I remember when VMware was just a cool desktop app for safely testing new code in a sandbox. I've led projects to move applications onto partitioned AIX machines, VMware ESX, and even Linux for zSeries. I've seen consolidation rates as high as 50 servers per month. Yep, I've got some experience with virtual servers.

While gaining all this wonderful experience, I haven't been shy about asking folks for information and advice. Friends, family, co-workers, vendors, competitors, anyone who may make my project more efficient. I also feel like I'm pretty good with Google. When I try something new I track down every piece of prior art I can find. Thus, I've discovered that certain types of information are rare:

• There's a lot of information on what software to install and what knobs to turn to get a guest up and running in a virtual server environment, but little about how to determine whether a given application is a good virtual server candidate.
• The industry hasn't stepped up to teach support organizations how to manage virtual server environments. 60% of network managers, engineers and IT executives polled at this year's Interop reported that the primary problem with virtualization was a lack of experience to appropriately manage the technology.
• A multitude of consulting firms, large and small, offer to help you install VMware, but have you found any to help you update your server procurement process to take advantage of rapid VM provisioning?
• Lots of vendors talk about capacity-on-demand, but have any offered to help you streamline your decommissioning process to make capacity-on-demand worthwhile? Have any of your vendors mentioned how to design an internal server charge-back model that provides the proper incentives around application platform choices?

Am I wrong? Are truly myriad vendors and consulting firms waiting to help you with virtual server-specific project management issues? Are there a bunch of IT charge-back templates that account for Total Cost of Ownership, including data center floor space, system administration headcount, power and cooling? If so, leave a comment below. If not, keep checking this space for valuable information about the business side of virtual servers. Indeed, I don't think I'm starting a virtualization blog. I'm starting a virtualization-aware blog... and that's what I wish I'd seen several years ago.