Management tools
Do I use the same tools to manage a virtualized server as I do to manage my current physical servers? What do I keep, what do I toss and what do I need to acquire?

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This is a great question! Despite the importance of managing virtual machines, it seems like many IT departments tend to look at administering virtualization as an afterthought. In general, I recommend that virtualization administrators treat their virtual machines (VMs) just as they would physical ones. Best practices such as managing security, monitoring performance, and keeping systems up-to-date should be followed for both physical and virtual systems. This is especially true for VMs that will participate on production networks.

Regarding management tools, a good first step is to continue to use whatever practices apply to your other machines. For example, if you have deployed an enterprise-level server monitoring solution or have developed a patch management infrastructure, you can add the virtual machines to the list of systems to be managed. The good news is that, in most cases, the tools you're using don't have to be virtualization-aware. Of course, virtualized environments do have additional needs. If you want the ability to compare guest OS performance with host resource usage, the ability to move VMs and dynamic resource allocation, you'll need to find (or build) virtualization-aware management products.

The bottom line: Over time, all major system management solutions will support virtualization. Until then, stick to leveraging your current tools and practices and add in specialized virtualization management layers if necessary.

This was first published in September 2006

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