Asaro gave his take on [Dell's Logic - The Storage Market is No Longer Equal], and Steve Duplessie writes [Dell Just Bought N.H.’s Tech Sector]. The last time I remember Steve talking about EqualLogic, [Catching Up], he had the funniestquote:

"EqualLogic didn’t get 2,000 customers because people were dying to use iSCSI. It got them because it built systems that scale dynamically and because a system the size of Montana can be managed by someone as clueless as my ex-wife."

As with any acquisition, people might be asking if this is a "match made in heaven" that makes strong business sense,or another HP-Compaq debacle. Back in September, I posted [Supermarkets and Specialty Shops] to explain how the storage marketplace has two market segments. Internally, IBM distinguishesbetween "clients" and "customers". Clients are those that buy services and complete solutions from a one-stop systems vendor, such as IBM, HP, Sun, or Dell, or systems integrator like IBM, CSC or EDS. Customers are those that buy products and components, from the systems vendors I just mentioned, as well as from individual specialty shops, like EMC, HDS, or NetApp.

To reach the growing "supermarket" segment, specialty shops are dependent on systems vendors to OEM or resell their kit: EMC disk through Dell, HDS disk through Sun and HP, NetApp through IBM. Until now, EqualLogichad to make their living as a "specialty" shop, but iSCSI appeals more to SMB than large enterprises, andSMB tend to be in the "supermarket" segment, so they partnered with Sun. Here is the timeline of this likely awkwardand strained relationship:

• 2002: [Sun Says iSCSI May Be a 'Mistake']quoting Balint Fleischer, CTO of Sun's network storage group.
• 2003: [Sun changes iSCSI tune] andcertifies EqualLogic arrays for use with Sun servers.
• 2004: [EqualLogic and Sun Microsystems Enter into Reseller Agreement]

I am not surprised that I haven't seen anything in the blogosphere yet from HP, Dell or Sun. I suspect this news meansthat Sun won't be reselling Dell's EqualLogic boxes anymore, and perhaps there is nothing more for Sun bloggers Randy Chalfant or Nigel Dessau to add to that. HP and Dell are practically non-existent in the storage blogosphere, so I didn't expect much from them either.

I did, however, expect EMC to put in their spin, given that Dell resells EMC disk, and accounts for perhaps 15% of their revenues.Now that Dell has multiple offerings, they will be instructing their channel reps when to lead with EqualLogic versus when to sell EMC, for now, until 2011, at which point may simplify their storage sales model to just EqualLogic. I don't know if Dell would do that in 2011. Depending on how quick the decline happens, EMC may have to increase the pricesof their gear, or cut into their development budgets, to make up for this loss.

I started this post because of a comment from EMC blogger Chuck Hollis, who speculates how this will impact[Dell, EqualLogic and EMC].In that post, he expresses his opinion (which I will put into a different color):

"Speculation is pretty evenly split. Neither HP nor IBM have a good, entry-level iSCSI product."

If he had left out the word "good", then that would just be a false statement, but by adding the word "good" reduces this to merely an opinion of IBM products that I disagree with. (I have no experience with whateverHP sells in this category, nor talked to any customers about their experiences, so will neither agree nordisagree with Chuck's opinion of the HP half of his statement). As for the term "Entry-level", this is fairly well defined by analysts as a storage system under $50,000 US Dollars. Actually, IBM has three good offerings.

DS3300

Our basic, lowest-price model is the IBM System Storage DS3300, which does iSCSI only, like the EqualLogic offerings. This supports both SAS and SATA disks, and can attach to our System x and System p server product lines.

N3300

Our smallest model of our fancier IBM System Storage N series not only supports iSCSI, but also CIFS, NFS,HTTP, FTP, and FCP protocols, what we call "Unified Storage". The iSCSI feature is included at no additional charge, and small customers can start with this, then scale up to larger N3600, N5000 or N7000 models, andadd more protocols and software features, as their business grows.

N3600

Our next larger model, but still entry-level, is the N3600. Since the N series supports a unified multi-protocolplatform, with features like SnapLock for regulatory compliance and SnapMirror for remote disk mirroring. The IBM System Storage N series easily replaces any mix of EMC "C-boxes": Centera, Celerra, and CLARiiON.

Both the DS3300 and the N series support the various Business Applications I have discussed this week, Microsoft Exchange, Lotus Domino, SAP, Oracle, Siebel, JD Edwards and PeopleSoft. N series offers SnapManager for variousapplications to make the business value even that much better.

Chuck speculates that Dell did this to compete better against rival HP, but that doesn't make sense, sincehe feels HP didn't have much to offer in this space. Perhaps Dell did this to competebetter against IBM, the number one vendor in storage hardware, according to IDC. Looking at what IBM andNetApp have to offer, Dell may have realized that they didn't have competitive disk systems from their resellingrelationship with EMC, looked elsewhere and found EqualLogic. Meanwhile, EqualLogic probably felt that Sun wasgoing out of business, or not yet fully supportive of IP SAN environments, and decided to ["switch horses midstream"].

For more about the DS3300 or N series, see my [Announcement Recap of October 2007] or visit our [www.ibm.com/storage] website.

technorati tags: IBM, entry-level, iSCSI, Dell, EqualLogic, ESG, Tony Asaro, Steve Duplessie, Montana, ex-wife, HP, Compaq, systems vendors, systems integrators, supermarket, specialty, products, components, services, solutions, Chuck Hollis, Sun, NetApp, HDS, Exchange, Domino, SAP, Oracle, Siebel, JD Edwards, PeopleSoft, IDC, DS3300, N3300, N3600

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Continuing this week's theme on Enterprise Applications, today I will cover Oracle.

IBM is Oracle's number #1 integration partner, and has the leading market share, nearly 40 percent, for IT hardware running Oracle applications. In the coopetition category, Oracle's databases competes against IBM's DB2 database offerings, and Oracle'sapplications compete against SAP's set of Enterprise Apps. While SAP offers its own internal database, most production SAP environmentsuse either an Oracle or IBM database instead. Comparing license revenues, Oracle's application side earns roughly 70 percent of the amount SAP applications earn.

To compete against SAP, Oracle has been on a spending spree of acquisitions. This includes PeopleSoft, Siebel, Hyperion, Agile, and JD Edwards.IBM can help with all of these applications, and many clients continue to use IBM DB2 as the underlying database, rather than switching over to Oracle database. For example, IBM has sizing tools to help identify the right amount of servers and storage based on "best practice" experience.

Server Platforms

Oracle's database uses a number-letter combination. "9i" was Version 9, "i" for Internet. "10g" and "11g" are versions 10 and 11, "g" for Grid. Most of the Oracle customers I deal with are still on 9i or 10g. The 11g releaseis supported on Linux and Windows, with the other platforms to be delivered in a staged approach.

Alternatively, most run also on AIX on System p, and Linux/Windows on System x. For System i customers, the Oracle supports its [JD Edwards World] andJD Edwards Enterprise One natively on i5/OS, the other applications can run under an AIX LPAR on an System i server.

While some of my readers cringe everytime I mentioned benchmarking, IBM has the top benchmarks for Oracle 10g database, [Oracle e-Business Suite], JD Edwards and PeopleSoft.

As with SAP, it is possible with Oracle to run a front-end application on one server platform, and theback-end database on a different server platform. Many of IBM's largest customers run the front-end onAIX or Linux, and then use z/OS on System z for the back-end database.

Oracle has implemented a "Scale-Out" approach called Real Application Clusters [RAC],pronounced same as "rack", which I discussed before [Similar Sounding Storage Speech].Several servers can act as an "application cluster" to access a common database. This approachallows customers to use a bunch of x86 servers instead of a bigger System p or System i machine. Additional processor capability can simply be added into the "application cluster" as needed.

IBM and Oracle are both staunch proponents of Linux. Oracle offers theirOracle Enterprise Linux support program.In this support program, Oracle will offer support service contracts for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) corporatecustomers.This could explain why Oracle decided to support[Linux first]on its new 11g database, rather than Windows.

What's New

To deal with all of their acquisitions, Oracle has announced its Applications Unlimited strategy. Inthis strategy, the Oracle Fusion middleware will support all of Oracle'sapplications, including JD Edwards, PeopleSoft, and Seibel. This is good for IBM, as it will simplify IBM's testing of server and storage platforms for its Oracle clients.

To support pre-sales efforts, IBM and Oracle have formed the IBM Oracle International Competency Center,[IOICC]

technorati tags: IBM, Oracle, SAP, PeopleSoft, JD Edwards, Siebel, Hyperion, Agile, Red Hat, RHEL, 9i, 10g, 11g, z/OS, i5/OS, AIX, Linux, Windows, Oracle Enterprise Linux, Real Application Clusters, RAC, Fusion, Applications Unlimited

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Continuing this week's theme on Enterprise Applications, I thought that since I mentioned Lotus Notes in my discussion ofSAP yesterday, that I would cover Microsoft Exchange today.

IBM and Microsoft is the ultimate example of "Coopetition". Both companies develop popular operating systems. Microsoft's "Xbox 360" gaming console uses IBM processors. Microsoft Exchange and IBM Lotus Domino are the Coke-and-Pepsi dominant players in the email marketplace, with Microsoft slightly in the lead, as seen on this graph[Lotus Notes/Domino marketshare growing] from fellow IBM Lotus blogger Alan Lepofsky.And now, Microsoft is getting serious about participating in the storage software business, with its strong support for iSCSI and its SharePoint product. For this post, I will focus just on email.

For those not familiar with both Microsoft and IBM products, I offer the simple cheat-sheet below:

Microsoft Outlook (client)::IBM Lotus Notes (client)
Microsoft Exchange (server)::IBM Lotus Domino (server)

Server/Storage Considerations

Email has become the primary collaboration tool for most businesses, raising it to the level of "mission-critical".Microsoft has introduced its new Exchange 2007 to replace the existing Exchange 2003. Here are the key differences:

Exchange 2003	Exchange 2007
Windows 2000 or 2003	Windows 2003
Runs on 32-bit x86	Requires 64-bit EM64T or AMD64, but Itanium IA64 not supported
Two(2) server roles	Five(5) server roles
	Edge Server Role for combating SPAM
	Unified Messaging services to combine voicemail, email, fax
5 storage groups	50 storage groups per server on Enterprise edition
5 databases	50 databases per server on Enterprise edition (max 5 per storage group)
NAS or NTFS-formatted block disk	NTFS-formatted block disk recommended

Obviously, Exchange only runs on Windows operating system. The change from 32-bit to 64-bit means that many Exchange 2003 customers have not yet migrated over, and perhapsnow is a good time to point out alternative email servers on more reliable operating system platforms.For example, in addition to Windows 2003, Lotus Domino runs on IBM AIX, Linux on x86, Linux on System z, Sun Solaris, i5/OS on System i, and z/OS.

Another Linux alternative to Microsoft Exchange is Bynari InsightServer, which allows you to use your existing Windows-based Microsoft Outlook clients, swapping out only the server. This approach can be used when consolidating Windows servers to Linux virtual images on System z mainframe.Linux desktops can run [Ximian Evolution] to attach to either Bynari server, or Windows-based Microsoft Exchange server.Linux Journal offers a few articles on this:[Understanding and Replacing Microsoft Exchange, andExchange Functionality for Linux].

As with [Exchange 2003 editions], the new Exchange 2007 comes in both ["Standard" and "Enterprise" editions]. With all the newroles supported, you now can limit your "Mailbox Storage Server" role as Enterprise, and have the other roles, likeEdge and Hub, as simply "Standard" instead. Enterprise is about 5x more expensive than Standard, so that can makea difference.With Exchange 2003, the big difference was that "Standard" supported only 16GB, versus 16TB with "Enterprise",making "Standard" impractical for all but the smallest company. In the new Exchange 2007, both Standard and Enterprise support 16TB.

Exchange 2007 is also less IOPS-intensive. Thanks to 64-bit addressing, it generates about 75 percent fewer IOPS than Exchange 2003 for comparable configurations. This is good becauseaccording to a 2006 Radicati Group survey, the average corporate employee gets 84 emails per day, averaging 10MBdaily ingestion, and this is expected to grow to 15.8MB daily ingestion by 2008. The number of mailboxes worldwideis growing at a rate of 16 percent per year.

IBM System Storage is a Microsoft Gold certified partner, and participates in Microsoft's Exchange Solution Reviewed Program [ESRP].Both IBM DS8000 and DS4000 series are certified under this program, using a testbed called Jetstress.Those considering IBM System Storage N series can use Exchange 2007 with NTFS-formatted LUNs via FCP or iSCSIattachment.

Backup and Business Continuity

Back in 2003, the Meta Group found that 80 percent of organizations surveyed felt access to email was more importantthan telephone service, and that 74 percent believed being without email would present a greater hardship thanlosing telephone service. These percentages are probably higher today, with websiteslike ["Crackberry.com"] to cater to those addicted to theirRIM Blackberry hand-held devices.

IBM Tivoli Storage Manager can provide backup and recovery support for Microsoft Exchange.TSM for Mail supports both Microsoft Exchange and Lotus Domino. TSM for Copy Services can use MicrosoftVolume Shadow Copy Services (VSS) interfaces. I blogged about this before, back in June[Exchange 2003 VSS Snapshot Backup Whitepaper], and now there TSM has support for Exchange 2007 as well.

Interestingly, Exchange 2007 has some built-in"Business Continuity" features. Of the ones below, Standard edition has LCR only, Enterprise edition gives you the full set.

• Local Continuous Replication (LCR):In this approach, a single server ships update logs from the active storage group on one disk system over to a passivecopy on a secondary disk system, presumably within 10km FCP distance. These logs can then be forward-applied to thepassive copy. This is sometimes called "database shadowing".

• Cluster Continuous Replication (CCR):This is based on two servers in an active/passive MSCS cluster. First server is attached to the primary disk system,and ships logs to the passive copy attached to the second server.

• Standby Continuous Replication (SCR):For the MSCS cluster-averse customer, SCR is based on two independent servers that are in two locations. In the event of failure on thefirst, scripts can be run to switch over to the second server. Each server has its own disk system.

• Single Copy Clusters (SCC):This is for customers who have existing systems, but not recommended for new customers. An MSCS cluster, where both active andpassive servers are connected to the same single disk system. The disk array can be a single point of failure (SPOF) in this environment.You could mitigate risks by using IBM's disk mirroring in this situation, but then you are left coordinating those copies with new servers at the remote location.

Archive Support

It is estimated that as much as 75 percent of a company's intellectual property (IP) can be found somewhere in their email repository. Email is often requested in lawsuits and regulatory investigations. According to the Workplaceemail IM & blogging 2006 survey by AMA and the ePolicy Institute, 24 percent of organizations have be subpoenaed by courts and regulators, and another 15 percent have gone to court in lawsuits triggered by employee emails.

New regulations now mandate that emails are archived, protected against tampering and unauthorized access, and kept for a specific amount of time, or until certain conditions are met. According to a 2004 CSI and FBI Computer Crime and Security survey, 78 percent of organizations were hit by viruses (the rest must have been running Linux, AIX, i5/OS or z/OS!)and 37 percent reported unauthorized access to confidential information.

IBM offers software to archive emails. IBM CommonStore software supports both Microsoft Exchange and Lotus Domino.For SMB customers, we made things easier with the [IBM CommonStore eMail Archiving Preload Solution], an appliance which I mentioned in [Day 2 Storage Symposium].

What's Next

According to Gartner, over 60 million people will be doing some form of telecommuting, so access Microsoft hasbeen working on extending the reach of email beyond Outlook client. There is now "Outlook Web Access" thatprovides browser-based access, "Outlook Mobile" to provide text access from cellular phones, and even "Outlook Voice Access" which allows you to listen to your emails from any phone. These are all part of the new Unified MessagingServices feature.

Microsoft is also teaming up with SAP, with a new offering called Duet. See the [SAP and Microsoft Introduce Duet] press release for more details.

It might be a while before all these are commonly deployed, but at least it is something to look forward to!

technorati tags: IBM, Microsoft, coopetition, Xbox 360, Exchange, Lotus, Notes, Domino, client, server, EM64T, AMD64, IA64, Itanium, Alan Lepofsky, Unified Messaging, services, Bynari, Ximian, roles, standard, enterprise, edition, ESRP, Jetstress, Edge, Hub, IOPS, NAS, NTFS, Blackberry, Crackberry, Windows, Linux, AIX, z/OS, i5/OS, VSS, CommonStore, Gartner, Outlook, web, access, mobile, voice, SAP, Duet

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