InMon Corp. announced the immediate availability of Virtual Probe, a free software product that uses sFlow® technology to provide traffic visibility in virtualized environments.

Popular virtual server systems such as VMWare® and Xen® make use of "virtual switches" to connect virtual machines together and to the network. Providing sFlow monitoring of these virtual switches ensures that the benefits of virtualization can be realized without losing the visibility into network traffic that is essential for network troubleshooting, traffic accounting and security.

"sFlow is the leading, multi-vendor traffic monitoring technology built into network switches," said Peter Phaal, President, InMon Corp. "Adding sFlow monitoring to virtual switches allows our customers to monitor virtual switch traffic using the same tools that they use to monitor the physical switches, reducing costs and eliminating the need for yet another management console in the data center."

InMon's Virtual Probe is a software solution that connects to a virtual switch using a virtual SPAN/mirror port. The probe uses patented technology to trace packet paths through the virtual switch and export sFlow data; providing the same information that would be available from a physical switch.