This June 2009 white paper was jointly written by Cisco and VMware. It elaborates on virtualized DMZs (the concept that was called "Fully Collapsed DMZ" in VMware's earlier white paper DMZ Virtualization with VMware Infrastructure) in much more detail and with a focus son the Cisco Nexus !00V virtual switch. Interestingly, it doe snot mention VMware's own vShield Zones technology, indicating some duplication of effort/divergence in research after VMware's purchase of some BlueLane assets. All in all, a worth-whilw and more sophisticated take on DMZs than the earlier white paper, which, however, remains valid as it also discusses other models of separation.

Is it State-of-the-Art or pre-launch advertising? In any case our editors believe that Cisco's overview of this new (and at least partially proprietary) hardware-centric approach to Network Virtualization is a must read. It contains a very sound summary of the network challenges in virtualized environments, a recap of VMware's Distributed Virtual Switch (DVS), Cisco's Nexus 1000V and a somewhat vague introduction to concepts such as port profile, VN-Link and vEth.

This 2008 Joint Cisco and VMware White Paper makes the case for using 10Gb Ethernet in VMware environments. The evident intention to promote Cisco's Nexus switches does not reduce the value of the discussion. It makes a strong case for network virtualization in the sense of replacing NIC sprawl with redundant 10Gb cards.

A June 2009 research presentation by a team from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and AT&T Research presented at HotCloud09. Academic research tries to go beyond the current state-of-the-art. Therefore we typically do not include research papers in our collection. Why this one? Mostly because of the problems it summarizes and less because of the sketch of a proposed solution. It is an interesting summary of problems that enterprises and enterprise applications face in the cloud. Importantly it is directly positioned at the interface of networking and cloud/virtualization (the presentation explicitly focuses on virtualization-based clouds). It also includes a brief summary of CloudNet, a research project that addresses the resulting set of issues.

This April 2009 revision of the classic Cisco SAFE Reference Guide covers all aspects of network security including some virtualization related issues. In particular, it makes the case for the Cisco Nexus 1000V virtual switch. Enough to make it a "must read".

A December 2008 Implementation Guide by Juniper. It is less detailed than the corresponding Cisco document, but since it's only one third of the length a much quicker read. An absolute "must" only for (the still rare) users of Juniper switches, but still a highly recommended second opinion for pure-play Cisco environments.

VMware's official guide in its updated version for ESX 3.5 and VirtualCenter 2.5 is the more current alternative to the more thorough Department of Defense STIG. A must read when you upgrade.

This 2009 white paper by Cisco provides a brief and non-technical summary of network virtualization by the most important vendor in the space. Marketing material or unbiased white paper? Both. While weak on technical content we believe it is a must read because it provides context for network virtualization. Ironically it is actually marketing material that is biased. How is that possible? Given Cisco's market share just growing the market in a vendor-neutral way is proper marketing ...

Virtualization of network DMZs becomes more common, this white paper helps network, security and virtualization professionals to stay (or get) on the same page. It provides descriptions of three different virtualized DMZ configurations and identifies best practice approaches that enable secure deployment.

A May 2008 joint white paper by VMware and Cisco that summarizes best practices for deploying VMware ESX severs in a Cisco network. Most aspects, however, apply to non-Cisco network and storage environments. The document also serves as an introduction to ESX for network engineers or as an introduction to virtual networks for server virtualization professionals. A detailed and hands-on reference that makes day-to-day operations easier.