Xen and Gone?
A random blogger recently made a rather
stunning
prediction: That Xen is as good as dead. His logic? Citrix, which bought
Xen, is so wedded to Microsoft that it will kill Xen in favor of Hyper-V.
I interviewed Citrix chief Mark Templeton for the premiere issue of Virtualization
Review magazine (you can check out the article here).
The interview came just as Microsoft and Citrix were announcing a multiyear
cooperation agreement over virtualization. The deal calls for both companies
to support each others' hypervisors, Hyper-V and Xen, and work on interoperability.
I asked Templeton how he can support Microsoft's Hyper-V and still give his
full weight to Xen. It's a delicate balancing act, but Templeton explained that
he would leave it up to customers. He also made it clear that he wouldn't be
at all shy about pushing Hyper-V.
That is the kind of talk that got Brian Madden, the blogger, speculating that
Xen was ultimately dead.
Virtualization Review Editor Keith Ward took on the issue in his
own blog.
My take? Citrix and Microsoft have had complementary and competitive products
in the thin client space for years. And Xen, more than anything, is an open
source tool that helps Citrix build relationships with the likes of Sun, IBM
and Novell. I don't think it's going anywhere.
Posted by Doug Barney on July 10, 2008