Manage Workloads in Virtualized Environments

Whitepaper uses popular Tetris game to illustrate mixing and matching of workloads in dynamic IT environments

CLEAR LAKE, Iowa, January 18, 2011 - A TeamQuest whitepaper provides three workload management techniques and
dispels the myth that reactive, virtualization performance management
technologies help you attain the best performance.

"The truth is, these reactive technologies help, but they aren't a
complete solution and don't necessarily make workload management easier,"
said TeamQuest Enterprise Performance Specialist Per Bauer.

"Don't expect dynamic resource scheduling and migration to quickly fit
everything together on the fly," warned Bauer.

Bauer said the three best techniques for ensuring workloads coexist in
virtualized environments are estimation, analytical modeling and synthetic
load testing.

"You need to understand a lot about the resource requirements of the
underlying applications in order to know whether one workload might interfere
with another," he said. Bauer advised that it makes sense to do some careful,
up-front analysis.

Analysis Options

Estimation analysis involves stacking workloads on top of each other
until a predetermined threshold is reached, but is the least accurate option.
Load testing is more accurate than estimation, but may not be the best option
for virtual environments. Analytic modeling (analytic queuing network solver)
is much simpler and more accurate than load testing, and is the best option
of the three.

Whichever technique is used, Bauer emphasized the need to plan ahead and
make sure that placement and migration policies are designed to ensure that
workloads will run efficiently together.

Illustrating the Process

Bauer compared the process of ensuring workload efficiency to playing
Tetris. Tetris-like blocks symbolize the irregularities among different
workloads. A simple workload with a moderate need for resources would be
represented by a basic two-piece block. Higher needs for resources and higher
complexity would cause the block to expand in various directions.

An inability to combine the blocks translates into workloads that are
starved for resources and can't be migrated to another host. All of a sudden,
two of the key mechanisms that enable flexibility in virtualized environments
become unusable.

"If you don't pay attention to the characteristics of the workloads
you're hosting, there's a big risk you'll either over-provision or starve
your applications," said Bauer.

Additional Content:

- How to Manage IT Resource Consumption
(www.teamquest.com/pdfs/whitepaper/tqwp59.pdf)

- Workload Analysis of IT Infrastructure
(www.teamquest.com/solutions-products/products/technical-details/workloads/index.htm)

- Capacity Management is Crucial in Virtualized Environments
(www.teamquest.com/pdfs/whitepaper/virtualization-capacity-management.pdf)

About TeamQuest Corporation

TeamQuest Corporation is the global leader in IT Service Optimization
(ITSO), specializing in Capacity Management software. TeamQuest helps IT
organizations consistently meet service levels while minimizing costs and
mitigating risks. By combining performance data and business metrics,
TeamQuest software enables IT organizations to provide accurate, objective
information as input to critical business decisions. Companies around the
world trust TeamQuest software to help them proactively improve service
delivery and support best practices.

Vernon Johnson of TeamQuest, +1-641-357-2700, vernon.johnson at teamquest.com