Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Preview: IBM z/VM V6.1

Today IBM announced a preview of z/VM V6.1 : 'Preview: IBM z/VM V6.1 - Foundation for future virtualization growth (ZA09-0015)'. It's planned to become available in the fourth quarter of 2009 and it will only run on the z10 and future generations of the System z. Allthough some functionalities will also be available on z/VM V5.

The highlights ?
  • Exploitation of the System z10 server cache management instructions to help improve the performance of virtual networking
  • Closer integration with IBM® Systems Director by shipping the Manageability Access Point Agent for z/VM
  • Support for Linux® guests using dynamic storage reconfiguration, IBM FlashCopy® SE, Worldwide port name (WWPN) prediction tool, OSA-Express QDIO data connection isolation, Multiple file dumps ...
  • Additional tape encryption : "Guest operating systems running under z/VM can take advantage of these encryption features through z/VM, even if the guest does not exploit them itself for reading and writing tapes. In addition, this tape drive can be used for native z/VM tape functions.
But I would also like to draw your attention to a couple of the Statements of Direction. Take notice : these are statements of direction, so I guess this goes already beyond z/VM V6.1.
  • z/VM Single System Image
    IBM intends to provide capabilities that permit multiple z/VM systems to collaborate in order to provide a single system image. This is planned to allow all z/VM member systems to be managed, serviced, and administered as one system across which workloads can be deployed. The single system image is intended to share resources among all member systems.
  • z/VM Live Guest Relocation
    IBM intends to further strengthen single system image support by providing live guest relocation. This is planned to provide the capability to move a running Linux virtual machine from one single system image member system to another. This is intended to further enhance workload management across a set of z/VM systems and to help clients avoid planned outages for virtual servers.
VM-plex ? We'll just have to wait and see !

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