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Saturday, June 30, 2012

Red Hat details next Linux and storage platforms for cloud, big data era

Red Hat is ramping up for the next generation data center by supporting Google’s Open Compute project, software-def ined networking advancements such as OpenvSwitch and OpenFlow and making steady advancements in the operating system, virtualization, storage and networking, company executives said at the summit this week.
Red Hat, for example, is optimizing its Linux, storage and virtualization software platforms to hook into Google’s Open Compute project to provide for a more agile and flexible data center, essential for cloud computing. Red Hat Enterprise Linux is ready for certification on Open Compute Hardware.
“Red Hat Linux is the foundation to ensure hardware enablement happens,” said Red Hat CTO Brian Stevens, noting that RHEL-based nodes can become more compute and network savvvy to better participate in elastic storage services. Later this year, Red Hat plans to debut live migration features to its storage platform.
During the weeklong summit, executives detailed how its next generation software will exploit important new virtualization and cloud technologies.
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 clusters, for example, will scale up to 200 hosts and expanded virtual PCI bridge support will enable thousands of PCI devices to be connected to each virtual machine, while the VMware limit is 60 per VM.
Additionally, the RHEL 7 NUMA-based balancing solution will offer new AutoNUMA and SchedNUMA features.
KVM, which is integral to the Linux kernel and Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization for Servers and Desktops, is now used by IBM, ebay, Qualcomm and Dutch Cloud. Red Hat claims the open source hypervisor recently achieved a world record IOPS benchmark and the next generation of Linux KVM will support Microsoft’s Hyper-V, sVirt security, QEMU sandboxing and secure wipe of retired VMs.
Storage is another major area of focus as the cloud and big data eras move forward.
On the storage front, Red Hat this week announced general availability of Red Hat Storage 2.0 based on its acquired Glusters technology designed for unstructured data. Version 2.0 offers a unified file and object store (REST API), geo-replication ailback and high availability or NFS and CIFS and OpenStack SWIFT as well as geo-replication and compatibility with more than 50 dual-socket x86 servers.
Red Hat now has in technical preview a new storage management console and Hadoop Plug-in and plans better support for storage resident applications (MapReduce), storage virtualization and file centric storage.
In the next 2.X Storage release, Red Hat plans to offer multimaster geo-replication and the new management console as well as NFS v 4 and Volume Snapshot. Beyond that, Red Hat is working on storage virtualization enhancements such as extending its virtualization platform and oVirt engine to manage storage pools and file centric storage.
For instance, Red Hat intends to leverage its Linux containers to run applications within storage nodes. This will enable highly scalable storage for unstructured data in physical, virtual and cloud deployments, company execs said.
Red Hat also plans to offer file centric storage support in its storage platform to allow for geo replication multimaster asynchronouous replication, write-once ready many capabilities, and multi-tenancy (with encryption security) capabilities should the storage pool be supporting multiple audiences.
Future generations of Red Hat Storage will also offer next generation of storage will also provide better web administration, a powerful search capability, better history and reports and better supportf or Samba and CIFS and possibly SMB 3.
On the OpenStack front, Red Hat is working on a SWIFT interface for Gluster, Gluster image store and replication support for OpenStack and making its OpenShift PaaS work better on OpenStack. The company is also working on a “Quantum” generalization on oVirt to enable interconnectivity between the storage and networking technologies of Red Hat and OpenStack work seamlessly.
Red Hat has Linux-based storage, cloud and middleware components and the big data movement is dominated by Linux deployments.
Big data is “very open source dominated and that puts Red Hat in a good position,” said Scott McClellan, senior dirctor at Red Hat, who notes that the company is optimizing Hadoop to run on Red Hat Grid.

Red Hat Summit 2012

Red Hat is this week hosting its Red Hat Summit and JBoss World 2012 developer symposium in the city of Boston, Massachusetts.
The company has been more than vocal in the run up to the event's opening 'pre-keynote', as delivered by VP & GM for middleware Craig Muzilla.
Muzilla along with Red Hat CEO Jim Whitehurst talk with almost aggressive assertion about this being the "time of the season" for Linux as we now see long time open source partner IBM push out more Linux units at the enterprise level than ever before.
Could this be the perfect storm for Linux now then?
To be clear, while many IT industry commentators suggest that Windows 8 will not be as well received as Microsoft would have liked -- and with Java Enterprise Edition and the enterprise level Linux stack including middleware now well out of its adolescence and into mature adulthood... this may be the moment that Linux (and enterprise Linux at that) comes of age.
Red Hat for its part is pushing deep into Java Platform-as-a-Service territory this week with the announcement of JBoss Enterprise Application Platform (EAP) 6.0, which (as an open source Java PaaS solution) will allegedly help "usher in" an era of cloud-enabled application servers for HTML5, mobile and enterprise.
EAP 6.0 is available as a developer preview in OpenShift's free introductory offering via OpenShift.com, creating what Red Hat likes to label as the "industry's first enterprise-grade Java PaaS" no less.
According to Red Hat, "The combination of JBoss EAP and OpenShift validates the importance of openness and hybrid cloud computing. The hybrid cloud is one of the fastest-emerging and most important trends that we strongly believe empowers and preserves open choices for our customers."
Red Hat says says supports a philosophy and strategy for the cloud based upon:
• Flexibility - in terms of a choice of deployment models i.e. on-premise (private), virtualized or in a public or private cloud infrastructure.
• Cloud portability without lock-in - i.e. the ability migrate deployments to the cloud location and type of choice at all times
• Spanning & connecting clouds - for customers running multiple cloud environments concurrently
Secret (middleware) sauce?
So how will all these technologies be underpinned and woven together? Red Hat for its part is banking on the (also announced this week) JBoss Enterprise BRMS 5.3 iteration, which includes "situationally-aware" active decision enterprise Business Rules Management System (BRMS) functions.
"The ability to execute business rules, processes and complex events is the cornerstone to building a highly-intelligent, well-integrated enterprise. JBoss Enterprise BRMS 5.3 drives our customers toward this goal by helping them become more intelligent and agile. It includes a powerful combination of features that, together with our affordable subscription model, offer an enormous amount of business value," said Muzilla.
So the future is open source, the future is complex event processing, the future is the "Internet of things" and connected devices, the future is business process management (BPM) software and the future is open clouds -- it is ALL of these things we are told.
Is Red Hat biting off too big a chunk of the enterprise IT space?
Or has (enterprise) Linux truly come of age?

Saturday, June 9, 2012

Eight New Features in Ubuntu Linux 12.10

1. Linux Kernel 3.4
Linux creator Linus Torvalds released version 3.4 of the Linux kernel last month, and it's now been incorporated into Ubuntu 12.10. Particularly notable highlights of the new Linux 3.4 are driver support for several new graphics cards as well as a new security module and key updates to the Btrfs file system.
2. A Single 800MB Image
Also new with Ubuntu 12.10 is that the CD and DVD Ubuntu desktop images have been consolidated into a single 800MB image usable on either USB or DVD, according to thetechnical overview of the Alpha 1 software.
3. A New Look for Update Manager
Not much detail has been provided about this so far, but Ubuntu Linux 12.10 will feature “a slightly new look” for its Update Manager, the overview notes intriguingly. “More to come in the future,” the developers add.
4. GNOME Updates
Though GNOME 3.4 is the current version, some pieces of GNOME 3.5.1 and 3.5.2 have already arrived in Quantal Quetzal, “with more to follow,” the developers note. GNOME 3.6 is expected to be what's ultimately included in the final version of Ubuntu 12.10.
5. Firefox and Thunderbird
Also included in Ubuntu 12.10 Alpha 1 are the newly released Firefox 13 and Thunderbird 13.
6. No More Migration Assistant
Because of the many bug reports that have been associated with it, the installer in Ubuntu 12.10 no longer offers the migration assistant that used to help migrate documents and settings from other operating systems. “The installer team felt that it was not worth the resources to bring it up to a level of quality sufficient to continue including it,” the developers explain.
7. GCC 4.7
Whereas Ubuntu 12.04 LTS included version 4.6 of GCC, or the GNU Compiler Collection, Quantal Quetzal's Alpha 1 upgrades that to version 4.7.
8. Python 3.0
Last but not least, Ubuntu 12.10's desktop image will ultimately ship with only Python 3; Python 2 won't be included, the developers say. “Alpha-1 begins this process, with the installer and some other applications ported to Python 3,” they note. “There are still quite a few packages left to port, and so Python 2 and 3 are both installed for the time being.” Python 2 will continue to be available as the “python” package for the foreseeable future, however.
Two more alpha versions of Ubuntu Linux 12.10 are expected to arrive before the debut of the beta version in September, according to the software's release schedule. The final release is expected on Oct. 18, with support through April 2014.
I'll post more updates as new features are added. In the meantime, check out this new video posted by the project today entitled, “Reasons to Love Ubuntu 12.04 LTS.


Friday, June 8, 2012

Create a Professional Business Web Site in Minutes with IM Creator

What's the first thing a startup needs? Right: lots and lots of cash. But what's the second thing a startup needs? A Web site, of course.
Just one problem: few entrepreneurs have the time, resources, and expertise to build an pretty, functional, comprehensive site from scratch.
There are, of course, any number of tools and services that can provide soup-to-nuts site building. One of the best I've found: IM Creator, which helps you create polished, professional business Web sites.
The creativity is up to you; IM Creator merely supplies the tools. And they're some of the easiest, most effective tools I've seen.
You start by selecting a template. IM Creator offers several dozen very attractive choices, all of them divided into professions and businesses: architect, designer, consultant, real estate, law, and so on. There's also a batch of bio/resume templates in case you're mainly looking to promote your personal brand.
After you select a template (and register for an IM Creator account, which is quick and easy), you replace the boilerplate text and stock images with your own. Simple, straightforward browser-based tools make these tasks equally quick and easy.
For example, suppose you own a restaurant. Assuming you've already assembled the text and photos you want to include, you could build a really slick-looking three-page site (Home, Gallery, and Menu, for example) in less than an hour. Seriously. 
There's no charge to use IM Creator, nor to publish your site to Facebook, WordPress, or a custom IM Creator URL. If you want your site to appear on your own domain or a new one, IM Creator charges $6.95 monthly when you subscribe for two years, $7.95 monthly when you subscribe for one year, or $9.95 monthly for six months. (A new domain adds $10 per year.)
All those prices include unlimited bandwidth and templates, plus free custom email accounts and the option to add shopping-cart capabilities. Given what most services charge just for hosting, those are reasonable rates.
Although I can see where a business might outgrow IM Creator, for a startup or small shop that needs a simple, professional-looking Web presence, it's a great place to start.

Thursday, June 7, 2012

Microsoft to Run Linux on Azure

After years of battling Linux as a competitive threat, Microsoft is now offering Linux-based operating systems on its Windows Azure cloud service.
The Linux services will go live on Azure at 4 a.m. EDT on Thursday. At that time, the Azure portal will offer a number of Linux distributions, including Suse Linux Enterprise Server 11 SP2, OpenSuse 12.01, CentOS 6.2 and Canonical Ubuntu 12.04. Azure users will be able to choose and deploy a Linux distribution from the Microsoft Windows Azure Image Gallery and be charged on an hourly pay-as-you-go basis.
In Suse's case, Azure users will be able to provision the latest edition of either the Suse Linux Enterprise Server or OpenSuse. "To set up an instance, they just pick the Suse enterprise image and provision it like they would on any other cloud service," said Doug Jarvis, Suse product marketing manager for Cloud. Suse can automatically update these virtual distributions with security patches, bug fixes and new features.
Azure users will also deploy applications they've built with the Suse Studio IDE (integrated developer environment) directly onto Azure. In this case, they do not need to worry about the machine image. Instead, they will enter their Azure ID into Suse Studio before deploying their application to the Azure cloud.
The move may be a surprising one for observers of Microsoft, which has traditionally considered itself a platform company, built around the enormous success of Windows. As such, the company has traditionally seen Linux as a competitive threat, especially in the server market, where it competes with Windows Server for replacing traditional Unix servers.
With its Azure cloud service, however, Microsoft faces a formable rival in the popular Amazon Web Services -- which offers Linux distributions such as Canonical Ubuntu and Red Hat Enterprise Linux in addition to Windows.
"We do find it to be a watershed moment, especially considering the past, but it's not surprising," said Amanda McPherson, vice president of marketing and developer services at The Linux Foundation, in an email interview. "Cloud computing has mostly been a Linux and open-source affair. Microsoft is a smart company and will do what they need to do to be a player in cloud, and in this case it means doing something that was anathema in its past: agreeing that another operating system is needed in order to be technically relevant. I'm sure many Redmond inhabitants aren't too happy about this, but it's good for users."
Over the past year, Microsoft engineers have done considerable work on ensuring the driver for its Hyper-V Windows-based hypervisor works with Linux, the underlying hypervisor for Azure. As part of an earlier cooperative agreement with Suse, Microsoft has also worked quite a bit with Suse on adapting Linux to work on Hyper-V.
"Microsoft recognizes that their customers run more than just Windows in their enterprise, and this is an opportunity for Windows Azure to run as many workloads as possible," said Wade Wegner, chief technology officer for Aditi Technologies, a technology services company and Microsoft partner. "The cloud provides a way to make it easier to connect all of these different platforms and technologies, and my take is that Microsoft is trying to make Windows Azure the best and simplest place to run your applications regardless of the platform or technology."

Sunday, June 3, 2012

Mini X is an Android 2.3 Network Media Player

For people who want to use their television to browse websites on the Internet or enjoy streaming online movies and music, the Mini X provides a solution.

This media device that fits right into one’s palm looks like a plastic box with an antenna protruding from its body to receive wireless signals. It has measurements of 2.8″ x 2.4″ x 0.5″ and a weight of merely 1.8 oz.
Inside it runs an Allwinner A10 ARM Cortex-A8 processor. It also has a custom version of Android 2.3.4 (Gingerbread), although it is likely that the device might be able to run Ubuntu and other Linux-based operating systems because of the presence of the Allwinner A10 chip. It had been previously noted that Ubuntu works with other devices carrying such processor.
The Mini X comes with 512 MB of DDR3 memory and 4 GB of internal Flash storage, expandable via a built-in microSD. There is also an HDMI port for connecting the device to an HDTV, and 2 USB ports for attaching it to other devices. For facility of use, the Mini X’s user interface can be controlled with an IR remote control that comes with the box.
Being made in China, it plays a wide variety of video formats. Among these are VOB, DAT, ASF, TRP, FLV, BD-ISO, AVI, MPG, MKV, TS, TP, M2TS, RM, and RMVB. It also supports a range of video codecs like RM8/9/10, VP6, Divx, Xvid, MPEG1/2/4, H.264, and VC-1. It also reads various subtitle files like SSA, SMI, SRT, SUB, and IDX. Music formats that are supported include WAV, M4A, APE, MP3, ACC, OGG, and WMA whereas image files that can be read are JPG, BMP,GIF, TIF, and PNG.
Perhaps because of the small size, this device doesn’t come with a SATA connector, VGA output, or Ethernet port. If users require such ports, they may look for a similar yet larger device and more expensive product called the Mele A1000 STB.