About two months ago I published an updated version of the Cloud Services Cheat Sheet, the amount of (positive) feedback has been overwhelming, to say the least. Again, I have added and updated multiple columns including Big Data/Warehousing and Ping/latency times (visuals included) to the various European Data centers (from all three vendors) next to a few smaller updates. Note that I performed two separate Ping tests, one using standard ICMP and a second one using HTTP requests.
Continue ReadingFULLY UPDATED: Cloud Core Services Cheat Sheet
Average time to read: < 1 minuteHere you go, a fully updated sheet with help from the community – thank you! If you feel there is still something missing, do let me know. I cannot promise an update right away, but I’ll keep collecting feedback and get it in there eventually. I’ve added a (connection) protocol section (thanks Rachel) and updated 10 other fields (over 20% new content). Again, it’s not meant as a ‘like for like’ comparison sheet, it’s more of a ‘this is what to look for on a per-platform basis to get you started’ kind of thing. So, no this one is faster, better, cheaper etc…
Cloud Core Services Cheat Sheet. Compute, Networking, Storage, and Databases
Average time to read: 2 minutesThere are hundreds, if not thousands of different cloud services to choose from, it can be quite overwhelming. Where to start? Also, while each cloud vendor offers the same services and/or functionality (there are differences, of course) they all use slightly different naming conventions, which can be very confusing. That’s why I thought it would be helpful to list a bunch most used Cloud services (25 in total), on a per platform (AWS, Azure, and Google) basis, listing their main purpose/use-case and accompanying service names. This way you’ll know where to start and what to look for, hopefully. The primary focus lies on Compute, Networking, Storage, and Databases services – the building blocks of (Cloud) life.
Inside Citrix: The Prologue and first three chapters are online and available for download
Average time to read: < 1 minuteA moment I’ve been looking forward to for the past couple of weeks! I’ve just published the Inside Citrix prologue and the first three chapters – just to get you started. Click the link the below or directly visit chapters page via the main menu. Throughout the coming months, I’ll try and publish at least one chapter per week, though I might skip a week here and there, so bear with me.
All chapters of Inside Citrix – The FlexCast Management Architecture published online!
Average time to read: 4 minutes
Just over two years ago, around May the 16thmy book became available on Amazon, the paperback version that is. Two months later, the Kindle version was finished as well. Today I’m announcing the (soon to be) online availability of all chapters here on basvankaam dot com. Continue Reading
For your convenience – 100+ Citrix XenApp & XenDesktop FMA facts listed!
Average time to read: 15 minutesI like, no wait, I love lists… there, I’ve said it. But no, really, I think (bulleted) lists are one of the best ways to share facts and knowledge. That’s also why I used multiple lists in my book, dozens of them containing hundreds of bulleted (FMA) facts. Throughout the various chapters I highlight multiple so-called ‘FMA facts’, 116 in total to be exact and I conclude each chapter with a list of key takeaways. This post is meant to share with you most of the FMA Facts that I came up while writing The FlexCast Management Architecture, though I did slightly alter quite a few of them.
The Citrix XenApp & XenDesktop FMA Services complete overview – new 7.12 Services included
Average time to read: 15 minutesThe release of XenApp/XenDesktop version 7.12 introduced couple of new FMA services (primarily used by LHC) — time for an update. As you might be aware, I have written multiple articles on the FlexCast Management Architecture in the past (including my book) talking about its core services, their responsibilities, capabilities, communication channels/interfaces and so on. Throughout the past two years I also came up with a nice graphical overview (at least I like to think so) representing a Delivery Controller including all main FMA services. This article/post is meant to provide you with a continues update on the FMA and its primary core services, graphical overview included. Each time something changes you’ll read about it here – as soon as NDA has been lifted of course.
Inside Citrix – The making of & lessons learned!
Average time to read: 20 minutesNow that my book is out in the open I get a lot of questions about my approach. People are really interested to find out how long it took me to complete, what kind of tools I used, where I found the time, what drove me to write a book in the first place and of course what I’ve learned along the way. And since I like to share… hopefully this post will answer most, if not all of these and other questions you guys might have.
An in-depth look at the Citrix FMA Server VDA… The one that (almost) got away!
Average time to read: 5 minutesEver since the introduction of XenDesktop 7, where the FMA took over and XenApp was integrated, a lot has been written with regards to its components, services, agents and so on. What surprises me though, is that the Server VDA is (almost) never mentioned, while this is, or at least was a brand new component. Never before was it optional to install a (relatively) lightweight agent onto a XenApp server, it was basically all or nothing.
Containers? Docker? Docker on VMware. Docker on Windows. Docker on Citrix?
Average time to read: 11 minutesWith all the excitement going on around Docker, and containerisation in general, including the latest rumours around Microsoft’s Nano Server, I thought it might be useful to have a closer look at this technology to see what it can and cannot do and when it might be a good time to actually start using it in a real world scenario.