Imagine yourself as an IT superman, and on your best day, configuring 50 or so desktops at your company. That would be pretty impressive, I’d say.

Now, imagine process automation that can ramp up thousands of virtual machines in less than a month. In this age of virtualization, this is a reality now with products such as Surgient’s Cloud Express suite of tools that allows IT organizations to do just that.

I read about this new development by Austin, TX-based Surgient on CTOedge, and the goal is to provide companies with a turnkey set of systems management tools automating the provisioning of virtual servers across massive cloud computing deployments. That’s according to Brian Wilson, Surgient’s VP of services and support.

So, you may ask, why is this capacity so important in today’s computing environment? Well, like everybody else in the corporate world these days, IT has to cut costs, and that often means labor, unfortunately.  Meanwhile, the number of virtual servers that organizations need to deploy or implement keeps on climbing. And so companies need to employ the latest IT automation tools that do the job of the system manager.

I don’t like to see anybody – and their skill set – replaced, but this is the kind of technology that companies need today to increase efficiencies on a grand scale and stay competitive. And I suppose the more competitive that companies remain, the better able they’ll be to expand and grow and then, perhaps, take on more IT specialists to focus on other areas. It’s a vicious cycle.

Meanwhile, companies, especially small businesses, continue to seek out services, such as automation to monitor websites, that allows them to do more with little or no IT support staff. And the cloud is the perfect infrastructure model because IT tasks like monitoring can be done 24/7 and from anywhere in the world – not just one location.

IT executives already have a lot on their plate – everything from lack of time to concentrate on strategic initiatives to security worries and green computing.

But listen up, though. For 2010, you’ll need to make sure you’ve got a handful of tools on tap to make it easier to adopt advanced technologies in order to keep your IT service delivery in shape and maintain advanced data center operations.

#1 – Service Assurance

Because companies are rapidly adopting and expanding their use of virtualization and cloud computing, it’s essential that IT departments gain visibility into network traffic flows as well as application performance across multiple components supporting IT services. It used to be that this was something only service providers worried about, but IT departments are becoming service assurance experts on their won. So, you should check into services that give you clarity into the life cycle of an IT service. What you want is a true end-to-end picture of how traffic flows across the network, systems, applications and databases.

#2 – Virtual systems management

For some, cloud management capabilities is a more hyped or popular projection for 2010 than virtual systems management. But cloud management depends heavily on support for virtual systems and advanced features covering performance and capacity management. To put it another way, virtual servers comprise the computing environment, and automation enables the cloud to be monitored, managed, secured and made compliant. In 2010 you’ll we’ll see more enterprise IT organizations equip their toolboxes with multi-hypervisor virtual system support.

#3 – IT Service Catalogue

As IT departments streamline processes and better align their strategies to business demands, they’ll also improve the way they communicate those services to customers – via web-based catalogues. End users need to know what levels of service they are entitled to and in what frequency and –sometimes—how much it costs. And a catalogue allows IT folks to easily provide that information. A NetworkWorld article I read quotes Andi Mann, research director at Enterprise Management Associates, saying: “It is hard to imagine broad cloud computing adoption without an IT service catalog.”

#4 – IT Process Automation

This is a must for companies deploying virtual servers. But the trend will be even more robust in 2010 because virtualization and cloud computing rely on automation more than any other technology. The real benefit here is that things can be done at machine speed rather than human speed. And it’ll continue to be an invaluable tool for monitoring, as automation can keep up with the pace of virtual environments and stay on top of changes as they happen faster than humans can.

#5 – Resource Planning

If you’re already using virtualization and thinking about exploring cloud computing, you’ll also need to adopt IT resource planning processes and technologies in 2010. IT resource planning is a mix of capacity planning and financial management as well as usage and service measurement. With it, IT departments can be sure of how services are being consumed and respond quickly to business demand. So what elements should be part of resource planning? Aside from traditional IT capacity measurements, you need to consider such metrics as business requirements, human capital, financial metrics, facilities and power data, risk and compliance information and workload placement. Include, too, configuration management, asset management, change management, event management and performance management.

I highly recommend that you ensure each of these elements are in place for 2010 in your IT organization. The initiatives support effective monitoring of servers, networks, sites, transactions and even cloud platforms themselves.

Analysts Gartner released a report that says IT spending globally will grow this year a total of nearly 5% over 2009 and reach $3.4 trillion.

From a “Great Recession” point of view, that’s good news because IT spend actually fell by nearly that much from 2008 to 2009. Plus, it’s a change from Gartner’s previous estimate earlier this year that IT spend wouldn’t hit 2008 levels until next year. Gartner’s prediction follows forecasts by other research firms and technology companies of a huge IT spending surge.

“Although recovery will be slow, over the next 12 to 18 months, gross domestic product (GDP) is projected to increase, consumer confidence is expected to improve, and the availability of credit should increase,” said Gartner Research Vice President Richard Gordon in a statement, reported by cnet.com.  “At the same time, pent-up demand for new technologies will be released as enterprises focus on new growth opportunities and increase spending plans.”

Every major segment will feel the blessings of new investment, including hardware, software, IT services, and telecommunications.The rebound should be more gradual in mature markets like the U.S. (2.5% growth) and in Western Europe (more than 5% growth) and in Japan (1.8% growth). Meanwhile, look for spending to jump a more robust 9.3% in Latin America, 7.7% in the Middle East and Africa, and 7% in Asia Pacific countries.

I’d bet my last nickel that those new technologies Gartner is predicting that companies will invest in include cloud and virtualization services. I believe that, yes, IT departments and the CIOs that oversee them will pump up spend but still retain a mentality of thriftiness.

Smart spending is what I call it, and the Cloud, because it allows firms to expand computing resources without investing in expensive, maintenance-heavy servers and data centers, is the perfect example. 

Like a plasterer at the ready, Microsoft is set to patch the security hole in its Internet Explorer browser that is believed to have allowed the infamous breach of Google Gmail from Chinese hackers.

The BBC reported that MS was giving this top priority (usually it issues security patches at a set time each month) because of all the attention the breach is getting globally. “Given the significant level of attention this issue has generated, confusion about what customers can do to protect themselves and the escalating threat environment Microsoft will release a security update out-of-band for this vulnerability,” said George Stathakopoulos, general manager of Microsoft’s computing security group, in the article.

It’s interesting to note how fast things can change in this Internet age of ours. For MS, the damage is coming on a few fronts.

The BBC article quotes security experts noting that they have seen malicious code on “copy cat sites” exploiting the weakness, although MS insists that the trouble has only affected those using IE6 or older versions (its latest version is IE8).

Plus, following recent warnings by the French and German governments that their computing citizens should switch to a different browser (other than IE), it now appears that Firefox, an MS rival, has profited from the incident.

The BBC article quoted web analysts StatCounter as saying that Firefox is now a close second to IE in Europe, with around 40% of the market compared to MS’s 45% share. Further, in Germany and Austria, Firefox has taken the lead.

I’m glad that MS acted quickly on this because I think it’ll give a shot of confidence to small and mid-sized businesses sketchy about using cloud apps.

Regardless of the browser they choose, companies that want to make the switch to the cloud need to feel that their data is secure. In the meantime, many are taking comfort in cloud-based monitoring services that act as an extra, very vigilant line of defense against evil-minded hackers who would destroy their businesses and the confidence of their customers.

One other consideration here: it’s in MS’s favor to take quick action to reassure cloud app users. After all, MS itself is betting pretty heavily on the future of the cloud – with its launch of Azure and new cloud computing business group (the Server and Cloud division).

I really enjoyed reading author Ken Hess and his assessment of the top 10 server technologies for the new decade. It was a great read, not only because he’s a good writer with the ability to speak (that is, write) plainly, but also because it covered just about every IT trend that will save money for companies, promote green computing, and make life easier for IT folks and end users. Here are a few:

- Virtualization technology – which will touch every data center in the world. Virtualization promises that companies can save on IT costs by converting their infrastructures to virtual hosts and guests or moving to an entirely hosted virtual infrastructure. The migration to virtualization will in turn put pressure on computer manufacturers to “deliver greener hardware for less green.”

- Cloud computing – Hess predicts that “savvy technology companies” will use cloud computing to market their products and services to a global audience at a fraction of the cost of current offerings. (This doesn’t just mean platform providers like Amazon and Azure but also companies that offer such services as website transaction monitoring.) And, despite some pretty high-profile outages this year, cloud computing providers will increasingly move closer to offering an “always on” philosophy. Hess says “entire business infrastructures will migrate to the cloud during this decade.”

- Mobile computing – Any available web connection is what’s needed here for a rapidly expanding army of mobile workers, plus hardware that’s lightweight and easy to use (meaning no complex set-up) and that can pull data, apps, even your computing environment (or operating system) from the cloud.

- Virtual Desktops – Virtual desktops have been in the news lately with the development of fully functional cloud-based desktops and other neat gadgetry, for example, USB-enabled virtual desktops.  It’s all about leaving behind resource-needy local desktop operating systems and migrating to virtual ones housed in data centers. Hess predicts that desktops will be based in PCs, data centers and the cloud for the next few years, but eventually will all be non-local by 2020. He rightly points out that virtual desktops will help companies lower maintenance bills and help eliminate errors associated with desktop operating systems.

- Digital Libraries – Personally speaking, I like my books on paper (In one day, I look at the computer screen for more than is good for my eyes.) But Hess predicts that by the end of this decade “printed material will all but disappear” and that, someday, libraries will function more as museums to house historic and valuable volumes and to show kids how people used to read.

Of course, Hess writes a lot more about technology, including the advance of open-source migration, online storage and web-based apps.  To read more, check out his article.

Chief information honchos at companies are hot for cloud computing and virtualization in 2010, says a new report by Gartner.

In the study, Gartner asked CIOs to list their top technology priorities for 2010, and respondents ranked virtualization as their top area of focus. Next came cloud computing and web 2.0. That makes sense because Gartner researchers predicted that firms will invest more in hosted solutions this year and less in hardware – as budgets continue to shrink and be constrained.

And what are CIOs most concerned about? At the top of the list: business process improvement. The next biggest concern is reducing IT costs, according to the study.

I’m very happy to see that CIOs, the ones who hold the purse strings, are not just paying lip service to the cloud and virtualization. In fact, in a story I read elsewhere, Gartner has boldly predicted that one-fifth of all businesses will own absolutely no IT assets come 2012 – due to migration to cloud computing.

CIOs are getting more serious about incorporating cloud tools into their cost-saving strategies. Seems everyone wants a piece of the pie, as cloud computing and virtualization solutions continue to prove big money savers for companies, and more companies invest in the technologies.

Chipmaker Intel Corp. says that a corporate IT spending wave is about to hit, and much of it will come from the cloud. Intel’s interest in the cloud stems from its recognition that cloud computing will require a whole new kind of chip — cheaper and more energy efficient. And the company believes it’s well-suited to take up the challenge.

I’m ecstatic that the industry is talking about spending — and therefore recovery — again. “We remain in an excellent position to benefit from the build out of cloud infrastructure as well as the reconfiguration of existing data centers for power performance efficiency improvements,” CEO Paul Otellini told analysts on January 14th, when the company posted a huge earnings jump during the fourth quarter ($2.3 billion during Q4 2009 versus $234 million in the same quarter last year). Included in those stellar numbers was a strong jump in sales for the company’s data center business group, which makes chips for servers, workstations and data storage systems.

In a story that I read on The Wall Street Journal’s MarketWatch, several financial industry analysts predicted some pretty positive trends for both cloud computing and virtualization. For instance, an analyst with JMP Securities gave the thumbs up for Intel “towards the higher end of guidance” because he was confident that cloud computing and virtualization trends “will drive increasing data center upgrade cycle demand across the balance of the year.”

There’s no doubt in my mind that Intel is well positioned as an influential player in the cloud infrastructure, after all, most cloud providers get their chips from the giant. And the trends toward smaller budgets and more computing power are here to stay, and will grow. While Intel is only expecting modest pick up in spend for corporate PCs, the company is seeing potentially robust growth in the market for chips for server computers.

Hold on, though. Let’s not get too carried away. I like that one analyst quoted in the piece acknowledged that cloud computing is in its early stages — stating that the infrastructure is just being built in Asia and Europe.

Yet it was odd that no one in the piece mentioned the concerns that companies and end users have with cloud security and reliability issues.

Mental note: get a hold of those MarketWatch reporters to give them my take on this trend and the resulting demand for cloud-based services such as website monitoring and cloud provider monitoring

I bet you thought that Los Angeles’ deal to use Google Gmail was big news. No; the biggest cloud deal yet is between Panasonic, the electronics giant, and IBM.

According to a story about the cloud-computing deal that I read, Panasonic will stop using Microsoft Exchange, messaging and collaborative software, for IBM’s LotusLive cloud services – within Panasonic’s internal corporate structure for web conferencing, file sharing, project management and instant messaging.  In addition, Panasonic will also use LotusLive for social networking between employees, partners and supplier.

Panasonic will apparently take a phased approach. To begin with, it will roll-out LotusLive services for 100,000 employees. But in a few years, the company will use the service for about 300,000 employees, partners and suppliers. 

The company chose IBM’s cloud service because it wanted an integral vehicle that enables it to work with customers and business partners as “a globally integrated enterprise,” a Panasonic executive was quoted as saying.

While both companies wouldn’t say how much the deal was worth, it’s easy to guess at the scale: 300,000 users for one company. Compare that to Google Apps, which has over 2 million business users in total with an average of 10 users per account.

Don’t feel so bad for Microsoft, though.

This news follows on the heels of a recent announcement by Hewlett-Packard and Microsoft of a $250 million deal (over three years) to develop both hardware and software focused on management and virtualization solutions for data centers, pre-packaged solutions for data warehousing technology and the Windows Azure platform.

Looks like 2010 is roaring toward being the year of the cloud!

I’m really loving a phrase that I read recently about cloud computing. It came from the CIO of Avago Technologies, a San Jose, CA-based semiconductor maker, which is gradually migrating its data and apps to the cloud from its internal servers – including recruiting, human resources, e-mail and web security.

According to Bob Rudy, CIO at Avago, migration has saved the company millions of dollars by eliminating hardware needs and software licenses and improving security, speed and storage. Moving to the cloud has also freed up employees from annoying and trivial tasks like managing their e-mail, enabling them to focus more on their core jobs.

But Bob phrased a simple description about the pull of cloud computing that I’d like to share: “The days of owning software are coming to an end.”

Bob was featured in a recent story in the San Francisco Gate about the rise of cloud computing, which called Bob’s statement “an increasingly common sentiment.

“As 2009 draws to a close, cloud computing is floating past that threshold between curiosity and convention, or as Gartner Research put it, `beyond the pure hype stage and into the beginning of mainstream adoption.’ Mainstream like Comcast Corp., Genentech Inc., Kaiser Permanente and the Obama administration, which formally embraced the approach in September as a means of cutting government waste. They’re among the millions of new business customers, organizations and consumers demanding software that runs and stores data on the Internet rather than on the desktops or servers in their building.”

I liked, too, what the story said about why the Cloud has such particular relevance today. The savings angle of the Cloud has long been praised, as in the “pay as you go” approach. But what’s different today is that conditions are ripe for mass adoption:

a) the growth of devices that continually connect to the web, such as smart phones and netbooks,

b) the emergence of newer, better and safer tools,

c) success stories of early adopters,

d) and the new frugality born from the economic downturn.

Yet, as the article says, not all express uncontrolled optimism. There are legitimate concerns about cloud security and reliability of cloud service – spawned by failures like Gmail outages several times in 2009, and the recent downtime at Rackspace.

Overall, I think Bob Rudy’s assessment is right on the mark, however. Businesses will overcome their hesitancies about putting – if not all – at least some of their apps on the cloud, and cloud providers will get better at mitigating risk and ensuring more reliable service.

To quote Dave Girouard, Google’s president of enterprise, from the story: “There was a time when people thought it wasn’t safe to do business over the telephone.”

In the meantime, don’t underestimate the power of independent monitoring of cloud providers to help you manage your applications and data on the cloud.

When I go to visit a prospective client, I’m often asked to explain why it’s better to have a single website monitoring service to oversee that company’s websites and other public services externally, as well as its networks and servers internally? Why a single solution rather than two or more? Wouldn’t multiple solutions be better apt to handle the many problems that arise?

Well, for one, your IT department will have a much simpler job. A single solution will literally alter the way that IT operates.

Let’s look at it this way. When you’re driving your car to a new destination, you’re typically required to watch a number of things in order to drive safely – for example, the dashboard to check on speed and remaining fuel plus a map to make sure you don’t’ get lost. In fact, to coordinate it all, you have to pull over every so often to check the map, ask for directions if needed, get gas and make sure your car’s running properly.

But if you have technology like a GPS navigator – you get a single solution that handles multiple tasks: a map that knows your speed and current location, and it eliminates the need for you to stop to coordinate multiple tasks. You always know where you are and, by setting your destination, you’re sure about the route you’re taking and how long it will take you to get there.

Think of it this way, too. A GPS allows you to save time and have more fun and less stress on the road. When you are late, you can focus on driving, but if you’ve got more than enough time, you can find points of interest along the way, without having to worry about getting lost.

So, why not consider a single product for monitoring IT networks, one that combines the understanding of delivered service levels provided by external monitoring systems with the knowledge of resource use you get from internal server and network monitoring. You’d wind up with the detailed picture, combined with an accurate assessment of the end-user experience.

Choosing the right, single solution, you can track:

• The uptime and speed of websites
• Servers, including those that are virtualized or housed on the cloud
• Desktops, including assets monitoring
• Applications such as email, VoIP, databases, business applications, processes, transactions 
• Networks, including switches, routers, VPN, firewall, DNS, VoIP
• Printers
• Notifications, including email, SMS, IM, Twitter, RSS

A single website, network and server monitoring service can handle a multitude of tasks efficiently – leaving IT managers to better focus on more pressing issues.