There are few things more frustrating to an employee than
being forced to do tasks that require little skill and lots of time.
Busy-work, as it is most commonly known, forces smart and talented
people to devote a great deal of time to finish something that does not
push them or use their skills wisely. This is particularly true of IT
administrators who must maintain computer systems for their company. IT
admins are often unable to focus their time on solving challenging
problems because they must update technology systems that are more
tedious than rewarding. Over time this can wear down the IT admin and
damage the company’s production.
One source of this frustration is a multiple server environment. This
environment necessitates that an IT admin devote a large portion of his
or her time to upkeep and managing the system when he or she would feel
more rewarded creating a solution to a more serious threat. It is
dangerous for a company to relegate an IT admin to this task because it
can damage moral and limit the company’s capacity for growth.
In multiple server environments information, operating systems and
applications are spread across several different servers. Each server
must be individually maintained, backed up and updated by the IT
administrator. The job is repetitive and does not require him or her to
use all of the knowledge that he or she has spent years acquiring. It
also limits the remaining time that the IT admin can use to benefit the
company by focusing on streamlining operations.
A multiple server environment also creates stress adding expenses to the
IT budget. Purchasing, storing and updating the machines are expensive
processes. As the company grows the expenses increase as more servers
need to be purchased and there is even more time required to keep them
running properly. Some companies have viewed this practice as a
necessary evil because it is the way that they have always done business
but many companies are creating a solution by switching to a
virtualization infrastructure.
A virtualization infrastructure allows a company to put all of its data
on a single server. Operating systems, applications and information are
housed on a single machine rather than spread around several different
machines. The information stored on the server can then be accessed by
virtual computers sharing the single server’s resources. This
arrangement allows the IT admins to spend less time focusing on the
upkeep of multiple machines.
Virtualization infrastructures provide the same level of protection as
multiple server environments. The data are kept in different places on
the server. Each different place is secure and separate from the others;
if one area experiences an issue the remaining areas as untouched and
remain accessible while the problem is addressed.
After a company switches to a virtualization infrastructure it should be
sure to protect its new investment. I/O bandwidth bottlenecks from
accelerated fragmentation, virtual machine competition for shared I/O
resources not being properly prioritized across the platform and virtual
disks set to dynamically grow not resizing when data are deleted are
all problems that arise on a virtualization infrastructure that has not
been properly protected.
Luckily protecting a virtualization infrastructure is not expensive, all
a company needs to do is install virtualization software on the
infrastructure platform.
Virtualization software, like V-locity from the
Diskeeper Corporation, works to prevent the problems that are common in
virtualization infrastructures. V-locity acts as a virtual disk
optimizer to perform background optimization and improve the overall
performance of the system.
By creating a fast and efficient computing platform for new
consolidation and provisioning initiatives, with no need for additional
hardware, V-locity prevents bottleneck issues. Resource usage is
coordinated to eliminate competition for I/O resources and the virtual
disk is compacted to prevent the disk from “bloating.” The software
provides a solution to these issues to keep your IT admins free and able
to work on more lucrative projects.
Companies need to make sure that their IT admins are cared for and not
relegated to tasks that make them feel underutilized. Switching to a
virtualization infrastructure and keeping it protected with
virtualization software will allow the IT admins to take up rewarding
challenges and push your company’s development forward.
