What is Virtualization?

Simply put, server virtualization consists of running multiple operating systems and applications on the same server at the same time. The current process of partitioning one physical server into several operating systems, or virtual machines (VMs), lets you simultaneously deploy, operate, and manage these multiple operating system instances on that single physical server.

The concept of virtualization originated back in the era of mainframes. Today’s advances, especially the introduction of Intel x86 architecture and inexpensive PCs, finally made virtualization technology possible. This innovation enabled companies of all sizes to flexibly accommodate a multitude of users, extend the life of their datacenters, and save on hardware purchases and utility costs, in addition to streamlining server administration.

Moreover, virtualization substantially leveled the economic playing field, enabling small to medium businesses (SMBs) to compete and reach parity with much larger enterprises, something that was impossible a few years ago.

For SMBs, virtualization increases application availability and can dramatically shorten disaster recovery time to significantly improve business continuity preparedness.

For enterprises, virtualization offers levels of efficiency in security, management, automation, and VM deployment as well as the ability to provide increased resources to more users.

Advantages of Virtualization

There are a number of key areas in which virtualization offers companies important benefits:

Energy efficiency

By stacking multiple applications on a single server and sharing resources among them, virtualization optimizes server utilization and cuts waste. Lessening the physical size of datacenters also results in energy efficiency, decreased hardware costs, and maintenance savings.

Improved server utilization

Removing the physical relationship between an OS and its native hardware with virtualization greatly expands server capacity and avoids under-utilization where, in some instances, single servers use less than 30 percent of their processing power.

Architecture control

Virtualization enables companies of all sizes to simplify datacenter architecture. Virtualization not only provides built-in redundancy by spreading the computing power across multiple inexpensive machines, it also ensures a server resource pool.

Automation

The role of automation means that VMs can be copied, administered, and restored easily. Single-console management of VMs adds another layer of efficiency and increases response times during emergencies. The ability to shift VMs or other resources to a different server is another key feature. Administrators can conduct maintenance without interrupting service, disabling a system, or having to work off-hours.

Types of Virtualization

A common aspect of server virtualization renders each operating system instance independent of the other OSs on the same server. In this way, VMs are typically full implementations of a standard OS, such as Windows 7, running side by side with many other instances, for example, versions of Windows Vista or RedHat Enterprise Linux. Each OS then runs its own applications that are accessible to an almost unlimited number of users.

In the case of desktop virtualization, the client OS runs on a server in the datacenter and is delivered virtually to a user. It offers greater workplace efficiency, lower costs, and increased scalability for IT managers. Virtualized desktop users have the ease of mobility — they can access their desktop from anywhere by logging in as a unique user.

Essentially, there are four types of desktop virtualization:

• Thick client: This is a standard desktop supplied with a virtual desktop image delivered from the datacenter.
• Thin client: This employs a stripped-down OS and supports the user interface functionality (video, audio, printer, mouse, keyboard).
• Net client: This can be a mobile device, such as an iPhone running a specific OS.
• Zero client: All of the operating system runs on a server in the datacenter and is sent out to the client, nothing at desktop.

User virtualization provides the ability to maintain a fully personalized virtual desktop when not on the company network. For example, users can log into a workplace desktop from anywhere with all the settings and applications in place using a smart phone, tablet, or laptop.

For IT, user virtualization provides the ability to manage desktop components independently and apply them to a workspace as needed without scripting or group policies. IT administrators can perform:

• settings management
• workplace configuration
• application lock-downs
• streamlined management

In terms of application virtualization, formerly referred to as ‘thin client,’ applications are not installed locally on a workstation. Personal information and unique application characteristics are all stored on, managed, and delivered via a remote service. The local device provides the CPU and RAM required to run the software. Thus, the virtual applications run locally, but the management and application logic run remotely.

Next week will wrap this series up with a look at the top Virtualization players.

Excerpted from Global Knowledge: Virtualization 101 by Kerry Doyle

In pale comparison, my requirements were that I wanted a virtualization product to support my existing educational VMs built using Virtual PC and Virtual Server. I was very interested in Hyper-V as it has this compatibility (at least for VHD files) but was dismayed to learn that it was delivered on the 64-bit platform only. I was working with Windows 7 Professional 32-bit, so what are my options? Well, to find out if your machine supports 64-bit systems (even if you are currently running a 32-bit OS) you can use a Processor Identification Utility such as Intel’s Processor ID Utility. But Hyper-V is not available with Windows 7 anyway, so I would need to upgrade to Windows Server 2008 64-bit. There are other Hyper-V requirements you can check on. If you want to migrate from Virtual Server to Hyper-V there is a whole VM Migration guide for that too.

Reluctantly, I decided to revert to Virtual Server 2005 SP1, especially since Microsoft Learning VM’s are fully compatible with this version regarding the courses that I teach. Yes, any new VM’s from Microsoft Learning are now fully Hyper-V compatible, but I’ll have to wait for SQL Server 2011 before I see any that are applicable to me. OK, I’ve installed Virtual Server 2005 SP1 many times before, so piece of cake, right? Wrong.

Much as I love Windows 7, it actively blocks the install of Virtual Server 2005 SP1. So I was caught between a rock and a hard place — or specifically between Windows 7 and Virtual Server. Now Google and Bing are just brilliant, but often you have to sift out the poor quality forum entries from the well crafted, accurate, and knowledgeable blog entries. I found a great step-by-step solution that involves a few registry hacks but ultimately worked like a charm and even has a solution for the infamous Microsoft Learning “Lab Launcher”. It is a blog entry by MVP Thomas Lee whose blog is branded “Thomas Lee’s collection of random interesting items, views on things, mainly IT related, as well as the occasional rant”. The blog entry is titled: “Windows 7 and Virtual Server”. Thanks Thomas!

Now I must get into Hyper-V, but I’ll jump through those virtual hoops a little later!

By arinas74 via RGBstock

Virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) is a very hot topic right now. A VDI can deliver a pre-configured Windows virtual machine with all of the necessary applications on demand. This benefits highly regulated environments like banking and healthcare because they can configure their virtual desktop with precise security settings to comply with current laws. Also, legacy applications that won’t run on Windows 7 can run on a virtual desktop using an older version of Windows.

To implement a VDI with Windows Server 2008 R2 you need an Active Directory Domain, Hyper-V, and the Remote Desktop Services Role. A VDI requires the following:

• Remote Desktop Session Host makes applications and virtual desktops available to clients running the Remote Desktop Connection Client (RDC) using the RDP protocol
• Remote Desktop Virtualization Host integrates Hyper-V based virtual machines with the Remote Desktop Session Host to make them available to RDC clients
• Remote Desktop Connection Broker works with the Virtualization Host to direct RDC clients to a virtual desktop. Connection Broker also reconnects users to their desktops if their connection momentarily drops out
• Remote Desktop Web Access allows Windows 7 users to connect to their virtual desktop from the start menu. Users with older versions of Windows can connect from their web browser
• Remote Desktop Licensing issues and manages Remote Desktop Services client access licenses (RDS CALs) which are required to use Remote Desktop Services

All virtual machines in Hyper-V that are available as Virtual Desktops must be joined to the Active Directory Domain and have the same fully qualified domain name in the Hyper-V console. The Remote Desktop Connection Manager console configures Virtual Desktops. A Virtual Desktop can be placed in a pool of identical desktops that are available when clients connect. A single Virtual Desktop can also be assigned to a user account in Connection Manager so that the user can reconnect to the same desktop.

A Remote Desktop-based VDI is available from anywhere in the world using a low-bandwidth connection. Any computer, including thin clients, that can run RDC, can reach a virtual desktop accessing new technology on older hardware. Security updates and software management are centralized, and administration is simplified with VDI, making it a low-cost alternative to conventional networks.

In SQL Server 2008 Enterprise Edition, we were allowed unlimited virtual instances of SQL Server, as long as the physical CPUs being used were licensed. With the release of SQL Server 2008 R2, the Enterprise edition is no longer the top dog in the Edition stakes. It has been now overtaken by both the new Data Center Edition and the new Parallel Data Warehouse Edition. So the goalposts have been moved and now the EE can only support 4 virtual instances and instead of unlimited CPUs it is now limited to 8. To get unlimited support you will need to now go with either of the two new high-level editions and pay the new high-level price. To calm down existing customers, Microsoft has a “grandfathering” strategy whereby if you are current on Software Assurance and you wish to upgrade to R2, you can inherit the “unlimited” virtual licensing you had before. This all assumes you are licensing all of the physical processors on the server.

If you decide to license only a portion of the physical CPUs for SQL Server, you will need to do some math to get to the number of Virtual CPUs you can use in the Virtual Machines (or what Microsoft now calls OSEs – Operating System Environments). The nice thing is that Microsoft only charges by the socket so that a multi-core processor counts as one physical CPU and therefore one processor license. But if that multi-core processor has 4 cores, all those cores are available to SQL Server in the virtual machines as virtual CPUs. That’s pretty simple math: 4 for the price of 1. You can get more complex if you want to, say with 2 dual-core processors and the virtual OSEs use 3 virtual CPUs, you will need 3 / 2 = 1.5 licenses. Of course, Microsoft wants us to round-up to the nearest license so we end up needing 2 processor licenses.

It’s all outlined in the following document which goes into various scenarios. As new technology opens up new loop holes, I am sure this document will be updated to close them down, faster than you can say “It’s between you and your lawyer.”

SQL Server 2008 R2 Licensing Quick Reference:

http://download.microsoft.com/download/2/7/0/270B6380-8B38-4268-8AD0-F480A139AB19/SQL2008R2_LicensingQuickReference-updated.pdf

Cheers

Brian

In Hyper-V the memory allocation of a Virtual Machine could only be modified if the VM was shut down. This would cause an interruption of services for any network connected users. System Administrators would have to specify an amount of RAM that was sufficient during periods of peak demand. This meant that often memory was unused on a VM most of the time but was still not available for other, busier VMs. This leads to a situation where a significant percentage of the memory resources of a Hyper-V server is wasted.

When Service Pack 1 for Windows Server 2008 R2 is installed a VM can be configured with Dynamic Memory. An administrator can assign a range of memory to a VM that can change based on an increase to a VM’s workload. This range consists of a Startup RAM allocation and can increase to a Maximum RAM value. A percentage of RAM can also be reserved, based on a VM’s workload, to be used as a buffer if memory demand increases suddenly. Each Virtual Machine running on a Hyper-V server can also be assigned Memory Priority ranging from low to high relative to the other VMs. I if multiple VMs need more memory at the same time those that have a higher priority will receive more Dynamic Memory.

The Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2 Service Pack is still in beta and is intended for testing and evaluation only. The final version is expected to be released in early 2011. Check out Dynamic Memory by down loading the beta version of the service pack at:  http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/ff183870.aspx

Author: Mark Menges

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Two of the graphical user interface (GUI) management tools for Hyper-V are the Hyper-V Manager (virtmgmt.msc) and System Center Virtual Machine Manager (VMM) 2008 R2. Management and usage control for Hyper-V, and therefore management using both of these tools use the RBAC Authorization Manager (AzMan) to adjust the management permissions for Hyper-V. The GUI management interface for AzMan is the MMC console AzMan.msc.

AzMan is used to manage sets of authorization configuration information called authorization stores. An authorization store for a particular application or service could either be stored in Active Directory or in a configuration file in extensible markup language (XML) format. By default, Hyper-V uses an authorization store in the file InitalStore.xml at the full path such as C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Hyper-V\InitialStore.xml. If you are managing the Hyper-V server with VMM 2008 R2, the authorization store file HyperVAuthStore.xml supersedes the InitialStore.xml. If you have access to the host server, you could query the registry value HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Virtualization\StoreLocation, which reveals which authorization store AzMan is currently using. An example value would be:

msxml://C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Hyper-V\InitialStore.xml

Just what is in the authorization store? You could look at it within AzMan.msc. That’s the typical way if you have already set up networking between your ServerCore-based Hyper-V server and your management station. But remember that Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 has some shared heritage with release two of the full standard, enterprise, and datacenter editions of Windows Server 2008. In R2, Windows PowerShell is supported on ServerCore. How would we install it? The following command could be run in the server’s command prompt to install the .NET framework and PowerShell.

start /w ocsetup NetFx2-ServerCore;MicrosoftWindowsPowerShell

Once we have PowerShell installed, we can run it by typing powershell.exe (or without the .exe part) to run it. Then in PowerShell we can examine that InitialStore.xml authorization store for Hyper-V in a structured way rather than in raw XML notation in notepad.

$az = [XML](get-content InitialStore.xml)

$az.AzAdminManager.AzApplication

The first line here gets the contents of the authorization store and translates it using the XML parser. The second line just shows a few of the basic components of the authorization store. One of these components is the AzOperation list, which defines the permissions that AzMan can be used to assign.

$az.AzAdminManager.AzApplication.AzOperation | FT Name,Description –auto

This lists out the operations which can be delegated to people administering Hyper-V. While VMM 2008 R2 includes some PowerShell cmdlets for working with Hyper-V, these are not included with either Hyper-V Manager nor Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 itself. Even without such cmdlets, PowerShell can be used to help manage Hyper-V delegations, basic server setup, and with WMI even Hyper-V itself can be managed.

–Brad

It is the next question and its answer which are possibly unique per person. In the aforementioned story, getting that wrong is simply disastrous, whether it be ambivalence of affinity to a frequency in the electromagnetic spectrum or ignorance of ornithological species differentiation in terms of unladen velocity. In the wonderful world of computing, the proper authentication is the critical precursor to specific authorization and accounting.

In terms of Windows authentication, the correct username and passphrase combination or smart card and PIN validation yield a user’s security access token (SAT). This token contains a user’s security identifier (SID), the SIDs of the groups they are a member of, some user rights (privileges), and other associated information. In recent versions of Windows (Vista, Server 2008, Seven, and Server 2008 R2) there could be a split token for administrative and non-administrative identities. Through this token obtained via authentication, all Windows authorization and accounting is derived.

That’s the prologue. Many services hosted on Windows have management and end user roles associated with them, along with assignments of abilities through permissions to different users and groups. Operating systems and devices classically offer discretionary access control (DAC) to resources. For example, the Windows registry, NTFS file system, and Active Directory (AD DS and AD LDS) all utilize security descriptors which include ownership, auditing, and permissions. The permissions for each value, file, or object area specified in thee security descriptors’ discretionary access control list (DACL).

Such permissions lists are “discretionary” in the sense that owners of resources, and other users who have been delegated with “take ownership” or “change permissions” permissions could potentially modify the initial security controls, including the permissions and auditing, which had been established for those resources. Therefore, the security of the system is at their discretion. This discretion is a violation the prime directive of another sort of access control called mandatory access control (MAC). As the name implies, the security controls in such a system are indeed mandatory. Everyone, including owners and delegates of resources must follow the security rules established by the central security authority without discretionary exception. Because many systems administrators, and of course resource owners and delegated administrators, want flexibility, DAC is far more commonly implemented than MAC. Again, Windows is primarily a DAC-based system.

In the story of the aforementioned bridge keeper, when King Arthur queried the bridgekeeper, it was shown that the bridgekeeper was subject to the same controls as everyone else, therefore that is an example of MAC not DAC — just in case you were wondering.

In the next part, we will actually focus on RBAC and Hyper-V.

–Brad

What do servers need a graphical user interface for? Why would they need a keyboard or mouse? Why does a server even need to be a server?

Around the time Windows Server 2008 came out, Microsoft released a major replacement for their Virtual Server 2005 R2, namely a hypervisor based virtualization platform called Hyper-V. Many VMware customers, particularly those of ESX or ESXi, may be unlikely to switch to Hyper-V. But now this is starting to pick up some steam, and like a caterpillar evolving into a butterfly, a new incarnation of Hyper-V holds even more promise.

Now available as a standalone product with a free license, Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 provides just the Hyper-V role without the extra baggage of other roles or the license costs of Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 in the Standard, Enterprise, or Datacenter editions. Note the lack of the name Windows in the title of this standalone Hyper-V product.

Hyper-V Server, in this standalone 2008 release two incarnation, is essentially a limited Windows Server 2008 R2 “Server Core” installation which is x64 based. No other roles and very few features can be installed directly on it. There are several implications and ramifications of this.

Firstly, if you are going to manage the Hyper-V Server(s) locally, you need to be aware that in Server Core installations like this, local graphical management tools are almost entirely out of the question. Certainly, the Microsoft Management Console (MMC) will not run locally on the Hyper-V Server. Luckily you have a command line and Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI). If you’re not into that kind of administrative joy, then just run the server headless and manage it from across the network. You’ll still want to configure basic networking and such using netsh, netdom, and related commands. Then go remote.

You could manage Hyper-V Server remotely using WMI with a number of tools, including wmic or PowerShell. Two other alternatives are a lightweight management tool which is useful for small deployments of one or a few Hyper-V based servers, and a heavyweight management product targeted at larger virtualization deployments, perhaps with both Hyper-V and VMware servers.

Let’s start light and go heavy.  Hyper-V Manager (virtmgmt.msc) is a MMC snap-in which can be installed on Windows Vista or Windows 7. If you don’t already have this, download the appropriate version from Microsoft. Before you connect to your Hyper-V servers across the network from this graphical management interface, you will want to do a bit of preparation work of the server(s). Specifically, you can use Authorization Manager (AzMan) to adjust the management permissions for Hyper-V. Perhaps I’ll get into more details later. But remember one thing: Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 and this Hyper-V Manager are both free, zero cost license downloads.

System Center Virtual Machine Manager (VMM) 2008 R2 is the more heavyweight approach. Yes, like other components of the System Center suite, VMM 2008 R2 must be licensed with money. For example, estimated enterprise pricing is $869 U.S. and $40 per hosted operating system, while workgroup edition pricing is estimated at $505 U.S. for five host servers. A trial edition is available. SQL Server is used on the backend, failover cluster, consolidation, migration, and management of mixed environments with both Hyper-V and VMware are just some of the aspects of this bigger scale management product.

If you’re we doing virtualization now or looking into it, take a look at this version of Hyper-V that is decoupled from the full Windows Server 2008 R2.

–Brad

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Those of you who know that PowerShell 2.0 is included in Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 and the foundation for the Exchange Management Shell in Exchange Server 2010 must be wondering what’s so new and great about PowerShell 2.0. In a series of articles, we’ll look at that from several angles — Exchange, Windows administration, and … well, we’ll start our journey with a language tack.

In the midst of that Get-RandomName script, we had a code snippet to pick a random first name, either male or female, from one of two distinct lists (arrays).

if( $rand.NextDouble() –lt $percentFemale ){

$gender = “male”

}

else{

$gender = “female”

}

$f = (Invoke-Expression (“‘$_RN_{0}[‘$rand.Next(‘$_RN_{0}.Count)]” –f $gender)).Split(“‘t”)[0].ToLower()

In PowerShell 1.0, the value of statements such as if or switch cannot be evaluated. PowerShell 2.0 changes this, which might not mean much to you if you aren’t prone to take the value of an if or switch statement, but… well, keep reading as we look at two variations on the above code.

First, in PowerShell 2.0, we can take the value of the if statement and therefore assign the variable $gender to the value of the if or else clause as follows.

$gender = if( $rand.NextDouble() –lt $percentFemale ){“male”}else{“female”}

That could of course still be written across six lines instead of one, however the important distinction is that we’ve specified the $gender = before the if, and not within each of the code blocks for the if and else clauses. If you’re a programmer familiar with the question-mark + colon operator in languages such as C, C++, and C#, then taking the value of an if or switch statement might seem ordinary. If you’re used to PowerShell 1.0, it might seem bizarre, but PowerShell 2.0 let’s us do this and more.

So riddle me this. If we can take the value of an if statement an assign a variable to the result, can we simply inject the whole shehe ($shehe = if( … ){ … }else{ … }) into the middle of another expression? Oh yes. Yes, we can. As such — noting that the following was written on one line in the modified Get-RandomName script which is only PowerShell 2.0 compatible.

$f = (Invoke-Expression (“‘$_RN_{0}[‘$rand.Next(‘$_RN_{0}.Count)]” –f $(if( $rand.NextDouble() –lt

$percentFemale ){“male”}else{“female”}))).Split(“‘t”)[0].ToLower()

The important “extra” syntax used to properly insert the if statement into the expression is to use $() around it.

PowerShell 2.0 has much more expressiveness as a scripting and programming language than PowerShell 1.0 had, making it that much more powerful in the arena of languages such as Icon and LISP. Yes, true fans, now with PowerShell 2.0 you can take the value of a switch block in an expression as well. “If” is just the beginning.

This is your brain on PowerShell… any questions?

–Brad

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The laptop in question is a Lenovo Model T61 Type 7665-CTO. This is a typical laptop, widely used on corporate networks. It has an Intel Core 2 Duo T7700 @2.4GHz and 4 GB of RAM. It also has 160 GB SATA hard drive that spins at 7200 RPM. I was to find in my testing that fast disk access is an important feature.  I installed Windows Server and added Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS), DHCP, DNS and Windows Deployment Services (WDS). Active Directory and the other services were necessary for WDS a service that deploy Windows Image files across the network using unicast or multicast transmissions.

After Hyper-V was installed, it would be an interesting test to see if WDS could install Server 2008 into multiple virtual machines concurrently using a multicast stream. This test succeeded, WDS was able to multicast Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard Edition 64 bit into four VMs. At this point the laptop was supporting 5 total installations of Windows and Active Directory. Each VM was allocated 512 MB of RAM on the host system. With 1.1 GB of RAM still available I decided to create two more VMs at 512 MB of RAM each to see if the system could handle the additional load. It could, and even with only 4 GB of RAM the laptop could support a total of 7 instances of Server 2008 running at the same time. The computer was quite busy of course, the processor was running at an average of 20 % Usage and only 6% of RAM was still available. The disk drive was the busiest during the image multicast and file copy operations with att. With a peak disk I/O of 19 MB per second the drive was able to cope with the demands of all 7 OSs. Of course, the VMs were not on a production network and no clients were making demands upon them as server. In that situation proper server hardware is definitely required. Still, it proves that current laptops have enough horsepower to be a great training aid and a convenient platform for software developers.

Perhaps soon the new, very small netbooks will be able to match the performance of the Lenovo. Something to look forward to.

–Mark

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