Ubuntu, Koalas, and Clouds...oh my!

Ubuntu "Fridge" ^ | 7/9/2009 | papasmurf

[papasmurf]

The doctrine of karma states that one's state in this life is a result of actions (both physical and mental) in past incarnations, and action in this life can determine one's destiny in future incarnations.

Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to introduce the Karmic Koala, the newest member of our alliterative menagerie. Mark Shuttleworth introduces Ubuntu 9.10-Karmic Koala!

A good Koala knows how to see the wood for the trees, even when her head is in the clouds. Ubuntu aims to keep free software at the forefront of cloud computing by embracing the API’s of Amazon EC2, and making it easy for anybody to setup their own cloud using entirely open tools. We’re currently in beta with official Ubuntu base AMI’s (Amazon Machine Image) for use on Amazon EC2. During the Karmic cycle we want to make it easy to deploy applications into the cloud, with ready-to-run appliances or by quickly assembling a custom image. Ubuntu-vmbuilder makes it easy to create a custom AMI today, but a portfolio of standard image profiles will allow easier collaboration between people doing similar things on EC2. Wouldn’t it be apt for Ubuntu to make the Amazon jungle as easy to navigate as, say, APT?

What if you want to build an EC2-style cloud of your own?

Of all the trees in the wood, a Koala’s favourite leaf is Eucalyptus. The Eucalyptus project, from UCSB, ***enables you to create an EC2-style cloud in your own data center, on your own hardware. *** It’s no coincidence that Eucalyptus has just been uploaded to universe and will be part of Jaunty (i.e. this means it's available right now!) - during the Karmic cycle we expect to make those clouds dance, with dynamically growing and shrinking resource allocations depending on your needs. A savvy Koala knows that the best way to conserve energy is to go to sleep, and these days even servers can suspend and resume, so imagine if we could make it possible to build a cloud computing facility that drops its energy use virtually to zero by napping in the midday heat, and waking up when there’s work to be done. No need to drink at the energy fountain when there’s nothing going on. If we get all of this right, our Koala will help take the edge off the bear market.

If that sounds rather open and nebulous, then we’ve hit the sweet spot for cloud computing futurology.

I am stoked on building an Enterprise "Cloud" with open source (FREE) technology, maintaining it locally on company hardware, keeping data secure, and being able to reduce costs. I'm sure, this will be my Fall project! :)

[papasmurf]

On the Desktop
Koala gets prettier and faster than all previous Ubuntu releases...We made a splash years ago with Usplash, but it’s time to move to something newer and shinier. So the good news is, boot will be beautiful. The bad news is, you won’t have long to appreciate it! It only takes 35 days to make a whole Koala, so we think it should be possible to bring up a stylish desktop much faster. The goal for Jaunty on a netbook is 25 seconds, so let’s see how much faster we can get you all the way to a Koala desktop. We’re also hoping to deliver a new login experience that complements the graphical boot, and works well for small groups as well as very large installations.

Ubuntu Netbook Desktop

For those of you who can relate to Mini Me, or already have a Dell Mini, the Ubuntu Netbook Edition (watch the video) will be updated to include all the latest technology from Moblin, and tuned to work even better on screens that are vertically challenged. With millions of Linux netbooks out there, we have been learning and adapting usability to make the Koala cuddlier than ever. We also want to ensure that the Netbook Remix installs easily and works brilliantly on all the latest netbook hardware, so consider this a call for trying Ubuntu 9.04 if you’re the proud owner of one of these dainty items.

The desktop will have a designer’s fingerprints all over it - we’re now beginning the serious push to a new look.

Sounds to me like Google has NOTHING on Ubuntu, Netbooks, and Cloud computing.

[papasmurf]

For the Techie crowd!

[pvoce]

I usually wait a month or two after a release for all of the bugs to get worked out.

[smokingfrog]

Mmmm. If that will work on an EeePC, I may have to try it out.

[papasmurf]

Jaunty has been out since April.

Ubuntu’s versioning system is as follows:

Example: 9.04 indicates that this version was released in April of 2009. 9 is the year, and the digits after the dot indicate the Month.

Koala will be 9.10.

Ubuntu releases a new version every 6 months, but supports each version for at least 3 years. Exceptions are Server Editions and LTS Editions (Long Term Support) are supported for 5 years.

Normally, there isn’t much new or changed, just improved or added features, which you can get, for free, and install on an older version.

Any security updates are released every day, bug fixes are released each week, and application updates released as approved after testing.

[papasmurf]

I wish you would. I don’t have a Netbook. Although, I did install Ubuntu MID on my Tablet PC just for sniffs and grins. LOL

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Thanks...

Alpha three is due later this month...fired up Alpha 2 and didn't see much different as yet...from jaunty.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

I didn't know they had a weekly newsletter...:

UbuntuWeeklyNewsletter/Issue149

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Canonical Delves Deeper into the Cloud

Ubuntu heads to the clouds

On July 1, Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu in partnership with Eucalyptus Systems, an open-source cloud infrastructure firm, launched Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud Services. According to sources at Canonical, Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud Services "is a set of new professional services to help and support users building 'private clouds', that is cloud infrastructures behind a corporate firewall." The idea, as it always is with cloud computing is to save organizations money by optimizing server use, while lowering costs and providing end users with self-service IT. With Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud Services, Canonical will help businesses build private clouds. In a statement, Mark Shuttleworth, Canonical's CEO said, "Enterprises are realizing that building 'private clouds' enables them to better manage variable workloads, while reducing the waste of idle servers. Building on an open-source technology also avoids the issue of vendor lock-in. Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud enables businesses to do this--and the addition of these services helps them to do it with confidence." Once more Canonical is showing that, while its reputation is based on Ubuntu, the popular end-user desktop Linux distribution, the company has every intention of competiting with Red Hat and Novell for the business server market.