Comments on: The Virtualization Administrator is Dead: Long Live Virtualization! http://www.tripwire.com/state-of-security/it-security-data-protection/the-virtualization-administrator-is-dead-long-live-virtualization/ Debunking myths, analyzing trends and sharing best practices in IT security and compliance. Sat, 11 Feb 2012 01:47:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Andrew http://www.tripwire.com/state-of-security/it-security-data-protection/the-virtualization-administrator-is-dead-long-live-virtualization/comment-page-1/#comment-19 Andrew Fri, 27 Jun 2008 12:24:34 +0000 http://www.tripwire.org/blog/?p=55#comment-19 I would have to agree that the virtual administrators job will be less "all encompassing", but there will still be a need. We are already doing this, to a degree, where I work. The SAN management has stayed with the storage team, the network management has stayed with the network team (although we VMware admins had to teach them how to administer it). The VMs of differing operating systems belong to the administrative groups for the different OSs…i.e. Windows VMs are managed by the windows team. I don’t think, however, that there will ever not be a need for an admin to manage the physical servers that run the virtual servers. We are an ESX shop. ESX is different enough from RHEL that the rest of the linux admins don’t understand it. Additionally, provisioning of servers is completely different. It requires someone with knowledge of how the virtual world works to determine the best setup for a VM, and then to manage the VM (not the OS inside it) on the physical host. Additionally, ESX has it’s own requirements…DRS, resource pools, virtual datacenter management, etc. There are still some struggles that we have with the other (sub)departments…network guys don’t understand why we want multiple 10G channels into the blade chassis (”It’s only got 14 blades…why do you need that much bandwidth?” “Ummm, because there’s actually > 170 virtual servers running in there, and they all use the network…”), and the storage team doesn’t understand why iSCSI doesn’t work for everything all the time (”but [insert document here] says that iSCSI is cheaper and faster for VMware…we’ll just give you some LUNs, you don’t need an aggregate to yourself…”, ugh). Don’t get me started on security…most of them (here at least) are terrified they are going to break ESX by hardening it (and piss off everyone who uses a VM for their services in the process), and they have difficulty understanding that the VMs need to be secured as well (”When ESX is secure, all the VMs will be secure too!!”). I would have to agree that the virtual administrators job will be less “all encompassing”, but there will still be a need. We are already doing this, to a degree, where I work. The SAN management has stayed with the storage team, the network management has stayed with the network team (although we VMware admins had to teach them how to administer it).

The VMs of differing operating systems belong to the administrative groups for the different OSs…i.e. Windows VMs are managed by the windows team.

I don’t think, however, that there will ever not be a need for an admin to manage the physical servers that run the virtual servers. We are an ESX shop. ESX is different enough from RHEL that the rest of the linux admins don’t understand it. Additionally, provisioning of servers is completely different. It requires someone with knowledge of how the virtual world works to determine the best setup for a VM, and then to manage the VM (not the OS inside it) on the physical host.

Additionally, ESX has it’s own requirements…DRS, resource pools, virtual datacenter management, etc.

There are still some struggles that we have with the other (sub)departments…network guys don’t understand why we want multiple 10G channels into the blade chassis (”It’s only got 14 blades…why do you need that much bandwidth?” “Ummm, because there’s actually > 170 virtual servers running in there, and they all use the network…”), and the storage team doesn’t understand why iSCSI doesn’t work for everything all the time (”but [insert document here] says that iSCSI is cheaper and faster for VMware…we’ll just give you some LUNs, you don’t need an aggregate to yourself…”, ugh).

Don’t get me started on security…most of them (here at least) are terrified they are going to break ESX by hardening it (and piss off everyone who uses a VM for their services in the process), and they have difficulty understanding that the VMs need to be secured as well (”When ESX is secure, all the VMs will be secure too!!”).

]]> By: Virtualfuture.info » Blog Archive » The Virtualization Administrator is dead ! http://www.tripwire.com/state-of-security/it-security-data-protection/the-virtualization-administrator-is-dead-long-live-virtualization/comment-page-1/#comment-18 Virtualfuture.info » Blog Archive » The Virtualization Administrator is dead ! Fri, 27 Jun 2008 09:53:54 +0000 http://www.tripwire.org/blog/?p=55#comment-18 [...] I stumbled upon an article of Mark Gaydos on TripWire.org. In this article he describes a conversation he had with an [...] [...] I stumbled upon an article of Mark Gaydos on TripWire.org. In this article he describes a conversation he had with an [...]

]]>