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Rackspace Releases Cloud Stack As Open Source

Posted by timothy on from the sounds-a-bit-diffuse dept.

zerocool^ writes "Techcrunch is reporting that Rackspace is open-sourcing their cloud computing technologies, under the name OpenStack. Rackspace has chosen to release under the Apache 2.0 license. The initial release encompasses the cloud object storage and cloud virtual server management suites. Along with this release, NASA is contributing technology from its Nebula Cloud Platform. Early partners include Intel, Dell, and Citrix."

7 of 65 comments (clear)

  1. video by porjo · · Score: 5, Informative

    There's a video up on youtube from BusinessWeek which gives a nice overview:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g71ULBQv208

    1. Re:video by FuckingNickName · · Score: 3, Informative

      Right, I see a diagram with three big areas surrounded by both circles and rectangles and with more little rectangles inside:
      STORAGE - CLOUD FILES
      INTERFACE - PUBLIC APIS
      COMPUTE - CLOUD SERVERS
      and two smaller areas surrounded only by one rectangle:
      CONTROL PANEL
      AUTHENTICATION & ACCOUNT MANAGEMENT

      And I hear quotes like:

      "OpenStack enabled us to better serve our customers. In an open-standards based cloud world, cloud interoperability and cloud portability is increased [...] Our cloud today is the second largest cloud in the marketplace and by launching OpenStack we further increase our commitment to the cloud."

      ...I was shocked that this little speech didn't end with, "Praise be to the cloud."

      Am I the only one that wants to stab my head with a fork whenever someone starts talking about "cloud" technology? Look, we've had compute and storage clusters for decades... tell us in precise technical terms what you're offering that's new and why it'd be suitable for general projects.

    2. Re:video by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      Oh come on, it's not that hard. Cloud computing services charge a rate more closely related to actual use. That is, per CPU cycle. Sure, you could previously rent mainframe time but that was (relatively) difficult to do and not likely to be on a familiar architecture to most developers out there. Cloud computing also gives you a lot of flexibility to ramp up the number of instances you use when you temporarily need more horsepower such as during your Christmas sale on your website or something. So in summary, the two main differences are: pricing more closely related to actual processor use and the flexibility to ramp up and down on pretty short notice.

    3. Re:video by zerocool^ · · Score: 2, Informative

      And, with a cloud object storage system, the ability to upload things and not worry about file replication / redundancy. That's the idea for the end user - redundancy is taken care of. OpenStack lets people not worry about the system that worries about end user replication.

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      sig?
  2. Re:Good licence, has anti-swpat clause by zwei2stein · · Score: 4, Informative

    It is basically same thing that most big companies do to each other: Before you sue us because of patent issues, remember that we hold quite a bit of patents too. Patents that you use. MAD doctrine minus nukes, plus patents.

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    -- Technology for the sake of technology is as pathetic as eschewing technology because it's technology.
  3. Re:ok, but what is it? by quanticle · · Score: 2, Informative

    As far as I can tell, the software they've released allows you to start, stop and configure large numbers of virtual machines in a fully automatic fashion. In other words, you can set up your own cluster more quickly than if you had to set up all the VMs manually.

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    We all know what to do, but we don't know how to get re-elected once we have done it
  4. Re:ok, but what is it? by tomweeks · · Score: 5, Informative

    Hey there... man, :)

    In a nut shell, Cloud Files is the Rackspace equivalent to AmazonS3 online storage webservice or "file hosting service", except Cloud Files also includes CDN (content distribution services) via limelight. Cloud Servers is the Rackspace Xen offering, and Cloud Sites is the web and DB hosting services. All wrapped up with the Rackspace Cloud control panel and back end auth-API. Here's some sales-less info on them: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rackspace_Cloud Scanning over it though I see that wikipedia article is a bit out of date. Our Cloud Servers offering DOES actually support Windows VMs now (in beta). Though I'm more a Linux guys myself.. ;)

    Part of the coolness is that between the Cloud Servers and Cloud Files systems, we have a publicnet and servicenet interface. The latter allows direct "intra-cloud" transfers, while public (external) clients can hit the same content via CDN (limelight), allowing you to distribute your content and load via embedded URL around the world without hitting any one data center.

    Tweeks