If you are of the mind that everyone else in the world understands virtualization, while you’re still trying to understand just what it is to begin with, and how you might take advantage of it or not, you’re not alone. Virtualization is a new technology. (Actually, it’s a pretty well-established technology, but a merging of conditions happening just now has brought it into new light)
It seems like everywhere you go these days, someone is talking about virtualization. Computer, CPA, and other technical magazines put the technology on their covers. Virtualization seminars and trade show sessions feature the trend, and in great demand, at technology conferences. So what is it?
Virtualization is a technology being widely applied today with excellent working and financial benefits, but many just don’t quite understand it or use it. The purpose of this series is to give you an understanding of how virtualization works and what has validated its need in such high fashion today.
Ok already…so what is it?
Virtualization is a computer software technology in which access to a single underlying piece of hardware, like a server, being managed so that multiple guest operating systems can share that single piece of hardware. This is all done without the guest operating system being aware that it is actually sharing anything at all. (A guest operating system is an operating system that’s hosted by the underlying virtualization software layer, which we call the host system.) A guest operating system appears to its running applications and services as a complete operating system (OS), and the guest OS is completely unaware that it’s running on a virtualization software platform and not directly on a dedicated piece physical hardware.
More to come soon…
