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Microsoft System Center & XenServer Together Opening Up the Cloud
Continuing the thought from my last blog, it looks like Microsoft is next. In case you had not seen the news, Microsoft is coming out with a greatly enhanced version of System Center that is heavily focused on the cloud. Microsoft, like Citrix, is clearly seeing the increase of applications in the cloud. To some organizations, that means migrating applications that can be hosted off premise, ...
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Seeing the Forest Through the Trees
Sometimes it really does pay to step back, breath deep and take in the landscape surrounding you. It's during those introspective moments that connections just seem to come a little easier. My guess is we simply need to have the space to let pieces fall into place. I recently had that experience when I saw this. As I read through the announcement, it occurred to me that ...
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Postcards from a Revolution. Texas A&M Turns to XenServer for Private Cloud
As part of this continuing series on XenServer as the platform for public and private clouds, we had the opportunity right before the holidays to sit down with the Infrastructure Systems and Services Group within Texas A&M's Computing and Information Services (CIS) department to discuss how they are using XenServer and how they plan to leverage the platform going forward. This group is responsible for a ...
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Postcards from a Revolution
Today, the latest release of XenServer became available for download. This release, which adds key functionality such as distributed virtual switching, automated VM protection and recovery and a web management console for delegated administration, marks just the latest step in a measured march to deliver customers performance, openness and choice in a virtualization platform. As this message percolates, we at Citrix have seen a rapid increase ...
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What’s Driving the Surge in XenServer Market Share?
Beth Pariseau at SearchServerVirtualization.com recently posted an article on the surge in XenServer market share and, after talking to a few customers and highlighting their pros and cons of using XenServer, posited some reasons behind the rapid expansion seen since Citrix implemented the freemium XenServer model. First and foremost - great article! Beyond the numbers themselves, its good to see market watchers noting the trend that customers ...
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Serendipity and the Art of Customer Centricity
Broadly, BusinessDictionary.com defines customer centric as: "An approach to doing business in which a company focuses on creating a positive consumer experience at the point of sale and post-sale. A customer-centric approach can add value to a company by differentiating themselves from competitors who do not offer the same experience." Clearly this is a "big tent" definition with lots of nuances that can be pursued- from demand ...
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Let Freedom Ring
Fresh off a long U.S. holiday weekend and what should I stumble across this morning but iXen for the Apple iPad. It looks like a cool little app that enables customers to perform basic management functions on XenServer installations remotely from their iPad. According to Inpirationlabs (I haven't yet had the chance to try the product), the current version enables the following functions: - Add remote hosts - ...
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Time for Summer Camp
It's been a great couple of weeks since RTW of XenServer 5.6. Demand has been overwhelming and the feedback from customers has been great. I know a lot of you are in the process of upgrading from 5.5, but if the past few releases are any indication, there is also a host of folks out there who are downloading and activating for the first time. ...
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Imgram Cloud Conduit, How About Them Apples?
For those that haven't yet seen it, I wanted to provide a quick link to Ingram Micro's newly announced Cloud Conduit initiative as well as the Seismic site for managed services including cloud. Very cool stuff. Anyone want to hazard a guess as to a common (but unstated) theme throughout the press release? If you've said XenServer, you've just entitled yourself to a free copy. Go ...
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The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated….
Yes, I know somewhat cliché and greatly overused, but in this case the quote perfectly captures the sentiment. As we are now nearly half way through 2010, it seemed to me like a good moment to share some of the XenServer "vitals." For those of you that follow Citrix, you know that XenServer is targeted at three distinct constituents / solution areas: the datacenter with server ...