Infrastructure 2.0 Session at Virtualization Expo

This week InformationWeek featured my recent infrastructure 2.0 interview with Alexander Wolfe. As the infrastructure 2.0 Working Group is in stealth mode, we focused on the high level tech issues resulting from the collision between virtual and static (physical) infrastructure:

InformationWeek: Let's dive right in. Define the issue, as you see it.

Greg Ness: If you look at networks today, the way they're operated, run, and configured hasn't really changed for the last several decades. There's a contrast between today's networks and today's systems. The systems are getting increasingly automated, while the networks are still very much in silos. If I were to articulate this in one sentence, I'd say that today's networks are run like yesterday's businesses.

You can read the entire interview here.

CNET blogger James Urquhart (Cisco’s Cloud Computing Market Strategist) referred to the interview in his blog entitled Understanding Infrastructure 2.0.

James did a great job highlighting the problems around manual address management at the core of the network:

"Take a look at the core TCP/IP and Ethernet networks that we all use today, and how enterprise IT manages those services. Not long ago, I wrote an article that described how most corporations relied heavily on manual labor to manage everything from IP addresses and domain names to routing and switching configuration. At the time, I cited a survey that indicated that a full 63 percent of enterprises were still using spreadsheets to manage IP addresses."

Unfortunately as we move into an era of data center virtualization and cloud computing, spreadsheets don’t cut it anymore.

You can read the rest of James’ excellent blog here, where he also points readers to several of his favorite infrastructure 2.0 blogs.

The common theme from both of these news sites is disconnect between virtualized, dynamic systems and static, manually managed networks. IT automation will require network automation and network automation will require DNS, DHCP and IPAM automation. Virtualization by itself isn’t enough; it needs an infrastructure 2.0 network.

You can follow my rants in real-time via Twitter at Archimedius.

• Virtualization Driving the Network Revolution
• The Cloud Metastructure Hubub
• Egenera Signs First Virtualization 2.0 Partner
• Infrastructure 2.0 Podcast with John Willis
• Infrastructure 2.0: Squishy Name for a Squishy Concept