Data Center Infrastructure: Internal Cloud Layer
Internal cloud has emerged as utility infrastructure. Underlying infrastructure for a so-called internal cloud includes industry standard servers, networked storage, and 10 Gigabit Ethernet abstracted by virtualization software such as VMware.
Internal Utility to Cloud |
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In utility infrastructure, applications are provisioned with compute resources abstracted from underlying processors, memory, storage, and networks. As with a utility, cost per unit of capacity metrics are the business measures for these abstracted resources.
Here, virtualization is about more than hypervisors and virtual machines, it is an operating system for the consolidated infrastructure. VMware, for example, has used terms like Data Center OS, Operating System of the Cloud, and “software mainframe” to describe the role of its vSphere product.
The mainframe analogy likely resonates differently with different IT professionals depending on age and technical background. Certainly, like a mainframe, this converged infrastructure is managed as a single scalable system where resources are partitioned off for multiple application workloads
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The Cloud Layer Cake
Virtualization software is critical to these combined solutions. Virtualization is the cake frosting that surrounds each of the hardware layers and ties them together into one cake. The cake is the foundation for hosting application workloads in the same way the layer cake is the platform for a forest of burning birthday candles.
Infrastructure Layers of the Internal Cloud |
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Architecture and benefits.
- Converged high speed networking. 10 Gigabit switching for converged high speed networking. Protocol enhancement in this area includes Fibre Channel over Ethernet, and so-called DataCenter Class Ethernet.
- Blade servers. Server virtualization is a key enabler of a utility infrastructure, and blades provide a flexible scalable platform for virtualization. The blades should be optimized to mitigate two common limitations of virtual machine performance, memory constraints and I/O bottlenecks. New generation blades (typically based on Xeon 5500 processors) include expanded memory addressing and direct path I/O for virtual machines.
- Consolidated storage. Shared storage is also an enabler of virtualized server consolidation but proprietary hardware approaches can also be an impediment to open cloud architectures. For example, site-to-site replication schemes often require storage from the same vendor at each location. Traditional Fibre Channel Storage Area Network architecture is also not the only option.
- Virtualization as “Operating System.” Management is the value differentiator for virtualization. However, management is more than virtual machine management. Virtualization providers such as VMware will be focusing more on areas of virtual resource management including such areas as storage and backup management, tiered application performance management, application lifecycle management, and chargeback.
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