At its core, server consolidation is an enabling approach designed to optimize the IT infrastructure by leveraging existing skills and resources and simplifying existing architectures across applications and data. It provides a foundation for new application investments, as well as quicker and more efficient application deployment for a faster time to market. In addition to combining physical assets, server consolidation can be a starting point for other initiatives, such as post-consolidation implementation of standards and procedures for application testing and deployment, or establishment of a disaster recovery plan. It can also be used to realign resources, to integrate enterprisewide architectures and improve access to information, or to implement high-availability solutions. Whatever the goals of a server consolidation - planning is critical.
Related white papers
IDC reports on Novell's Secure Desktop Solution: A Modern-Day Marriage of Business Benefit and Risk Reduction
The increasing mobility of the modern workforce and the competitive requirement to optimise that workforce with mobile communications has greatly increased the complexity of IT security. This IDC whitepaper examines...
Green IT: Reducing your Carbon Footprint with Citrix
Going green has become an imperative, not an option, for companies facing the new reality of balancing business objectives with dwindling environmental resources. Limited energy supply and skyrocketing costs are...
Protecting virtual macchines: the "best of Vmworld" approach
By enabling IT managers to move virtual machines (and the applications they host) between physical servers, server virtualization gives them a powerful method for reducing planned downtime and speeding recovery....
IDC Executive Brief: The Rising Concerns Over Endpoint Security
Today's IT environment is increasingly vulnerable to threats and attacks, both from within and without. The most vulnerable node in the enterprise network is the endpoint. This IDC executive brief...
Security Beyond Corporate Boundaries: Using Citrix Application Delivery to Protect Corporate Information Anywhere Business Happens
Ironclad security has become the Holy Grail for companies looking to protect corporate and customer information at large in the modern enterprise. The move toward greater data distribution -- thanks...
Identity and Security Management and Strong Information Technology Goverance
A total identity and access management (IAM) – driven goverance, risk and compliance (GRC) solution should ensure foolproof and accurate measurements of policies and practises across the enterprise. This IDC...
The End of Application Deployment: Virtualised Applications Streamline, Secure and Manage Your Business
Hundreds, even thousands, of applications serve as the life blood of each of today's distributed global enterprises - at use in more places and in more ways than ever before....

