Now I’m about to start a new episode in my technical career and life, and although the opportunity is a result of the “Virtumania” I am (we are all) a part of, it is definitely not an lackadaisical new start.

I am excited to say “Here Goes Somethin’ !” to a great new opportunity with Veeam Software.

Veeam Senior Systems Engineer Southeast

On Monday April 26, 2010 I start as a Senior Systems Engineer for Veeam in the Southeast U.S. Region. I’ll be joining

David Sile’s team of world wide engineers responsible for partner training, customer proof of concepts, product pre sales and support, and spreading overall Veeam evangelism.

I’ve been fortunate to get to know David, Doug, and many of the Veeam team at conferences and events over the past few years, and I couldn’t be more enthusiastic about getting to work for and with such a great company, such great engineers, and a great group of people.

I believe there is big things in the future ahead at Veeam Software, and I’m appreciative to get the chance to become a part of their success.

Thanks for everything

It was not an easy choice to decide to leave my team and friends at Softchoice Optimus Solutions. I have laughed with and learned from a great group there. We all know we spend more time with our co workers than any one else during the day, and this is sincerely a bittersweet change for me. Knowing that I am leaving a Veeam Gold Partner that I will now get to support in my territory made the decision a little easier, believe it or not. I will stay in touch.

Hello Veeam Partners and customers in the Southeast!

I can’t wait to get to know all of the great partners and customers (both current and future) in the territory. Let me know who and where you are!

How does this impact VM /ETC and Virtumania?

It doesn’t from my perspective! Veeam is encouraging me to keep my personal activities independent and I’m thankful for that. Although it has not been officially discussed, maybe I’ll contribute posts to VeeamMeUp.com from time to time when inspired. – frankly I’m not sure if that’s an option or not. Maybe I’ll start my own separate Veeam centric blog. The point is that this blog and my podcast will remain as independent as possible.

Like my co host Marc Farley (3PAR), on the Virtumania Podcast I’ll continue to talk about virtualization from the operational perspective. I expect to still be in data centers helping with different virtual infrastructure solutions on a regular basis. I’ll have plenty of inspiration!

Here Goes Something’

So, like so many others already in 2010, I’m announcing a change. If you ask me it’s hardly nothin’.

For those who do not know, the vExpert Award was introduced by VMware in 2009. Best described as an award similar to Microsoft’s MVP, I was lucky enough to be named one of the 300 vExperts awarded last year. Check out my acceptance speech post from last February. All joking aside, the award distinguishes those “who have significantly contributed to the community of VMware users over the past year.”

The application process is not a contest or an election campaign, so if you have a candidate that may not be as well known in the vEcosphere already but has significantly contributed to the VMware and virtualization community be sure to fill out an application for him/her. All it takes is one application to recognize someone for their efforts in 2009!

FREE FEATURES ADDED IN THE LAST 12 MONTHS:

• CPU Protection – No longer will a single site on a server impact the performance of other websites on the same server.
• Memory Protection – No longer can a single user or program consume disproportionate memory that would cause slowdowns for our customers.
• Bandwidth Compression – This allows our customers to see a 10-25% decrease in site load times. This is especially noticeable for customers with slower internet connections.
• Process Protection – No longer will a single user be able to spawn runaway processes that cause the processors/cores to slow down trying to handle all the requests. This is especially useful when it comes to MySQL usage where sometimes hundreds of thousands of queries happen in short period of time (5 minutes).
• Many other changes Too many to list in this email.

I’ve been with BLUEHOST.com for 2 years now. I’ve almost moved this blog more than once because of several of the shared hosting plan challenges mentioned in the list above, but the convenience of CPanel management and the ease of site monitoring and reporting have kept me around. For the price, it’s a hosting plan really hard to beat.

Now I firmly recommend BLUEHOST for any blogger that just wants to focus on managing the site and creating content. Don’t get it twisted though – you can get dirty with .cfg, .ini, .php and any other files via the CPanel interface or ssh access if you wish.

Thanks for the free improvements BLUEHOST! I’m glad I stayed put!

Here’s the information from my email for those that did not sign up to be notified:

Breakthrough Technology: Test and Verify the Recoverability of EVERY Backup

Veeam is enhancing the SureBackup™ capabilities in Veeam Backup & Replication™ with a breakthrough technology that overcomes the final obstacle of image-level backups. IT professionals will have the ability to verify the RECOVERABILITY of EVERY backup of EVERY virtual machine EVERY time. It’s never been possible before.

SureBackup introduces a new patent-pending technology that allows IT professionals to run a virtual machine directly from a compressed backup file.

By publishing the content of backup files directly to ESX hosts, you can:

• Eliminate the need to extract backup files
• Test and verify EVERY backup in a matter of minutes, without affecting backup windows
• Perform recoverability testing without additional hardware or staff

The same technology also allows for item-level restore for any virtualized application, on any OS (patent-pending).

This exciting new technology will be made available in version 5.0 of Veeam Backup & Replication, scheduled for release this summer.

Sound too good to be true? Join us for a free webinar on Wednesday, March 24 at 2:00pm EDT to find out more. Live Webinar – Register Now!

Can’t wait? Go to www.veeam.com/surebackup NOW!

I was actually invited to Veeam’s pre release blogger briefing over the weekend, and the rest of this post is my notes and thoughts about what I learned during briefing.

Before continuing I want to be clear. I have not yet used Veeam SureBackup or a beta copy of Backup and Replication V5.

SureBackup is not available until Veeam Backup and Recover v5 is available

Veeam made it very clear to all of us on the call that for now SureBackup is just a technology announcement. Veeam feels that this breakthrough feature for full image VM backup deserved some time to be understood before it hit the market. Veeam told us SureBackup will be a feature of Veeam Backup and Replication version 5 which will be due sometime in Q3 2010.

What is it and how is it done?

Simply put, the magic of Veeam SureBackup is a wizard that walks an administrator through the configuration of mounting VMs in their compressed Veeam backup file format. This wizard, still to be named later, will create a NFS share from the Veeam Backup Server and automatically configure NFS access from an ESX host. All VM verification, credentials and ESX host information is identified and configured during the wizard. My understanding is that there is complete flexibility in choosing which virtual machines and hosts are used during each verification attempt.

Since the Veeam Backup Server is a Windows host, Veeam has developed it’s own proprietary NFS server. Multiple VMs can be mounted simultaneously and are isolated via a Veeam network fencing feature. The NFS mount is temporary and read only, and it will be removed once the administrator completes the verification process.

Why is that unique and helpful?

Imagine the ability to test your restores. Power on the full VM and it’s dependent VMs without shutting down the production originals. Start an isolated instance of your Domain Controllers so you can also start your Exchange server, for example. Know for a fact that your full VM backups can be successfully powered on when needed and your applications work as expected on the restored copies. Do all of this from the compressed backup files and not by transferring the VM back to your primary storage.

Is SureBackup competition for VMware SRM?

No it’s not. SRM requires SAN based replication. Veeam SureBackup requires full image backups from Veeam Backup and Replication. SRM is intended to leave VMs running at a DR site after failing over. SureBackup uses read only VMs that are designed to be used temporarily. Once the restore is verified the wizard ends and the NFS mount is removed.

I’ll point out that some interesting use cases may be possible. Can you clone or Storage VMotion a SureBackup copy of a VM? Could you replicate your Veeam Backup repository to a DR site and use another Veeam Backup and Replication Server to run the Verification wizard? I’m sure users will explore these unsupported possibilities and report their success on the Veeam Forums.

General Thoughts

By rolling up the administrator sleeves, other full image backup products could be used to test restores in an isolated virtual network on an ESX host. However, no other solution automates that process and makes the configuration as simple as a wizard. No other backup product would allow you to run the restored VMs from the actual backup file in the backup repository. Veeam definitely has a great idea with SureBackup.

Of course, VI environments will still need available capacity to run the verification copies.

Another cool use case will be the ability to start up any incremental backup of VM – not just the latest full image. This means you could go back as far as needed to find a version of a file or operating system prior to corruption, infection, or deletion. An admin will be able to drag the file from the verification VM to a restore location if needd.

Siebert has published a couple posts explaining the total voting results and his process of determining the ranking order. It is a lot more complex than one might think. Check out these links for more info:

• The top blog full voting results

• And the winners of the top VMware/virtualization blog are…

If you did not already know, Siebert also maintains the vLaunchpad – a web page of links to all virtualization blogs, news, and resources. Look for the vLaunchpad to be updated soon with the latest rankings as well.

“At the same time, Veeam introduced a new policy with respect to support for the free edition of VMware ESXi. “As a longtime Premier Technology Alliance Partner and supporter of VMware’s product strategy, Veeam Software takes great pride in creating innovative software products that enhance the customer value of VMware ESX, ESXi, and ESXi Free,” said Ratmir Timashev, Veeam president and CEO. “One such example is support for the free edition of VMware ESXi in Veeam Backup and Replication.

“Recently, VMware requested that Veeam discontinue support for ESXi Free in Veeam Backup and Replication in order to comply with VMware’s updated licensing policy,” Timashev continued. “In light of VMware’s request, and our close technical partnership, Veeam Backup and Replication will no longer support ESXi Free. We will still continue to offer support for ESXi Free to existing Veeam customers who purchased Backup & Replication prior to version 3.1.””

Be sure to read those two paragraphs again.

Veeam, a company that seems to have found a successful niche marketing to SMBs and remote branch office VMware deployments, has been asked to remove support of the use of one it’s popular products with free ESXi. Possibly shedding some additional light on this mystery, the press announcement mentions respect for VMware’s product strategy and Veeam’s long time status as a technology partner. There is no mention of Veeam pulling free ESXi support of the popular FastSCP file management tool.

Without any inside information about the VMware ESXi roadmap and strategy, here is a quick review of ESXi’s public timeline:

• VMware announces ESX3i and the availability of ordering hardware with ESXi embedded. ESXi appears to be poised to become a ubiquitous hypervisor in datacenters
• VMware declares ESX classic and the Service Console will be phased out due to security, patching, and distribution size, and the firmware appliance -like ESXi will become the only hypervisor version offered from VMware.
• VMware announces ESXi Update 2 is free to compete with emerging hypervisor competition. The free version appears to be geared towards small deployments or an introduction to VMware’s licensed versions, and is locked down preventing remote access
• ESXi Update 3 is mistakenly released with remote administration left open via the RCLI. VMware recognizes the mistake and closes back down remote administration with ESXi Update 4
• VMware introduces the concept of VIMA/vMA appliances for technology partners to develop remote console based replacements for current Service Console agents used in ecosystem products (VM backup, etc)
• Veeam publicly removes support for Veeam Backup with free ESXi at VMware’s request.

The above order is relatively chronological, but not necessarily in the exact order.

A shift in Strategy For ESXi?

At a time when most of the virtualization community expects VMware to bend to the free offerings available from the hypervisor competition by offering more features in free ESXi (VMotion, HA, or even remote adminstration), VMware appears to be doing the opposite while asking (forcing?) a technology partner to abandon existing/potential business. On that note, how many VMware ecosystem partners have announced new versions that work in a remote console, VIMA/vMA configuration even with a licensed version of ESXi? None come to mind for me.

Does VMware favor the mass adoption of ESXi any longer or, is this the tip of the iceburg of a power play to sqeeze out competition alternatives to VMware vSphere’s new features? (VMware VCB, vDR and SRM versus Veeam Backup, for example) Keith Ward may have been a prophet with his post Cutting Off the Competition’s Air Supply?

“VMware CEO is Paul Maritz. Paul Maritz is the former No. 3 at Microsoft, and a key player in the late-90s U.S. Department of Justice anti-trust trial. It was Maritz who allegedly made the famous threat about “cutting off Netscape’s air supply.” It’s important to note that Maritz has denied saying it (an Intel executive during the trial said he heard Maritz make that statement during a meeting), but it played a key role in the case.”

Adding to the VMware competition conspiracy theory is last week’s VMworld exhibitors and sponsors contract changes PR nightmare.

[updated 06.06.09] - SearchServerVirtualization’s Alex Barrett provides VMware’s reasons for the request to Veeam. My thoughts and summary here.

Other reactions to Veeam’s announcement so far

[updated 06.05.09]

Is VMware becoming the bully Microsoft is known for? – by Gabe

Is VMware becoming the bad guy? – by Erik Scholten

Keeping Sales a Priority — at The Expense of Free Tools – by Rick Vanover

Comments on the Veeameup.com post Veeam and Free ESXi – it’s official now

Follow Twitter replies to Veeam’s announcement on Tweetgrid : http://tweetgrid.com/grid?l=0&q1=veeam

Here is a listing of Brian’s posts on PE09 so far, a few quotes, and some of my own comments.

• Partner Exchange Day 1: PTAB

“Overall, it was a great experience. It was a series of presentations that generated a lot of great discussions and introduced us to some of VMware’s future products and features. They even had a couple of presenters that would throw out ideas just to see if it was a feature we thought was worth developing. Meeting some of the elites within the partner community was definitely a highlight as well.”"Overall, it was a great experience. It was a series of presentations that generated a lot of great discussions and introduced us to some of VMware’s future products and features. They even had a couple of presenters that would throw out ideas just to see if it was a feature we thought was worth developing. Meeting some of the elites within the partner community was definitely a highlight as well.”

I echo Brian’s thoughts. PTAB was awesome. I am honored to have participated and extremely grateful to have been invited. 13 hours straight in a room that was cooler than most data centers sounds brutal, but the content, discussion, and value of the presentations kept me engaged for all 13 hours.

• Partner Exchange Day 2: The Conference Begins

“I now need to admit that it’s really hard practically starting my blog at a conference where most of what I hear is covered under NDA. What I will say is that, fortunately, most of it will be sharable soon.”

Patience Brian, patience.

• Partner Exchange Day 3: The vSphere Experience

“Yesterday’s keynote started with Carl Eschenbach, VMware’s VP for Global Sales, who presented a series of improvements to the Partner Program. Being a recent addition to the Partner community, I have felt some of the pains with the online access to Partner information, but have had little introduction to the program itself. I have to admit to being very impressed with the changes they are making to the program. Though most of the improvements will only be seen by the Partners, I think the agility and access to resources will be felt by the customers. Very cool stuff.”

The VMware Partner program changes and the tools available to help take advantage of the upcoming technology announcements are impressive. Considering next week’s event, I’d say all VMware partners now should know how to get everything they need.

Although I am at Partner Exchange 2009 (PE09) in Orlando, FL this week

In the meantime, here are some summary links and some quick thoughts about what has been discussed publicly so far at the conference.

Dave Lawrence has summarized the first 2 Keynote/General Sessions on his VMguy Blog:

• First day of keynotes at Partner Exchange
• Day 2 Keynotes at Partner Exchange

Seemingly related to the PE09 Keynotes but not confirmed (by VMware or myself),

• Mental Ward: vSphere Set for Debut
• Watch the vSphere Launch and Win a TrainSignal ESX Training Kit
• VMware vSphere is coming
• vSphere 4.0 may not support some other VMware products

Chad Sakac, VP VMware Technology Alliance at EMC, and Ed Bugnion, VP/CTO Server Access and Virtualization at Cisco, were on stage this morning to talk about their latest announcements, products, and partnership efforts with VMware. Of course, Chad and EMC also announced some big news this week in advance of VMware’s event next week.

“The new EMC® Virtual Matrix Architecture™ integrates industry-standard components with unique EMC Symmetrix® capabilities to deliver massive scalability—enabling systems that scale to hundreds of thousands of terabytes of storage and tens of millions of IOPS (input/output per second) supporting hundreds of thousands of VMware and other virtual machines in a single federated storage infrastructure. It is the first storage architecture that combines the performance and efficiency of a scale-up architecture and the cost-effective flexibility of a scale-out architecture. It was designed and built from the ground up to break the physical boundaries of data center storage, incorporates automation to simplify storage management, enables resources to be scaled on demand and uses less energy per terabyte of data stored than traditional high-end storage systems.”

Check out Chad’s blog post EMCs VMware Storage Strategy – The 3rd Shoe Drops for more on EMC’s V-Max.

What’s up with Chad using the PE09 General Session for trying to boost his Virtual Geek Blog standings?! He showed his Virtual Geek URL on a slide and he begged for attendee help breaking into the top 3 VMware blogs in his presentation!! All kidding aside, Chad’s blog is a must read for VMware admins and the new EMC V-Max and Cisco Nexus 1000v technologies are awesome advances for virtualization. V-Max really made me think when I learned it was possible to extend VI shared storage across multiple, separate physical data centers. Could geo-location VMotion finally be a reality?

On a personal note, the social networking has exponentially increased for me at PE09. I’ve really enjoyed meeting in person all the on line friends made through both VM /ETC and Twitter!

Check out my PE09 tweetgrid to virtually attend the conference the rest of the week – it works even if you don’t have a Twitter account yet. The conference party tonight should produce some entertaining tweets and twitpics.