Rise of the Virtual Machines

If you thought you knew what virtualization was all about – VMware letting data center admins run thousands of virtual machines on hundreds of physical servers -- browse on over to Moka5 to get your mind blown.

Moka5 is one of a number of Web sites offering free, downloadable virtual environments for your client PC. By virtual environment I mean the whole shebang – operating system, applications, supporting database – running as a virtual machine alongside your regular OS and applications. Its library of “LivePCs” includes everything from environments for creating secure VPNs to a Christian version of the Ubuntu open-source operating system, complete with customized parental controls and the WhatWouldJesusDownload toolbar.

And lest we forget servers, there’s a whole slew of downloadable server-based “virtual appliances” downloadable – again, for free -- from sites such as Jumpbox. Let’s say you’re a start-up software company and need a real low-cost (read: free) development management tool. Download one from the Web and run it as a virtual server on the lead developer’s notebook. Need a free customer relationship management system? Download one and run it in a virtual machine on your receptionist’s or CFO’s desktop, and just make sure they leave it running when they go home.

These start-up vendors (who hope to make a living selling higher-end versions and support for their appliances) point out that beefing up a host PC to run a virtual appliance is a lot less expensive than buying dedicated server and a high-priced commercial application. And as if all this wasn’t enough, you can store many of these “virtual appliances” on a CD-ROM or even on a USB drive. This lets you use the virtual appliance off-line (although you need to hook to the Internet to get patches or updates) and to instantly load the virtual appliance on another system.

So this is all pure goodness, right? Well, no. First, you get what you pay for, and a free virtual appliance may – or may not – be properly configured to keep your data and the host PC secure. It may or may not deliver adequate  performance, may or may comply with regulations (such as those governing customer privacy) that could sink your business, and may or not be able to share data with other enterprise applications. The last thing a large organization wants are dozens or hundreds of unknown, unmanaged virtual appliances lurking on users’ hard drives or their desk drawers, just waiting to launch onto the network and do mischief.

So what does all this mean for tech marketers? First, when you talk up the benefits of virtualization you also need to talk about how to manage the resulting sprawl of virtual machines and virtual appliances. Second, when you talk about virtualization, extend the conversation beyond the first-level benefits such as cost savings to talk about agility – the fact that virtualization can quickly deliver new application functionality so users can get more work done for the business. (Microsoft is among those thumping this theme with the Softgrid Application Virtualization) technology is acquired from Softricity last year.)

Above all, get past thinking about virtualization as only being important on the server, only coming from VMware and only being about hardware consolidation.