The second part of my in-depth look at the role of application virtualization techniques that can be used to develop, or adapt existing, applications for use within a grid environment. Part 2 looks at the second level of the virtualization process – building an environment in which our virtualized application can execute.

In Part 1, we examine how virtualization within an application structure can be used to turn an application from a stand-alone solution into one that can be adapted for use within a grid.This tutorial covers the creation and components of the new grid environment required for your new virtualized application to operate within a grid. Whether you have virtualized your entire application, or virtualized individual components of the application, they both need the same range of additional components — grid manager, security and other elements — to operate. With these requirements in mind, you need to examine how information and work might be distributed throughout the grid. There are a number of potential models that can be used, and we’ll look at each of these solutions and how they work with our virtualized application.In this tutorial, we’re going to consider all these points and build a number of theoretical models that can be used with a virtualized application.

Read Application virtualization, Part 2: Level 2 — Understanding your virtualized environment