Virtualization and Server Consolidation Project

1. Virtualization and Server Consolidation Project Newmarket International, Inc.

2. What is virtualization? • The term virtualizationbroadly describes the separation of a resource or request for a service from the underlying physical delivery of that service. • Virtualization as a technology becomesconsolidation in practice for business

3. Who is Virtualizing Source: CIO Insight IDC expects spending on virtualization technology to be $15 billion by 2009.

4. kernel 1 2 Kernel Mode What is virtualization? • Virtualization through Ring Compression • Virtual Machine Monitor (VMM) runs at ring 0 • OS Kernel(s) run at ring 1 • Requires CPUis virtualizable User mode 3 0 VMM

5. What is virtualization? Operating System Operating System Intel Architecture Virtual Machine Monitor Virtual Machine Monitor: A thin software layer that sits between hardware and the operating system — virtualizing and managing all hardware resources Intel Architecture

6. What is virtualization? Email App1 App2 App3 App App App App Win2k NT4.0 Linux Win2k3 CMS MVS CMS CMS VMWare IBM VM/370 Intel IBM Mainframe • 1960’s IBM VM/370 • A VMM for IBM mainframe • Multiple OS’s on expensive hardware • Desirable when few machines around • Popular research idea in 1960s and 1970s • Entire conferences on virtual machine monitor • Hardware/VMM/OS designed together • Interest died out in the 1980s and 1990s. • Hardware got cheap • Operating systems got more powerful (multi-user) • Fast Forward to 1996 • Disco: Stanford research project (1996-): • Run commodity OSes on scalable multiprocessors • Focus on high-end: NUMA, MIPS, IRIX

7. What is virtualization? Parallel Ports Serial/Com Ports Monitor (VMM) Floppy Disks Ethernet Keyboard Sound Card Mouse IDE Controller SCSI Controller

8. The Big Four • CPU • DISK • MEMORY • NETWORK

9. What is virtualization? Four Example Roles of Virtualization • Testing and QA • Server Consolidation • Application Compatibility • Security Solutions

10. #1: Testing and QA Production VM Production VM DEV VM QA VM Production VM Development Quality Assurance Production VM Develop Test Deploy

11. Database Server App Server App Server Web Server Web Server VMware MultipleWorlds + Physical Hardware #2: Server Consolidation Web Server Web Server App Server App Server Database Server

12. #3: Application Compatibility Legacy Application Legacy Application Legacy Application Unixware NT 4.0 Netware VMWare Hardware

13. #4 Security Solutions ClassifiedVM Internet VM VPN Firewall VMWare

14. Newmarket International’s Virtualization and Server Consolidation Project Ken Wilson Manager, Network and SystemsMike Ransom Systems Administrator

15. Brief Intro on Newmarket • Founded in 1985 as Newmarket Software • What does the Newmarket International do? • Solution Provider for the Hospitality Industry • Flagship product is Delphi • Some of our Customers: • Starwood Hotels Atlanta • Hyatt International • Whitbread Hotels • Trump Entertainment Resorts • Workforce of about 360

16. Brief Intro on Newmarket • Founded as a software developer, Newmarket has branched out into the ASP market with our product Delphi.net in 2003 • Hosted in a Tier 1 Data Center • Global Company • Offices in Portsmouth, London, Barcelona, Singapore, and Australia • Servers are located in Portsmouth, London, and Singapore

17. Brief Intro on Newmarket • Recent News • Recently acquired another local company – competitor based on Pease • Looking for an additional Network Administrator

18. Newmarket’s Approach • Identified internal drivers to virtualize • Needed to reduce IT costs • Both hard (capital and operational) and soft (administration) • Needed flexibility • Ability to quickly provision new servers and move servers easily • Needed to make better use of existing and new equipment • Many of our servers were underutilized. New hardware only exasperated the problem.

19. Newmarket’s Approach • Needed easier way to support a diverse environment • Many older DOS, NetWare, and Windows Operating Systems on old “whiteboxes” that were not reliable. • A rebuild of NetWare could take a day as the expertise is limited. • Like the idea of a server being hardware-independent – prompted by problems with managing Ghost templates in the past • Needed to reduce provisioning times • Needed centralized management • Saw VMWare ESX was maturing • Sprung from another project – Lifecycle Management

20. Why Virtualization as part of Lifecycle Management • Took an inventory of our existing server install base. • Found that 54% of our servers were in or going into their fifth year of service • Found that 52% of those servers were workstation-class machines

21. Why Virtualization as part of Lifecycle Management • Doing the math, we realized that we’d save 25% in Year 1 and 18% over three years in capitalization costs. Additionally, we’d see an increase of 11% in Year 1, and 13% over three years in hard operational costs. • However, we also saw the other soft benefits in going with virtualization. We saw virtualization as a way to be a better service provider to the organization, being able to meet the needs more quickly and efficiently. We found that virtualization met our corporate direction.

22. Basic Example Cost of three servers over three years

23. Basic Example Cost of three servers over three years

24. How did we get started? • Started with VMWare Workstation in 2003 • Implemented several instances for our Dev/QA Departments • Implemented for some low-end enterprise applications • Made the jump to ESX in December of 2004 • Made virtualization the cornerstone of our Lifecycle Management Plan for 2005

25. Environment Prior to Virtualization • Four server rooms full of “white boxes” • A number of aging Compaq Servers • Challenges with failing hardware and non-redundant systems • Remote management difficult – often making a drive into the office necessary • Messy – lots of KVM and network cables

26. What hardware? • Used HP 2-Processor Servers • Cheaper • Didn’t want to put too many eggs in one basket • 8GB RAM in each server • Generally HP BL20pG3’s attached to an MSA (Dev/QA) and EVA4000 (Enterprise) • Some installs on DL380 G4’s for standalone and less important servers

27. Why VMWare ESX Server? • Seemed to be the most mature • Supported more than just Windows • Nice tool set and simplified management • SAN Multipathing built in • Very few bugs – software seemed to be well designed

28. Multipathing SAN

29. Tools Used to Migrate • VMWare’s P2V Assistant • Cumbersome and not very useful • Approximately 50% success rate • Platespin’s PowerConvert 5.1 • Nearly “drag and drop” virtualization • Near 100% success rate

30. Other VMWare Tools • VMSnap.pl • To perform an online backup locally or to a remote host • Example “vmsnap.pl -l -c /home/vmware/vm_name/vm_name.vmx” • We have used it, but currently use original strategy (Legato Networker) • VMKUsage • Live monitoring • Need to run “vmkusagectl install” on ESX host first • ESXTop • Used through SSH Client

31. Management Tools • VMWare ESX MUI • Good for one or several ESX Servers • Cumbersome • Needed for many tasks (i.e. Scan SAN) • VMWare VirtualCenter • Great VM Deployment and Monitoring Tool • Best part is the ability to see performance data at a glance! • Well-designed • Granular permissions • For instance, I can grant access to the QA Manager so that he ONLY sees the QA Farm. Can bring that level of permissions right down to the virtual server level.

32. What is VMotion

33. How did it go? • We did see our overall number of servers grow. • We had need for more servers and it was almost too easy to deploy them. • We needed servers to host the virtual servers on (added to the overall number). • Were able to standardize on several templates • Increased the speed of our Lifecycle Management Plan • We were able to retire servers more quickly by simply P2V’ing old servers

34. 2005 Server Trend

35. Where are we at today? • 22 Hosts (soon to be 24) • 125 Virtual Machines

36. Where are we at today? • VM’s support services such as • SAP (Dev/QA) • Domain Controllers • WINS/DNS • Crystal Reports • Intranet • FAS • ADP • Dynamics • SQL • Limited Terminal Services • Blackberry Router • Instant Messaging • etc

37. Where are we at today? • Provisioning times approximately 25% of where they were in 2004 • Production Enterprise Server Availability at 99.936% for 2005 (Overall Availability at 99.901%) • Environment is standardized • Much easier to “stage” applications before deployment • Able to quickly migrate machines from “overworked” or failing hardware to available hardware in seconds without downtime. • Provides us with more time to be proactive and plan (or deal with other fires!)

38. Where do we go from here? • Improve virtualization ratio to 60/40 • Implement VMWare Server in Remote Offices • Increase monitoring and alerting using built-in alerting • Implement ESX3 with VirtualCenter2

39. Pro’s and Con’s • Pro’s • Saved money • A lot of flexibility • Easier management • Snapshotting • Load balance easily • Much easier to deploy new servers • More effective use of SAN • Better use of existing and new equipment • Nice migration tools available – Platespin • Easier to keep images of servers

40. Pro’s and Con’s • Con’s • Cheaper, but not significant • Significant amount of hardware needed especially if implementing VMotion • Must have a SAN (again if implementing VMotion) • In reality, you really need four NIC’s per host (if doing VMotion) • Gigabit Ethernet needed for VMotion • Additional capacity needed for hardware failure • Virtual Center needs SQL

41. VMWare ESX3 and VirtualCenter2 Dan Sullivan, VMWare SE