Feature

posted 2 Feb 2007 in Volume 9 Issue 8

Virtualisation: reality

All law firms need to maximise their efficiency to remain competitive. Cost-effective IT systems are crucial and server capacity is one area where considerable savings can be realised. Virtualisation software can allocate resources to multiple applications from one server.

By Ian Lauwerys, IT director, Kennedys

‘Virtualisation’ is the latest buzzword sweeping through the IT department, and unlike some over-hyped technology fads, it seems that this one really can deliver on its promises. As the 7,000 attendees of the VMWorld conference recently held in Los Angeles will attest, virtualisation is re-shaping the IT landscape for law firms.

The fall and rise of virtualisation

Virtualisation was invented in the mainframe era of the 1960s in order to make better use of expensive computer resources. It is a technique for dividing one physical computer into several ‘virtual’ computers, thus making it possible to perform multiple tasks simultaneously. The technology had fallen out of favour by the mid 1980s, however. For one thing, the low cost of PC-based servers made mainframes irrelevant to all but the largest businesses. For another, improvements to server operating systems made it possible to undertake multiple tasks simultaneously on the same computer.

Virtualisation didn’t fade into complete obscurity, however. Both Citrix and Microsoft’s Terminal Server products use virtualisation techniques to run desktop applications such as Word for multiple users on a single shared server. Some 40 years after it was invented, the wheel has now turned full circle and virtualisation is solving the headaches of a new generation of server-based applications.

Too much power

Today’s IT department faces a new problem; computer power is cheaper than ever, but hard to make use of efficiently. Over its lifetime, your firm’s e-mail or accounts server may only use 15 per cent of its available capacity. This significant waste of resources has a direct impact on your firm’s bottom line.

For example, buying a fairly modest server, housing it in central London and operating it over a typical five-year lifespan will cost your firm anywhere up to £10,000. Up to 75 per cent of the money you put into capital investment, floor space and electricity is wasted.

Even a modest set up of perhaps 20 servers will lose a firm as much as £150,000 of profit over five years. This waste isn’t just profligacy on the part of the IT department, but rather a compromise designed to address a number of problems. Each server must have enough capacity to cope with peaks in demand that occur for a few hours a day, or on a few days in a month. The accounts server will also be working at full stretch during the year-end billing run, but may spend much of the rest of the time idling along at five or ten per cent of its capacity. It will use nearly as much electrical power (and thus generate as much heat) when ‘idle’ as when it is working at full capacity.

Servers running several applications tend to be less reliable due to conflicts between those applications. Software vendors and IT teams prefer to install each application on its own server to guarantee that it will be available when the firm needs it.

Managing the allocation of resources to different applications running on the same server is also difficult. Applications compete for resources rather than being allocated them based on how important they are to the firm’s business.

Moving an existing application that has outgrown the demands of its old server to a new one is also expensive, risky and potentially disruptive to the business. IT departments sensibly over-specify servers to put the day off for as long as possible.

Until now, the most pragmatic response to these challenges has been the “one application, one server” approach adopted by most IT departments but this result is unsatisfactory for both the IT department and the firm’s partners.

The frustrations faced by Westminster firm Winckworth Sherwood are entirely typical. According to IT manager Sam Luxford-Watts, “We were running out of space and available power in the server room. We were forced to purchase additional servers for each new project, yet we knew that many of the servers we already had were under-utilised.”

Virtualisation to the rescue

At its heart, virtualisation is a relatively simple piece of software that pretends to be computer hardware. All the IT team needs to do is install some additional virtualisation software on a new server before installing the operating system in the usual manner.

The extra virtualisation software fools the operating system into thinking it has exclusive control of the server’s processors, memory and disk drives and thus everything behaves exactly as it would in a normal installation. Virtualisation’s neat trick is that a second operating system can now be installed on the same server, which also thinks it has exclusive control of the hardware resources.

Multiple ‘virtual servers’ can be created to make full use of the physical server’s capacity, while keeping each isolated from the misdemeanours of other virtual servers on the same machine. One virtual server can crash or be restarted with no impact on its neighbours.

Just as usefully, each virtual server is entirely self-contained in a handful of (very large) files, which, as we’ll see, solves a number of previously intractable problems.

Quarts into pint pots

Virtualisation’s big planet (and wallet) saving benefit is that it eliminates energy-wasting equipment. The IT team can now install multiple virtual servers on a single box, and decide how much memory, processor and disk resource is allocated to each application.

Luxford-Watts explains: “Virtualisation has enabled us to cut our physical servers from 22 to just seven. We found it hard to believe at first, but our systems are more responsive with less hardware, as we can now allocate resources to applications as they require them.”

However, while the results achieved by Winckworth Sherwood are remarkable, they are by no means an exceptional case. According to Taylor Vinters director of IT, Steve Sumner: “Our firm has achieved significant savings in space, power consumption and cooling requirements since we introduced virtualisation. Of our 41 main servers, half are now virtualised and run on just four physical boxes.”

VMWare, a vendor of virtualisation technology, estimates its customers are currently running more than one million virtual servers, with estimated annual energy savings in excess of $560m. That is about the same as the residents of New England in the US spend each year on heating, ventilation and cooling – just the tip of a very large (and melting) iceberg of potential energy savings.

Averting disaster

Most applications have to be moved to a new server at some point in their life. In the very worst case scenario, the equipment may have been destroyed by a fire or similar disaster, but the cause is often a more mundane problem such as breakdown or the need to move to a more powerful box as the firm grows. Unfortunately, it is not simply a matter of copying everything from one server to another and then hitting the ‘on’ button. Configuring the operating system to support a new set of hardware is fraught with problems and the end result is often an unreliable server.

The usual solutions are either to pay a hefty premium to duplicate critical equipment at another location, or to spend several weeks re-installing everything from scratch. However, the latter approach never produces an exact match for the old system and isn’t an acceptable option in a disaster recovery situation.

By way of contrast, virtualisation presents a standardised set of ‘virtual hardware’ to the operating system regardless of the underlying physical hardware. Moving a virtual server between completely different types of hardware is simply a matter of installing the virtualisation software and then copying the handful of virtual server files to the new machine.

Sumner continues: “Operating from our single Cambridge site brings additional business-continuity risks, and so we must replicate all key systems and data at an offsite location. Virtualisation has enabled my team to create this crucial safety net using just two physical servers located in a specialist data centre, once again achieving considerable cost savings when compared with a traditional solution.”

Solving security headaches

One of the biggest headaches for any IT department is dealing with the increasing pace at which new security vulnerabilities are exploited. Major threats to the firm’s IT systems require the team to respond in a few hours or minutes rather than days or weeks. As most specialist legal applications have exacting set-up requirements, the rush to address a new security threat carries a significant risk of breaking the very thing you are trying to protect.

However, virtualisation makes it possible to take a copy of an existing server, apply a security patch and then test it in an isolated environment in a matter of minutes. If no problems are discovered, the updated server can be copied back in to the live system immediately.

According to Sumner: “Virtualisation has released us from this Catch-22 situation. We can maintain a high degree of security, while at the same time being confident of recovering immediately from unforeseen problems caused by a new security fix. For the firm’s partners, ensuring systems are available when needed is far more important than any cost savings that we have achieved.”

The ability to copy, update and test quickly is also proving useful in more routine tasks. “We were able to completely mirror our live e-mail system on a test network and upgrade it to a new version without the need to purchase additional equipment. This entire upgrade was completed without any interruption to service,” explains Luxford-Watts.

The main players

Unsurprisingly, virtualisation is the new battleground for software corporations and it is far too early to predict who will emerge as the eventual winner. The two front-runners are Microsoft and VMWare (a subsidiary of computer storage company EMC), with a whole host of others vying for a place at the head of the pack.

VMWare has built up its position from start-up to global player in seven years. Microsoft, meanwhile, is pursing its favourite market-domination strategy of buying up innovative technology companies, application virtualisation specialist Softricity being the most recent example. These newly acquired products are quickly assimilated and released at a low cost or as add-ons to Microsoft’s lucrative software assurance agreements.

Both main players have a range of products covering both the desktop and server virtualisation spheres, including a number of free products aimed at those dipping a toe in the water. Regardless of the current uncertainty, however, virtualisation is being adopted rapidly by law firms small and large. It gives everyone the opportunity to achieve a level of resilience that was hitherto the preserve of only the largest firms. An entire IT set-up can be replicated using very modest amounts of equipment and time. The range of benefits obtained with little or no disruption makes it irresistibly attractive to both IT managers and partners with an eye on the bottom line.

Case study: Kennedys

The recent project to launch the Kennedys Sydney office illustrates further the benefits of the ‘hardware agnostic’ nature of virtual servers. Flying out a large team of IT staff and suppliers to set up the systems for the new office was ruled out on the grounds of cost and practicality. From previous experience, it was known that installing everything on hardware in the UK and then shipping it overseas was equally costly and would miss the opening deadline.

The solution was to build a set of six virtual servers in the UK using experienced staff and suppliers. This enabled the team to create a system of the highest standard and prove that it was fully working. At the same time a local IT supplier in Sydney procured and set up a pair of suitable servers and the virtualisation software, which is a VMWare product in this case.

The fully tried and tested virtual servers were copied to a backup tape and couriered down under. Three days later we had the complete system up and running, right on schedule and for about 30 per cent less than the cost estimates for a more traditional approach.

What’s more, because the virtual servers are just files, the process can be repeated effortlessly. According to Luxford-Watts: “We set up all of our new servers by copying existing templates. We can create a new server in minutes with no set-up or configuration errors, which has drastically cut the time taken to install new applications and upgrades.”

It is easy to see how having a complete set of IT systems packed and ready to go would save time and money in other scenarios too – in a merger situation, for example, or the set up of a litigation support system for a major case.

In another example, one of two brand new servers actually broke down in Kennedys’ recently opened Sydney office. It took us a matter of minutes to transfer all the virtual servers from the failed server to the remaining one. The fault was repaired and the virtual servers copied back again with no material impact on the firm’s business.

Ian Lauwerys is IT director of Kennedys. He can be contacted at i.lauwerys@kennedys-law.com