IBM VMready software

Highlights

• Manage virtual machines in the network across the entire data centre including end devices compliant with the 802.1Qbg standard¹
• Discover and identify virtual machines in the data centre—automatically
• Create groups of similar virtual machines with dedicated switch resources and isolated from other virtual machines
• Track all virtual machines during migrations
• Reconfigure network settings automatically
• No proprietary tagging or changes to hypervisor software
• Works with all major hypervisors
• Supports IEEE 802.1Qbg Edge Virtual Bridging
• Scales across multiple physical switches and to any edge device supporting the 802.1Qbg standard
• Integration with VMware vCenter
• Track virtual machines during migrations with automatic reconfiguration of network settings
• Uses open standards and requires no propriety tagging or changes to Hypervisor software
• Works with all major hypervisors including: VMware, Hyper-V, Xen, KVM and Oracle VM

Current networking switches are not aware of virtual machines (VM) and this can lead to incorrect network configurations that can expose virtual machines to service outages or security breaches, and prevent virtualisation from reaching its full potential in creating cloud computing and dynamic data centres.

IBM System Networking has patented a unique solution to make the network virtual machine aware. The approach—called VMready®—extends the concept of virtualisation into the network, so that network polices can be configured for virtual machines, rather than just for the physical switch port.