Long View Systems presented on their experience deploying vCloud Director and converged infrastructure solutions. They discussed two case studies: 1) A public cloud for a service provider built on FlexPod architecture, and 2) A private development cloud on VCE architecture to enable rapid provisioning for projects. Key lessons included the importance of monitoring tools, understanding requirements, and extensive planning and testing.

2. Cloud Solutions with vCloud Director
Notes from the Field
James Charter
Practice Lead, Virtualization Services

3. Agenda
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About Long View Systems
•
Solution Areas
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vCloud Director & Converged Infrastructure
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Case 1 – Public Service Provider
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Case 2 – Private Development Cloud
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Lessons Learned
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How Can We Help?
Slide 3

4. About Long View Systems
• One of North America’s largest IT Services/Solutions
organizations
• Focused on end-to-end, operational IT Infrastructure
• Industry leading expertise in key technology
innovations and best practices
• Extensive project experience (complete lifecycle)
with SMB to enterprise corporations
• A people-focused corporate culture dedicated to
“Being the Best”
Slide 4

5. Quick Stats
What we do
•
North American IT Services/ Solutions organization
focused on:
•
•
•
•
•
•
Infrastructure Services
Managed IT
Cloud
End User Computing Solutions
Procurement
IT Outsourcing
Key Statistics
•
Calgary (CDN HQ), Vancouver, Victoria, Edmonton,
Denver (USA HQ), Houston, Dallas, Phoenix
•
2011 expansion plans for US East-Coast
• Largest and Fastest Growing IT Solutions Company 10
to 800+ employees, $2M to $200M+ in 10 years
•
•
•
600+ employees are technical today
2011 total headcount trending to 1000+
2011 expansion offices
Current offices
Privately owned and debt free, focused organic
growth in leading technology areas
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6. Strategic Partners
• VMware Premier Solution Provider (Canada/US)
• Cisco Gold Partner
• EMC Velocity Solution Provider Partner
• VCE Certified to Sell and Deliver Vblock
• HP Converged Infrastructure Elite Partner
• NetApp Star Partner
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7. What we do – Virtualization
ASSESSMENTS:
• Environment Health Checks
• Full Technology Assessments
• Operational Readiness Assessments
• Business cases and ROI analysis
PLANNING AND DESIGN:
• Architect and Design Solutions
• Proof of Concepts and Pilots
• Disaster Recovery Planning
• Solution Strategies and Roadmaps
SOLUTIONS:
• Converged Infrastructure
• Private Cloud / Infrastructure as-a-Service
• Virtual Desktop Infrastructure
• Application Virtualization Infrastructure and
Packaging
MANAGEMENT AND OPTIMIZATION:
• Backup and Recovery
• Performance and Capacity Management
• Availability, Monitoring and Alerting
solutions
• Systems Automation, Provisioning and
Capacity Allocation
Slide 7

8. vCloud Director & Converged Infrastructure
Two use cases with different requirements and success criteria
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Public Service Provider
•
Private Development Cloud
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Built with vCloud Director 1.5 on vSphere 5
•
Each solution built with a different Converged Infrastructure as the ‘Cloud
Engine’
Why vSphere 5 and vCloud Director 1.5?
•
We had some usage requirements that could only be met with the new
features offered in both products
•
The scalability offered by the new products offers more agility
Slide 8

9. Case 1 – Public Service Provider
Long View Public Cloud Offering – OnDemand Environment (ODE)
Hosted Services for clients:
• Looking for additional resources off premise
• Who no longer wish to own IT Assets
• Want to be able to turn up or turn down services as business needs change
Requirements: Scalable, Secure, Adaptive, Repeatable
Scalable
• Expandable as additional capacity is required.
• Build in Pods
Slide 9

10. Case 1 – Public Service Provider
Secure
• Multi-tenant, with tenant isolation across the infrastructure
Adaptive
• Architecture that can support future offerings and technologies that may
not be exclusively virtual (including new hardware) within the same fabric
Repeatable
•
Pod/Block approach to capacity/expansion, repeatable across geographic
locations – Canada and the US
Slide 10

11. Case 1 – Public Service Provider
How did we build it?
FlexPod Architecture (NetApp, Cisco, VMware)
Cisco Networking and Compute
NetApp Unified Storage (FAS3200 series) via NFS
Space savings via De-Duplication on the Volumes
Two Tiers of Disk
VMware Virtualization – vCloud Director 1.5 on vSphere 4.1*
Slide 11

12. Case 1 – Public Service Provider
Slide 12

13. Case 2 – Private Development Cloud
Private Infrastructure as-a-Service (IaaS) Development Environment
Client looking for a new way to enable development and decrease the time to
deliver new products to the business. Current model is based on a
combination of traditional virtualization and physical platforms.
Requirements: Scalable, Consistent, Responsive
Scalable
• Capable of hosting 1000’s of VM’s
• Capable of hosting many projects concurrently within their own security
boundary (Organizations)
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14. Case 2 – Private Development Cloud
Consistent
• Share re-useable components (master templates) to create standardized
offerings. Share these components across projects (Organizations).
Responsive
• Create a framework where development platforms (groups of related VM’s
- vApps) can be quickly provisioned (Linked Clones).
• Scale and provide consistent performance for workloads.
Slide 14

15. Case 2 – Private Development Cloud
How did we build it?
V (VMware) + C (Cisco) + E (EMC) to create a Reference Architecture
Cisco Networking and Compute
EMC Unified Storage on VNX via NFS
• FAST (Fully Automated Storage Tiering) – Using Two Types of Disk
• FAST Cache (Enables Flash Drives to used for Array Cache)
VMware Virtualization – vCloud Director 1.5 on vSphere 5.0
Slide 15

16. Case 2 – Private Development Cloud
Slide 16

17. Lessons Learned
1.
Monitoring and Predictive Tools!
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vCloud Director introduces new levels of abstraction, so our methods of
monitoring and troubleshooting have to change
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Leverage vCenter Operations and CapacityIQ
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Leverage advanced reporting for your storage platform
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Understand you environment! Set yourself up for success!
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18. Lessons Learned
2. Understand Your Requirements
• IaaS often involves process change, engage with the business an codevelop process together.
• Interface with the business to determine what is required in the Catalogs
Slide 18

19. Lessons Learned (Continued)
3. Plan, Plan, Plan, Test, Test, Test
• Take the time to plan out your environment, and then validate it with
extensive testing and create an environment baseline
• Test your environment as it grows using the same testing and measure it
against your baseline.
Slide 19

20. Lessons Learned (Continued)
4. Leverage Native VMware technologies to reduce overhead on common
processes
• VAAI – Use a compliant array to reduce host overhead for storage tasks
• vShield Endpoint – Use with compliant Anti-Virus product to offload
antivirus processing from the guest
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21. Parting Thoughts
Gartner, predicts that “20 percent of businesses will own no IT
assets by 2012.”
http://www.networkworld.com/news/2011/061511-gartner-private-clouds.html?page=2
Slide 21

22. How Can We Help?
Interested in moving forward with your own Cloud Initiative?
•
Drop by the Long View table, tell us your story, and talk with one of our
experts
•
Ask to have one of our Account team book a meeting to discuss your
requirements
Contact us
Email: info@longviewsystems.com
Slide 22

23. Thank You
James Charter
Practice Lead, Virtualization
Main: 403.515.6900
Direct: 403.515.3331
Email: james.charter@lvs1.com