Articles from Derrick Harris

1. VMware: ‘The software-defined data center is coming’ Explore GigaOM (May 9 2012) Construction , Cloud Computing VMware CTO Steve Herrod has a message for the IT world: "[S]pecialized software will replace specialized hardware throughout the data center." Via virtualizations and SDNs, software-defined data centers will bring the dynamic natures of Google, Facebook and Zynga data centers into the mainstream. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Google   Facebook

2. Facebook, eBay win awards for data center efficiency Explore GigaOM (Apr 17 2012) Construction , Cloud Computing Facebook and eBay are among the winners of this year’s Green Enterprise IT Awards, which the Uptime Institute doles out for advancements in the world of energy-efficient data centers. Dell and eBay took home the award for “Modular Data Center Deployment” for its Project Mercury data center in downtown Phoenix. That data center, which I profiled earlier this month, makes use of standardized racks of gear on the floor and of high-powered but high-efficiency data center modules on the roof. It currently has two Dell modules and two HP units in place, but is looking to add seven more as its computing needs ramp up. Because they’re so efficient, the entire facility’s Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) rating, which gauges the percentage of power used for tasks other than computing, falls with each new module. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Uptime Institute   Uptime Institute Symposium   Facebook

3. How IO is trying to build modular data centers for the rest of us Explore GigaOM (Apr 9 2012) Construction , Cloud Computing IO Data Centers wants to make it faster, cheaper and easier for companies to add computing capacity. The Phoenix, Ariz.-based company has made a large-scale shift from selling traditional data center capacity to selling its own brand of modular data centers that can sit just about anywhere, and that can be filled with servers one rack at a time. The units, called IO.Anywhere modules, are designed for smaller-scale deployments and those requiring less customization than the modular units filling up eBay’s cutting-edge data center just a few miles to the west of IO’s headquarters, but the idea is the same. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   eBay   Dell

4. Making the web more efficient, a thousand servers at a time Explore GigaOM (Apr 6 2012) Construction , Servers Peak efficiency at a webscale data center feels like a blast furnace. I experienced it firsthand on the rooftop of eBay’s new Project Mercury data center in downtown Phoenix. It was hot enough standing on a grated-steel roof with the sun beating down on an 86-degree day. Then I stepped into the hot aisle of Dell Modular Data Center and 1,920 servers blasted 115-degree air right in my face. If eBay’s Dean Nelson has his way, that was just the beginning. His future is one of ever-greater density in data centers driving ever-greater efficiency, and he’s relying on modular data centers like the ones Dell has provided to get him there. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   The Green Grid   eBay   Dell

5. Under the covers of eBay’s big data operation Explore GigaOM (Jan 31 2012) For online auction powerhouse eBay, big data is serious business. The company has 100 million active users globally, 300 million live listings at any time (and it archives them all), receives 2 billion page views daily, and handles 250 million search queries and 75 billion database calls a day. How does eBay make sense of all this activity? With Hadoop, of course. Hugh Williams is VP of experience, search and platforms at eBay. His team is responsible for theentire eBay experience from the moment users hit the site until moment they make a purchase, from code to data center automation to building new picture-hosting platforms. If it has to do with driving traffic to eBay and improving the customer experience, Williams’ team builds it. But in order to know what to build and how to build it, the team needs insight into what customers want and what they’re doing. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Facebook   eBay

6. Grading my cloud predictions for 2011: How’d I do? Explore GigaOM (Dec 29 2011) Cloud Computing I made a lot of predictions about cloud computing and the general IT infrastructure space heading into 2011, and I impressed myself with my skills of prognostication. Of course, some might have been no-brainers, and it’s possible I’m just grading myself too generously, so I’ll let readers be the judges. For your assessment, here’s what I predicted (the full predictions are all available on GigaOM Pro, subscription required) and a synopsis of what actually happened. Comment away. 5 trends not to expect Ubiquitous cloud adoption. This might be one of those no-brainers. We certainly heard a lot more about large enterprises experimenting with the cloud this year, but we’re still nowhere near ubiquity, especially when it comes to serious applications. I’d argue we’re getting there, however, as Amazon Web Services’ incessant enterprise push makes it more appealing and newcomers such as Virtustream successfully ... (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Apple   Amazon.com

7. Virtustream buys cloud pioneer Enomaly Explore GigaOM (Dec 15 2011) Virtustream, a fast-growing enteprise cloud provider, is buying cloud-computing pioneer Enomaly for an undisclosed amount. Enomaly, which launched in 2003, sells one of the first private-cloud management products, Elastic Computing Platform, and in the last year launched an infrastructure resource exchange called SpotCloud. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Amazon.com

8. Survey: Cloud isn’t a cost panacea, but few expect it to be Explore GigaOM (Dec 5 2011) Cloud Computing Cloud computing is not the money saver it’s sometimes made out to be. But don’t fret — it’s still a very valuable delivery model for IT resources, according to a new survey by systems integrator Computer Science Corporation. While cost savings, where present, were small among the survey’s 3,645 respondents — under $20,000 in 35 percent of cases — the cloud brings a wealth of benefits around mobility, efficiency and, believe it or not, jobs. Mobility, the ability to access applications and data from a variety of end-user devices, was actually the No.1 reason respondents gave for adopting cloud computing. The survey results aren’t entirely surprising when one considers ideal cloud use cases, especially with regard to infrastructure-as-a-service clouds. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Amazon.com   CSC

9. Amazon’s Oregon cloud region open for business Explore GigaOM (Nov 9 2011) Construction Amazon Web Services is making available a new US West region located in Oregon, which it is positioning as a lower-cost alternative to the company's existing Northern California region. AWS says services in the Oregon region costs about 10 percent less than in Northern California. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Amazon.com   Data Center Knowledge

10. Inside the SuperNAP and its high-tech clouds Explore GigaOM (Sep 29 2011) You might have heard of the SuperNAP data center before because of its military-grade security, more-than-400,000-square-foot footprint and roots as Enron's attempt to build a bandwidth exchange, but the cutting-edge facility is also home to some very interesting customers. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Amazon.com   Cisco   Enron

11. Twitter’s ever-changing infrastructure story Explore GigaOM (Sep 19 2011) Cloud Computing , Microblogging Earlier this year, rumors swirled about whether Twitter had actually moved into a new Utah data center, or if it was forced to move its operations to a different facility. Now there are reports that Twitter is leasing more data center space, this time in Atlanta. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Data Center Knowledge   NTT

12. Why Intel put $24M behind cloud, big data Explore GigaOM (Sep 9 2011) Cloud Computing Intel Capital announced $24 million in new investments, and cloud computing and big data companies were the big beneficiaries. They underscore Intel's understanding that it has to prop up software partners to keep Intel dominant as computing evolves. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Intel

13. Why shutting down 800 federal data centers won’t be easy Explore GigaOM (Aug 1 2011) Cloud Computing There has been a lot of talk about consolidation lately because federal agencies have until Oct. 7 to present their plans for slashing data center footprints by 38 percent by 2015. But how exactly the government will pull this off is still up for debate. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Google   Juniper Networks   Office of Management and Budget

14. How Facebook moved 30 petabytes of Hadoop data Explore GigaOM (Jul 28 2011) For anyone who didn't know, Facebook is a huge Hadoop user, and it does some very cool things to stretch the open source big data platform to meet Facebook's unique needs. Today, it detailed how it migrated its 30-petabyte cluster from one data center to another. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Facebook

15. Simon Crosby leaving Citrix to tackle cloud security Explore GigaOM (Jun 22 2011) Cloud Computing Simon Crosby is leaving his post as data center and virtualization CTO at Citrix Systems to launch a new company called Bromium that will utilize virtualization technology to tackle cloud computing security. The company raised $9.2 million from Andreessen Horowitz, Ignition Partners and Lightspeed Venture Partners. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Google   Citrix Systems   Simon Crosby

16. GoDaddy unveils its take on cloud computing Explore GigaOM (Jun 16 2011) Cloud Computing It looks like web hosting giant GoDaddy is now in the cloud computing business with a new service called Data Center On Demand, which could potentially make a dent in the market share of providers such as Amazon Web Services or Rackspace. According to a marketing brochure for the service, GoDaddy plans to offer three options for users. However, all three levels provide fixed resource amounts for a monthly fee, with additional resources available “a la carte.” This is a deviation from the standard infrastructure as a service model of charging for resources on an hourly basis and allowing for the number of servers to be spun up or down on demand. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Amazon.com

17. The web’s watchful eye fixes on Apple’s cloud gear Explore GigaOM (Jun 8 2011) When Steve Jobs flashed inside images of Apple's new cloud data center during his WWDC keynote on Monday, he ignited a mini firestorm of speculation about just kind hardware is filling its immense surface area. Everyone seems to agree that HP and Teradata were big winners. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Apple   Google   Data Center Knowledge

18. Fusion-io’s IPO spurs huge flash investments Explore GigaOM (Jun 7 2011) Cloud Computing , Storage It looks as if solid-state cache specialist Fusion-io's IPO on Thursday has investors thinking big about the possibilities of flash storage in the enterprise. Flash array maker Violin memory raised a $40 million flaround from strategic public-market investorsand a software company called VeloBit emerged from stealth. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Larry Ellison   Google   Oracle

19. Infineta raises $15M to move big data across data centers Explore GigaOM (Jun 6 2011) Cloud Computing , Networking WAN-optimization startup Infineta has raised $15 million for its product that speeds traffic flows between data centers. Unlike many WAN-optimization products that speed traffic between user sites and a data center, Infineta targets data moving between data centers at up to 10 GbE speeds. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Cisco   Juniper Networks   Arista Networks

20. How Facebook Brings a New Data Center Online Explore GigaOM (May 16 2011) For Facebook, bringing its Prineville, Ore., data center online last month required more than building a specialized facility with customized servers. According to a post today on the Facebook Engineering blog, the social networking leader also undertook an effort called “Project Triforce,” which entailed spinning up a replica of the Prineville data center on an existing set of servers in Virginia to ensure the site could run smoothly across three regions without falling on its face. In true Facebook fashion, it didn’t take the task lightly. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Facebook

21. From M&A to R&D, Cloud is Driving IT Activity Explore Structure Blog (Aug 29 2010) Cloud Computing Still wondering if cloud computing is the real deal, if it will find its way to a data center near you? I suggest looking back at the last several months (or year) of vendors girding their loins in preparation for an inevitable battle in the cloud. As I posit in my weekly column on GigaOM Pro, whether they’re buying, building or buddying up, vendors are surrounding their core competencies with everything they’ll need to compete in an increasingly integrated IT market. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Apple   Cisco   Dell

22. CloudSwitch Makes Going Cloud as Simple as Can Be Explore GigaOM (Jun 23 2010) Cloud Computing CloudSwitch, a Burlington, Mass.-based cloud porter, today launched the commercial version of its flagship product to help enterprise customers seamlessly move applications into the cloud. The startup claims that using it, applications from stack components to security protocols run in the cloud just as they do within the data center. For businesses hesitant to learn the intricacies of cloud development and management tools, CloudSwitch should be a welcome sight. The underlying premise behind the CloudSwitch offering is simple. Applications and associated data currently housed in VMware or Xen environments, and running on Windows or Linux, are transported to compatible public clouds (Amazon EC2 and Terremark vCloud Express, initially) via a Layer-2 network bridge. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Amazon.com   Sun Microsystems

23. How Much Integration Is Too Much in the Cloud? Explore GigaOM (May 30 2010) If you’ve been following the data center hardware space for the past year, you might be under the impression that integrated stacks are the future of IT. After all, Oracle’s purchase of Sun Microsystems was all about integration and HP and Cisco appear locked in a death match over which one of them is best equipped to handle your server, storage and networking needs. However, as detailed in my weekly column on GigaOM Pro, IT spending is ramping back up after the economic meltdown, and it doesn’t look like customers are buying into the promise of having just one throat to choke. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Sun Microsystems   Google   Oracle

24. For Open Cloud Computing, Look Inside Your Data Center Explore GigaOM (Mar 28 2010) Cloud Computing For all the talk about openness and interoperability in cloud computing, both public-cloud and private-cloud providers still operate very much in their own silos. Amazon, Rackspace, Google, Microsoft are all doing wonderful things — but they’re doing so largely within their own environments. And while (most) data center vendors can’t offer users complete vertically integrated cloud stacks, they’re more than happy to lock users into their product lines as much as possible and form strong partnerships in areas they don’t play. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Amazon.com   Google   Microsoft Corp

25. Elastra Makes Its Cloud Even Greener Explore GigaOM (Jan 12 2010) Cloud Computing , Servers Elastra has incorporated energy efficiency intelligence into its Cloud Server solution, allowing customers to define which efficiency metrics are important to them and then rely on the software to route each application to the optimal resources with their internal cloud environments. Elastra’s efforts are just the latest in a growing trend toward saving data center costs by using the least possible amount of power to accomplish any given task. Especially in the internal cloud space, power management capabilities are becoming a must-have, with vendors from Appistry to VMware offering tools to migrate workloads dynamically and power down unneeded servers. (Read Full Article)

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