Chuck's Blog

Winds Of Change

I really enjoy meeting customers.  However, not every customer interaction is sunshine and lollipops. 

Sometimes, the interactions can be tense at the beginning, but result in an extremely productive discussion.

I had one of those today, and -- as I thought about it -- I realized I'm starting to see this particular situation more often.  It's a harbinger of things to come.

Storage And Cloud

One of the more popular questions that gets directed at me by journalists and others these days is around the above topic.

I guess since EMC does storage -- and is very active in things cloud-like -- they expect us to have some nice sound bites.

Well, I have my pre-packaged answer that's suitable for the press, but -- if you have the time and the interest -- the deeper answer is much more engaging.

The Three Faces Of Cloud

Going out to the GigaOm Structure09 cloud event gave me an opportunity to reflect on "what is cloud" and, more importantly "what is not cloud".

While many of the discussions were interesting, I did feel that there were way too many contrived arguments needed to support thinly-veiled product pitches.

At the event, a journalist I know stopped me, and begged me for a very short, understandable description of what this cloud stuff was all about so she could better understand what everyone was talking about.

Needless to say, I was very sympathetic.

I did my best to oversimplify -- let me know how I did?

Element Management vs. Service Orchestration

One continual theme that comes up around any strategic discussion of fully virtualized environments and private clouds is management.

"There aren't any tools!". 
"There are too many tools!". 
"The tools don't work the way I do!"

So what's going on here?

Getting Comfortable With Oversubscription

It's a key concept in getting any sort of shared resource efficiency.  We see it everywhere we look in our daily lives.

But as we talk about IT strategies, private cloud and fully virtualized environments, one of the biggest stumbling blocks I'm encountering is the idea of intentionally pushing oversubscription of IT infrastructure resources -- servers and storage.

And that's going to have to change, I think.

Monetizing The Private Cloud -- Part 1

If you've been following this blog -- or other similar conversations -- you'll know that my current focus is on private clouds.

A private cloud is a fully virtualized IT environment that can optimize the use of IT resources -- whether they be internal, external or a combination of both.

Up to now, I've been covering what they are, how they're built, why we need them, etc.

It's now time to take on a big, hairy issue -- how will they be paid for?

Because -- at the end of the day -- it all boils down to money and economics, doesn't it?

Business Continuity -- Virtualization Changes Everything

I haven't looped back to this thought in quite a while, but felt motivated to do so by this recent press release announcing EMC's business continuity professional services for virtualized environments.

Once again, it's another example of virtualization changing everything, including how we think about protecting against the unthinkable.

Barriers To Private Cloud Adoption

I've must have had the private cloud discussion well over a hundred times with customers.

Begin to fully virtualize your environment

Learn to manage it more like a cloud, and less like a data center from 1989.

Start to consider the strategic implications of the new choices you now have -- everything from dynamic federation of resources to a bring-your-own-laptop program.

Mostly, it's gone pretty well.  Far better, in fact, than any other discussion I've had with customers -- ever.

And I'm starting to see more and more consistency regarding the structural barriers to private cloud adoption by enterprise IT groups.

Why Do I Work For EMC?

It's funny how things happen.

Joe's open letter to Data Domain employees has spontaneously triggered a number of us to share why we like to work at EMC.

First Scott Waterhouse jumped in, and then 'Zilla, and Steve is pretty clear on his motivations, and Barry is pretty clear, and Polly -- so I guess it's my turn.

And, since I'm a different sort of person, my motivations are well -- rather different.

Private Clouds and Portable User Experiences

When talking about private clouds, there's just so many interesting angles to dig into -- it ties so many different themes in IT into a consistent story that I keep getting drawn in like a moth to a flame.

Fortunately, I'm not the only one -- all of the customers I talk to are starting to get the buzz as well.  At some future point, I'll share my reasons why I think this is the case, but -- for now -- I'd like to discuss the user experience part of this discussion.

This post was triggered by a VMware news item describing how health care professionals can use VMware View to create a "follow me" user experience across thin clients, laptops, desktops, tablets -- just about any reasonable user device.

IT gets to package up a user experience, push it to multiple devices, and manage it all centrally.

Talk about your win-win scenario!

Dear Data Domain

This morning, the twitterverse had multiple references to an open letter written by Joe Tucci (our CEO) to the employees of Data Domain.

I thought it was a nice, thoughtful touch -- consistent with how Joe tends to do things.  He thinks about people first, which is a great attribute for any CEO or leader.

For those of you who might be wondering, Joe is a "no BS" guy.  You can take him at his word. 

Personally, I'm hopeful that Data Domain ends up joining the EMC family.  It'd be a blast ...

Trying To Get The Point Across ...

For some years, EMC has been investing in EMC's Proven Solutions -- targeted at industrial-strength application deployments, EMC assembles and tests the daylights out of these combinations of products.

The customers who use them think they're absolutely great, and tell us no other vendor does this sort of qualification work.

But -- alas! -- we still haven't cracked the code on how best to effectively communicate just how much work goes into these Proven Solutions, and -- just as important -- why they're not just another "solution" that some marketing department dreamed up.

In our continual search for better ways to get the message across, the team came up with this most decidedly non-corporate video. 

Hopefully, this gets the message across a bit better  ... now, if I could just figure out what this thing is all about!

The Future Is Here

Those of us who speak on IT topics often find ourselves waxing poetic about the future of technology, or the future of the data center, or something similar.

We wave our hands, and talk about what could be.

What happens when the future is here?

Do we immediately acknowledge that entirely new things are possible and set off in new directions, or do we as human beings take a considerable period to adapt to our new circumstances?

For the last few months, I've been focused almost entirely on private cloud concepts, and the alliance of VMware, Cisco and EMC that has formed to accelerate the adoption of these fully virtualized IT environments that form the basis of private clouds.

I don't think anyone is really arguing that much with what I'm saying.  But changing our thinking and our actions is going to take a while, it seems ...

EMC Makes Surprise Play for Data Domain

Never a dull moment …

EMC just announced our offer for Data Domain.  You can read the full press release here.

I’m sure – like any other acquisition move – there will be a healthy amount of speculation around the motives.

While it’s always fun to read what different people think, I thought I’d offer up my personal perspective as to the rationale for this move.

And it might not be what you think.

The Limitations Of (Storage) Models

Memes come and go in this industry. 

One popular one that's making the rounds is the Doeswijk Data Model, as described by my esteemed colleague and competitor Hu Yoshida over at HDS.

Now, I don't have problems with simple models to illustrate a concept or two, but every model (and analogy!) has its limitations.

In this case, I've now started to see a few people use this model as a basis for creating their overall storage strategy, and the results -- well -- haven't been pretty.

I do want to thank Hu for sharing the model.  And while I want to praise its strengths, I also want to highlight a few key intellectual flaws that can lead you astray if you're not careful.

Press and Analysts React To Private Cloud

I've worked with the press and analyst community for many years. 

Say what you will, but I've found them a very good barometer of what ideas will fly, and which ones won't. 

Sure, they don't actually buy IT products.  But they do get exposed to just about every IT pitch in the world, and they usually have a good nose for what's going to be a popular discussion, and what won't.

I've now had a few outings where I've had an opportunity to share private cloud concepts with these folks -- and how VMware, Cisco and EMC are working together to accelerate this vision.

The reactions have been mostly favorable, but with a few interesting wrinkles here and there.

Storage Made Simple?

Ever have to explain this storage stuff to someone who doesn't really have a background in it?

I find myself speaking to all sorts of people these days, including more and more that are relatively new to all of this.   One example is at press events -- there are people who follow these topics closely, and those that are relative newcomers.

The first few times I tried to explain the wide world of storage to an outsider, I'm afraid I made a terrible mess of everything, and ended up leaving people more confused as a result!

As a result, I've been searching for a quick way to explain to people why storage is such an interesting topic to so many people.  I've sketched out some of the key ideas below.

Let me know how I did?

FCoE, iSCSI and the Meaning of Life

Lots of great content coming out of EMC World, including this very thorough treatise by Stuart Miniman of Blog Stu fame. 

Update: saw this blurb today that IBM is "embracing" FCoE -- at least the server guys are!

I'll link more as I see them ...

EMC World Wrap Up

I'm sorry.

I really intended to spend more time blogging about EMC World this week, but I just got caught up in the whirlwind of so much activity, and now I'm forced to take more of a retrospective view.

It got so crazy that I literally let myself get scheduled in two places at the exact same time.  I really wanted to go to the EMC Blogger's meet & greet on Tuesday, but I found myself being the Master of Ceremonies for part of our presales conference at the exact same time.

My apologies and regrets for not being able to join my social brethren at that meet up.

But -- that being said -- there's a pile of interesting observations I'd like to share.

EMC Takes Atmos Storage OnLine

Perhaps the first big announcement to come out of EMC World is the twin combination of the new Atmos OnLine service, as well as AT&T's new Synaptic Storage as a Service based on Atmos.

While the new services and capabilities are interesting in their own right, I think they're emblematic of certain trends we'll inevitably see more of in the future.

And that's worth discussing ...

EMC World -- Initial Impressions

Hi everyone -- we're all down at EMC World.  Lots to talk about in terms of concepts and technology, but I thought I'd use this first post to focus more on less-quantifiable aspects of this gathering.

Over many years, I've developed a certain cynicism around industry events in general: they're too big, or they're too marketing-focused, or they're just plain boring.

That doesn't seem to be the case with EMC World.

Can You Help?

This post is important -- but a bit off-topic.

All of us in the EMC community are rebroadcasting this request for help.  Please take a moment to consider if you or someone you know would consider helping saving a life.

Thanks!

Oracle Wins Virtual Iron, Customers Lose

Sometimes you see things in this industry that make you shake your head and wonder.

Such is the situation with Oracle's recent acquisition of Virtual Iron. 

Put in the context of other recent activities, the picture is crystal clear: it appears that Oracle intends to use their market power with databases to force customers to consider their soon-to-be-announced virtualization stack.

And, from a customer perspective, this will not be a good thing.

Symmetrix V-Max: What It Takes To Deliver A New Architecture

Well, it's been a while since we announced the new Symmetrix V-Max. 

Industry watchers realized that there was a new way of thinking about enterprise storage: delivered by EMC.  Customers and prospects have been deluging our web sites and sales organizations wanting to know more.

And competitors?  My impression is that they're figuring out what to do next.

One common theme I've noticed in the competitive response was the usual unproven, risky, etc.  It's a predictable competitor response. 

I knew better.  I felt it unjustified.  As a result, I did a bit of digging around to see just how much work went into building and testing the Symmetrix V-Max before we shipped the first one.

And I think you'd be interested in the stats ...

Why Oracle Doesn't Like VMware

In my travels and customer discussions, this particular topic is coming up more and more frequently.

Now that EMC and VMware and other vendors are encouraging customers to seriously consider virtualizing their more critical applications, it's going to become a increasingly hot topic.

As a matter of fact, I'm now quite ready when I hear the familiar "well, Oracle doesn't support VMware".

Getting to the truth of why this actually might be has proven a bit difficult.  It's not something the Oracle people really want to talk about.

In the meantime, I've put together a list of possible reasons why this could be, and offered a bit of commentary as to the thinking behind it.

So let's go take a look at what could possibly be behind this rather unproductive stance towards customers.

Backup and The Private Cloud

OK, so I'm on a theme here. 

The concepts around private clouds have been introduced and discussed, and there are even a few large enterprises who have declared they're building one.

I'm now very interested in looking at the operational impact -- going from IT topic to IT topic -- and seeing how familiar discussions change radically -- and for the better -- when thinking about private clouds. 

The last post was about securing the private cloud; this one's about backup.

And, as we'll see, how we think about something as familiar (and essential) as backup might be up for some wonderful re-thinking in this world.

Accelerating Virtualization And The Private Cloud

I really haven't met anyone recently who thinks that virtualizing as much of their environment as possible isn't a good idea -- at least in the abstract.

I mean, if you're a career IT person, it's a pretty attractive prospect.

Sure, there are issues, challenges and concerns.  If doing this was easy, everyone would be doing it already, right?

This specific discussion comes up when I'm discussing private clouds with an enterprise customer.

Generally speaking, they like what they see, and ask how they should get started.

The inevitable response?  You've got to get busy virtualizing as much of your environment as you can.  The sooner, the better.

So, what's holding you back?

And that can lead to some interesting responses.

Moving On

Big news in our corner of the world. Dave Donatelli is leaving EMC to join HP.

Steve D did me a great service of netting it out.

Dave has always been one of those rare individuals who transformed everything around him for the better: EMC's storage business, our culture -- even my own career and personality.

I'm going to miss him an awful lot.  I wish him well.

Securing The Private Cloud

So much to write about, so little time. 

I guess I'm going to have to think carefully about the topics I write about going forward -- I could easily spend every day doing nothing but blog posts on interesting topics.  Sure, that'd be fun, but my day job would seriously suffer.

A few interesting announcements last week that we can correlate:

• VMware's vSphere announcement -- all about the private cloud
• The Jericho Forum issued their best practices around secure cloud computing
• VMware and RSA made an interesting announcement as part of last week's RSA Conference

Put it all together?

It's all about securing the private cloud ...

Cisco and HP Square Off In Server Land

We all enjoy it when vendors face off on key technologies -- like next-generation server architectures. 

Not only is it fun to watch, but intense competitive pressures are good for customers and good for the industry.  And we've only seen the first few salvos in what should prove to be a sustained battle for data center supremacy

Now, my biases should be clear (rooting for Cisco!) -- but, with the latest round of HP announcements, you can begin to see some very distinct differences in architectural thinking between the two companies.

vSphere as an I/O Engine

As more and more people consider bigger and bigger workloads running in virtual containers, the discussion inevitably turns to I/O throughput and latency.

Now, VMware is no slouch at driving big I/O workloads.  I shared one proof-point discussion from testing done last year in this regard on a previous post.

But today, VMware took a big leap forward in this regard with EMC's announcement of PowerPath/VE.

So, why should you care?

The Real Impact of vSphere

Another milestone day today -- VMware announces their "cloud operating system" -- vSphere.

Much will be written about what it does and how it works.

I thought I'd step back and talk about what it means -- at least, what it means to me.

Thoughts on Oracle and Sun

Like everyone else, I was caught just a little bit off-guard with the announcement this morning.  But now I've had a few hours to consider different aspects of the deal, and it's an interesting mixed bag.

I'm sure we'll hear lots of commentary (and spin!) regarding this combination in the next few weeks and months.

So let the games begin!

Symmetrix V-Max: Watching The Reaction

Well, it’s the day after the big announcement.  Plenty more to discuss on technologies, architectures, pros and cons, impacts, etc.  -- and that will inevitably happen over the next few weeks and months.

But when you announce something this big, it’s always interesting to see how different audiences react. 

And, yes, I do have some gentle suggestions for some of EMC’s competitors in this regard.

Symmetrix V-Max: A New Paradigm For Storage Virtualization?

OK, today's a busy day in storage land -- EMC has some pretty big news.

But -- somewhere in all the speeds and feeds, architectural discussions and weighing in -- we in the storage world have an entirely new model to consider around storage virtualization.

Rather than take the extreme view that "this new model rocks, and all other are no longer worthy", I would say that the storage virtualization model embedded in the V-Max architecture is considerably different than those that have come before, and -- just on that basis alone -- it's worthy of discussion.

Symmetrix V-Max: Storage Architecture Redefined

Today is a very big day for EMC -- and for the broader storage industry. 

EMC has announced an entirely new approach to high-end storage architecture -- nothing more, and nothing less.

I think it's going to take a while for people to fully appreciate what's been done here, and what it means going forward.

Say what you will about EMC, but we're not afraid to make very big bets on very big ideas -- and that's what we've done here.

Thoughts On "The State Of The CIO"

Rather than blather on incessantly about my company and products (again!), I thought I'd share with you some commentary around some great work by a few EMC people to summarize the 'state of the state' when it comes to CIOs.

Most of this material came from a recent CIO Magazine survey, but the EMC team added a few more data points that amplified the general story.  Thanks, guys!

I get to meet more than my fair share of thes individuals, and I found the research intensely interesting.  Maybe you will too.

Keep in mind, this isn't strictly about the person who is the CIO -- it says a lot about how thinking is evolving in enterprise IT in general.

Although many sources were used to create this composite picture, you'll see some very consistent themes throughout.

ESG Weighs In ...

... on VMware, Cisco and EMC working together on the "private cloud" model.

Find it here! 

Good reading ....

Say Hello To EMC SourceOne

I love major product introductions at EMC. 

Fortunately, we get to do this on a relatively frequent basis :-)

Sure, it's great to go through all the new features and functions, but what I like to do is attempt to reflect on some of the thinking behind any new product -- what trends does it try and anticipate?

Such is the case with EMC's new SourceOne platform, publicly announced today.

And you can look at the product one of two ways.

Is it just an email archiving platform with extremely advanced features? 

Or is it a new generation of ILM software that just happened to target emails first?

Opportunities for Telcos and Service Providers

Greetings from Istanbul, Turkey!

I'd never been before, but here I am.  It's a surprisingly rich and colorful city -- definitely on my list of gotta-get-back-here-some-time destinations.

I took a quick picture from my hotel balcony.  That's the Bosporus behind me, connecting the Black Sea with the Aegean Sea. 

My side of the water is essentially the end of the European land mass -- across the water is the beginning of the Asian continent and the Middle East. 

Kind of cool when you think about it from a geographical, historical and cultural perspective.

It's even more cool when you think about why I'm here -- it's for EMC's annual Middle Eastern Telecom Summit. 

Tease Of The Day

Saw this little gem on my EMC Information Calendar widget this morning.

"See how.  04.14.09"

"The virtual data center of the future.  No ordinary approach can take you there.  One virtual event shows you the only approach than can. 04.14.09"

Now, I know what EMC is doing that day -- but do you?

EMC 2009 Strategic Forum -- Joe Tucci's Final Thoughts

Sorry for the gap in the posts.  I'll use the usual excuse -- it's been busy. 

Really, really busy -- but in a good way.

Fortunately, I've been able to squeeze out enough time to finish out the sequence from this event from March 10th. 

If you need the prequel, please see Joe Tucci's intro, the storage discussion, comments on protection, intelligence and automation, Joe's introduction of the private cloud, Paul's discussion on vSphere, and his thoughts on the vCloud and vClient initiatives.

In this segment, we'll wrap up with some final thoughts from Joe Tucci on EMC's newest business unit -- the Cloud Infrastructure Group.

EMC 2009 Strategic Forum -- Paul Maritz Part 2

I had to take a break from my sequence of posts recapping this event on March 10th, what with Cisco's UCS launch, and the whole IBM/Sun thing. 

But I'm back to the task at hand. 

Why? 

So many important and interesting concepts came out at this event that I'm committed to keep working through the sequence -- it was a treasure trove of advanced IT thinking, and deserves wider exposure.

The last post covered the first half Paul Maritz' take on VMware's strategy.  So much was said that I had no hope doing it all justice in a single post -- even a very long one.

So, let's get back into the flow from Paul Maritz.

Private Cloud Webcast

Many of you have expressed a strong interest around what VMware, Cisco and EMC are doing together to transition enterprise IT in the next few years. 

The recent UCS launch probably adds even more relevance to this three-way combination.

I'll be hosting an open-ended discussion with my good friends Doug Gourlay of Cisco (VP of Data Center Solutions), Dr. Stephen Herrod of VMware (SVP of R&D and CTO), and our own Chad Sakac of EMC (VP VMware Technical Alliance)

We'll be discussing our shared vision of enterprise IT (e.g. private clouds), talk about what each company is doing separately and together to make this vision a reality sooner than later, and make sure to share where we are today.

It should be fun!  Sorry, no NDA stuff on this call, though!

For more info, please register here.

Corporate Responsibility

For those of you who are EMC followers (regardless of your motivations!), you might be interested to know that EMC was just announced as making the "100 Best Corporate Citizens List" published by CRO Magazine.

I bet you didn't know there was such a thing as a Corporate Responsibility Officer, did you?

Having worked here a long time, I know that EMC takes its corporate responsibility very seriously.  And we're investing more and more in this important topic -- good economy or otherwise.

If you're interested in the survey and the context, please see here.

If you'd like to see how the various companies stack up, please see here.

I, for one, think there's always more we can do here ...

IBM In Talks To Buy Sun

My, it's been a busy week in our industry, hasn't it?

Cisco UCS on Monday, IBM interested in acquiring Sun on Wednesday. 

I wonder what Friday will bring?

Much will be written about this -- as usual, I found Chris Mellor's take very insightful -- but I thought I'd offer up a bit of quick personal commentary.

Brave New Thinking From Cisco

Today, Cisco announced their long-rumored entry into the heart of the data center market: the UCS, or unified computing system.

Do not make the mistake of dismissing this as "just another x64 blade server".

Regardless of what you may think about the product, the technology or the strategy, there is no denying that UCS represents serious new thinking and innovation in our industry.

And things won't likely be the same around here anymore ...

EMC 2009 Strategic Forum -- Paul Maritz and VMware - Part 1

We're continuing a sequence of posts recapping key themes and ideas from this event (targeted to investment and industry analysts) on March 10th.

Many important highlights, one of which was the sheer pleasure of listening to Paul Maritz, CEO of VMware, present his vision and strategy to this important audience.

Paul is one of those must-see industry speakers.  If you ever have a chance to hear him stretch out on his favorite topics, make the effort to go see him.

And this time, he did not disappoint -- even going farther than the material he shared at the recent VMworld in Cannes.

EMC 2009 Strategic Forum -- Private Cloud

Continuing on our post sequence from the past few days, Joe Tucci's last topic -- and perhaps the most major one -- is how he and Paul Maritz firmly believed enterprise IT would evolve over the next few years into a "private cloud" model.

Note: for regular readers of this blog, the ideas presented here are pretty much the same as my previous posts on the same topic.

But it was awfully good to hear Joe and Paul stand in front of a large room of financial and industry analysts, and spend a good hour on the topic -- it's that important.

And when Paul started his presentation following Joe, it smoothly picked up where Joe left off.

EMC 2009 Strategic Forum -- Protection, Intelligence, Automation

Continuing on previous posts, we're recapping EMC's recent "Strategic Forum", held March 10th in Boston where Joe Tucci and Paul Maritz laid out both EMC's and VMware's strategy to large audience of financial and industry analysts.

I've already covered Joe's opening remarks, and his storage discussion. 

Today, I thought I'd run through the combined topics of protection, intelligence and automation before getting into the more beefy cloud discussions that dominated the day.

Feedback from the event continues to be extremely positive from those who attended.  In case you want to watch the whole event (long, but useful), you can see the recorded webcast here.