Ian Pratt, Citrix VP of Engineering, founder of the open source Xen.org community, and project leader of Xen.org was recently interviewed by Randal Schwartz and Leo Laporte of FLOSS Weekly. The recorded podcast is about 40 minutes long and can be accessed at http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/twit.cachefly.net/FLOSS-067.mp3.

This PodCast is a chance to learn about the origins of the Xen.org Xen Hypervisor project, how Cloud Computing was really behind its origins, and how the Xen.org community continues to drive the leading open source hypervisor.

NetScaler Virtual Machine

Today, Citrix announced a virtual appliance version of their NetScaler Application Delivery Controller - the NetScaler VPX, the first of its kind. All of the functions that traditionally were performed in the datacenter can now be performed in the domain of virtual machines. Load balancing, application acceleration, security and offload functionality are now available as a XenServer virtual appliance.

Industry's first Virtual Load Balancer

No other vendor offers this type of software as a Virtual Appliance. By making advanced web application delivery functionality available as a virtual appliance, NetScaler VPX drives convergence of virtualization and networking. In the continued movement toward simple and affordable convergence, NetScaler VPX makes sophisticated application delivery functionality available to any size organization. This breaks down deployment barriers for all types of organizations.

What used to run on a proprietary piece of hardware now runs on any hardware that supports virtualization. Because there is no physical appliance to ship, install or move VPX can be installed at a moment's notice, on any server running XenServer.

The challenge

• Check out The Great NetScaler VPX challenge and get $10,000.
• The Tech Preview will be downloadable from citrix on May 18th.
• If you are running VMWare, you need to run Xen - and why wouldn't you, Xen is free.
  

NetScaler VPX

It's powerful - AppExpert!

В конце февраля компания Citrix Systems объявила о выходе в апреле месяце бесплатного продукта XenServer Free. Тем кто хотел воспользоваться продуктом виртуализации от компании Citrix предлагалось скачать Citrix XenServer в редакции Enterprise с ознакомительной лицензией с продлённым сроком действия - 45 дней или использовать продукт Citrix XenServer Express Edition, который иизначально был бесплатным, но с ограниченной функциональностью.

Многие пользователи воспользовались такой возможностью, но со временем встал вопрос - как перейти к бесплатному продукту и при этом получить необходимый функционал?

На самом деле эту задачу можно подразделить на две более простых:

1. Переход от ранних редакций (Express, Enterprise с ознакомительной лицензией) к бесплатному продукту Citrix XenServer Free
2. Активация лицензии бесплатного XenServer.

Начнем с первой задачи.

Если Вы скачали Citrix XenServer Free, то этот пункт Вы можете пропустить, так как он адресован тем, кто уже использовал Citrix XenServer 5 до выхода бесплатного продукта.

Эта часть описана в статье базы знаний http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX120960.
Приведу здесь краткий перевод.
1. В существующей инсталляции XenServer 5 устанавливаем Update 3.0 (см. CTX120619)

2. Удаляем ознакомительную или express лицензию с помощью консольной команды XenServer:
rm /etc/xensource/license

3. Перезапускаем стек расширений XenServer, используя консольную команду:
xe-toolstack-restart

После выполнения этих трёх шагов мы готовы приступить ко второй задаче.

Когда у нас машина с установленным клиентом управления (Citrix XenCenter) имеет выход в Интернет, то всё просто, я же рассмотрю более сложный случай, когда мы не имеем прямого выхода в Интернет.

1.Запускаем утилиту управления Citrix XenCenter;
2.В открывшемся окне утилиты, в меню «Tools», выбираем «License Manager»

3.В открывшемся окне менеджера лицензий, выбираем сервер, для которого мы хотим активировать лицензию.
После выбора сервера, нажимаем справа кнопку «Activate».

4.Если сервер не подключен к Интернету, то мы увидим предупреждение о невозможности активации лицензии.

Для продолжения, нам необходимо нажать на кнопку «Save»
5.После нажатия на эту кнопку, нам будет предложено сохранить файл с информацией в директории, в которую установлен Citrix XenCenter.

Для сохранения, нам необходимо дать файлу произвольное имя.
6.Так как в данный каталог, Вы скорее всего не имеете прав на запись, то Вы получите следующее сообщение об ошибке доступа и предложении вместо этого каталога сохранить файл в стандартном каталоге «Документы/Documents» для Вашей учётной записи.

7.После сохранения файла, можем его открыть в любом редакторе. Он представляет собой обыкновенный XML документ.

8.Теперь переносим этот файл на компьютер, у которого есть выход в Интернет и обращаемся по указанному в пункте 4 адресу - https://activate.vmd.citrix.com
9.Откроется веб-страница, которая представляет собой форму для загрузки файла.

10.Нажимаем кнопку «Browse» и выбираем сохранённый ранее файл.

11.После выбора файла, нажимаем кнопку «Upload». После этого начнётся процесс загрузки файла в систему активации лицензий.

12.Процесс загрузки занимает считанные мгновения и после этого открывается страница регистрации:

Обратите внимание на следующие поля - адрес электронной почты и Access code.
Вам необходимо ввести актуальный адрес электронной почты, так как именно на него будет отправлено сообщение с лицензионным файлом. Поле Access code можно не заполнять.
13.После заполнения всей необходимой информации и нажатия кнопки «Request Activation» вся необходимая для подготовки лицензии информация будет собрана и отправлена на обработку.

14.Теперь осталось подождать немного и в своём почтовом ящике обнаружить письмо с вложением. Этим вложением, как раз и будет годовая лицензия для бесплатного гипервизора - Citrix XenServer.

15.Последним шагом будет перенос этой лицензии на компьютер, где установлен Citrix XenCenter, предназначенный для управления сервером на который мы только что с Вами активировали лицензию. На этом компьютере Вам останется два раза «кликнуть» на полученной лицензии и запустится Citrix XenCenter и предложит выбрать сервер, для которого нужно установить данную лицензию. Завершить процедуру следует нажатием кнопки «Install».

Вот и всё что необходимо для активации лицензии при отсутствии подключения к Интернет компьютера с установленным Citrix XenCenter.

Инструкцию по активации в формате PDF можно скачать ниже:

	Name	Size	Creator (Last Modifier)	Creation Date	Last Mod Date	Comment
	Активация лицензий Citrix XenServer.pdf	699 kB	Sergey Khalyapin	May 05, 2009	May 05, 2009	Инструкция в PDF формате

We hear from many of you every day, in person, by email, by Twitter, in your own blogs -- and even some ways I can't think of -- I bet some testimonials have washed up on the beach in bottles! -- about how virtualizing your business, your lab, or your own services on Citrix XenServer and Citrix Essentials for XenServer have saved you money, made your environment more responsive, and simplified management.

Now we're going to put a little bit of our money where your mouth, or keyboard, is.

Let us know how you and your company have "attained Xen" -- and we'll choose a few of our favorites each month and give them a gift to thank them.  We'll pick anywhere from one to three of them each month and give the winner a gift credit of US$100 or equivalent at Amazon, iTunes, or a major online retailer in their local area. 

Send us anywhere from fifty to 500 words.  Be creative, be specific, and let others know what XenServer has done for you.  (If your creativity runs more to the visual, we'll also be announcing a video contest in the next month or two.)

Mail your entry to findxen@citrix.com. At the end of every month, the XenServer/Essentials marketing team will choose its favorites and we'll notify the winner (or winners) by the middle of the following month.

There's a catch, of course -- we ask for the rights to use your testimonial.  (See the fine print below for details.)  At a minimum, you'll need to tell us your name and email address, so we can contact you if you win. To be considered, you'll also need to specify your company, industry, and company size, as well as your job role.  If you only want us to use your job role, industry and company size, that's fine -- but if you give us permission to use your name and your company's, we'll double the prize to US$200 or equivalent. Whether you win or not, we retain the rights to use your testimonial under the terms you choose, either anonymous or named.

It's a small token of how we value your support. 

And now, the "fine print."

ELIGIBILITY

This Contest is open to individuals who have used Citrix XenServer or Citrix Essentials for XenServer. By submitting a testimonial entry, Contestants acknowledge that their entry may be showcased on the Citrix Web site, and may also be utilized in part or in full in media stories. Entries must be submitted by an individual who is at least 18 years of age.  Void where prohibited.

HOW TO ENTER

Contestants must mail their entry to findxen@citrix.com, and in 50 to 500 words, submit their entry explaining how using Citrix XenServer or Citrix Essentials for XenServer has benefited the Contestant or the company the Contestant works for. E-mail is the only medium to enter this contest and no other means of entrance will be accepted. All entries must be submitted in English. Contest timeframe is limited and can end at anytime, as deemed by Citrix.

SELECTION OF WINNER

Each entry will be judged by a Committee designated by the Citrix XenServer/Essentials Product Marketing team. Judging will be based on the unique perspective and interesting anecdotes Contestant provides in their testimonials about how Citrix XenServer and Citrix Essentials for XenServer have enhanced the Contestant's or Company's IT infrastructure. The decisions of the Committee will be final.

CONDITIONS OF PRIZE AWARD

The top one to three selected Contestants each month will be notified by e-mail that their testimonial has been selected; a gift credit for the desired online retailer will be delivered to their e-mail address.

Failure to comply with any term or condition in these Official Rules, or if prize is returned as non-deliverable, may result in prize forfeiture, in whole or in part, and selection of an alternate potential winner. Prizes will be shipped approximately 2 to 3 weeks after each month's Contest end. Citrix will post the names of the winners  after the prize is awarded, except where prohibited by law. Winners are responsible for any applicable federal, state, or local taxes.

COPYRIGHT AND PUBLICATION

All entries and submissions become the property of Citrix. Citrix will not return any entries. By submitting a Contest entry, a Contestant: (a) assigns to Citrix all copyrights and moral rights in and to the Contest entry arising under stature and common law, and all other rights derivative therefrom, (b) grants to Citrix permission to publish, copy, and disseminate all or part of the Contest entry; and (c) grants to Citrix permission to use the Contestant's name for advertising or promotional purposes all without any royalty, compensation or other consideration to Contestant, except where prohibited by law. Contestant agrees that e-mail shall satisfy any writing requirement which may apply to intellectual property waivers, transfers, and licenses.

GENERAL TERMS AND CONDITIONS

This contest is subject to all applicable federal, state, and local laws. Void where prohibited or restricted. Participation in the Contest constitutes Contestant's full and unconditional agreement to and acceptance of these Official Rules.

Citrix is not responsible for lost, late, stolen, delayed, damaged incomplete, illegible, misdirected, or unreceived e-mails and Contest entries; for failed, partial, or garbled computer transmissions; for technical failures of any kind related to the Web site or the administration of the contest; or for any technical malfunction of any telephone network or lines, computer on-line systems, servers, access providers, computer equipment, or software. Citrix reserves the right to cancel, suspend, or modify the contest, if fraud, technical failures, viruses or bugs, beyond the reasonable control of Citrix, corrupt, impair or destroy the administration, security, fairness or integrity of the contest as determined by Citrix in their sole discretion without liability to any Contestant. Entries are subject to verification and will be declared invalid if they are illegible, forged, falsified, altered or tampered with in any way or if they violate any provision of these Official Rules.

As a condition of entering this contest, Contestant agrees that Citrix and affiliates, officers, directors, employees and agents shall not be liable for injury, loss or damage of any kind resulting from participating in this Contest or from the acceptance or use of any prize awarded. The exclusive warranty for any prize, if any, is from the manufacturer as set forth in the product documentation. All issues and questions concerning the construction, validity, interpretation and enforceability of these Official Rules, or the rights and obligations of Contestant and Citrix in connection with the contest, shall be governed by, and construed in accordance with, the laws of the State of Florida, U.S.A. without giving effect to any choice of law or conflict of law rules or provisions.

When we talk about the Citrix Delivery Center, we are talking about an end-to-end application delivery infrastructure solution. A solution which represents a family of Citrix product lines: Citrix XenServer, Citrix XenApp, Citrix NetScaler and Citrix XenDesktop. It also represents products that add integrated security, management and networking functions, products such as: Citrix Access Gateway, Citrix Branch Repeater and Citrix Desktop Receiver. Overall, the Citrix Delivery Center gives customers the power to adopt virtualization that meets their specific requirements. Customers can choose to optimize delivery of their Web Applications, Windows Applications, Desktop Delivery, Data Center Optimization - individually or in combination. How about all of them?

So how did we do it....First we virtualized every Citrix Delivery Center component and the backend SAP NetWeaver application servers using Citrix XenServer. Then we showcased what a remote SAP NetWeaver user would experience accessing the SAP NetWeaver Portal via Citrix Delivery Center while focusing on the high availability/fault tolerant solutions Citrix and Marathon provide. Finally, we simulated a complete failure in the primary site and used the combined NetScaler Global Server Load Balancing feature in conjunction with Marathon's everRun DR product to failover SAP to a secondary data center.

Let's go through the steps that describe the demonstrated user experience:

• Remote SAP NetWeaver Portal user securely connects to the SSL VPN provided by Citrix Access Gateway Enterprise Edition.
• All connections from the remote user client are accelerated using Citrix Branch Repeater Plug-in.
• Remote user is seamlessly presented with the Citrix Web Interface website with on-demand access to virtual desktops, applications, bookmarks and other corporate resources.
• From the Citrix Web Interface page, the remote user launches a virtual Windows XP desktop hosted by Citrix XenDesktop. This desktop is a private virtual image of Windows XP running within a secure data center and maintained from a centralized Windows XP image provisioned dynamically with Citrix Provisioning Server.
• From the secure virtual Windows XP desktop, the remote user launches a published SAP NetWeaver Portal delivered by Citrix XenApp. The published NetWeaver Portal application is separated from the virtual Windows XP Operating System allowing optimal user performance.
• As the remote user navigates the application, all SAP NetWeaver Portal connections pass through a Citrix NetScaler configured to optimize SAP NetWeaver Portal application delivery.

We also demonstrated the following high availability and recoverability solutions provided by Citrix XenServer and Marathon everRun software:

• Level 1: XenServer delivers out-of-the-box high availability, including cost-effective core failover, recovery and restart capabilities for SAP applications running in the virtual environment.
• Level 2: Marathon everRun VM delivers high availability of component-level fault tolerance, eliminating downtime caused by I/O component failures and guaranteeing recovery from system failures.
• Level 3: Marathon everRun VM's Lockstep Technology delivers continuous availability from system-level fault tolerance, eliminating data loss, downtime and transaction loss.
• Disaster Recovery: Marathon everRun DR provides a robust and flexible remote disaster recovery solution providing automated and reliable long-distance protection for critical data and applications, in this case, SAP.

Each piece of the demonstration was broken down into small video segments for this blog. The first video features the Citrix Delivery Center environment for SAP from top to bottom including the remote user login, virtual desktop access, and SAP NetWeaver Portal launch. Then a complete site failure is simulated and the secondary site recovery is shown using Marathon's everRun DR solution with Citrix NetScaler's Global Server Load Balancing feature.

Stay tuned for a detailed reference architecture and video blogs on different High Availability scenarios including everRun VM also demonstrated at SAP Co-Innovation Lab.

Here's the video:

Now that we have released Workflow Studio 1.1, I wanted to point out that we also have articles with details about what is available in each activity library. There are 8 different libraries listed in the installer - click on the item below to view the activities available with each one:

• Citrix NetScaler
• Citrix XenServer
• Active Directory
• Group Policy
• Networking
• Windows
• WMI
• Workflow Math Functions

Note: The Group Policy activity library requires the Microsoft Group Policy Management Console (GPMC) to be installed before it can be used. You can get GPMC here:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=0a6d4c24-8cbd-4b35-9272-dd3cbfc81887&displaylang=en

Fire up your test machines! We're pleased to announce the beta release of XenServer 5.5 (code-named "Project George") is now available.

The only requirement for accessing the beta is a MyCitrix account. To access the XenServer 5.5 beta downloads once logged into MyCitrix go here directly, or select Downloads, then select "Citrix XenServer/Essentials", then scroll down to the "Betas/Tech Previews" section.

We expect this beta to last four weeks (standard disclaimer applies: actual release will be determined by test results) so it's critical we get your feedback as early as possible. To report issues go to http://bugtracker.vmd.citrix.com, more details here.

The Project George forum can be used for general discussion on the beta release and reviewing updated known issues.

XenServer 5.5 contains several highly-requested new features:

• Active Directory integration. Specify the AD domain to use for authentication by the pool and use your AD credentials to connect to the pool via XenCenter and ssh. You control which AD users/groups are allowed access.
• Workload balancing. Guest and host performance metrics are used to create star ratings for individual VM placement and balancing recommendations for resource pools to achieve optimal performance.
• LVHD. Fast cloning and snapshots are now supported on all SR types through integration of our software VHD stack and LVM-based Storage Repositories (SRs)
• Snapshot support in XenCenter. Create and manage disk snapshots from within XenCenter.
• StorageLink integration. CLI-only support for a new StorageLink Gateway SR that adds native standards-based support for HP MSA, HP EVA, EMC Clariion, and NetApp storage arrays over iSCSI and Fibre Channel with optional automated initiator/fabric/array management.
• Expanded guest OS support. RHEL 5.3, Debian Lenny, and SLES 11 Linux guests.

Carl, on behalf of the XenServer engineering team

Jerome Reid manages both the Citrix Technical Support escalation team and the frontline teams for XenServer and Provisioning Server in the Dublin, Ireland office which assists customers in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA). Jerome will be presenting the following sessions at Citrix TechEdge during Citrix Summit and Citrix Synergy 2009: End-to-end virtualization with Citrix Delivery Center, with a focus on Citrix XenServer, and then his in-depth session will cover Disaster recovery and automation with XenServer.

Q. How has XenServer improved from a support perspective over the past year?

Jerome: Much work has been done over the past year to improve the support processes for XenServer. We now have a dedicated team in each GEO with responsible for managing cases that are referred to our engineering team. This support escalation team ensures that our customer issues are prioritized correctly with engineering and that our customers are aware of their case status. Escalation is also able to bring pre-release solutions in the form of private fixes to customers which allows us to be confident at the earliest opportunity that the fixes for bugs are really addressing the reported issues. We have also been working hard in support to understand the key areas in the product that can be improved from a support and supportability perspective. We have projects designed to allow us to capture this information and carry it to the engineering team. This is a key driver for product development going forward. Q. What XenServer and Citrix Delivery Center tips will attendees learn at your session this year? Jerome: The session will provide the key information you need to consider when implementing a disaster recovery plan for a XenServer deployment. We'll review how to use the different backup and restore mechanisms provided with XenServer 5.0, including VM metadata backup, XenServer host backups and database backups. In addition we'll automate the different backup mechanisms using Xenserver consoles and CLI scripting, and show how to leverage the XenServer CLI for task automation via scripting.

About Jerome Reid
Jerome has been with Citrix Technical Support just over five years. He began as an escalation engineer in the Dublin, Ireland office supporting EMEA customers. He then took on management of the XenApp escalation support. Recently he's been responsible for managing the Server Virtualization and Provisioning support team. In this role he's responsible for managing the support case lifecycle for these technologies from when a customer first logs a call with technical support until a resolution is provided. He graduated from Waterford Institute of Technology with a degree in Software engineering, and has his CCA. He enjoys spending time with his family of three children, two girls and a boy, age nine, six and two. He's also training for his private pilots license.
Do you have an XenServer troubleshooting area that you would like Jerome to focus on during his presentation? Leave a comment.

Check out more posts in the Citrix TechEdge 2009 series.

With Citrix Synergy fast approaching, it's time to get the word out on an exciting addition to the Citrix Booth.  This year we've carved out an area where attendees can go deep (very deep) with not only Citrix product architects and gurus, but industry experts from Intel, Marathon and Oracle.  Our experts have been prepped that no question on the topic of the hour is too technical; so bring your implementation questions, and we'll whiteboard up best practice solutions to get you moving toward a successful deployment. 

Our schedule runs whenever the Expo hall is open, so please come by and try to stump our experts.  As you can see, we have some meaty topics for your enjoyment.

~~~~~

Ask the Experts Schedule

Sunday May 3^rd

7:00 PM - To VPN or not to VPN

7:45 PM - Citrix XenServer on Intel® Server Products: Your recipe for Virtualization Success

8:30 PM - EdgeSight Scalability and Resiliency

9:15 PM - How XenDesktop Works

Monday May 4^th

7:00 PM - Supporting External Users with Smart Card Authentication

7:45 PM - HA Design Decisions in Virtualized Environments

8:30 PM - Considerations to Maximize XenDesktop Performance

9:15 PM - Real-World PVS Deployment Considerations

Tuesday May 5^th

12:30 PM - StorageLink Deployment Considerations

1:15 PM - Delivering Oracle Applications with Citrix XenApp and Citrix NetScaler

2:00 PM - Deploying Branch Repeater and Access Gateway Plugins

2:45 PM - XenApp Server Scalability

Wednesday May 6^th

12:30 PM - XenApp Application Streaming Deep Dive

1:15 PM - Fault Tolerant SAP Delivery with the Citrix Delivery Center

2:00 PM - Leveraging NetScaler for Disaster Recovery

2:45 PM - Deploying Branch Repeater for XenApp 

Our pursuit of interoperability and portability for virtual infrastructure has pased a new milestone:  The Tech Preview of the free XenConvert 2.0 utility is now available for free download.  We'd love to get your feedback on its features. 

For starters, XenConvert 2.0 supports direct import of VMware VMDK virtual hard disks into XenServer, including all v2v operations.  It has also productized the Citrix Project Kensho implementation of the DMTF portable application packaging format, OVF (Open Virtual machine Format), which Citrix has helped to develop and standardize.  OVF virtual appliance packages will now directly import in to XenServer to instantiate a complex virtualized application stack, together with all of its relevant infrastructure resource requirements. 

XenConvert's v2v capabilities mean that even VMware dependent OVFs will be able to be imported into XenServer, which in turn means zero switching cost to XenServer.   Since XenServer itself is also free, my guess is XenConvert 2.0 puts you well into the black on your next virtualization project.  Finally, any VM you import into VHD files for use by XenServer can also be used in our provisioning services engine (the artist formerly known as Citrix Provisioning Server for Data Centers) to allow you to dynamically stream a VM onto any hypervisor and even bare metal!

Here are some other nifty features that the XenConvert team have added :

• •  Offline conversion of VMware VMDK into OVF/VHD for future import into XenServer via XenConvert or Hyper-V via Project Kensho
  • P2V conversion of native workloads into OVF/VHD for direct or offline import into XenServer via XenConvert or Hyper-V via Project Kensho
  • XVA (XenServer internal runtime format) to OVF/VHD for direct or offline import into XenServer via XenConvert or Hyper-V via Project Kensho
  • Substantially improved import transfer time of OVF/VHD files into any XenServer SR
  • OVF Signing for security and to check that packages have not been tampered with since creation

XenConvert is rapidly becoming a vital component in our tool bag because it offers customers portability between virtualization platforms, native and clouds.  It offers the industry a powerful answer to proprietary virtualization solutions.  More cool features will be included when XenConvert 2.0 ships for real, likely within the next 90 days.  Give it a whirl and give us your feedback.

StorageLink is one of the components of the new Citrix Essentials for Hyper-V product that was just released last week.

I recently recorded a technical deep dive presentation and demo with Pete Benoit, the Senior Director of Engineering for StorageLink. You can watch the hour long presentation and demo below -

You can download the StorageLink Install Guide here. The StorageLink User guide is here and you can download the Powershell guide here.

UPDATE: I added the Deep Dive webinar video to my SkyDrive on Windows Live. You can download it here

Follow me on Twitter.

In a recent post I posted some data to show that we are getting terrific performance results for XenServer and Intel Nehalem based servers.  In the first formal set of tests we found that the bottleneck on performance lies in the fact that the hypervisor still has to perform I/O on behalf of all guests, and so the system scaling limit is the rate at which we can scale the internal I/O stack.  I postulated that we would get some impressive numbers for  Nehalem based platforms using IOV enhanced 10Gb/s NICs, and contacted our friends at  Solarflare, asking if they would help to run some numbers using their 10Gb/s NICs, which offer a powerful direct hardware-to-guest acceleration path that avoids the necessity for the hypervisor to process I/O on behalf of the guests - allowing guests to interact with the hardware directly.Below is a summary of the initial findings for the  the Nehalem tests using XenServer 5.0 and Solarflare I/O acceleration.  Thanks to Steve Pope of Solarflare for his help.  It turns out that with a smart I/O architecture such as the Solarflare offload stack, when guests interact directly with I/O safe hardware, we can dramatically change the system performance, and basically saturate a 10Gb/s link, in both directions at the same time! :

Here's how the experiment is set up.  We have 2 physical servers, A and B, connected back to back with Solarflare 10G Ethernet gear. Each server is running XenServer 5.0 Update 3 with a single 8 logical core Nehalem CPU.

To create a traffic workload between the servers we ran  NetPerf TCP_STREAM pairs between Linux RHEL 5 guests (each pair spans server A and server B) and measured the aggregate throughput both with and without acceleration.

Non-accelerated

The configuration used 4 guests transmitting from A to B and 4 guests from B to A.  Raw results were: 

• (A -> B) 1094 + 1068 + 1046 + 1128 = 4336 Mbps
• (B -> A) 1019 + 1028 + 1050 + 1021 = 4118 Mbps

Total: 8.45 Gbps; Bottleneck: Hypervisor CPU

In other words, we confirmed the hypothesis that there is plenty more system capacity but that the hypervisor is I/O bottlenecked on behalf of the guests.

Accelerated
As previously, the configuration used 4 guests transmitting from A to B and 4 guests from B to A.  Raw results were:

• (A->B) 2355 + 2318 + 2296 + 2289 = 9258 Mbps
• (B->A) 2285 + 2295 + 2315 + 2350 = 9245 Mbps

Total: 18.50 Gbps

In the accelerated scenario we have basically maxxed out bidirectional I/O on a single 10Gb/s link, with only 4 guests! This is awesome.  I should mention also that the Solarflare architecture is remarkably clean and avoids much of the pain of dealing with SR-IOV (which deserves a full post in its own right, and I'm half way through noodling on).

Mark Angelo of Lanamark has clearly just signed a deal with Symantec and/or Parallels for Lanamark's capacity planning tools (which look pretty interesting).  Either that, or Mark and his pals at Parallels know more about virtualization than VMware, Citrix, the Xen community, Microsoft and Virtual Box. 

Mark correctly points out that Symantec has a portfolio of interesting point products that are relevant in the delivery market.  Altiris SVS, nSuite, Appstream and possibly other technologies that we don't know about are all relevant in the market - particularly Altiris, which is a well established vendor in the PCCLM space.   He states that Symantec is going to announce a compelling portfolio that competes with VMware, Citrix and Microsoft.  And he states that a good acquisition by Symantec would be virtualization vendor Parallels.

As far as the Symantec play with its Endpoint Virtualization Suite is concerned, Mark has correctly observed that Symantec brings some interesting assets to the table.  They are a player in PCCLM, and presumably their customers are demanding that Symantec respond to the clear strategic trajectories of the major application and desktop delivery vendors.  At the same time, Symantec is a good partner of ours in many areas.  I think it's fair to say that we're very comfortable that customers will prefer our solutions in those areas where Citrix has always played a strategic role - delivery of apps and desktops as a service - but that customers will have environments that include Symantec even in those scenarios, and we will work with Symantec to enable customers to succeed wherever that is the case.

Where Mark's enthusiasm about his new found friends leads him toward hyperbole, is the role of Parallels. Mark says:

"Enter Parallels. While Parallels has taken its time to build a bare-metal hypervisor, the company knew that it could not bring a second rate product to market given the fierce competition. So instead of launching Parallels Server prematurely, Parallels continued to build and refine a virtualization offering that is technologically superior to anything currently available on the market"  [followed by a feature list that is .. pretty unremarkable in any virtualization context]

While Parallels is a very respectable vendor that owns the "microslice" web hosting market world wide as well as being the initial leader in type 2 virtualization on the Mac, they have very limited credibility in the enterprise.  Could they get there with "technology that is superior to anything currently available on the market"? Sure.  So what's this magical technology? A type 2 hypervisor that is becoming bare-metal capable over time?  Perhaps I'll leave it to my friends at VMware to respond to that one. 

At the end of the day, the argument that Mark is advancing is similar to those I've recently heard from Red Hat about the superiority of KVM.  Just as with Parallels, I have no problem with KVM. It's just another (currently immature, but advancing) virtualization technology that will be in Linux, that presumably will become great over the timescale that all software becomes great.  Open source KVM will, by virtue of cross pollination, be compatible with Xen, and via our contribution of VHD support, possibly even be compatible with Hyper-V.  (Parallels is none of those.)  But both are just another way to virtualize a server.  No more, no less, no magic.

But look at the competitive landscape: With ESXi and Microsoft Hyper-V the hypervisor itself is free, and in the case of XenServer, the complete virtual infrastructure is free.  So arguing about another way to use Intel VT seems like a waste of time.  The conversation that I find myself engaged in with our customers relates to a much larger issue in the enterprise:  How can Citrix Essentials for XenServer and Hyper-V enable IT and lines of business to automate the lifecycle of their workloads, automatically orchestrate complex data center storage networks,  data networks and their XenServer or Hyper-V based vitual infrastructure to offer an agile IT infrastructure service to the business.  Users and application owners need direct role-based access to a lights out IT environment that is agile and accountable, yet that takes advantage of virtualization features offered by multiple vendors.   So, much as I enjoyed using Parallels on my Mac, I thinkit is important to up-level the vendor view of customer challenges beyond simply OS virtualization.   

Finally, while on the topic of Parallels, I've recently switched to Virtual Box which apart from being open source (like Xen)  has a great UI and excellent performance, useability and simplicity.  With Parallels initial lead now being challenged by both Virtual Box and VMware Fusion, I can't see any reason why I would recommend it.   That said, Parallels support has been excellent, when I've had to use it, and their disk utilities are very useful.

Get your test machines ready! We're pleased to announce the beta release of the next version of XenServer, code-named "Project George", is expected to be available at the end of April (the standard disclaimer applies: actual release will be determined by test results). Watch this space or subscribe to this RSS feed for an announcement that the beta is available.

We're doing this pre-announcement because the George beta will only last a few weeks and therefore it's critical we get your feedback as early as possible once the beta hits your hands. The only requirement for accessing the beta will be a MyCitrix account.

Project George contains several highly-requested new features:

• Active Directory integration. Specify the AD domain to use for authentication by the pool and use your AD credentials to connect to the pool via XenCenter and ssh. You control which AD users/groups are allowed access.
  
• Workload balancing. Guest and host performance metrics are used to create star ratings for individual VM placement and balancing recommendations for resource pools to achieve optimal performance.
  
• LVHD. Fast cloning and snapshots are now supported on all SR types through integration of our software VHD stack and LVM-based Storage Repositories (SRs).
  
• StorageLink integration. CLI-only support for a new StorageLink Gateway SR that adds native standards-based support for HP MSA, HP EVA, EMC Clariion, and NetApp storage arrays over iSCSI and Fibre Channel with automated initiator/fabric/array management.
  
• Expanded guest OS support. RHEL 5.3, Debian Lenny, and SLES 11 Linux guests.
  
• Enhanced beta problem reporting system. We've deployed an enhanced problem reporting system for use with the George beta. The forums will still be used for discussion but issues with the product can now be reported via a Jira-based ticketing system that supports designating issues as public or private. No more having to FTP your Server Status Reports (aka bug-tools)!
  

Carl, on behalf of the XenServer engineering team

XenServerでの仮想マシンのコピーを行う時どのようにしていますでしょうか？通常はXenCenterから仮想マシンのエキスポート、インポートを使っている人が多いかとおもいます。もし仮想マシンのディスクをVHDというファイル形式で作成されている場合、VHDのファイルをコピーすることも可能です。その際に注意するべき点を踏まえて、手順を書いてみましたので参考になればと思います。VHD形式で仮想ディスクを作成する場合はSRをNFSにするか、Local SRをextで作成しなおす必要があります。

xvaファイルでの操作

• エキスポート
  シャットダウンしている仮想マシンを右クリックして、Export as Backupを選択して、エキスポートを指定します
• インポート
  XenCenterで、XenServerを選択して、右クリックして、Import VMを選択して、インポートしたい仮想マシンを選択します
  
  

VHDファイルのコピー(XenServer -> XenServer)

仮想マシンのディスクをVHDファイルで持たせるにはSRをあらかじめNFSで設定しておく必要があります また、Local SRであればextで再作成する必要があります。詳しくはこちらを参照ください。

1. コピー元の仮想マシンのStorageタブの仮想ディスクのプロパティでNameとDescriptioinを設定し
   ておきます
2. コピー元のVHDファイルを探します
   

   [root@xs503 ~]# xe vm-disk-list vm=ddc21 <--ddc21という名前の仮想マシンの仮想ディスク（VDI)をリストします
   Disk 0 VBD:
   uuid ( RO)             : b65be04e-e7cc-f71d-aa67-a5db057adaf8
       vm-name-label ( RO): ddc21
          userdevice ( RW): 0
   
   
   Disk 0 VDI:
   uuid ( RO)             : ef707d10-2da7-4149-b5ad-c5d12e23fe9c　<-- このUUIDが仮想ディスク名になります。
          name-label ( RW): ddc
       sr-name-label ( RO): Local File SR
        virtual-size ( RO): 8589934592
   
   
   [root@xs503 ~]# xe sr-list type=ext  <-- ext形式のストレージをリストします。
   uuid ( RO)                : d8e9523d-23be-6203-0550-76d6df40f029  <-- このUUIDがext形式のストレージとなります。
             name-label ( RW): Local File SR
       name-description ( RW):
                   host ( RO): xs503
                   type ( RO): ext
           content-type ( RO): local SR
   
   [root@xs503 ~]# ls -lah /var/run/sr-mount/d8e9523d-23be-6203-0550-76d6df40f029/ef707d10-2da7-4149-b5ad-c5d12e23fe9c.vhd  <-- 仮想ディスクのファイルサイズや更新日を確認します。
   -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4.1G Apr  7 20:24 /var/run/sr-mount/d8e9523d-23be-6203-0550-76d6df40f029/ef707d10-2da7-4149-b5ad-c5d12e23fe9c.vhd

   
   
3. コピー先のXenServerのSRにリンクを設定します。あとでコマンドを打ちやすいように。
   

   [root@xs501 ~]# xe sr-list type=ext  <-- ext形式のストレージをリストします。
   uuid ( RO)                : b3cbfe22-c84f-1bc9-68a5-711eb93f14a6  <-- このUUIDがext形式のストレージとなります。
             name-label ( RW): Local File SR
       name-description ( RW):
                   host ( RO): xs501
                   type ( RO): ext
           content-type ( RO): Local SR
   
   [root@xs501 ~]# cd /var/run/sr-mount/
   [root@xs501 sr-mount]# ln -s b3cbfe22-c84f-1bc9-68a5-711eb93f14a6/ link  <-- リンクを設定します。
   [root@xs501 sr-mount]# ls link/
   830e58d1-709c-42bb-b9fd-310400d2b4a0.vhd
   c9ead5de-ff80-4f24-a938-ec06db78597a.vhd
   ca3ffca6-3513-4d2f-a2ae-4e1478af5014.vhd

   
   
4. コピー元のXenServerから、VHDファイルをコピー先のXenServer(192.168.1.241)にコピーします
   

   [root@xs503 d8e9523d-23be-6203-0550-76d6df40f029]# scp ef707d10-2da7-4149-b5ad-c5d12e23fe9c.vhd 192.168.1.241:/var/run/sr-mount/link/ <--scpでXenServerからXenServerにコピーします。
   root@192.168.1.241's password:
   ef707d10-2da7-4149-b5ad-c5d12e23fe9c.vhd                                       100% 4126MB  21.3MB/s   03:14
   [root@xs503 d8e9523d-23be-6203-0550-76d6df40f029]#

   
   
5. コピー先のXenServerで、コピーしたVHDファイルをSRに認識させます。
   

   [root@xs501 ~]# xe sr-scan uuid=b3cbfe22-c84f-1bc9-68a5-711eb93f14a6  <-- コピー先のXenServerのSRでは新しくコピーしてきた仮想ディスクの認識していないので、認識させます。
   [root@xs501 ~]# xe sr-param-list uuid=b3cbfe22-c84f-1bc9-68a5-711eb93f14a6 <-- 認識されたか確認します。VDIsにコピーしてきた仮想ディスクのUUIDがあればOK
   uuid ( RO)                    : b3cbfe22-c84f-1bc9-68a5-711eb93f14a6
                 name-label ( RW): Local File SR
           name-description ( RW):
                       host ( RO): xs501
         allowed-operations (SRO): forget; VDI.create; VDI.snapshot; plug; destroy; VDI.destroy; scan; VDI.clone; unplug
         current-operations (SRO):
                       VDIs (SRO): ef707d10-2da7-4149-b5ad-c5d12e23fe9c
                       PBDs (SRO): 60e3a493-2da2-9fbb-77ff-9d68a7cede2f
         virtual-allocation ( RO): 8606732288
       physical-utilisation ( RO): 29132607488
              physical-size ( RO): 484164509696
                       type ( RO): ext
               content-type ( RO): Local SR
                     shared ( RW): false
               other-config (MRW):
                  sm-config (MRO): devserial: scsi-SATA_ST3500630NS_5QG2VTXB
                      blobs ( RO):

   
   
6. コピー先のXenServerで、XenCenterで新規に仮想マシンを作成します（Start VM automaticallyはチェックオフしておきます）
7. コピー先のXenServerのStorageタブで、先ほど作成した仮想マシンからディスクを削除します
8. コピー先のXenServerで、先ほどコピーしたVHDをアタッチします。アタッチするときに、Noneと出てきますのでファイルサイズで判断してアタッチします。複数のVHDファイルを同時にコピーすると、どのVHDファイルがどの仮想ディスクか分からなくなる場合があるので１つづつコピーしてアタッチしていったほうがいいかと思います。
9. 仮想マシンのStorageタブの仮想ディスクのプロパティで、後で分かりやすいようにNameとDescriptioinを設定しておきます
   
   

VHDファイルのコピー(Windowsマシン -> XenServer)

• WinSCPで、scpか/sftpモードで転送します
  scpでログインすると、4G以上のファイルをリストできないようです
  sftpコマンドでログインして、ファイルを転送すると、scpで転送するより遅いようです
  但し、WinCSP 4.2.1で若干ましになっているようです。4.1.xはかなり遅いです

• CygWinでscpコマンド/sftpコマンドを使用する
  まだ試してないですが、XenServer -> XenServerと同じくらいのスピードはでると思われます。

VHDをコピー後、仮想マシンを作成して、コピーしたVHDファイルをアタッチする必要があります。詳細はVHDファイルのコピー(XenServer -> XenServer)を参照してください

VHD形式で仮想ディスクのバックアップを持つと、xvaのエキスポート、インポートよりはるかにコピーにかかる時間がすくないですし、仮想ディスクを作成するときに割り当てたサイズのファイルを作らず、動的にサイズを増やしていきますので、仮想マシンの移動が楽になります。ただ、仮想マシンからディスクI/Oパーフォーマンスとしては、ボリューム単位で仮想ディスクを割り当てるほうがよいといわれています。

How many of you have worked with or started designing a XenDesktop solution?  Chances are you have tons of questions about the best way to design the environment for growth, scalability and stability.  I know this because I, like so many others, are asked the same questions.  For example

• Should I install or stream applications into the virtual desktop?
• Where should the Provisioning Services write cache go?
• How should I design my Web Interface implementation to provide seamless integration without causing confusion for my users?
• How do I provide better availability to the TFTP server used to deliver the Provisioning Services bootstrap file?

Thomas Berger and I started gathering these questions to build the XenDesktop Design Handbook.  The current release of the Handbook is focused on Operating System, Application and Virtual Desktop delivery design decisions, but this is only a start. Over the coming months, we will continue expanding into different design decision areas commonly discussed in a XenDesktop solution including: virtualization infrastructure and implementation practices. We will discuss the Citrix Consulting Best Practices about these topics and encourage you to submit your related questions .  Thanks and we look forward to hearing from you 

Daniel - Sr. Architect

Follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/djfeller
Follow me in the Blogs: http://community.citrix.com/blogs/citrite/danielf

From 360is blog (http://360is.blogspot.com/2009/03/xenserver-administration-poster.html) you can find a very handy administration poster on XenServer.

From blog...

Since XenServer was made freely available for downloada few weeks ago, there has been a surge in companies new to virtualization, taking their first steps into this area. As you would expect, this has resulted in lots of questions on the user forum and calls to our help desk.

360is have produced a XenServer administrators poster, in A4 format, for both new and experienced admins to download for free. Do let us know what you think, and make any suggestions for improvement via the normal channels.
 

Thanks.

Stephen Spector
Community Manager, Xen.org

HP just announced their next generation G6 ProLiant and BladeSystem servers powered by Intel Xeon 5500 (Nehalem) processors. My engineering friends suggested that the new Hyper Threading Technology in the 5500 processors is worth reading up on ... see the link in Pat Gelsinger's blog post for more on this front. Previously we talked about HP testing, and new performance characterization work just completed by HP indicates that a 2P HP BL460c G6 server equipped with the Intel Xeon X5570 can provide optimal support for up to 402 users when running HP's most aggressive test workload in a 64-bit HP Server Based Computing environment. The HP test results demonstrated that Hyper-Threading Technology was able to enhance performance by 41%, and that Nehalem provides a 2x performance improvement over the previous platform. Get all the details for yourself in the HP paper here. This BL460c G6 paper is the latest in HP's extensive library of performance characterization papers covering XenApp and XenServer with HP servers.

The HP G6 product release includes six new HP ProLiant servers certified with the new free Citrix XenServer. XenServer is certified on the: HP ProLiant BL490c G6, BL460c G6, DL380 G6, DL360 G6, ML370 G6, and the ML350 G6 models. This takes the total number of XenServer certified ProLiant models to 27!

Yup - HP now offers no less than 27 server platforms certified with XenServer!

The much anticipated Intel Nehalem platform is now available from leading server OEMs - finally available on servers rather than the new Mac Pro machines a month ago, that is.  Now known as the Intel Xeon 5500 series, Nehalem is the codename for an Intel processor micro-architecture, successor to the Intel Core micro-architecture. The first processor released with the Nehalem architecture was the desktop Core i7, last November. The first system to use Nehalem-based Xeon 5500 series processors was the Mac Pro workstation announced in March 09, but glancing around the various server vendors, I see compelling offerings from Sun, Dell, HP and IBM are all raring to go.

Also today, the new free XenServer virtual infrastructure platform is available for download from over 250 partner sites worldwide.  The response to our decision to change our go to market strategy for XenServer has been tremendous, and the list of partners who have volunteered to host downloads for the product is testament to the incredible interest in the product. 

The coincidental timing of the two announcements couldn't be better.  Intel is on record stating  that a single Nehalem octo-core server can replace nine single core servers.  And if you run free XenServer on that, and fully utilize the available resources, you can easily double the number of servers you can replace. At the same time Nehalem, by virtue of its new micro-architecture and 45nm process, reduces system power consumption by about 20 per cent.  So one new server can probably replace a rack full of legacy systems.   

Bernie Hannon in our performance lab has been doing some performance tests on Nehalem - pitting the  Xeon® E5570 against the Intel® Xeon® E5405 (Dunnington) using XenServer. His tests simulate a Microsoft SQL Server 2008 transaction processing workload and measure the I/O capacity of the configuration using SQLIO. His full results will be published this week and I'll link to them.  He has a blog out today too, which discusses some of the same results as I have below.  In the interest of minimizing redundancy, check his post for the authoritative performance results.

SQLIO allows us to benchmark disk read and write performance for the host server configurations used tests using DBHammer. We tested disk reads and writes using two common SQLIO sizes, 8K (random) and 64K (sequential), allowing for the fact that both are typically present in SQL Server workloads depending on how the user has optimized for IO. By their nature, random data reads and writes are not very efficient and are performed in smaller increments (8K) to minimize IO request servicing latency. On the other hand, sequential disk reads and writes are more efficient, produce less latency and can therefore be performed in larger (64K) chunks.  Most users optimize their SQL Server environments to minimize the number of random read/writes.

We simulated a transaction processing workload with a 10 million record database against which we used DBHammer to generate transaction typical SQL Server 2008 client workloads. We started with 200 simultaneous clients, and then steadily incremented the number of simultaneously active clients in the DBHammer workload. Each client workload test ran for 30 minutes, with measurements beginning at 10 minutes and lasting for 20 minutes.   We measured max transactions-per-second every fifteen seconds, and added additional client workload in increments of 200 clients until the average CPU utilization of the system under test reached 90%.  

To summarize the results: We found that the Intel® Nehalem Xeon® E5500 class CPU shows a remarkable performance gain over the Xeon® E5400 - offering an average speedup of about 53%. The Xeon® E5405 system reached peak utilization with about 1000 clients, and CPU utilization of 95% was reached at the 1,600 client workload level, with a maximum of 13,708 TPS.  The graph below summarizes the results.  Bernie's full results are herebut you may need a login to get them.  In these results the system appears to be substantially  I/O bottlenecked (the system is spending much of its time processing I/O on behalf of the guest(s)).  I'm looking forward to getting some test results for Nehalem platforms using IOV enhanced 10Gb/s NICs, which is currently in flight with our friends at Solarflare.  More results soon.

This is essentially a copy of a post I did on the Intel Server Community page last week. Since it didn't feed the virtualization industry blog pages, I decided to re-post it here as well....

This is a big week for Intel, as they formally announce the availability of their new high performance Xeon 5500 CPU, codenamed "Nehalem". Citrix has anticipated the potential for enhanced performance when using the Intel Xeon E5500 with XenServer for some time now. We were fortunate to have received one of these gems from Intel in January to do our own comparison tests in our Bedford, MA test lab. Since we had just completed a series of performance validation tests for virtualizing SQL Server 2008 in a XenServer 5 environment (a very successful test series I might add...look for the technical WP on this shortly at: http://citrix.com/English/ps2/products/documents_onecat.asp?contentid=683148&cid=White+Papers), we decided to keep the same test environment and repeat a portion of the SQL test series comparing Xeon E5405 vs. Xeon E5570-based XenServer hosts to see what kind of performance improvement we would get.

Each of the test servers were configured with a single SQL Server 2008 VM with 4 vCPU cores and 7GB RAM. We used DBHammer for SQL to create a 10 million record database and generated transaction processing workloads to simulate an actual SQL Server 2008 client workload. Workloads were created starting with 200 clients. Each client workload test ran for 30 minute periods. Starting after the first 10 minutes of each test, we began taking measurements using Microsoft performance monitor and continued doing so for the remaining 20 minutes of the test. MEasurements of the maximum transactions per second rate were taken every fifteen seconds until the 30 minute test period had elapsed. Increments of 200 clients were added until the maximum average CPU utilization level of 90 percent was reached. At 90 percent average CPU utilization, it was determined that the system was saturated and testing was ended.

Given the difference in the clock speeds of the two systems tested, 2.0 GHz and 2.93 GHz respectively, we fully expected to see some level of improved performance, but what we saw was pretty astounding, even to us. The Xeon E5405 XenServer host topped out at 1,600 clients, generating 13,708 maximum transactions per second. The Xeon E5570 XenServer host, by comparison, was able to sustain a load of 2,400 clients, generating 20,978 maximum transactions per second. That's an improvement of 53%!
The results are pretty clear. Not only is the new Intel Nehalem Xeon 5500 series a powerful addition to the Intel Server Solutions lineup, but it is a clear advantage to customers seeking to virtualize enterprise application platforms like SQL Server 2008 using XenServer.

Details of this comparison test will be posted in a whitepaper to: http://citrix.com/English/ps2/products/documents_onecat.asp?contentid=683148&cid=White+Papers later this week.