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News and insights from the vibrant world of virtualization and cloud computing

Statelesx Looking For A Home

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If you’ve been following the Vinternals blog too, this will be no news to you, but the guys behind it have been busy building a virtual appliance, and they are now releasing version 1.0.0 of the app called Statelesx (placeholder page for now).

From the blog post:

“The architecture of the app is something like this:

1) A python script on your fat ESX boxes that runs on startup
2) A Java app that listens for requests and acts via the VirtualCenter SDK
3) A minimal web interface for managing XML cluster configuration files

In a nutshell, you create a cluster configuration file that contains cluster options (DRS,DPM,HA) and network info (vSwitches, portgroups, vmkernel interfaces) and then associate hosts to the cluster config file by their FQDN and UUID. The python script on the ESX host sends the UUID to the statelesx listener, which searches the cluster config files for a match on the UUID. If it finds one, it goes to work. If it doesn’t, nothing happens.”

It runs on Ubuntu 8.04 JeOS with the Sun Java 6 package and Tomcat 6. VI 3.5 is required, although if they get enough requests they may also backport to VI 3.0.

The team has created a couple of demo videos to show off the app: the first one giving an overview and basic configuration demo, and the second one going into much more detail around the XML config files and demoing an advanced configuration being applied to some hosts.

Unfortunately, the app isn’t available for download yet, as they haven’t yet found a hosting provider who can host the 200 MB zip file for free as well provide the necessary bandwidth. If you can help them out, get in touch! (vinternals at gmail dot com)

Xenocode Releases Postbuild 2008 for .NET

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Xenocode (previous coverage) today announced the availability of Postbuild 2008 for .NET, a major update to its code obfuscation and deployment solution for Windows developers. Xenocode Postbuild allows software developers to deploy .NET applications in a single, secure executable that runs anywhere, with or without the .NET Framework.

Postbuild uses a range of powerful obfuscation techniques to protect intellectual property against decompilation and integrates directly with the advanced Xenocode application virtualization engine. The 2008 edition of Postbuild includes support for the latest .NET platforms and technologies, including Visual Studio 2008, .NET 3.0/3.5, WPF, and LINQ.

Postbuild 2008 for .NET incorporates the latest Xenocode application virtualization technology, allowing developers and ISVs to deploy applications in pre-configured virtual executables that run instantly on any Windows desktop via intranets, the Internet, USB keys, or existing desktop management infrastructure.

Postbuild’s integrated code optimization capabilities – including metadata reduction, transparent compression, dead code pruning, and dead and duplicate literal elimination – maximize application performance and minimize disk footprint.

Deploying applications processed by Postbuild does not require any per-end-user licensing fees or royalties. For more information on Postbuild, or to download a free evaluation copy, click here.

Xenocode

Ceedo Enterprise Support for Citrix XenApp Announced

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Ceedo today announced the availability of Ceedo Enterprise for Citrix XenApp, a solution that will give customers using XenApp (formerly Citrix Presentation Server) portable and secure access from any PC without the need to install client software and without requiring administrative rights. Compatibility of the XenApp Plugin for hosted applications with Ceedo’s application virtualization technology has been demonstrated through a rigorous testing program established by Citrix.

Ceedo Enterprise, launched a little over 2 months ago, enables organizations to create customized virtual workspaces, comprising of standard Windows applications, and run them without installation or requiring administration rights on any Windows PC. Ceedo workspaces can be placed and run from a webpage, a folder on a PC, a network drive or a portable storage device. The virtual workspaces can also be controlled and managed through a comprehensive remote management system.
In addition to using the XenApp Plugin, users can install their personal client applications to the workspace (such as WinAmp, Skype, FireFox, etc.), which will be available to them alongside XenApp on any PC.
The Ceedo Enterprise for Citrix XenApp is $89 per seat perpetual license. Discounts are available for large volume purchases. An evaluation version of the solution is available for download here.
Ceedo

Pivot3 Asks: Who Needs Servers Anyway?

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Pivot3 today announced a “technology breakthrough”, allowing for the elimination of servers for most applications that store information. Pivot3 Serverless Computing allows customers to absorb compute-intensive workloads, now performed using stand-alone application servers, into Pivot3’s X86-based storage nodes.

Pivot3 Serverless Computing also enables environments that have not typically been considered good candidates for conventional server virtualization deployments, because of the technology’s unique performance characteristics.

“Pivot3 has taken advantage of the openness and high performance of the Xen hypervisor to deliver a powerful new architecture for storage subsystems,” said Ian Pratt, chairman of xen.org. “Xen virtualization is rapidly becoming embedded in all components of enterprise IT architectures, from servers, to storage and network appliances.”

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“As Pivot3 works with its partners to apply Pivot3 Serverless Computing to the general marketplace, we believe we can enable a significant reduction to the carbon footprint of today’s datacenter. We intend to help our customers do more on fixed power and physical space constraints while insuring they are as efficient and responsible as technology will allow,” added Bob Fernander, chief executive officer of Pivot3.

Pivot3 Serverless Computing technology, and products based on the technology will be announced and made generally available this fall.

Pivot3

Elastra Raises $12 Million from Amazon for Cloud Management

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Elastra, a startup focused on providing solutions for internet cloud configuration and management, secured $12 million in Series B financing in its second venture round, which was was led by Bay Partners, with Amazon.com and existing investor Hummer Winblad also participating. Elastra had previously raised $2.6 million. If the investment by Amazon makes you raise your eyebrows too, go read the excellent analysis on GigaOM.

Check our previous coverage of the company here.

CEO Kiril Sheynkman says Elastra’s offering is unique because it can manage individual applications, rather than virtual appliances, and because it manages applications across private and public Internet clouds.

Elastra now has more than 40 paying customers running databases on Amazon’s cloud using its technology, and plans to announce support for VMware and additional components such as application and web servers. It’s also planning to support clouds other than Amazon.

Elastra

[Source: VentureBeat]

VirtualLogix Joins LiMo Foundation

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VirtualLogix today announced that it has joined the LiMo Foundation, an industry consortium dedicated to creating the first truly open, hardware-independent, Linux-based operating system (OS) for mobile devices. VirtualLogix joins LiMo to extend the discussion and application of virtualization in the mobile handset space in order to make devices more efficient, secure, powerful and cost-effective.

VirtualLogix’s VLX real-time virtualization technology enables Linux to be deployed on low-cost feature phones by sharing a single core baseband processor with the Real-Time Operating System (RTOS) supporting the wireless protocol stack, thus avoiding the need for an additional application processor and associated peripheral hardware. These low cost VLX-based, and LiMo compliant, Linux feature phone platforms are deployed today by LiMo member companies. In addition, VLX provides Linux-based mobile phones with a standards-conformant advanced security architecture, which enables trusted security services to support m-commerce, financial transactions or DRM protected content distribution. VLX handset solutions are based on ARM, XScale, and Intel Atom processor families.
VirtualLogix