Happy Holidays

Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas to those who celebrate it, to all our prospects, clients, partners, suppliers and even our competitors.  I hope everyone has a great holiday season and comes back refreshed to face the New Year.

On a personal note it has been a fun and challenging year, my first as CEO for Metron.  Overall the economic picture remains very mixed across both geographical and vertical markets.  Some businesses seem to be thriving, some struggling, within the same territory or area of business.  Hopefully next year will be one of success and growth for everyone as the global economy slowly picks up.

 

From a capacity management perspective, the twin technological challenges of Cloud and Big Data grow ever more important.  Sat here watching the trees get buffeted by the strong winds passing across the UK at the moment makes me think of the ever-improving job that weather forecasters seem to do.  They have been pioneers in collating, analyzing and reporting on vast quantities of data.  Their forecasts seem to me to get more and more accurate in the UK – not easy for a small island in a blustery sector of the northern hemisphere.  As capacity managers, we can learn a lot from how they sift huge volumes of technically complex numbers into the concise predictions we see on the TV or Internet.

Cloud has brought different challenges, partly due to the lack of control and visibility we now have into the entities we have to manage.  A major factor in helping Metron get to grips with parts of applications and services we could not previously see has been our partnership with Correlsense and their SharePath application monitoring software.  The combination of our athene® software with SharePath has been a real sales success for us this year.  The two combined give unparalleled visibility into where, in a complex processing structure, resources are being consumed and prediction of what needs to be done to correct those issues and prevent a recurrence.  Now there’s a Christmas present worth having.

Once again, thank you to everyone who has worked with Metron over the past year.  We look forward to working with you again and contributing to your success.

Andrew Smith

CEO

Managing capacity for Solaris containers

Solaris 10 introduced the ability to clone the base operating system to create what is known as Containers (Zones). 

I'll be hosting a web presentation tomorrow which will provide some insight and understanding into this technology, specifically covering the main differences between Zones and Containers, their rival comparatives, Process and Extended Accounting and associated benefits.

I'll also be discussing Capacity and Performance reporting, focusing on effective Zone reporting through the use of the correct commands. 

I'll show you how to check and set correct permissions for Zone file system reporting access and explain how and when Shared Memory can be reported incorrectly, and how to do it the right way. 

The agenda I'll be covering: 

Introduction Hypervisor - Solaris 10 Difference between Zones and Containers Zone nomenclature Comparatives Process and Extended Accounting What are they? How they differ Advantages / Disadvantages UIDs and their importance Capacity and Performance Reporting Useful Metrics and their meanings Zone reporting - including permissions Shared Memory reporting What extended accounting provides vs. other commands I’ll be concluding with some best practice guidelines for you. Register for free now http://www.metron-athene.com/services/training/webinars/index.html Jamie Baker  Principal Consultant

Capacity Management for Solaris Containers

The Solaris 10 release introduced Solaris Container functionality into the distributed market. 

Solaris Containers or Zones as they are also known, provide virtualized environments within a single instance of Solaris 10.  This essentially allows for multiple virtualized systems to be hosted on a single piece of hardware.

The advantages allow many applications that run on a Solaris O/S to be isolated from each other in independent systems, with the added benefits that virtualizing systems bring.

Virtualized systems however come with their own challenges, especially when identifying Capacity and Performance requirements and lead to questions like:

·         I've heard Solaris Containers uses a Type 2 Hypervisor – what is that?

·         What is the difference between Zones and Containers?

·         How do they share resources?

·         Do they impact on each other and how?

·         What should we monitor and how do we interpret the results?

·         How can we forecast and plan for future growth? 

 I'll be hosting a webinar Capacity Management for Solaris Containers on 5th December which will cover these topics and more. Register now and join me http://www.metron-athene.com/services/training/webinars/index.html

Jamie Baker 
Principal Consultant

What do Virtualization Capacity Management and Hollywood have in common?

Many individuals within an organization look at Virtualization Capacity Management as a “Black Art” or something only “Techies” understand. 

In reality Virtualization Capacity Management is more of a business practice with the technical data used to show the effect on the enterprise. The objective of introducing virtualization into an enterprise is to provide an increased efficiency of resources.

I am a Big Bang Theory fan and Sheldon is always speaking over many of the characters heads with his knowledge and technical ‘dribble drabble’, as Penny calls it.  There is one particular episode in which Penny asks Sheldon to teach her what physics is so she can talk to Leonard about the subject http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Um7SttlM8fI

In his own inimitable way, Sheldon finally gives Penny the words that help her understand physics

With this in mind Hollywood and the way top TV shows and blockbuster movies capture a person’s attention can be used in relation to Capacity Management.  What are the five key ingredients that make for a successful movie?

·         it makes you ask questions

·         it keeps you engaged and holds your attention

·         it is told in story format and there is a relationship created with the viewer

·         The end of the movie or show relates to the beginning and often you have that “Ah Ha” moment

·         There are one or more items that the viewer remembers in detail afterwards

How do we take these ingredients and show Capacity Management in a way that benefits both the technical staff and the business user? 

When speaking of Virtualization Capacity Management, the capacity manager performs the function of director and weaves the presentation via reports through the script to tell a story.  The final outcome is an ending that you hope resonates with the audience and shows how it affects that individual. 

On Thursday, November 21, I’ll be hosting a webinar “Virtualization Capacity Management and Hollywood” which will cover:

•    How various functions within capacity management can relate to Hollywood movies
•    The technical information that spans all the various virtualization technologies
•     Discuss the Virtualization Capacity Management challenges
•    Show various sample reports to use to show the information
•     How to end the presentation on a high note for the viewer

Register for your place now http://www.metron-athene.com/services/training/webinars/index.html

Charles Johnson

Principal Consultant

Virtualization Capacity Management and Hollywood

Capacity Management as an integral component within an Enterprise has its challenges. 

Capacity Managers need to look at ways to acquire the buy-in from both business and technical areas. Virtualization Capacity Management and Hollywood, not something you would normally connect together. So how can the items that make a Hollywood film successful assist you as the Capacity Manager?

The main components of a successful Hollywood film are that it:

• Makes you ask questions
• Keeps your attention
• Unfolds a story that you can relate to in some way
• Ends in a way that relates to the beginning

You need to incorporate these components when presenting your Capacity Management story. 

At my next webinar, November 21, I'll be discussing the top areas of concern for Virtualization Capacity Management, how they relate to the business, and how to introduce business metrics into the process. 

I'll also be suggesting ways that you can tell your story, encourage your audience to ask questions and look at how the outcome affects the initial scope.

Register for your free place now http://www.metron-athene.com/services/training/webinars/index.html and I look forward to seeing you there.

Charles Johnson

Principal Consultant

Data Data Everywhere and not a bit to use

There are many topics presented for capacity management which involve the best ways to display and distribute capacity information to the business. 

However, with the arrival of the cloud, and business focus on service based reporting, capturing the correct data in order to produce those reports has never been more important. A key prerequisite for effective capacity management has to be making sure good quality data is available for the capacity analyst or planner to use.

Relevant data for capacity management is often available from many sources within the organization.  The challenge is not so much about knowing where the data you want can be found.  

Often, the real challenge involves understanding the technicalities of how you can get hold of the data.  This can be hard enough in your own environment with teams sometimes reluctant to allow access to their systems, but when we start to look at public cloud a new challenge presents itself.

I'll be hosting a free webinar this week where I'll be discussing the challenges of capturing the sorts of data required for 360° capacity management, and the additional challenges encountered when cloud PaaS is introduced.

The topics I'll be covering are:

• Capture Techniques
• APM data
• The PaaS challenge
• How others get data

Come along this Thursday November 7th http://www.metron-athene.com/services/training/webinars/index.html

Phil Bell 

Consultant

Maturing your Capacity Management processes - Summary ( 11/11)

As mentioned at the beginning of my blog series, the implementation of a mature business focused capacity process is a long term project that requires a good deal of effort.

In this series  I’ve given you a basic beginner’s guide,  something to present to the business to gauge the potential requirements and interest.

In summary and to provide some guiding principles for anyone looking to achieve a more mature implementation of capacity management, the following are the 5 key areas that should be the focus throughout your project:

·         Involve all aspects of the business as soon as possible.  Early involvement will pay dividends throughout the project with getting buy-in and building communication interfaces

·         Be selective with the technical information being captured and processed.  Across the enterprise there are likely to be hundreds (if not thousands) of metrics available, but it’s likely that only a small subset will be useful.  Remember the more data captured, the more likely you are to miss the important information.

·         Be sensible with the scope.  Start on a service that is important to the business, but isn’t so complex or sensitive that you won’t be able to make any progress.  Review the incident or change records to see if any of the services are suffering large numbers of capacity outages or late change requests for upgrades.

·         Aim for the quick wins where possible and strive to demonstrate value/progress as quickly as possible.

·         Be cautious with tooling.  Get the process configured and ensure that the needs are understood before starting any tooling evaluations.

I hope you’ve enjoyed the series and if you need expert guidance with maturing your capacity management processes check out our Professional Services division http://www.metron-athene.com/services/consulting/index.html or drop me an email rob.ford@metron-athene.com

Rob Ford

Principal Consultant

Maturing your Capacity Management processes - Demonstrate value ( 10/11)

Sometimes getting started and maintaining capacity management can be a hard sell into an organization, especially where the common misconception is that just increasing the available capacity is cheap. 

There are a number of methods that can be used to demonstrate the progress being made and the value to the business:

·         Ensure all presentations and reports contain the right level of data.  Whether it’s for the business or a technical department, ensure that it’s written in a way that means something to them

·         In the initial audit or implementation phase there will be objectives set by the business about what they want to see from the capacity process.  Ensure these are understood and at least some of the KPIs are built around those objectives.

·         Carefully monitor incidents and problems, ensure all capacity related tickets are captured and ultimately reduced over time.

·         Continual Service Improvement (CSI) is a “reasonably new” concept within ITIL, but capacity management has had an iterative cycle of “Monitor – Analyse – Tune – Change” since at least version 2.  This cycle of improvement is critical in optimizing the IT environment and is one of the key parts of the process for creating value.  

By optimizing the environment the process can demonstrate the following:

o   Release of spare capacity

o   Deferred or optimized expenditure

o   Ensure service level targets are met, whilst reducing costs

On Wednesday I’ll summarize in the final part of my blog series and don't forget to register for my live webinar this Thursday http://www.metron-athene.com/services/training/webinars/index.html

Rob Ford

Principal Consultant

Maturing your Capacity Management processes - Keeping the momentum going ( 9/11 )

As with any implementation, once the initial project has been concluded, all the initial objectives have been met and the quick wins achieved, the difficulty is maintaining the momentum.

Having this momentum is essential for business capacity management and the following techniques are very effective:

Intranet/Newsletters

Most organizations have an Intranet or similar that is used to send out information.  Where possible, try to get capacity staff mentioned or get capacity management successes published.  

These can be in the form of selling the benefits and ensuring people are aware of the process and the value it provides.  Where possible, mention successes, achieving targets, reducing expenditure etc.  In short, promote and sell the work being done.

Road shows

An extension of the Intranet option, if there is the time and opportunity, mini presentations on capacity management to key stakeholders, different departments  and locations can be an excellent source of information.  

These also serve to raise the profile of capacity management and ensure people are aware of what’s happening, they can be done on their own or perhaps as part of a wider Service Management initiative.

The content would normally be at a high level (not too many graphs) and focus on the following:

• ·         Progress so far
• ·         Successes and failures
• ·         What’s next and how people can get involved

All of this momentum will help you to demonstrate value and that’s what I’ll be discussing on Monday.

Don't forget to register for my next live webinar on October 24th Big SAP Landscape = Big Savings with Capacity Management http://www.metron-athene.com/services/training/webinars/index.html

Rob Ford

Principal Consultant

Maturing your Capacity Management processes - People( 8/11)

The number of people used to support the capacity management process within your organization will obviously vary depending on budget, scope, IT landscape etc. 

Throughout the industry there is no set pattern on the number of people associated with capacity management with a wide variance in the number of people deployed regardless of the size of the estate.

If you are starting the journey of implementing capacity management the decision on experience and how many people to recruit will largely depend on the factors outlined above. 

Whether as a business you recruit an experienced capacity manager, contractor or a consultancy company, the one key people element is the utilization of capacity champions. 

A capacity champion is a person that is an expert in their respective area, has an interest in capacity management (they’re probably doing it already in their own silo) and is a good communicator/facilitator.  

The recruitment of champions provides you with the following benefits:

·         Easier to obtain relevant data

·         More detailed expertise and knowledge

·         Improved integration with the business

·         Easier to raise and maintain the profile of the capacity process

The capacity management champion will also be crucial in what I’ll be looking at next time, keeping the momentum going.

Don't forget to register for my next live webinar on October 24th Big SAP Landscape = Big Savings with Capacity Management http://www.metron-athene.com/services/training/webinars/index.html

Rob Ford

Principal Consultant

Maturing your Capacity Management processes - Information and Governance ( 7/11 )

With the complexity of today’s modern IT environments and the multitude of delivery mechanisms available, it’s safe to say that organizations are swamped with data.

 

The challenge for implementing capacity management is being able to distil this wealth of information into a useable form.  Rather than concentrate on specific platforms or metrics, I have found the following to be a useful guide for filtering information:

·         If implementing for the first time, follow the usual ITIL guidance of starting small and building up.  For capacity management this could be starting with a particular platform, service or application. 

·         Work with technical teams to understand which metrics are available for each of the platforms.  This is especially important when dealing with virtualized platforms as these tend to have various levels e.g. cluster, host, guest etc which are key for capacity planning.

·         Work with the application and service support teams to determine all valid metrics and importantly how these can be correlated with the underlying infrastructure data.

Remember, the more data captured, the more you need to store, manage and understand.  

As well as the obvious capacity implications of storing more and more data, you are also increasing the likelihood of missing key alerts and data trends.

On Wednesday I’ll be looking at your most important asset, People.

In the meantime download and listen to my last  webinar http://www.metron-athene.com/_downloads/on-demand-webinars/index.html or sign up for my next one 'Big SAP Landscape = Big Savings with Capacity Management' on 24th October http://www.metron-athene.com/services/training/webinars/index.html

Rob Ford

Principal Consultant

Maturing your Capacity Management processes – Tooling ( 6/11)

Given the complexity of today’s IT environments, the challenge in obtaining good and reliable capacity management data has never been more difficult. 

Most organizations utilize a wide range of technologies to deliver their services and each has its own range of metrics, interface methods and technical nuances.  There are a wide range of tools available for the capture and collation of data and all have their strengths and weaknesses.

There are also options for free trials with some companies offering the ability to download the software or better still, as a preconfigured virtual machine.  Rather than list them individually, it is probably more useful to list the sort of functionality that a solid capacity management tool should be able to provide:

·         Capture across the enterprise - Multiple point solutions are inherently harder to manage and collate the data

·       ability to bring in additional non-native data sources -  This could be via frameworks, partner products or more traditional sources such as SNMP, application API’s etc

·         Provide the capability for modelling -  Certainly basic techniques such as trending have their place, but realistically, to truly understand the relationship between the utilization, the response time and how this will change over time you will need to use more advanced methods such as analytical or simulation modelling.

·        Good reporting provides the foundation to any mature capacity process so any tool chosen should have the ability to deliver reports in a variety of ways e.g. web, email etc and support the correlation of data. 

The important thing to remember is that all organizations are different and have specific requirements.  To get the best results, utilize the experience of the Capacity Management SIG and spend plenty of time producing the Request for Proposal (RFP) document to ensure it covers all of your requirements.

I’ll be taking a look at Information and Governance on Monday.

Rob Ford

Principal Consultant

Maturing your Capacity Management processes – Beginning the journey ( 5 /11 )

Now that the Gap analysis or process audit is complete you’re ready to take the next step on the journey and begin by building your community.

Starting the process of education by involving key business stakeholders throughout the GAP analysis will have laid firm foundations for this implementation stage. 

It varies between organizations, but a solid first step is to provide a high-level overview of what capacity management is, its requirements and ultimately the benefits to the business.  This should cover the basic principles, the information interfaces and the value it will provide.  The intended audience should be similar to that of the GAP analysis; the key requirement is to include a mixture of people and roles. 

By putting business, capacity and technical staff (people that wouldn’t inherently mix) together it starts to build the necessary relationships and provide the flow of information required for a business focused process.  In addition, it provides everyone with a common language when talking about capacity management and the required information.

The next requirement (again depending on existing maturity) may be a more intensive look at capacity management, usually spread over a number of days and covering the whole process.  

This sort of course will normally cover all aspects of capacity management e.g. methods, techniques etc and involve staff that are likely to be more hands on or at least have key involvement.  The people attending this course will form the basis of the Special Interest Group for capacity management and on completion of this course can work with the process manager to define the goals, objectives and outputs for capacity management.

At the lowest level of granularity, more technically focused capacity management courses dealing with key elements of a particular technical domain can be provided.  Looking at the requirements of managing a particular domain e.g. vmware, Unix etc; can be useful in providing support personnel with an additional set of skills for front line incident analysis and ensure that everyone is talking the same language.

The next step is of course to automate and on Friday I’ll be talking about tooling.

Don't forget to join me live tomorrow http://www.metron-athene.com/services/training/webinars/index.html

Rob Ford

Principal Consultant

Maturing your Capacity Management processes – Interviews/Workshops ( 4 of 11)

The real information and business integration starts here. 

The individual interviews are essential in obtaining the complex information about a particular department or business area; the reality being that most people are far more willing to talk openly about particular issues when meeting individually.

It also allows for a degree of knowledge transfer, in particular some business areas or departments who might not have any prior knowledge of capacity management and provides an overview of what the project objectives are e.g. what are we trying to achieve?

One of the prime advantages with this approach is the early involvement of all key areas of the business.

This is especially true with the workshop format. Bringing together groups of people that may not normally work that closely together forges more of a co-operative working party, where ideas can flow and people can properly challenge others in a constructive, facilitative way.

 These people may also become capacity management champions and form the beginnings of a capacity management community or capacity management special interest group.

So the GAP analysis/process audit has been completed and should have documented the current situation, the desired situation and a series of prioritized next steps for getting there.

Much as before, there are lots of things that will be required to implement or mature a business focused capacity process.  I’ll start to take a look at the “key next steps” and an approach that has been successfully used in a number of organizations on Wednesday.

Register for my free webinar How to save $$$ by Capacity Planning an Oracle server http://www.metron-athene.com/services/training/webinars/index.html

Rob Ford

Principal Consultant

Maturing your Capacity Management processes - The Questionnaire (3/11)

Questionnaires tend to be a standard tool for Capacity management maturing exercises with most organizations providing on-line variants or a standardized set of questions. 

This approach can be very useful as a starting point but their generic nature tends to mean there are lots of questions that are irrelevant to particular people or departments. 

While it’s true that most organizations face similar challenges, these challenges can be caused by different sets of circumstances.

The other issue is language or jargon, in an ideal world everyone would talk the same language, the reality is that most organizations still have terminology or processes unique to them and a questionnaire is unlikely to align with the way things are done within your world.

Having said all that, questionnaires are very useful as a facilitator for future interviews and workshops. They begin the process of getting people to start thinking along the same lines. 

By providing a selection of “standard” templates, people can begin to understand what will be required from them or their particular area.

The next step is the interviews and workshops themselves which I’ll discuss on Monday.

If you want more capacity management related information join our Community where, once registered, you'll have access to white papers, on-demand webinars, performance tips and more http://www.metron-athene.com/_downloads/index.html

Rob Ford

Principal Consultant

Maturing your Capacity Management processes - Situation Appraisal( 2/11)

Before you can set about implementing or maturing any ITIL process, the first step is to conduct a process audit or GAP analysis. 

This can obviously be done internally, but it’s unlikely to provide an objective and honest appraisal.  A better option is to use some targeted consultancy that will provide the necessary expertise, knowledge and importantly, objectivity.  Whether it’s delivered internally or via a third party the following approach has always proved successful.

Rather than using a prescriptive approach each time, a combination of the following will yield the relevant (and appropriate) information. 

The roles or groups will alter slightly depending on the organization but the following areas should be engaged to ensure the project is successful.

·         Key business stakeholders

·         Service Managers or Service Owners

·         Technical domain experts

·         Tooling Personnel – Monitoring, alerting etc

·         Existing capacity staff

·         Service Management personnel

Every environment is unique; however there are a number of key questions that should be asked. By thinking these through it will help to ensure you create a Strategy for Capacity Management, and if you need to de-scope elements to start building momentum, you will at least have a clear sight of your end objectives.

·         What information channels/interfaces exist currently?

·         What reports are available and the associated delivery mechanism?

·         What metrics are captured and how are their thresholds derived?

·         What tooling is available?

·         What KPIs are being used?

·         What capacity deliverables are being provided?

·         Is the business suffering from capacity outages?

·         Are upgrades performed in a timely fashion?

I’ll be looking at questionnaires and their relevance on Friday, in the meantime register to come along to my webinars on October 10th and 24th http://www.metron-athene.com/services/training/webinars/index.html

Rob Ford

Principal Consultant