Jan 27, 2015

Citrix XenDesktop - Maintaining and Troubleshooting

10 Tips Every XenDesktop Admin Should Know

Top 10 Troubleshooting Tools for your Citrix Environment

Troubleshooting Provisioning Services Target Boot Processes

Best Practices for Implementing Administering and Troubleshooting XenDesktop 7.5

Configuring & Troubleshooting XenDesktop Sites

Implementing and Troubleshooting PVS

Jump Start your XenDesktop 7.5 Implementation

Citrix XenDesktop - Best Practice & Design

Design Citrix XenDesktop Built on FlexPod Citrix XenDesktop Using Citrix XenServer, Cisco Unified Computing System, Nexus 5000, and NetApp Storage

FlexPod Datacenter with Citrix XenDesktop 7.1 and Citrix XenServer 6.2 Appendix

FlexPod Datacenter with Citrix XenDesktop 7.1 and Citrix XenServer 6.2 Single Server and 2000-Seat Virtual Desktop Infrastructure with Citrix XenDesktop 7.1 Built on Cisco UCS B200-M3 Blade Servers with NetApp® FAS3200-Series and Citrix XenServer 6.2

FlexPod Datacenter for 2000 Seats of Citrix XenDesktop 7.1 on VMware vSphere 5.1

Scaling XenDesktop 7 to 5,000 users with VMware vSphere 5.1 (ESXi) on HP Server

Design for 4000 Seat Virtual Desktop Infrastructure Citrix XenDesktop 5.6 and Citrix XenApp 6.5 Built on Cisco Unified Computing System, Nexus 5500, EMC VNX7500, VMware ESXi 5.1

Design Solution - 1000 Seat - EMC Infrastructure for Virtual Desktops enabled by EMC VNX Series (FC), 3 VMware vSphere 4.1, and Citrix XenDesktop 5

Design Solution - 1000 Seat - EMC VNX - NFS for XenDesktop 5.5 - XenApp 6.5 - XenServer 6


Jan 26, 2015

Cisco Cloud and Systems Management - Prime Network

1. Introduction
Product Overview
Networks are becoming ever more complex in the era of virtualization, consisting of both physical and virtual infrastructures. Service providers are faced with the task of realigning network and data center operations with the corresponding operations support systems (OSSs) to build a more profitable operational model. Today’s disjointed management systems, however, make it difficult to achieve this.
Cisco Prime™ Network addresses this challenge by providing a single solution for device operation and fault management—supporting both the traditional physical network components, as well as compute, and the virtual elements—Cisco Prime Network helps service providers better meet the requirements of delivering carrier-class services. (Refer to Figure 1.)
Features
● Comprehensive, graphical views of the entire network from topology down to the device level with centralized inventory, status, and fault information (refer to Figures 2 and 3)
● GUI-based device component configuration with more than 200 prebuilt and downloadable configuration plug-ins
● Automated discovery, device configuration, and change management with up-to-date displays of network events, states, and changes
● Automatic root-cause identification, alarm reduction through de-duplication, and topology-guided troubleshooting
● Optimized for multilayer, multitechnology networks and enabled for multivendor network scenarios, supporting major third-party device types and configurations

2. Device Discovery and Administration

  • Autodiscover network elements and topology
  • View physical containment and logical inventory
  • Over 40 carrier technologies and services supported
  • Status of over 1500 attributes
  • Use the integrated topology and fault viewer
  • Support configuration and diagnostics
  • Over 200 bundled command scripts (more added through community site)
  • Command script builder (model-based scripting)
  • Add soft properties: extend inventory discovery
  • Define additional threshold-crossing alarms
  • Provide secure authentication (LDAP or local), and role-based authorization, with full security auditing
  • Create inventory and top-event reports

.....

3. Documents

Cisco Prime Network Introduction

Cisco Prime Network Business Overview

Cisco_Prime_Network 3.9 Business Overview

Cisco Prime Network 4.1 Business Overview

Cisco Prime for IP NGN Technical Education Series Introduction to Prime Network

Cisco Prime Network 4.0 Business Overview

Cisco Prime Deep Dive


Cisco Cloud Computing - Cloupia

1. Overview





Cisco Cloupia is a centralized management solution that enables IT departments to experience the full benefits of their converged infrastructure investment by continuing to reduce TCO and save staff time with transparent unified management. When combined with the industry’s leading converged infrastructure solutions, Cisco Cloupia:
  • Improves agility of IT to meet growth and business initiatives
  • Lowers cost per user without sacrificing scalability
  • Reduces the need for specialized operation skills and processes and decreases costs
  • Delivers management capabilities for multitenant and secure multitenant environments to accommodate virtualized workloads running alongside non-virtualized workloads
Cisco Cloupia delivers these benefits through the features listed in Table 1.

 2. Automate Service Delivery





3. Documents

Cisco Cloupia BDM Deck

Cisco Cloupia: Orchestratie en self-service tooling Unified Data Center

Cloupia Overview



Cisco Cloud Computing - CIAC

1. Overview







  • Cloud Management and Orchestration
    • Cisco Intelligent Automation for Cloud delivers a self-service portal and orchestration engine to automate provisioning across physical and virtual resources for public, private, or hybrid cloud environments.

  • Enable organizations to deliver a disciplined and structured automation solution to manage cloud environments
  • Accommodate complex customer’s technical and business requirements offering end users a single interface for requesting a comprehensive array of services
  • Accelerate and expand cloud adoption
  • Lower cost of operating via Open Source solutions
  • Standardize and simplify provisioning, configuration, troubleshooting  and lifecycle management of your cloud infrastructure
2. CIAC 4 What's new

More than 800 out of the box Services and Workflows covering basic and complex IaaS use cases
Over 500 extension points for easy customization
Deploy cloud within existing IT practices, policies and systems
Leverage pre-existing “runbooks”








  • Cisco UCS Director 4.1
  • Cisco Nexus 1000v
  • Cisco Cloud Services Router
  • Cisco ASA 1000v
  • Cisco Virtual Security Gateway
  • Cisco Prime Network Services Controller
  • Cisco Prime IPAM
  • Citrix Netscaler VPX
  • OpenStack
  • VMware vCloud Director
  • Amazon AWS



3. Architecture


  • IAC Base
    • Cisco Prime Service Catalog (Installation or Appliance)
    • Cisco Process Orchestrator
  • Compute Virtualization
    • VMware vCenter
    • VMware vCloud Director
    • OpenStack
  • Cisco UCS Director
    • Networking Virtualization Services
    • Cisco IAC Management Appliance
    • Cisco Prime Network Services Controller
  • Bare Metal Provisioning
    • Cisco Server Provisioner (Bare Metal and Virtual)

4. Documents


Cisco’s Cloud Solutions with CIAC 4 Deep Dive




Jan 23, 2015

Cisco UCS vs Legacy vs HP vs IBM Blade

1. Cisco UCS vs Legacy



Architecture and Scale
Cisco UCS Architecture
Legacy Designs
Unified Compute
Scattered, De-centralized Compute
•Stateless Computing, abstracted identity
•Portable Identities - form factor agnostic, blade to rack server identity transfer
•Physical & virtual functionally combined
•No truly functional identity abstraction
•Blade and rack servers segregated, no identity portability between form factors
•Physical & virtual identities independent





I/O and Virtualization
Cisco UCS Architecture
Legacy Designs
Unified Fabric
Siloed and Complex
•Single port - LAN, SAN, Mgmt path
•Reduced complexity
•Physical & virtual port end to end visibility and control with a single tool
•Multiple I/O protocols & stranded capacity
•High port consumption, no design leverage
•Limited & separate physical & virtual port visibility, minimal control, multiple tools





Management
Cisco UCS Architecture
Legacy Designs
Unified Management
Complex Mgmt Structure
•Single mgmt tool, single interface
•Highly collaborative roles based control
•Mgmt interface leveraged across multiple servers and domains
•Multiple mgmt tools, multiple interfaces
•Every Administrator has multiple tools
•Duplicative mgmt points and access, complicated and inefficient with no scale








2. Blade Architecture and Scaling


3. IO and Virtualization


4. Management

5. Documents


Unified Computing System Market Traction

C- series Competitive Overview

Cisco UCS Architecture Comparison Technical Decision Maker

ucs_architecture_comparison_deck_business_decision_maker

Cisco UCS Compute Intra-Line & Side by Side Competitive Compares

Cisco UCS Architecture Comparison Technical Decision Maker

Cisco UCS Architecture Comparison Business Decision Maker

Cisco UCS Technical Decision Maker TCO Competitive Overview

Cisco UCS vs. IBM Flex System

UCS vs. HP Blade Chassis Pricing

Power Efficiency Comparison: Cisco UCS 5108 Blade Chassis and IBM Flex System Enterprise Chassis

Cisco UCS Architecture and Management: Comparison with IBM Flex System

UCS vs IBM Flex

Cisco UCS Outperforms IBM Flex System Blades

How to Differentiate UCS from HP BladeSystem

Cisco UCS Architecture Comparison - Best Rated