Virtualization: Management Packs to woo customers!

Here's the deal. You don't have a product but a pretty darn good strategy:

• You spread the word through Seminars, Training
  
• You have an average product but a robust (customer is programmed to drool on your suite of management tools) management pack
• Frameworks are put in place to cultivate a culture of zombies

But what about

• Figures
• Numbers
• Benchmarks
• Performance tests
• Demos
• face-to-face tete-e-tete's
• Reality checks
• Dos and dont's
  

I think a lot of companies have succeeded in selling software which actually didn't/doesn't do much. No one (during the intake of a software) played the role of the *devil's inquisitor*, on the contrary a lot of *devil's advocates* who snubbed your "Wait a minute, but what does the product actually do?" OR "Hey, where is THE product? I have already bought the management suite, now please end my agony".

Lots of things like these happen all the time. WHY? Please don't look for answers at my end, look into the mirror and ask yourself "What really matters to me?". You are not doing it for yourself, its for your organization. For the good of it.

"Why would I need virtualization anyways?" , "What can it do to help me and my staff?", "How can I protect myself from the wolves when I go shopping?". Questions, Questions...Answer, my friend, lies in your hands.




OK so enough talk and a quick look at the developments today on the virtualization arena. Its the management pack that everyone is after. Sure Microsoft had one ready for download for its virtualization software but VMware seems to be meeting its deadline on the ESX 3.0/Virtual Center 2.0. Its good to see that Raghuram keeps reiterating the fact about features like DAS, DRS etc. Its important for all to understand what the products are and on what grounds they are superior to each other. Its CRITICAL to keep sending correct information as constant reminders to the user community about the product and how it truly compliments the technology. Anyways read further about the management packs around virtualization here, and here .

While linux club is pushing the virtualization as well. I am confident that Oracle will acquire a major linux vendor like SuSE pretty soon. They have to capitalize on this Virtualization arena as well. Its going to happen soon, trust me! On other news Akimbi is growing fast as well. They do have an impressive product called Slingshot which I personally like and will be using in one the projects while supervising a Foreign Summer Internship at our place.

I was reading an interesting article on ZDnet and I will take this issue further by talking about why a WebOS will be a lot better than Thin Computing (like Terminal Services) or Desktop Virtualization (lots of vendors like Altiris, Softricity are too rushing into it with all kinds of Softgrids et al). Ander Bylund talks about the desktop virtualization a bit and Vmware's vision around it. I'm going to attempt to do a "Blackboard Sessions"on my Vlog site. I just need to setup my Video Camera, Blackboard (which I will setup eventually in my GSE) and a decent attire/hairdo ;-)