One of my favorite presentations at the recent DevOps Enterprise Summit 2015 was Jeffrey Snover of distinguished engineer at Microsoft talking about his 16 year quest to bring what is today called Windows Nano Server to market.  Interestingly when I spoke with Gene Kim about what he thought were some of the best presentations  of DOES he also brought up Snover’s presentation as well.

Windows Server without Windows was something once considered heretical from anyone at Microsoft. As Jeffrey relayed to me in the interview below and on stage, he paid a price for evangelizing for this. But today we have a version of Windows Server that has only 1/20th of the footprint of regular Windows Server. It runs on mainframes, command lines and has virtually (no pun intended) all of the functionality that you need for a server in the cloud without the GUI overhead that Windows usually brings.

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Which of the following best describes how you currently monitor and manage systems across your hybrid cloud environment?(Required)

Multiple separate tools for different environments

Multiple separate tools for different monitoring and management functions

Single consolidated dashboard

Custom built monitoring and management solution

No full monitoring and management solution

Don’t know

How valuable would it be for your monitoring and management solution to incorporate predictive analytics to help you identify and address system issues that are critical and not waste time or effort working through all the data and “noise” that is not critical?(Required)

Extremely valuable

Moderately valuable

Somewhat valuable

Slightly valuable

Not valuable

How do you most typically address potential system issues BEFORE they impact your operations?(Required)

Automated workflows and playbooks to remediate potential issues as soon as they are detected

An orchestrated response process that leverages automation, AI, and human expertise to rapidly respond to potential issues

Advanced monitoring tools such as predictive analytics and anomaly detection to proactively identify and address potential issues

Respond to issues as they arise, using manual processes and troubleshooting techniques

A combination of automated remediation, orchestrated response, and/or proactive monitoring to address potential system issues

Don’t know

Other

What methods does your organization use to control and monitor cloud/IT spending?(Required)

Centralized procurement processes

Pre-approved budget thresholds

Automated cost monitoring tools

Department-level spending controls

Regular cost audits and reviews

Cloud cost optimization platform

Approval workflows for resource provisioning

Native financial operations tools provided by the cloud provider

No formal controls in place

Don’t know

Other

Please specify:

Which methods do you rely on most to detect security vulnerabilities in your systems?(Required)

Automated scanning tools

Manual assessments

Vendor notifications

Threat modeling (for early detection)

None of these

Don’t know

Other

Please specify:

What are the TWO most common ways you prioritize vulnerabilities to address within your environment?(Required)

Based on potential impact

Based on exploitability

Regulatory compliance requirements

Based on CVSS scores

Risk-based analysis of multiple factors

First-in-first-out approach

No formal prioritization process

Don’t know

How do you typically handle system updates and security patches?(Required)

Automated updates and patches

Manually review and apply updates and patches on a regular schedule

A combination of automation and manual review

Apply updates and patches on an as-needed basis.

Outsourced update and patch management

No defined process

Don’t know

Other

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As importantly for me, Jeffrey also gave us a glimpse of what it is like to work in Satya Nadella’s Microsoft. It sounds like a very different place than when Steve Ballmer was CEO.  Is also sounds very refreshing as well.

Here is my interview with Snover:

:

Here is Jeffrey’s actual presentation at DOES ’15