Chargeback and virtualization

CompareMyVM website to offer VMware ESX virtual machine configuration comparisons

Virtual machine provisioning sometimes requires administrator guesswork which doesn’t always yield the best results. To help address this need, Portsmouth, N.H.-based VKernel has launched a beta-stage community website, CompareMyVM.com, which will post configuration of virtual machines to help virtualization administrators.

At this point on the site, there are hardly enough virtual machines to make a quality sample of how the world is using ESX-based VMs. So, I encourage you to upload to the site, and as it matures the quality of the site will improve with more data. Uploading a VM or appliance’s configuration is easy, simply go to the CompareMyVM website and select to Snapshot My VM via a Java applet that will connect to VirtualCenter or the ESX host, or you can click the Contribute My VM button to enter the configuration manually. Once a virtual machine is loaded into the site, it is shown in the list among the other contributed VMs. An example of a VM I uploaded is shown below:

Uploaded VMs can be given information about what applications they run, such as a Windows domain controller, Apache 2.2 web engine or an Exchange mail server. At first glance, you may think that this is simply a way that virtualization admins can put their data on the CompareMyVM site and have it sold as data that says how administrators configure their VMs.

Not so according to Christian Simko, director of marketing and communications from VKernel who states that “The idea is to keep it open and never charge for it… We may eventually publish a best practices guide with data derived from CompareMyVM, but that will also be a freebie.” This is good news, as the site develops, there will surely be value to determine how other administrators are provisioning VMs with similar application inventories.

As the site matures, look for more comparative performance data on the contributed configurations as well. To date, there is only a limited number of virtual machines posted from virtualization users. I’ve put some VMs up there and hopefully you will as well. As more users contribute data, this free service will hopefully provide some valuable comparative information on how people use virtualization across different market segments. Most importantly, this information will be vendor-neutral, so different server hardware as well as various software configurations will be represented on the community site.

Chargeback for virtualization: VKernel’s approach

Increasing demands on busy virtual hosts often call for purchases of new, virtualization-optimized hardware. Chargeback systems, which provide utilization data to ensure fair billing for compute resources, then become particularly useful in justifying and allocating those costs.

A good chargeback approach can also keep departments from overspending. “Implementing a chargeback system forces virtual machine owners to re-evaluate their resource needs to see if there is any way to reduce the amount that they are using,” Eric Siebert, senior systems administrator for restaurant chain Boston Market Corporation, told me recently.

Alex Barrett and I recently talked with Alex Bakman, president and CEO of VKernel. Barrett wrote about a 2007 Bakman interview in the case for chargeback and virtual appliances

VKernel’s chargeback model

VKernel’s chargeback model is borrowed from lessons Bakman learned while working with mainframe chargeback – chargeback based on actual resource consumption. As the developer of CleverSoft and Ecora Software, Bakman had two successful software ventures under his belt before launching VKernel.

VKernel’s Chargeback Appliance is currently in version 1.3.3. It operates like this:

• The administrator defines the various consumer groups as folders, and drags and drops the virtual machines that they use into their folder.

• Costs are calculated either manually or by a spreadsheet available from VKernel’s website. The form asks the administrator about prior purchase costs and suggests the amount the IT department should charge for memory and storage use.

• Finally, the appliance monitors each VM’s activity, and reports usage on a weekly, monthly, or quarterly basis, in a similar fashion and appearance to an electric bill.

The 2.0 version, slated for release later this year, will include the Fixed Plus Overage chargeback method as well as new report types, Christian Simko, director of marketing communications for VKernel told me. The Fixed Plus Overage method enables system administrators to establish a fixed cost for virtual machine use via the current method and bill for overage costs as necessary.

VKernel’s products are modeled in a way so that the system administrator can pick and choose the systems management products they want and need to use, rather than purchasing an entire suite and having to spend time learning how to use it in order to get one or two functions out of the product’s capability.

Ease of use was Bakman’s goal, and the appliance model made that possible. Other chargeback systems he’d reviewed produced complex resource usage graphs which required many hours and a lot of expertise to analyze.

“At one university,” Bakman told me, “an IT department hired an intern to analyze the resource consumption to optimize performance. He quit after 20 days.” In general, he said, systems administrators are “overworked, overburdened and don’t have the time.”

IT pro Rick Vanover chose the VKernel appliance for its ease of use. “As a system administrator, I don’t have time to be an expert in everything,” said Vanover, system administrator for a worldwide vehicle glass repair and replacement company. “The VKernel appliance is easy to get up and running quickly, and it delivers usable information.”

A peek ahead

VKernel also sells a Capacity Bottleneck Analyzer virtual appliance and has two more coming down the pipe. The first, named Search, is slated for release in late August and will allow admins to search their virtual infrastructure for returns on a variety of queries, including, for example, which virtual machines have VMware tools installed and which don’t.

Capacity Modeler, which will debut at VMworld 2008, will allow admins to model changes to the virtual infrastructure before implementation and the outcomes of those changes on the virtual infrastructure as a whole.

Pricing on both Capacity Bottleneck Analyzer and Chargeback is as follows: $299 per CPU for the enterprise edition, $199 per CPU for standard, with support plans at 20% of the total purchase price for one year, or 15% per year for three years if paid in advance. The average total purchase price ranges from $5,000 to $10,000 according to Bakman.