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Wednesday, March 12th, 2014
| Time | Event |
| 11:30a | Highlights From DataCenterDynamics Converged NYC  Attendees at DataCenterDynamics Converged NYC were invited to enter the cloud – in this case, an inflatable igloo-style cloud – for a Training Taster session. (Photo: Rich Miller) “Modernizing Data Centers” was the theme for the DataCenterDynamics Converged conference Tuesday in New York. The event attracted more than 1,000 data center industry professionals to the Marriott Marquis for a program from DataCenterDynamics that featured sessions on modular data centers, the latest research on cooling, preparing infrastructure for mobile finance and more. Check out our photo feature, Scenes From DataCenterDynamics Converged NYC for details. |
| 12:30p | What’s The Key to Providing Mainframe Access for Web and Mobile? Dusty Rivers is a Principal Technical Architect at GT Software. Rivers is a 30-year veteran in IT and 4-time IBM Champion  DUSTY RIVERSGT Software Over the past few years, mobility has had a huge impact on the way businesses interface with customers, business partners and employees. Empowered consumers are demanding access to information and applications from anywhere at any time, regardless of the device they happen to be using. Business partners and employees are also demanding more convenient access to real-time data and information. The solution to these demands is to provide more self-service applications to enhance customer engagement. For a majority of midsize to large businesses, this begins in the data center by providing easy access to information within the enterprise mainframe. Consumer Demand Driving IT Infrastructure InnovationsIn the B2B and B2C worlds, self-service applications are emerging across all industries. For example, using smartphone, tablet or laptop to bank online or to book airline tickets and check in for flights is the new normal. Today, 54 percent of smartphone users routinely do mobile banking. And, according to a recent study commissioned by Nokia, most mobile users cannot leave their smartphones untouched for more than six minutes and actually check their phone more than 150 times a day! Clearly, the mobility trend is spreading rapidly across virtually every industry sector, including financial, insurance, business, education, health care, and government agencies. Organizations of every type and size are feeling pressured today to better deploy existing IT infrastructure to support new demands, and the ‘gold mine’ needed to bring them to the next level are the data and applications stored within the datacenter. Building Mobile and Web Access Is Easier Than You ThinkWhile mainframe servers sometimes get the rap of being ‘old school’ ‒ that is, dated and hard to access ‒ that’s just not the case. According to recent information from SHARE Inc., 96 percent of the world’s top banks, 23 percent of the 25 top US retailers, and 9 out of 10 of the world’s largest insurance companies run on IBM System z mainframe servers, and mainframe systems process about 30 billion transactions per day. (SHARE is an independent association providing information, education, training and networking for its member community of more than 20,000 enterprise technology professionals.) Even with the ubiquitous use of mainframes, “easy access” and “mainframe” are not terms we typically think of as compatible in accessing information. However, using today’s advanced modernization solutions and technologies on the back end, it has become faster and simpler than ever to provide a compelling and engaging mobile experience to users on the front end. Below are some brief snapshots of how five companies around the world have implemented advanced technology tools to unlock mainframe data and create value-packed mobile applications that engage customers and reduce costs. 1. A prominent German commercial bank running on IBM IMS wanted to modernize its systems by offering self-service information and transaction services to customers, bank employees, and smaller private label banks via a web interface rather than by telephone. Rewriting code was not feasible and the business logic residing on the mainframe had to be left intact. Also, the system had to be easy to use and the project had to be completed in less than eight months. With the help of modernization software, they were able to expose and orchestrate their IMS Cobol applications and migrate them to the new self-service web portal. In the process, they achieved 80 percent reuse of the services for subsequent projects, thereby saving additional development time and costs. 2. A U.S.-based insurance company dedicated to excellent customer service was looking to provide new capabilities enabling field agents to provide immediate, accurate, real-time policy quotes right from the customer’s or prospect’s location. Previously, the quotation process required multiple steps and time-consuming communications between the insurance provider and agents. Using advanced technology solutions, the firm was able to quickly (within six months!) build an array of web services to expose their CICS COMMAREA applications to the insurance quoting system, with complete security and data integrity. As a result, the company has streamlined a plethora of daily internal business processes for its managers, while providing field agents with a powerful and persuasive selling tool. 3. A world-renowned German sports car manufacturer wanted to give customers the opportunity to custom design, build and buy the luxury car of their dreams through an inviting and richly functional web portal, accessible in their homes or in distributor showrooms. The firm also aimed to stretch boundaries in its ongoing pursuit of continual improvement. Following their racing inspired philosophy of “Maximum Output from Minimum Input,” they sought a way to reach both of these goals, while still integrating the enterprise with Oracle tools and supporting internal development standards, all within an aggressive timeline. Using an innovative software toolkit, they were able to fulfill all their objectives by developing new web services and loading new car specifications into the design application in real time. They were also able to reuse up to 80 percent of these services in designing their next new car model, and to develop additional on-demand applications to improve internal processes for the manufacturer and its sales and distribution network. 4. A large financial services enterprise in South Africa sought to maintain its unique brand distinction as “coolest bank” while also improving service by giving customers a single solution experience across all 30 of its banking business channels. These included credit, internal banking applications and ATM network processing applications. The firm had a robust enterprise mainframe system built on IBM IMS and MQ. However, when their in-house developed gateway software was unable to deliver a single, cross-channel solution, they implemented a sophisticated yet easy- to-use software suite, which allowed developers to access mainframe data and quickly create new web-based applications. The results have been remarkable. The company achieved a return on investment in just 12 months and currently has over 600 services in production. These were built over an 18 month period and now support over five million transaction services per day across all channels. 5. A regional bank in the Southeast United States set a six-month deadline for developing the mobile banking services customers were demanding. With such an aggressive timeline, designing the system using conventional techniques (e.g., writing new code) was not feasible, so the firm turned to newer software tools to accomplish the task. The result? The bank’s IT team was able to deliver the multi-functional application in record time and saved hundreds of thousands of dollars in the process. The new user-friendly mobile and web services added value to legacy applications and is now the new internal standard. In addition, the team was able to reuse 80 percent of the services for the organization’s next-up brokerage project. These five organizations spanning three different industries ‒ finance, insurance and manufacturing ‒ all found ways to leverage their existing enterprise mainframe and applications to quickly create new self-service mobile and web applications. The new services add value to their brand and have significantly improved customer service. And, as each organization discovered, the web and mobile services also helped reduce administrative time and costs and greatly improved internal operational efficiency. Editor’s Note: Don Spoerke is Senior Software Solution Architect for GT Software, who also contributed to this article. Industry Perspectives is a content channel at Data Center Knowledge highlighting thought leadership in the data center arena. See our guidelines and submission process for information on participating. View previously published Industry Perspectives in our Knowledge Library. |
| 1:00p | Nutanix Granted Patent for Its Software-Defined Storage Architecture Nutanix is granted a patent for its storage architecture for virtualized data centers, Nimble Storage advances its Infosight analytics with new forensic capabilities, and Avere Systems launches the FXT 4800 edge filer for enterprise storage. Nutanix is granted software-defined storage patent. Nutanix announced hat it has been granted a patent (US 8,601,473) from the United States Patent and Trademark Office recognizing the company’s fundamental storage architecture for virtualized data centers. The patent provides clarity as to how software-defined storage solutions are optimally designed and implemented, detailing how a system of distributed nodes (servers) provides high-performance shared storage to virtual machines (VMs) by utilizing a “Controller VM” that runs on each node. The Controller VMs aggregate the local storage resources across all servers, including direct-attached flash, and delivers a shared pool of data storage that is functionally equivalent to a SAN or NAS array, but with greater scalability and higher performance. “While virtualization has brought impressive flexibility to both applications and server infrastructures, it has also outpaced the capabilities of popular storage products that have dominated in the previous IT generation,” said Brian Byrne, Principal Engineer at Nutanix. “Nutanix’s research and development teams are re-imagining what storage architectures need to look like to enable the next generation of data centers.” Nimble Storage launches new InfoSight analytics. Nimble Storage (NIMBL) announced new performance analytics capabilities within Nimble Storage InfoSight. These forensic capabilities are key enhancements to the predictive analytics InfoSight has offered providing real-time monitoring, reporting, forecasting and planning capabilities to customers. InfoSight allows customers to obtain a holistic view of their storage environment through its cloud-based data collection engine that automatically collects comprehensive data around the overall health of their storage, including performance, capacity, and data protection. The ability to automatically identify these challenges eliminates the days or weeks spent with manual data collection and analyses and professional services fees, while ensuring systems run at peak health. “Performance issues cost companies money, decrease employee productivity and can affect customer relationships,” said Rod Bagg, vice president of customer support, Nimble Storage. ”The ‘old school way’ of scouring through hundreds of data sets to identify an issue is inefficient, and is just that — old school. By automating this process through InfoSight we are allowing customers to get back to ‘business as usual’ an order of magnitude faster than traditional triage methods. In addition, end users will experience a new level of customer service as their trusted channel partners gain access to deeper insight into their current storage environment.” Avere launches FXT 4800 Enterprise storage. Avere Systems announced the release of its FXT 4800 Edge Filer, the newest solution to Avere’s FXT Series. Key features of the FXT 4800 include higher density SSDs to bring the total capacity for the FXT 4800 up to 4.8TB, and faster hex-core CPUs to increase performance. It features 144GB DRAM, 2GB NVRAM, Flash SSD capacity of 4.8TB, and dual 10GE ports. In a 50-node cluster it provides a high performance and high capacity tier for as many as 50 NAS and object-based Core filers. “The new FXT 4800 Edge Filer is the next logical extension of our Avere 4000 series,” said Jeff Tabor, senior director of product marketing at Avere. “Faster CPU enables our customers to reach higher performance levels, and as always, our Edge-Core approach optimizes response time to users and enables centralizing storage for cost savings and simplified management.” |
| 1:30p | Adaptive Storage: Rethinking How Hadoop Clusters Are Optimized  An Adaptive Storage Base Board, which provides an Open Compute-compatible solution for a new approach to optimizing Hadoop clusters. (Image: Open Compute Project) SAN JOSE, Calif. – Could an overnight Hackathon improve the way Hadoop clusters are optimized for crunching Big Data? January’s Open Compute Summit led to the creation of a new concept known as Adaptive Storage, in which compute and storage resources would be loosely coupled over a network and scale independently to optimize big data platforms. Adaptive Storage was one of the winners in the Open Compute Hackathon, a 24-hour hardware innovation contest. It was developed by a team that included engineers from Facebook, Adapteva, I/O Switch Technologies and several consultants. “Adaptive Storage raises fundamental questions about the way storage and compute are connected and about the power requirements for big data,” team member Ron Herardian reports on the Open Compute blog. “In just 24 hours, with no budget and with a few boxes of computers, circuit boards and networking equipment, our small team of engineers was able to imagine a totally new way of organizing Hadoop data nodes, build and demonstrate a working prototype running on ARM processor-based micro servers using open source software, and show production-ready engineering CAD drawings for a production implementation.” Hadoop is a software framework that supports data-intensive distributed applications. It has become one of the most important technologies for managing large volumes of data, and has given rise to a growing ecosystem of tools and applications that can store and analyze large datasets on commodity hardware. In adaptive storage, disk drives are connected directly to network switches, with no conventional storage array. Also connected to the switch are Parallella micro servers running Hadoop, each of which can handle data for one or more disk drives. Because every disk drive is individually connected to a network, any micro server can read from any disk drive, allowing the micro servers to join forces to process complex jobs or larger data sets. “In addition to dramatic power savings and independent, elastic scaling of compute and storage resources, Adaptive Storage is a simple and elegant way to eliminate compute hotspots and coldspots in Hadoop,” Herardian writes. “But the concepts and methods of Adaptive Storage are not limited to Hadoop. It can be applied to virtually any big data technology, such as Cassandra or MongoDB or to object storage in general.” For more details, check out the blog post at the Open Compute web site. |
| 2:00p | At OFC, Applied Micro Launches Optical Networking Devices At the OFC 2014 Optical Networking conference in San Francisco this week Applied Micro launched a 240Gbps Optical Transport Network smart PHY family of devices, Broadcom introduced 802.3bj compliant physical layer devices, and Acacia Communications rolled out its Coherent 100G CFP module. Applied Micro launches 240Gbps OTN. Applied Micro Circuits (AMCC) announced a 240Gbps Ethernet/Optical Transport Network (OTN) smart PHY family of devices for Carrier-Ethernet and data center connectivity applications. Built for cloud and enterprise data centers, the new products are designed to deliver unsurpassed density, low power and improved total cost of ownership. New X12, X24, X120 and X24 models offer up to quadruple device density and half the power consumption compared to competing solutions and address large and rapidly growing markets. The X-Weave devices support a wide array of interfaces for 10/40/100G and seamlessly interface with optical and copper inter-connect technologies. The new new products introduce IEEE-compliant Media Access Control Security, or MACSec, to address the emerging demands for wire-rate network security in service provider and data center applications. “Applied Micro’s new X-Weave products enable next generation Ethernet and OTN platforms to address the insatiable demand for network bandwidth. Importantly, the addition of MACSec to all ports at every speed allows for privacy without compromise. These products build upon AppliedMicro’s extensive OTN experience, world-class analog/mixed-signal expertise and leading-edge semiconductor technology,” said Francesco Caggioni, Senior Director of Marketing & Technology, AppliedMicro. Broadcom announces new 802.3bj physical layer devices. Broadcom (BRCM) announced an IEEE 802.3bj compliant physical layer devices (Lite-PHYs). Designed for 100G datacenter and enterprise front panel and backplane interconnect applications, the low-power 28 nanometer BCM8207x and BCM8238x Lite-PHYs support 4X25G backplane and line cards for the rollout of 100 Gigabit per second (Gbps) switches. The new models allow customers to design IEEE 802.3bj-compliant 100G products that support 100GBase-CR4/SR4/LR4 on the front panel and 100GBase-KR4 on the backplane. ”Broadcom’s latest Lite-PHY devices pave the way for the development of 100 Gbps switches that support the high speed requirements of the most technologically-advanced cloud and mobility infrastructure environments as well as rich video content,” said Lorenzo Longo, Broadcom Vice President and General Manager of Physical Layer Products. ”Our 802.3bj compliant Lite-PHYs enable OEMS and carriers to meet ever increasing traffic requirements by providing the needed performance and low power efficiency.” Acacia Communications launches 100G CFP module. Acacia Communications announced that the company is shipping samples of its Coherent 100G CFP (C Form-factor Pluggable) module to customers. The substantial reductions in size, cost and power consumption make the AC100-CFP especially attractive for carriers and content providers deploying 100G in the fast growing Metro segment. “We are enabling cost-sensitive metro network operators to move to 100G and achieve significant performance and capacity benefits,” said Acacia President and CEO Raj Shanmugaraj. “Our 100G DWDM Coherent CFP module offers carriers and content providers optimal flexibility, at price points comparable to non-coherent short reach or client CFPs like LR4 or multi-wavelength ODB. Furthermore the AC100-CFP’s lowest power and smallest form factor enable the highest densities for Coherent interfaces in the market, while reducing the total cost per bit. Coherent CFP is a technology game changer similar to XFP for 10G and our AC-100 CFP is the first to market.” |
| 2:30p | TIBCO Connects Big Data To Cloudera, Hortonworks, Pivotal TIBCO broadens big data connectivity options to Cloudera, Hortonworks and Pivotal, MapR is selected by Rocket Internet for a powerful behavior analysis system, and BMW selects IBM big data and analytics for boosting customer satisfaction. TIBCO adds connectivity options to big data sources. TIBCO Software (TIBX) announced TIBCO Spotfire customers now have direct connectivity to big data repositories from Cloudera, Hortonworks, and Pivotal. ”Our ability to connect directly to these data sources, conduct in-database analysis, and mash-up the data in the worlds of Hadoop and others puts Spotfire in prime position for enterprises looking to get the most out of their data assets,” said Lars Bauerle, vice president of product strategy, TIBCO Spotfire. “Spotfire now further embraces data access in all forms, including Big Data architecture, enabling our customers to derive significantly greater value from their existing data.” ”Apache Hadoop has become the cornerstone of a modern data architecture by enabling companies to store and manage massive data sets, and to capture net-new forms of data. When our partners build innovative analytic operations on Hadoop, it helps enterprises maximize the potential from their Big Data investments,” said John Kreisa, vice president of strategic marketing, Hortonworks. MapR selected by Rocket Internet. MapR announced that Internet incubator Rocket Internet has switched to the MapR Distribution for Hadoop to build a powerful user behavior analysis system. After looking for a way to scale its intelligence engine, Rocket selected the MapR Distribution for Hadoop to deliver an enhanced analytics engine, which can better determine the impact of each marketing channel and each keyword on overall client business. In terms of real-world return, the performance gains are allowing the company to better optimize marketing spend down to a single keyword. “MapR had the set of enterprise features such as data replication and flexible file support that we considered essential – especially as we wanted to retain flexibility,” said Patrick Fink, global head of Business Intelligence at Rocket Internet. ”For us, the long-term benefits of our switch to the MapR Distribution for Hadoop are significant and provide us with the flexibility, performance and resilience to build out our analytics capability in any direction we need.” BMW using IBM big data and analytics to boost customer satisfaction. IBM announced that BMW Group is deploying IBM Big Data and Analytics technology to optimize products, repairs and maintenance. The use of predictive analytics helps to detect and fix vulnerabilities before new models are launched – and long before they might cause problems in series production. The IBM SPSS predictive analytics software helps to combine and analyze data from, for instance, numerous test drives of prototypes, an average of 15,000 faults recorded by vehicles, and details from recent workshop reports. This way, vulnerabilities can be quickly identified and eliminated before new models go into series production. Another benefit is the automation of certain analyses, since different business divisions and subsidiaries often have similar analytics queries. For these recurring questions there is now a solution that can be used to provide answers to a range of queries. |
| 5:47p | Hosting Industry to Gather in Miami to Network, Learn, and Grow This post originally appeared on The WHIR. HostingCon, the premier industry conference and trade show for hosting and cloud providers, announced the theme for HostingCon 2014, which is scheduled for June 14-16, in Miami, Florida — “Turn Up the Heat” by accelerating ideas and insights into innovation, strategic vision, and new revenue opportunities. “The hosting and cloud industry continues to grow and mature and the sector has never been healthier,” said Philbert Shih, managing director of Structure Research and program director for HostingCon. “But at the same time, the industry is undergoing some significant change. Hosters have never before faced such intense competition and the likes of Google, Microsoft and especially Amazon, are increasingly making their presence felt in the competitive landscape. This has forced the entire industry to look for new ways to become more efficient, innovate, and drive new revenues. Complacency will leave laggards behind, and those who turn up the heat will continue to have impact.” HostingCon is the only North-American event specifically created for hosting and cloud providers with an unbiased platform for presenting the best networking, thought leadership, non-sponsored education, and value-added revenue solutions. For 2014, the conference has organized its educational program to help hosts and cloud providers identify emerging trends and create new business opportunities to drive breakthrough growth. The conference program is broken into four tracks covering Marketing & Sales, Technology, Management, and Industry Trends — all focused on sketching a compelling business vision and a robust roadmap for the future. Over 1,900 hosting and cloud provider decision makers from more than 34 countries are expected to attend HostingCon 2014 from June 16-18 in the high-energy destination of Miami Beach, Florida. “HostingCon is a highly interactive learning and networking environment designed to identify new partnerships and build stronger relationships,” stated Kevin Gold, Conference Chair of HostingCon. “For HostingCon 2014, the team has put tremendous effort into integrating new ways to help attendees connect with peers and solution providers, in addition to a greater emphasis within the conference program on emerging trends and technology.” HostingCon 2014 showcases an exhibit floor with more than 150 brands that provide solutions for hosting and cloud providers, including CloudFlare, Data Foundry, Interxion, Jelastic, HP, OnApp, Parallels, SolidFire, Arbor Networks, SoftLayer, MarketGoo, Symantec, TeleCity, McAfee, and Loaded Commerce. With an environment rich with thought leaders and deep with major industry brands, business executives and entrepreneurs attending HostingCon 2014 will have the opportunity to think broadly about the future, to identify with new business partners, connect with existing clients, and learn strategic insights to turn up the heat on their competitors. About HostingCon HostingCon is the premier industry conference and trade show for hosting and cloud providers. Now in its tenth year, HostingCon connects the industry — including hosting and cloud providers, MSPs, ISVs and other Internet infrastructure providers who make the Internet work — to network, learn, and grow. HostingCon is an iNET Interactive event. For details about HostingCon, visit www.HostingCon.com. This post originally appeared at: http://www.thewhir.com/web-hosting-news/i |
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