Citrix Project Kensho offers OVF Enlightment but only causes DeJa Vu
July 17th, 2008 | 
Author: Citrix has announced this week the projected September 2008 preview release of the Project Kensho tools to create virtualized application appliances in the Open Virtual Machine Format (OVF). The official Citrix news release, Citrix Unveils Project Kensho for Hypervisor-Independent App Workloads, states the following:
“Citrix Systems, Inc. (Nasdaq:CTXS), the global leader in application delivery infrastructure, today announced “Project Kensho,” which will deliver Open Virtual Machine Format (OVF) tools that, for the first time, allow independent software vendors (ISVs) and enterprise IT managers to easily create hypervisor-independent, portable enterprise application workloads. These tools will allow application workloads to be imported and run across Citrix XenServer, Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V and VMware ESX virtual environments.”
In the future Citrix will deliver OVF tools for the first time?
VMware’s OVF Tool already exists today and can be used on VMs created with Workstation, Player, and Fusion. VMs on ESX can also be exported to OVF via the VI Client version 2.5. Here’s some more information from the VMware OVF Tool technical note published in December 2007:
“The OVF Tool brings OVF support to VMware Workstation, VMware Player, and VMware Fusion. The tool converts OVF packages into the virtual machine format used by VMware Workstation and related systems. The tool also supports conversion of virtual machines from VMware Workstation format to OVF.
NOTE Support for OVF is built directly into VMware Infrastructure Client (VI Client) version 2.5. To import and export virtual machines in OVF, choose File > Virtual Appliance.
The package created by the OVF tool and the package created by the VI Client are completely compatible: You can import an OVF package created by the OVF Tool into the VI Client. You can use the OVF Tool to convert a package created by the VI Client into a virtual machine that one of the VMware Workstation products can use.”
The description provided on the VMware OVF Tool web page linked above helps one achieve OVF Zen:
“The Open Virtual Machine Format (OVF) is a virtual machine distribution format that supports sharing virtual machines between products and organizations. The format facilitates the use of virtual appliances, which are preconfigured virtual machines that package applications with the operating system they require. Because OVF runs on multiple platforms, a virtual appliance is ready to run without significant additional configuration.”
The Register’s Austin Modine may have been phrophetic when reporting on the Citrix announcement in the article Citrix’s ‘Kensho’ tools shed earthly hypervisor restraints:
“Kensho is a Buddhist term for glimpsing enlightenment by perceiving your true nature. It’s often used to describe an initial awakening to the essence of the mind and perceiving one’s self as impermanent and ever-changing.
We assume Citrix doesn’t intend for the project to live up to the title, as ISV employees who shed earthly attachments and break free from the eternal wheel of Samsara on a journey to enlightenment tend to neglect computer work.”
“the experience of feeling sure that one has witnessed or experienced a new situation previously (an individual feels as though an event has already happened or has repeated itself).”
updated 07.17 – Techworld.com’s article Citrix looking to simplify virtualisation offers some deeper insight in Citrix’s OVF tool, and the first mention I have seen about the existence of other OVF converters.
“Roger Klorese, Citrix senior director of product marketing, said a commercial version of the tool should be ready to ship within a year, probably less, but Citrix hasn’t decided yet whether it will be offered as part of XenSource, as a standalone tool, or both.
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The first technical preview of the tool will allow application workloads be exported to all three environments – XenServer, VMware’s ESX and Microsoft’s Hyper-V – but imported only to XenServer and Hyper-V, meaning a VMware server won’t be able to import workloads easily from Citrix and Microsoft environments.
[omitted]
Asked if an equivalent tool exists today, Klorese said: “There are various virtual format converter tools out there, but they are built really with the idea that the application started in one environment and will then – as perfectly as possible, but often imperfectly – be imported over to the next platform. So it’s really a difference of philosophy.”
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