"[H]omer" <spam@xxxxxxx> writes:
> Verily I say unto thee, that Roy Schestowitz spake thusly:
>> Fastscale puts VMware on a diet
>>
>> ,----[ Quote ]
>> | Fastscale remains a Linux-only thang but has Windows support scheduled to
>> | arrive in the fourth quarter. It also plans to support the Xen hypervisor in
>> | the fourth quarter in conjunction with its support for Red Hat Enterprise
>> | Linux 5. "We have pushed out our Solaris plans solely because we have not had
>> | customer demand," LeBlanc said.
>> `----
>>
>> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/08/27/fastscale_vmware_virtual_manager/
>
> Ooh I /like/ this:
>
> .----
> | Fastscale stands as one of the more unique virtualization-type
> | companies out there. It relies on a repository of OSes,
> | applications, libraries, configuration files and drivers to send
> | out lightweight software bundles to servers. An administrator, for
> | example, can tell the Fastscale management server to fire up a box
> | with WebLogic running on Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and the
> | repository will deliver all the goods out to the hardware on its
> | own.
> |
> | The real magic of Fastscale's technology goes beyond this basic
> | provisioning. The company has created super thin versions of
> | operating systems and applications by stripping out most of the
> | general purpose software components. If you want to run WebLogic on
> | Red Hat, Fastscale will install an anorexic version of Red Hat that
> | has only what it needs to run an application server. In many cases,
> | Fastscale can craft OS and application images that consume only MBs
> | of space, as opposed to GBs.
> `----
>
> Provisioning tools are getting /very/ sophisticated. I couldn't find any
> prices listed at FastScale though, so I'm guessing it's expensive. I'll
> stick with rolling my own and/or rBuilder, for now ;)
The mind boggles are how many distros will hit DistroWatch with
something "like" this...
I see it uses the very expensive DB2 and equally prohibitively expensive
FastScale management server.
,----
| To run FastScale Composer Suite, customers will need to set up a
| DB2-based software repository and at least one, dedicated management
| server. FastScale, of course, provides both pieces of this puzzle,
| starting at $30,000 for the management server, repository and control
| over 25 servers.
`----
There is no real need for this. Linux is light enough and people still
over exaggerate the "weight" and "resource usage" of components which do
little if anything. That and consider how easy it is to reconfigure your
kernel build scripts to move everything to shared modules. I wonder if
the cost benefit analysis will say "yes"?
In addition, To QA SW you need to run the app on a "real" VMWare image,
not a stripped down one, or the QA is meaningless.
Ditto for administrators. Reminds me of the philosophers who realised
they were out of a job if Deep Thought came up with the "answer"
,----
| "There is a question as to whether or not administrators will want to do
| things FastScale's way," Iams said. "They often like having a known
| quantity that's certified."
`----
Impressive though. If it works. But, frankly, doomed.
|
|
