Logs are continuous digital records of events generated by all components of your software stack – and they’re everywhere – your networks, servers, applications, containers and cloud infrastructure just to name a few. The data logs provide are like an X-ray for your IT infrastructure. Without logs, this lack of visibility creates operational challenges for managing modern applications that drive today’s digital businesses.
We've come across a lot of talk about "cloud-native" apps lately. (They even have their own foundation!) Developers build these apps specifically to run on a cloud-based infrastructure, with the kind of user interface we all expect from our apps now. Cloud-native applications are scalable, usable and flexible, usually packaged using containers. It's a step further in the cloud computing journey, and a step away from the way we used to conceive of apps. Application development happened for many years inside an IT bubble, with a long development and deployment lifecycle. They were used only in-house, on desktop computers, which were also on a strict, and non-agile, refresh cycle.
Almost a year ago, I wrote these words, "Technology has reached the tipping point for me, it moved from a help to a hindrance." The plethora of adrenaline- and endorphin-inducing mobile apps, 24x7 news, notifications, alerts and updates, drip fed my brain and hindered my "deep work and deep thoughts." In Cal Newport's new book titled, Deep Work he posits that most knowledge workers need concentration and substantial time, dedicated and uninterrupted, to produce their best work. He argues that a lot of technologies and open office layouts today inhibit creativity, "deep work" and "deep thoughts," and are the very things that are most highly valued, and one of the key differentiators between humans and robots.
The IoT continued its toddler-like growth and stumbles in 2016. Here are five trends to look for in 2017 as the IoT enters its adolescence and how to benefit from them. 1. Ecosystems begin to determine winners and losers Previously these were nice in-the-future concerns; now they will really count. Filling out a whole product value proposition through partnerships has repeatedly proven its importance across B2B and enterprise software sectors. In the IoT, they will be even more critical.
Nerdio is an IT-as-a-service platform with virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) technology at its core. It is designed for IT departments that need a way to easily manage their ever-increasing workloads. Nerdio allows users to efficiently manage their complete IT environments by giving them full visibility and control of users’ desktops. In addition to virtual desktops, the platform includes unlimited virtual servers, Microsoft Office 365 security, and disaster recovery and 24/7/365 support.
Regulatory requirements exist to promote the controlled sharing of information, while protecting the privacy and/or security of the information. Regulations for each type of information have their own set of rules, policies, and guidelines. Cloud Service Providers (CSP) are faced with increasing demand for services at decreasing prices. Demonstrating and maintaining compliance with regulations is a nontrivial task and doing so against numerous sets of regulatory requirements can be daunting task. CSPs need a foundation that provides a uniform, non-repetitive view across all the requirements.
I am often humbled by the depth of insight of those who toil in the trenches of the enterprise data center. At our Agility conference back in August, my cohort and I gave a presentation on the State of Application Delivery. One of the interesting tidbits of data we offered was that, over the course of the past year, our iHealth data shows a steady and nearly even split of HTTP and HTTPS traffic. To give you an example, my data from October was derived from over 3 million (3, 087, 211 to be precise) virtual servers. Of those, roughly 32% were configured to support HTTP, and another 30% were supporting HTTPS.
Hewlett Packard Enterprise advanced across several fronts at HPE Discover 2016 in London, making inroads into hybrid IT, Internet of Things, and on to the latest advances in memory-based computer architecture. A leaner, more streamlined Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) advanced across several fronts at HPE Discover 2016 in London, making inroads into hybrid IT, Internet of Things (IoT), and on to the latest advances in memory-based computer architecture. All the innovations are designed to help customers address the age of digital disruption with speed, agility, and efficiency.
The cloud promises new levels of agility and cost-savings for Big Data, data warehousing and analytics. But it’s challenging to understand all the options – from IaaS and PaaS to newer services like HaaS (Hadoop as a Service) and BDaaS (Big Data as a Service). In her session at @BigDataExpo at @ThingsExpo, Hannah Smalltree, a director at Cazena, provided an educational overview of emerging “as-a-service” options for Big Data in the cloud. This is critical background for IT and data professionals, as experts estimate that “as-a-service” cloud sourcing will increase from today’s 15% to 35% by 2021. Learn more and hear important considerations to help evaluate and rank your options.
It is not often that movies and television shows give viewers the opportunity to explore the world of hacking and digital security in a realistic manner. After two seasons, "Mr. Robot" has attracted its share of IT professionals as well as average citizens. The show has offered numerous depictions that are of particular interest to those who make their living by protecting their organizations. The critically acclaimed television series offers fictional situations rather than documentary evidence. However, the plots and actions of both the security engineers and hackers are realistic enough that they can send a shiver down the spine of any professional responsible for safeguarding their organization's system and responding to incidents. This two-part post explores some of the most chilling incidents depicted on the show – incidents that are especially disturbing because they can and do happen in the real world.
The Internet of Things (IoT) promises to simplify and streamline our lives by automating routine tasks that distract us from our goals. This promise is based on the ubiquitous deployment of smart, connected devices that link everything from industrial control systems to automobiles to refrigerators. Unfortunately, comparatively few of the devices currently deployed have been developed with an eye toward security, and as the DDoS attacks of late October 2016 have demonstrated, this oversight can have devastating, if not catastrophic results. In his session at 19th @ThingsExpo, Richard Blech, Chief Executive Officer at Secure Channels, explored the promise and the pitfalls inherent to IoT and offered a novel way of incorporating an effective security paradigm in which IoT "watchmen" monitor and maintain order within the IoT.
Fact: storage performance problems have only gotten more complicated, as applications not only have become largely virtualized, but also have moved to cloud-based infrastructures. Storage performance in virtualized environments isn’t just about IOPS anymore. Instead, you need to guarantee performance for individual VMs, helping applications maintain performance as the number of VMs continues to go up in real time. In his session at Cloud Expo, Dhiraj Sehgal, Product and Marketing at Tintri, shared success stories from a few folks who have already started using VM-aware storage. By managing storage operations at the VM-level, they’ve been able to solve their most vexing storage problems, and create infrastructures that scale to meet the needs of their applications. Best of all, they’ve got predictable, manageable storage performance – at a level conventional storage can’t match.
Nerdio is an IT-as-a-service platform with virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) technology at its core. It is designed for IT departments that need a way to easily manage their ever-increasing workloads. Nerdio allows users to efficiently manage their complete IT environments by giving them full visibility and control of users’ desktops. In addition to virtual desktops, the platform includes unlimited virtual servers, Microsoft Office 365 security, and disaster recovery and 24/7/365 support.
I’m a fan of Woody Allen movies, especially his earlier movies (can’t tell you how much I learned from the movie “Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex…” but that’s a topic for a different blog). In the Woody Allen classic “Annie Hall,” Woody Allen’s character (Alvy Singer) makes the following statement: “A relationship, I think, is like a shark, you know? It has to constantly move forward or it dies. And I think what we got on our hands is a dead shark.” This is relevant to a business – either your business is constantly moving forward or the business dies. And this is especially true for organizations seeking to leverage Big Data and the Internet of Things to drive business transformation. If you are not constantly trying to move forward on transforming your business, then it’s pretty certain that what you’ve got on your hands is a dead business.
Everyone knows that truly innovative companies learn as they go along, pushing boundaries in response to market changes and demands. What's more of a mystery is how to balance innovation on a fresh platform built from scratch with the legacy tech stack, product suite and customers that continue to serve as the business' foundation. In his General Session at 19th Cloud Expo, Michael Chambliss, Head of Engineering at ReadyTalk, discussed why and how ReadyTalk diverted from healthy revenue and more than a decade of web conferencing product development to start a project that reflects shifts in customer needs, cloud, dev tools, web standards, enterprise mobility and video. He covered the upsides, downsides and learnings in terms of investment, resource allocation, talent retention and technical considerations.
CloudJumper, a Workspace as a Service (WaaS) platform innovator for agile business IT, has been recognized with the Customer Value Leadership Award for its nWorkSpace platform by Frost & Sullivan. The company was also featured in a new report(1) by the industry research firm titled, “Desktop-as-a-Service Buyer’s Guide, 2016,” which provides a comprehensive comparison of DaaS providers, including CloudJumper, Amazon, VMware, and Microsoft.
I am often humbled by the depth of insight of those who toil in the trenches of the enterprise data center. At our Agility conference back in August, my cohort and I gave a presentation on the State of Application Delivery. One of the interesting tidbits of data we offered was that, over the course of the past year, our iHealth data shows a steady and nearly even split of HTTP and HTTPS traffic. To give you an example, my data from October was derived from over 3 million (3, 087, 211 to be precise) virtual servers. Of those, roughly 32% were configured to support HTTP, and another 30% were supporting HTTPS.
The IoT continued its toddler-like growth and stumbles in 2016. Here are five trends to look for in 2017 as the IoT enters its adolescence and how to benefit from them. 1. Ecosystems begin to determine winners and losers Previously these were nice in-the-future concerns; now they will really count. Filling out a whole product value proposition through partnerships has repeatedly proven its importance across B2B and enterprise software sectors. In the IoT, they will be even more critical.
"We are a modern development application platform and we have a suite of products that allow you to application release automation, we do version control, and we do application life cycle management," explained Flint Brenton, CEO of CollabNet, in this SYS-CON.tv interview at DevOps at 19th Cloud Expo, held November 1-3, 2016, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA.
Modern organizations typically use several IT tools to monitor their applications, networks and other IT components in real time. Unfortunately, this leads to independent data islands, which creates a one-dimensional view of IT. In order to make strategic decisions, organizations need an IT operational analytics tool to analyze data from multiple sources, spot trends and make better decisions.
Cyberattacks are relentless. The pace of attacks shows no sign of slowing, and organizations understand that 100 percent prevention of attacks is not possible. Traditional prevention and detection techniques are falling short, and security professionals are scrambling for new paradigms that can more effectively detect attacks and mitigate the growing levels of damage. In this climate of confusion, deception-based solutions offer a viable and proven way to stop attackers in their tracks. Why? Because instead of sitting back and waiting to be the victim, detection technologies let organizations be proactive and take the attack to the attacker. We’ve compiled a list of top five reasons why more security teams are opting for deception.
Almost three years ago, VMware introduced the world to its virtual SAN. This new solution enabled customers to use storage within ESXi servers without the need for external storage – an exciting promise for organizations that wanted to quickly scale their virtual storage. Now, it’s time to check in on this technology and see if it’s living up to its promise. VMware became a player in the storage array and software market when it launched vSAN. Server admins were looking forward to using vSAN because it gave them a symmetrical architecture that did not require external storage, thus being able to use storage within existing servers. It also doesn’t require specialized storage skills. However, no one solution can be all things to all enterprises, and as enterprises began to deploy vSAN across their environments, they noticed something big was missing.
Almost three years ago, VMware introduced the world to its virtual SAN. This new solution enabled customers to use storage within ESXi servers without the need for external storage – an exciting promise for organizations that wanted to quickly scale their virtual storage. Now, it’s time to check in on this technology and see if it’s living up to its promise. VMware became a player in the storage array and software market when it launched vSAN. Server admins were looking forward to using vSAN because it gave them a symmetrical architecture that did not require external storage, thus being able to use storage within existing servers. It also doesn’t require specialized storage skills. However, no one solution can be all things to all enterprises, and as enterprises began to deploy vSAN across their environments, they noticed something big was missing.
Modern organizations typically use several IT tools to monitor their applications, networks and other IT components in real time. Unfortunately, this leads to independent data islands, which creates a one-dimensional view of IT. In order to make strategic decisions, organizations need an IT operational analytics tool to analyze data from multiple sources, spot trends and make better decisions.
"We are a modern development application platform and we have a suite of products that allow you to application release automation, we do version control, and we do application life cycle management," explained Flint Brenton, CEO of CollabNet, in this SYS-CON.tv interview at DevOps at 19th Cloud Expo, held November 1-3, 2016, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA.