>> Live, from Las Vegas, it's theCUBE. Covering VMworld 2018. Brought to you by VMware and its eco-system partners. >> Welcome back, this is theCUBE's coverage of VMworld 2018, three days live coverage, kicking-off day two. On the right set, Michael Dell himself is talking. But I'm even more excited, because when we get to talk to the users here. That's what we love doing; talking, peers talking to their peers. I'm Stu Miniman, my guest host for this segment is, Joep Piscaer. Who's actually a user himself, and joining me, first time on the program, is PJ Romero who is the Principal IT Engineer at Turnitin, out of Oakland. >> Out of Oakland. >> Thanks for joining us. >> Thanks for having me, Stu. >> All right, so, PJ, first of all, your forth year at VMworld. Give us your initial impressions, and what brings you back to VMworld? >> VMworld is just getting, re-upping my education, so I'm learning more stuff, seeing what's new on the horizon, to get implemented in my situation. >> All right, you talk about learning more stuff. Tell us about Turnitin. Explain what this is and, you know, I think it'll resonate with a lot of our audience. >> Right. Turnitin is plagiarism detection software. So we're probably in most major universities throughout the world, really big in Europe and here at major universities. >> Okay. >> And we are also in the high school, high school down. >> Okay. Ya, I was wondering about that. My daughter actually starts high school tomorrow, so, make sure she understands that this is serious stuff. I mean, talk about education, I mean, heck, in this community when you talk about certification people are always worried about you know, tests getting out. >> Exactly. >> Things like that. >> Exactly. >> We take education seriously. >> Exactly. >> As a community, as we should. And your role at the company? >> My role; I'm the Principal IT Engineer, so basically I architect the corporate infrastructure, aside from the Turnitin papers. So I manage global infrastructure. >> Before we get into, you know, kind of the infrastructure itself, the business itself. How long has it been around? How long have you been in there? And what is the kind of, you know, mobile-web, digital-transformation impact your business? >> Oh, so everything's mobile now. Everything's on the web. We've migrated out there. We've moved out to the Cloud. And how it's migrated us, so, Turnitin's been around for about 20 years. We just uploaded our billionth paper a few weeks ago. So we have about nine petabytes worth of data to pull from. >> Oh wow. >> So you can imagine how we're getting that from our data centers into the Cloud. With nine petabytes, it's been a challenge. So recently we virtualized some VMware and to make that transition, we had rows and rows of servers to move them out; to virtualize. >> So nine terabytes. That's a lot of data. >> Petabytes. >> Petabytes even. >> Petabytes, ya. >> So tell me, how does that work from a tech perspective? What are you, what are you running, what's that tech stack look like? >> Well, Turnitin is actually a home-grown infrastructure from the ground for the storage. So it's highly available, it's highly redundant, we have multiple data centers new with the GDPR requirements. Now we have data centers in Europe, and we're moving all over the country. We're looking at EMA, APAC, and then South America. (laughing) Get it out there somewhere. >> So you're running your own data centers? >> Yes. >> I presume. >> Yes, we're running our own data centers. >> What does that mean for your hybrid cloud strategy? How much is in your data center? What are you considering to move to the Cloud? How does that impact your business? >> So right now we're probably 75%, 25% and, you know, with the Cloud being elastic as it is, as term papers come up, we're spinning them out. You know, so we're moving. >> Great, okay. So you're virtualized. Do you know what percentage of your applications are virtualized? And maybe walk us through a little bit about the stacks that you have, both on premises, as well as who you use for a public cloud. >> Oh, so we're using AWS and we're also, I think we use, some Google stuff. And Desrrve for some of the development. So we're using all of them, basically; to make sure we're fluid that way. We also do, all the applications, all the web servers are virtualized, and put up in the Cloud. But the main guts of it is still on premise. >> Okay, and what's that stack look like on premises? Who are you using today? >> As far as. >> Like, your whole infrastructure stacks? >> All the infrastructure has been super micro. >> Okay. >> Ya. >> But you're using like, an HCI solution? >> The corporate is. >> Okay. >> The corporate. Ya, I manage the corporate infrastructure. >> Right. >> Ya, we use HCI Solution. >> So whose are you're using. >> I'm using Nutanix. >> Okay. >> Ya. >> Great. So why don't you tell us a little bit about how you got to Nutanix. What apps you use that for? What apps you don't use that for? Maybe help to ease that out a little bit for us. >> Ya, of course. So I have the corporate infrastructure started out when I got there three years ago. I had server-sprawl. I had all physical serves. They weren't virtualizing yet and I got in there and was like, why not? So I did a small PoC with a couple of servers in a NAS that I built homemade and put VMware on it and said, look, this stuff works great. I can move stuff back. I can kill this box. And they were like, wow, that's pretty cool! And then I got a business intelligence project for the financial services. So they were doing some really high-end modeling based on Oracle database, and needed something redundant, powerful and fast to deploy. Well, that was the problem. It was going to take six weeks to get servers in, get them configured, stacked. I got Nutanix in within two weeks. So got Nutanix in there, I think I spent more time convincing them that this is really a to you box and I'm going to stick all our stuff in there, we started out with the three node unit, and got VMware on there to show them what I was doing, and then we deployed our Oracle stack in no time. >> So tell a little about the cost-model behind it. Has it changed the way, using HCI, has it changed the way you do business? Has is made it easier, cheaper faster? >> It's made it cheaper and faster. For me, easier, I don't say the easy part too much 'cause then they wonder what I'm doing. But it's really easy. (laughing) >> Yeah, that's interesting. When you talk about you've had homegrown stuff before. >> Yeah. >> Verses now. I've talked to some Nutanix customers they say, like hey, I got my nights and weekends back. >> Yeah. >> I don't have to worry about so many of the other pieces, maybe you talk a little bit about that dynamic. Did you have any change in personnel? Or who manages what after, or is it you? >> So I'm it. But with the ability to put Nutanix in there and ease of use, I give them access to the dashboards and show them how things work. It's been really simple, especially for some of my newer guys, the younger sys admins, who don't understand virtualization and it's still kind of magic for everybody. But now they got one dashboard. Green heart means good. Everything else, look at it. >> So you're saying you're the wizard now. >> I'm the wizard. >> Pay no attention behind the curtain. (laughing) It got really easy, but I'll just keep that behind. I can do more stuff and I'll just be the superhero. >> Yeah, exactly, exactly. It made my monitoring easier for them and my guys love it. They really love it. >> Tell a little bit about how you're using Nutanix. So Nutanix started-out as a virtualization, pure HCI company, but they've broadened their portfolio. So tell us a little bit about how you're using the Nutanix solution inside of your data centers. >> Right, so originally I put Nutanix with a virtualization product or the financial product. I was able to get a forth node. So I was able to use their analytics in there and say, hey, we're going to run out of space. So I'm running 47 machines on four nodes and I still have high redundancy. But I had no back-ups. So what do we do? So I got a second box, I put it inside of one of my other data centers and used that for replication in the back. And now with the Zy coming out, I'm going to start pushing that up to the Cloud, and start moving my single data center, toothpick as it were, it's going to be in the Cloud quickly. >> And you mentioned Oracle's, the application that catalyzed this. All certified, didn't have any issues. >> No issues. >> That's awesome. >> It was great. >> Those of us in the virtualization community, how many years did we spend just virtualizing Oracle, let alone, every new platform. It's challenging. >> Exactly. >> Your peers? All clear? They don't have to worry about it? >> Oh ya, they love it, they love it. They can't believe I got it all in the to you box. I like to take the picture of it and say, here's their stuff. I don't need this big stack, I just need the little box. (laughing) >> So basically, your whole operational model changed I'm guessing? You're not spending as much time anymore on operational issues. >> No. It's more of architecture now. We start moving the Cloud. I'm getting away from virtualizing more of the applications that we use. We just use basic active directory and DNS and that stuff. So it's all fine but, I'm going to start moving it so I push the button it will be in the Cloud, and I can literally lose my data center. >> Talk a little bit about the Zy. We've heard a lot the vision, so what's the roadmap for you to kind of embrace, adopt that? What's interesting to you about it? >> For me, I'm going to take the financial stack and really moving it right now in the tip is re-iping, it's a lot of back-end work. With the Zy, it should be a click and I mean, I've seen the database, so we're talking right now to get that done. It should be a click of the button and it's going to spin me up an AWS. So that's where I'm going next with my next project. That looks pretty cool. >> Okay, the rest of your applications, will you expand your Nutanix environment? Is this something to help you deal with that hybrid cloud environment? >> Yeah. >> What does the future look like? >> If I have my way, as I age-out my remote sites, we'll be putting more Nutanix out there. And then I can do more three to one back-ups. >> That frees-up even more time to be spending on future architecture. >> Yep, exactly. >> Instead of just the operational stuff. >> Yep, I'm making it so we can lose any leg and we're going to be fine. >> One of the things that everyone's poking at at this show is that whole multi-cloud environment. We said, I can make my data center kind of simple today. >> Yeah. >> But, multi-cloud, most people, at least I talked to, it's not simple. The Cloud is a little bit complex, it's not just swipe a credit card anymore. Managing between multiple environments, depending on how many clouds you have. What have you seen today? What would you like to see get even better over time? >> I'd like to see where Nutanix is going really, with the single-environment. I want to go one-spot. And right now I'm going to one-spot for my virtualization and all my on-prem stuff, but as I move up to the Cloud and spin stuff up, I want to go to the same spot. I don't want to have to think about it so much. Simple is good for me. I'm big in the KISS system. (laughing) >> Absolutely. Keep it simple. >> That's right. >> Engineering design, absolutely. >> I imagine your role is changing as well, right? It is becoming simpler, you get to spend more time on new projects. How is your role changing as an IT Engineer? >> I'm getting to think more. I'm not reactive anymore at all. When I got there it was a very reactive environment. And now it is more on design and how we can make sure we can tighten-up securities. We went through a whole bunch of new sox audits. And it's made it simple. It's made it simple for me. We're all in compliance now within the physical hardware and security and now, some of the other touches I'm able to think about and get those implemented. >> So outside of the Nutanix stuff, at VMworld, what kind of things are you digging into, learning, anything excite you that you either heard from your peers or announcements or sessions you've been in? >> VDI is still exciting to me. I'm still looking at those projects, and I have just enough space to do a PoC on my stuff, so I'm talking to management about that. As soon as I can show them they can do anything, from a web browser, I'd like to give them Chrome Books, and say, have a nice day. (laughing) >> It's funny you say that, because most people think of the HCI space and like, you start with VDI. And now you're like, oh well now I've got some fair capacity, I'm guessing. I can put in environment, manage it. Yeah, do some of the dynamics inside the company sounds like they're some of the bigger challenges. Always for VDI, has been a challenge. >> Yeah, it's always a challenge but so far, everything I've said's worked for them, so I've got a good trust-base. >> PJ Romero, really appreciate you talking about Turnitin. No plagiarism at this show, right? (laughing) >> That's right. We'll check. (laughing) >> PJ Romero, Turnitin, really appreciate you joining us. For you, Piscaer, I'm Stu Miniman. Lots more coverage. Wall-to-wall, here at VMworld2018. Thanks so much for watching theCUBE. (techno music)