As for the storage tier stuff, tier differentiation on the basis of characteristics like availability or performance is exactly what I’m talking about – I dont think I implied anything otherwise? The classification of anything according to things like service level or performance metric is by definition tiering, there is a graded relationship.

Unfortunately I’m not going to make it to VMworld, but when I come back home for a visit I will definitely try to catch up with you for a beer. And thanks for the comments

Rodos

Firstly UCS is not cloud. UCS is an interesting platform for building cloud on, just like it may be for building virtualisation on. I post on it because its interesting and something that others are interested in. I tag my posts and have asked VMware to feed only posts I tag with VMware, but they don’t they take all of them. I can’t help that. I know Scott has been posting on UCS too.

As to the Cloud adoption bit. Agree on the meta data thoughts. Especially as you move into larger organisations. That metadata may be human generated from the business units or it may be automated through other systems generating requests for services. I have described before (and keep pushing VMware to ensure they include in the vCloud APIs) the inclusion of customer specific placement and movement algorithms that manipulate your own metadata. For example the vCloud API may review the standard meta data in your workload and determine that out of your set of 16 data centers (some internal, some external) only 5 of those meet the criteria. However you may have metadata on your workload that vCloud does not understand or you many not even want to tell someone about. You want to write your own placement algorithm that you can program and load that may reduce that set of 5 down to a possible 2. For example you may have your own regulatory requirements around data placement or latency requirements to facilities that only you can know about or measure.

One other element, you mention metadata being related to Tiers of storage as an example. I believe that Metadata for the cloud may need to be further abstracted and instead be based on a service level or performance metric. You should not care what tier of storage its on, rather care that it performs in a certain way.

A few of us have been discussing this metadata you speak of a little while ago, see http://www.elasticvapor.com/2009/07/cloud-service-rating-system.html

Would love to catch up with you at VMworld and get some of your insights.

When you see UCS posts, hit next or delete and tell Mr Troyer to aggregate based on tags. If its on Cloud, keep on keeping us honest and relevant to your market.

Fantastic stuff!

Rodos