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Amazon Web Services (AWS) offers increased agility, developer productivity, pay-as-you-go pricing and overall cost savings. But you might wonder where to start, what pitfalls exist and how can you avoid them? How can you best save time and money? Learn what you need to know and where to start before launching an AWS-hosted service.

AWS has introduced Auto Scaling so that you can take advantage of cloud computing without having to incur the costs of adding more personnel or building your own software. You can use Auto Scaling to scale for high availability, to meet increasing system demand, or to control costs by eliminating unneeded capacity. You can also use Auto Scaling to quickly deploy software for massive systems, using testable, scriptable processes to minimize risk and cost of deployment.

The technologies examined reduce operational expenses (OpEx), not capital expenses (CapEx) that has traditionally been the focus of virtualization. Many companies implemented virtualization with the goal of saving money in the form of fewer servers to buy with a side benefit of reducing the footprint of the servers and lowering the required power and cooling. Most of the savings were in capital, but do not expect the same with many of the technologies listed here, because some may even require some additional capital expenditures, at least for software, in order to save on the day-to-day operations of IT. The bigger cost in running an IT department is in the OpEx category anyway, so savings there are recurring.

In 2013, VMware announced VMware Virtual SAN (VSAN), which is VMware's native version of Software Defined Storage (SDS). It is simple, easy to setup and managed by user-defined policies. This paper explains VSAN, its basic requirements and how it works.

Amazon Web Services: An OverviewThere's a really good chance that Amazon Web Services (AWS) has more than a few products to help you work faster, smarter, and more cost effectively. After all, the depth and breadth of AWS is significant, comprising more than 30 services in dozens of data centers located in nine regions across the globe. They offer computing, storage, networking, deployment, management, and a host of supporting services, such as queues and email services. Getting a clear understanding of what AWS is and how it can help your business can be challenging. Never fear. In this hour-long webinar, Global Knowledge instructor and cloud and big data analyst Rich Morrow will help. He'll give an overview of AWS and its many benefits.

This paper is aimed at IT professionals who are interested in earning a VMware Certified Professional on Data Center Virtualization (VCP5-DCV) certification. It provides the benefits of having the certification, details for earning the certification and tips for passing the exam.

VMware Horizon 6 was announced in April and began shipping in June 2014, bringing a more unified suite delivering more integration with infrastructure and cloud products and more simplicity for all devices. Along with the numerous updates across the Horizon suite, VMware has transitioned to a more traditional product licensing hierarchy. This paper explores the new licensing model and provides an overview of the new features associated with VMware Horizon 6.

With VMware's recent release of the Horizon Suite (specifically View 6), VMware has taken the performance and usability features and put them all under the Blast moniker. This category of features is grouped from a marketing perspective but will retain their technical terms in the documentation, similar to how the term vSphere encompasses both ESXi and vCenter. Learn about the various features of the components that comprise the Blast family, including a brief discussion of what they are, improvements in version 6, and any notes or requirements for implementation.

One of the advantages of vSphere is that you can move a virtual machine from one location to another, across servers, storage locations-even data centers. Physical servers don't have that ability and that can have many implications for disaster recovery, availability, and so forth. This white paper explains why migrations are useful, the methods that vSphere makes available for you to manually move a virtual machine (VM), and how vSphere can automate the process for you in various scenarios.

This white paper explores the native AWS storage solutions, enabling you to deliver applications in the cloud in the most efficient, cost-effective, and secure manner. In terms of storage, it's important to understand the characteristics of each AWS storage option so that you can implement one or more AWS storage services to meet your needs. Often, you'll find that utilizing multiple storage options together will give you the best outcomes.