Centralized Management of Physical and Virtual Infrastructure

The work required a development team familiar with both established server-management software and virtualization technologies. SaM Solutions brought experience relevant to the existing ServerView environment, including:

• Enterprise software development and enhancement,
• VMware ESX/3i, Microsoft Hyper-V, and Xen,
• Java, C/C++, JavaScript, Windows, and Linux,
• VMware ESX SDK, WMI, XML-RPC, Hibernate, and Swing,
• Previous cooperation with Fujitsu Siemens on a database web services prototype,
• Development, integration, deployment, and maintenance.

SaM Solutions implemented a Virtual Server Management layer within ServerView and connected it to the platform through a service-oriented interface.

The resulting functionality allowed the management system to work with virtual machines while maintaining the physical infrastructure context in which those machines operated. Instead of requiring administrators to move between unrelated tools for routine tasks, ServerView could expose the relevant virtual and physical resources through the same management environment.

The implementation covered several areas:

• Physical-to-virtual mapping to show relationships between hosts and VMs
• Infrastructure monitoring for server and VM status and resource consumption
• Event visibility across the managed environment
• VM control including start, shutdown, suspend, resume, and restart
• Host organization through configurable groups
• Vendor-specific access to VMware and Microsoft Hyper-V interfaces when required
• Support for VMware ESX/3i, Microsoft Hyper-V, Xen/XenSource, and PRIMERGY servers

The functionality was integrated with ServerView Operations Manager and supported management stations running Windows and Linux.

The completed functionality gave ServerView a broader role in mixed infrastructure administration, combining physical server management with virtual machine operations within the same environment.

The solution supported multiple virtualization technologies and provided administrators with a common set of monitoring and operational functions. SaM Solutions also remained involved after implementation, providing maintenance and further development of the platform.