VMware Private Cloud Computing with vCloud Director

It's All About Delivering Service with vCloud Director

Empowered by virtualization, companies are not just moving into the cloud, they're moving into private clouds for greater security, flexibility, and cost savings. However, this move involves more than just infrastructure. It also represents a different business model and a new way to provide services. In this detailed book, VMware vExpert Simon Gallagher makes sense of private cloud computing for IT administrators. From basic cloud theory and strategies for adoption to practical implementation, he covers all the issues. You'll learn how to build a private cloud and deliver it as a service using VMware vCloud Director 5.1.

• Consider what it takes to transition to the cloud, including the business, technical, and operational issues
• Get familiar with the essential tools—the vCloud Director 5.1 suite
• Understand the delivery model of infrastructure-as-a-service
• Define a service catalog, including determining how to track and allocate costs and design for service levels
• Measure the impact of a private cloud on your legacy applications and infrastructure
• Implement efficient operations—learn how to apply automation, set up backup and restore, and maintain HA
• Deliver an end-to-end solution to an end user with a fully managed guest
• Foreword by Joe Baguley, Chief Technologist, EMEA, VMware

About the Authors

Simon Gallagher first read about VMware Workstation in a magazine article in 2000. He was instantly hooked and used it to build various complex network and server labs for his studies. Simon built his first ESX server at version 2.5 and, in his work for a managed services provider, built complex test and development environments for customers. Simon saw an opportunity to create a multitenant environment using ESX 3 to deliver customer solutions faster, cheaper, and more flexibly, so he ended up building a very early implementation of a cloud.

Simon has since gone on to work for some of the largest technology & service providers in the world (including VMware), designing and delivering cloud solutions for customers using VMware technology.

Since his university days, Simon has maintained a large and ever-evolving home lab environment. When he found you could virtualize ESX itself, he spent a lot of his own time and money on the various incarnations of his vTARDIS project.

In late 2007 Simon began attending the London VMware User Group (VMUG) on the advice of a colleague and was impressed at the technical content and approachability of all the attendees. In 2011 he joined the steering committee for the London VMUG to assist with finding content and helped organize (and presented at) their first ever national UK event, which attracted over 300 attendees. He has been awarded the vExpert title annually by VMware since 2009 and continues to blog and contribute to the London VMUG and the wider community.

Aidan Dalgleish is a consulting architect with the VMware Global Center of Excellence. He has more than 12 years of experience working with IT hardware and software solutions. Before joining VMware, he served a financial services company as an infrastructure design consultant. There he architected solutions to support business needs, including a bespoke browser–based virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) broker solution—prior to the release of VMware View—to support satellite and offshore office locations. At VMware, he has guided partners and customers in deploying VMware solutions ranging from datacenter migrations and VMware View deployments to bespoke multisite disaster recovery solutions with vSphere PowerCLI automation. Aidan is also among the first VMware Certified Design Experts (VCDX 010).