Are you “what’s next”?

re: Are you “what’s next”?

Mike Blane — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 15:10:51 GMT

Thanks, Kevin. That's a lot to digest. I'll take all of this and keep studying.

I really appreciate all of the time and effort that you and the other folks at Microsoft put into these blogs.

re: Are you “what’s next”?

Kevin Remde — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 14:09:18 GMT

Hi Mike,

There is a lot to "cloud", whether public or private. Server 2008 is just one of the components for creating a "private cloud", but the bigger picture of what a "cloud" is really revolves around these 5 high-level tenets:

- Scalable

- Elastic

- Multi-Tenant

- Metered by use

- Self-service

The right hardware with the right OS and virtualization (Hyper-V) will get you dozens/hundreds/thousands of VMs, but the real benefit comes from then granting self-service to people, and being able to meter their usage. System Center tools play the key role for managing the virtualization, monitoring the usage and the performance, and providing a self-service portal.

Check out this blog post to get an idea of where we're going with this:

blogs.technet.com/.../what-s-coming-up-with-the-next-versions-of-scom-and-vmm.aspx

I also recommend you look at System Center Virtual Machine Manager and the new Shared Service Provider 2.0. This is what has grown from the "Dynamic Data Center for Enterprise" initiative.

blogs.msdn.com/.../system-center-virtual-machine-manager-self-service-portal-2-0-release-candidate-available.aspx

re: Are you “what’s next”?

MikeBlane — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 16:48:31 GMT

Kevin, does Microsoft explain how to set up a private cloud on Server 08? I've searched the Microsoft site and I haven't found a way of "creating" a personal cloud to learn about. From what I've been able to read and study about "cloud" technology, it sounds to me like it is a user-authenticated, web-based storage area. The example that I draw on for this conclusion is Microsoft's "SkyDrive". It seems to me that since I authenticate with the Passport, I am given power user privileges over my folder, and I can organize and set security up as I wish. I have my copy of Windows Server 2008 Enterprise that I received from the Windows Vista/Windows Server 2008 launch party. Is that all I need to setup a private cloud?