As anyone new to Cisco can tell you, joining this company is no game of candy land. \u00a0But I tell you, it is an exciting ride! \u00a0We lovingly call the first couple of weeks for a new hire ‘the firehose’. \u00a0Well, during the last three months that I’ve been at Cisco, I’ve been drinking from the firehose and focusing very heavily on the technical aspects of the UCS product line. \u00a0Learning its nuts and bolts, kicking its tires, and even setting up a new system in our internal lab. \u00a0Its been very exciting. \u00a0I’ve been learning a ton, and can pretty much talk the value of UCS to anyone.<\/p>\n
But this week when I was asked to give a general overview of Cisco’s vision of the Data Center lets just say I did a less than stellar job. \u00a0When you’re down in the blissful technical trenches, its easy to talk all day about trade-offs of remote storage alternatives. \u00a0But talking about it like you’re standing on the moon looking down at the earth is a different conversation all together, and one that I should have been more prepared to discuss.<\/p>\n
I’ve thought about it some more and I’ve tried to break it down into something that is truly differentiating and doesn’t reek of generalities. \u00a0To do that, I’ve had to frame it in the context of what is happening in the industry today. \u00a0There are three parts:<\/p>\n
1. \u00a0What the future data center is doing<\/p>\n
2. \u00a0Why were not there<\/p>\n
3. \u00a0How Cisco will get us there.<\/p>\n
The way we use technology to solve problems, to be more productive, and how to do it more efficiently is what IT has been about and what it will be about in the future. \u00a0We do this today using fixed purpose applications: \u00a0Microsoft Office Products, Email, Custom Apps that leverage the organizations data repositories, etc. \u00a0The vision of most technology firms is that of a future even more focused on applications. \u00a0Just ask Google<\/a>, Apple<\/a>, VMware<\/a>, and Cisco<\/a>.<\/p>\n In the future, we will still compose documents, but what will we use to do this? \u00a0It used to be papyrus and lamb’s blood. \u00a0Then we moved to ink, then the typewriter, and today in business it largely consists of Microsoft Word and some to Google Docs. \u00a0Whatever our data center of the future looks like, it will be\u00a0purposefully\u00a0built to support our applications.<\/p>\n At VMworld 2011, VMware CEO Paul Maritz talked about<\/a> how most applications today are being written by people younger than 35 and that they don’t feel the needs to adapt to the mold of software that has been written previously. \u00a0Most of this software will be delivered using \u00a0new frameworks, methodologies, etc. \u00a0In essence: \u00a0applications are being moved from being installed on your desktop, to being delivered over the network, or ‘the cloud’. \u00a0Examples: \u00a0Salesforce.com, Google Docs, 37 Signals apps, etc. \u00a0Data is no longer stored locally on the end device. \u00a0Its stored in a data center.<\/p>\n Why? \u00a0To name a few:<\/p>\n In essence: \u00a0Once the SaaS<\/a> app is created, it cost little to support. \u00a0For the user: \u00a0He can access it on any device, nearly any where, at any time. \u00a0This is part of Cisco’s borderless networks<\/a> vision. \u00a0 BYOD: \u00a0Bring your own device. \u00a0Where Cisco is focused on this is really making people feel secure about accessing sensitive data from anywhere on any device.<\/p>\n So what is the data center of the future doing? \u00a0It’s hosting apps that can be run anywhere. \u00a0If the apps can be run anywhere, then guess what? \u00a0The apps can be hosted anywhere. \u00a0The data center of the future is communicating with other data centers of the future. \u00a0Its been called the Inter-Cloud<\/a>. \u00a0And much like Cisco paved the way for the Internet, Cisco will pave the way for the Inter-Cloud.<\/p>\n (Note: Do not confuse Inter-Cloud with private cloud. \u00a0Inter-Cloud is like the Internet, but instead of many computers connected, there are many data centers connected. \u00a0Those data centers will need to figure out how services like DNS, DHCP, etc will work across them. \u00a0We’re still a ways off)<\/p>\n So what do we need to overcome to get us there?<\/p>\n Let’s talk about each point:<\/p>\n How many times this year have you read a headline about how some company’s data was compromised and now millions of people’s personal information is floating around in some cyber terrorists\u00a0briefcase? \u00a0I don’t think I need to dwell any more on that. \u00a0Companies just don’t feel safe enough. \u00a0Many individuals don’t feel safe enough. \u00a0My wife won’t even use Facebook.<\/p>\n As for reliability, remember how EC2 had a major crash<\/a> and caused outages in major web sites like FourSquare, Reddit, etc? \u00a0What if 911 was running on it? \u00a0I remember a story when some peers of mine were upgrading a network for the city. \u00a0The customer asked them: “If we upgrade this now, are you sure we’ll still remain up?” \u00a0The engineers were very sure. \u00a0They’d done it before and had no issues. \u00a0The customer then asked: “Would you be willing to bet people’s lives on it? \u00a0Because if this goes down, 911 will be affected, and people can die”. \u00a0The engineers decided to wait for a maintenance window. \u00a0No matter how many 9’s of availability you have, you’ll always have a 1 with 0’s in front of it of non-availability.<\/p>\n In the future, if these security concerns can be overcome, we won’t care where the workloads are running, just as long as they know they are secure. \u00a0Just like you don’t know exactly where your water comes from as long as you know its safe to drink.<\/p>\n Think about how long it took from apps to migrate from the Main Frame to the client\/server model today used by many desktop applications. \u00a0Now forget about that number, because if you believe in the singularity<\/a>, then the rate of change of technology is only increasing. \u00a0For Apps to move from the client\/server model of today to a SaaS based model it will still take some time. \u00a0And if you’re not completely SaaS then you need to keep supporting desktops that have older clients on them.<\/p>\n This brings up an interesting side note about Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI). \u00a0In essence, if what I have written going forward is true, then VDI is just a temporary solution for many places. \u00a0You won’t need a corporate approved desktop if you’re just running SaaS based apps. \u00a0You just need something that boots up and has secure access. \u00a0 Today that is done with 0 clients, or thin clients. \u00a0But guess what? \u00a0Those thin clients will just be running apps. \u00a0No need for cumbersome operating systems.<\/p>\n Personally, I can’t wait until I no longer need my Windows XP Virtual Machine to run just 2 or 3 apps. \u00a0It is an\u00a0immense\u00a0source of pain to me. \u00a0I can’t believe it took VMware this long to make a client for vCenter that didn’t require Windows!<\/p>\n Amazon and others tote the cost savings of outsourcing your data center. \u00a0This is true for small and even some medium size businesses. \u00a0But there comes a critical mass where outsourcing the data center, is less cost effective then having your own in house.<\/p>\n Zynga started out using EC2 but as the games got bigger, it was too expensive<\/a> and so Zynga invented its own Z cloud. \u00a0Today Zynga still uses EC2 for small tests or games that it is just launching, but for the real popular games, its just too much cost and they run on their own internal cloud.<\/p>\n It takes too much work right now to move your app to the cloud. \u00a0Where would you move it to? \u00a0And if you moved it to Amazon, then isn’t that vendor lockin ? \u00a0Where else could you go? \u00a0The market just isn’t mature enough. \u00a0So no thanks, we’ll keep our apps in house.<\/p>\n What is the definite way to migrate a VM between Data Centers of different suppliers? \u00a0What are the standard security settings needed on both ends to complete the handshake? \u00a0How do data centers get certified that they can work together? \u00a0Much of this still needs to be ironed out and I think you’ll find Cisco right there helping. \u00a0The latest announcement at VMworld 2011 with VXLAN is a great start. (More on that in a second)<\/p>\n So even though public clouds aren’t extremely attractive today for many organizations, the concepts of a cloud are extremely attractive. \u00a0Charge back, self provisioning, accounting can transform a data center into an extremely lean, efficient, transparent, and agile operation. \u00a0That is why private clouds are being built. \u00a0As private clouds mature, they’ll be able to share application hosting\u00a0seamlessly\u00a0through different data centers. \u00a0That’s what the Inter-Cloud is all about and is what will give rise to our future public cloud model. \u00a0This is the future of the data center.<\/p>\n How do we get to the Inter-Cloud? \u00a0First start reaping the benefits of the private cloud. \u00a0As more people do this, more technology will be developed, standards will arise, and we’ll be ready for the data center of the future and the Inter-Cloud. \u00a0Cisco is already doing this.<\/p>\n At VMworld 2011, Cisco announced VXLAN<\/a> which can enable virtual machines to migrate between physical servers in different subnets. \u00a0Cisco has already been clarifying the gray area between the network administrator and the virtual server administrator with the Nexus 1000V. \u00a0The only non-VMware dVS.<\/p>\n That’s all great stuff. \u00a0But what should your organization be doing to future proof your data center?<\/p>\n Follow this roadmap:<\/p>\n This is how Cisco will get you to the Data Center of the Future.<\/p>\n Most organizations have already been doing this. \u00a0Our applications are a combination of ones that must be installed on the desktop to ones that run straight from the Internet.<\/p>\n Universities like the University of Louisville and Case Western Reserve Institute completely outsource their mail to Google. \u00a0The admins love it! \u00a0No more headache’s with Exchange. \u00a0No need to store all that email. \u00a0The students love it too because its just like the GMail accounts they’re used to using.<\/p>\n Just like Google has solved the mail problem for hundreds of organizations, there other innovative companies<\/a> have done this with other solutions like Payroll, accounting, CRM<\/a>, etc. \u00a0These applications will only mature and become more compelling.<\/p>\n Cisco itself offers a great SaaS based solution called WebEx for meetings and other collaborative products. \u00a0Starting to use solutions like this is how organizations begin to transform from old world applications to the applications of the future.<\/p>\n Phase 1 summary: \u00a0Get acquainted with and consider SaaS technologies: \u00a0Try WebEx<\/a>. \u00a0Most likely, you’re already doing this.<\/em><\/p>\n Internally as we look at our present day data center, it is siloed, static, and inefficient. \u00a0There are all kinds of cables and networks intermingled causing massive overhead for IT. \u00a0This infrastructure needs to be simplified and consolidated. \u00a0According to a report last year, organizations spend 38% on IT personal<\/a>. \u00a0Thus, making these people more efficient is one of the fastest way to reduce operational costs.<\/p>\n Cisco offers its Unified Fabric<\/a> solutions to help in this. It has two big impacts: \u00a0First, it reduces management and cabling complexity for now you don’t need to buy as many devices. \u00a0Second, it allows for multitenency. \u00a0Fabric’s can be separated logically. \u00a0Consider Cisco’s pioneering of technologies like VSANs where you essentially have multiple SAN devices running on a single physical SAN switch. \u00a0This is a layer above zoning and once again collapses the need for multiple devices. \u00a0With Unified Fabric, you only need to wire it once, then you can run whatever protocol you want over the network, whether it be Fibre Channel or Ethernet.<\/p>\n Unified Computing System or UCS<\/a> is the other and important aspect of simplifying the management of hardware infrastructure. \u00a0A single management tool, UCS manager allows you to do things you can’t do with any other server management platform. \u00a0Administering legacy Blade architectures (anything non-UCS at this point), or rack mount servers is like writing assembly code to develop a web page. \u00a0You may be able to do it, but using higher level programming languages like HTML and Javascript to do it is much more efficient. \u00a0With UCS you’ll find something that used to take you 15 steps, now takes a single click. \u00a0You’ll feel that you were writing assembly code. \u00a0As an example, you’ll find you can update firmware on 120 servers with a single click. \u00a0Think anyone else can do that today? \u00a0Nope.<\/p>\n Phase 2 summary: \u00a0Get your hardware under control. \u00a0Consolidate with Unified Fabric & UCS<\/em><\/p>\n The hardware capabilities of one physical server far excede the requirements of most applications. \u00a0Indeed, they exceed the requirements of an entire operating system. \u00a0Even my laptop is able to run 2 operating systems without even feeling a hiccup.<\/p>\n The next phase is to virtualize that infrastructure. \u00a0With UCS, you’re most of the way there. \u00a0But Cisco can make it even easier for you. \u00a0We offer two major converged architecture solutions that enable you to have virtual machine appliances. \u00a0They are called Vblocks and FlexPods.<\/p>\n With Vblock<\/a>, Cisco has teamed up with VMware and EMC to create a virtual machine appliance. \u00a0We’ve even created a company around it called VCE<\/a>. \u00a0VCE has its own engineers and support organization who create solutions based on this virtual machine appliance. \u00a0They offer best recipes for all types of solutions. \u00a0With VCE, you can order a single SKU, it comes to you preconfigured, and within a week you will be up and running. \u00a0Try doing this with any other single vendor, or collection of vendors and it can take you nearly 100 days.<\/p>\n A Vblock gets you the best of breed architecture with the worlds leaders in storage, networking, and virtualization.<\/p>\n A FlexPod is a reference architecture with NetApp, Cisco, and VMware. \u00a0NetApp is the fastest growing storage company and its innovative approach to storing data with its RAID-DP technology, De-duplication, and snapshotting make it a very attractive storage vendor of choice for many organizations. \u00a0NetApp even offers a money back guarantee that if you don’t reduce your storage by 50% then they’ll give you storage for free. \u00a0To date, they’ve never paid that out.<\/p>\n A FlexPod can come preconfigured with everything ready to go. \u00a0Or you can buy the components separate, then register it with Cisco, NetApp, and VMware and we’ll tie the support on the back end.<\/p>\n Once you have started to virtualize your primary applications, its time to get serious and start virtualizing the serious stuff: databases and other critical apps. \u00a0With VMware Fault Tolerance, your applications will be more reliable then they were on physical machines.<\/p>\n Phase 3 summary: \u00a0Virtualize the infrastructure with Vblock or FlexPod<\/em><\/p>\n With your organization virtualized, you’ll already start seeing great advantages to managing your infrastructure. \u00a0But it gets better. \u00a0At this point the administrators are still provisioning machines. \u00a0Its time to free them to move on to bigger and better things. \u00a0Its time for the private cloud.<\/p>\n In this step, you automate the business processes for IT. \u00a0You’ll build a catalog of services for organizations that can easily be provisioned and allocated on demand. \u00a0This includes networking, virtual machine images, vApps, etc. \u00a0You build capabilities to charge time to different departments for what they use. \u00a0You start to bring incredible\u00a0transparency\u00a0to your IT organization. \u00a0This is a good thing. \u00a0Now people can see how valuable IT is and you may find IT is allocated more budget dollars.<\/p>\n In the last two years, Cisco made two incredible acquisitions. \u00a0new Scal<\/a>e and Tidal<\/a>. \u00a0Since then, Cisco has adopted these companies in, combined their technology and created Cisco Intelligent Automation for Cloud<\/a>.<\/p>\n With Cisco Intelligent Automation for Cloud, you get the only tier one server vendor who’s built a cloud solution from the ground up, and not just a rebrand of existing technologies. \u00a0Its tested on the market and will only improve over time.<\/p>\n Phase 4 summary: Build the self service catalog with datacenter automation with Cisco Intelligent Automation for Cloud.<\/em><\/p>\n The term ‘Cloudbursting’ can refer to the situation when an organization receives spikes in demands for its cloud and must ‘burst’ the workload to a public cloud. \u00a0This is the next step on the journey to the data center of the future. \u00a0Your data center begins to establish relationships with other data centers.<\/p>\n Standards are still being developed to handle this stage. \u00a0There are some interesting solutions in the open source field like Open Stack<\/a>, and Cloud Stack<\/a> that may aid with this journey.<\/p>\n Phase 5: \u00a0Begin flirting with cloud service providers. \u00a0Become a power user of Cisco Intelligent Automation for Cloud<\/em><\/p>\n Much like Cisco helped pioneer the Internet, and the Internet was built on top of Cisco networks, the Inter-Cloud will be built upon Cisco’s network. \u00a0As we get to this exciting destination those who have taken the leap to the data center of the future will literally leave behind those who never started the journey.<\/p>\n “He who rejects change is the architect of decay.\u00a0 The only human institution which rejects progress is the cemetery. ” ~Harold Wilson<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Phase 6: \u00a0Become a part of the Inter-Cloud<\/em><\/p>\n I hope this article has been useful for any organization looking to understand the current data center landscape and see what an innovative company like Cisco is doing to aid people looking for solutions. \u00a0In the end, building clouds and data centers is all about how we can help people work together more efficiently. \u00a0This is exciting because as people are able to work better, more innovation will take place at an\u00a0accelerated\u00a0pace. \u00a0Imagine as a result of technology the types of problems we’ll be able to solve both scientifically, biologically, politically, and organizationally. \u00a0Cisco has a cool slogan about how “Together, we are the Human Network”. \u00a0I think its safe to extend that to say: “Together we are the Cloud.”<\/p>\n If there is anything I missed here or corrections, please let me know. \u00a0I’d love to get your thoughts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As anyone new to Cisco can tell you, joining this company is no game of candy land. \u00a0But I tell you, it is an exciting ride! \u00a0We lovingly call the first couple of weeks for a new hire ‘the firehose’. \u00a0Well, during the last three months that I’ve been at Cisco, I’ve been drinking from…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[990,992],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/benincosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/benincosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/benincosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benincosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benincosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=455"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/benincosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2781,"href":"https:\/\/benincosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455\/revisions\/2781"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/benincosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benincosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benincosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Applications are moving to the cloud or SaaS based<\/h3>\n
\n
Why we’re not at the Future of the Data Center today<\/h2>\n
If your datacenter is doing nothing but hosting SaaS based apps most organizations will not be able to do it as cost effectively as cloud providers. \u00a0(Amazon EC2, Microsoft Azure, Google App Engine, etc). \u00a0This will only be more true as service providers continue to be more efficient. \u00a0Some believe that\u00a0Public Clouds will win the game<\/a>. <\/span><\/h4>\n
I don’t think its that cut and dry. \u00a0Certainly over the next 10 years I doubt larger organizations will be willing to give up their entire data center. \u00a0So it will be a hybrid. \u00a0And much like you can put solar panels on your house and give back to the power grid, you’ll be able to host workload on your own data center and\u00a0seamlessly\u00a0migrate it to the Public Cloud, or Inter-Cloud.<\/span><\/span><\/h4>\n
\n
Security and Reliability<\/h3>\n
Apps aren’t completely SaaS based<\/span><\/h3>\n
Still not cost effective<\/h3>\n
Transition Costs<\/h3>\n
Protocols and Standards<\/h3>\n
The Road Map to the Data Center of The Future<\/h2>\n
\n
1. Begin SaaS based solutions transition<\/h3>\n
2. Consolidate and simplify Hardware Infrastructure: Get control!<\/h3>\n
3. Virtualize the Infrastructure<\/h3>\n
4. Build a Private Cloud<\/h3>\n
5. Hybrid Cloud<\/h3>\n
6. The Inter-Cloud<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Summary<\/h2>\n