Erik’s Blog

- meta

– opensource cross-cloud scripting

– written in python

– floats over amazon, mosso, gogrid, etc.

- why python?

– java’s written by committee

– 3000+ packages already written

- design

– cloud object

— authentication

— lists services available

— config files

– service obj

— list to see the types

– device obj

— reboots and deletes

— runs file services

— shell access

- features

– storage: s3, nirvanix

– DB: SDB, Bigtable, etc

– will also run dreamhost pseudo server

- contribute

– bsd license, which won’t go away like a gpl license

- QA

– advantages of python? shell-like

– choices for management tools?

— rightscale, cohesiveft, ylastic, scalar, cavoo, coolparty, elastra

- meta

– chris richardson

– automated, outsourced, data center management for java apps on amazon ec2

– sdforums does cloud camps?

– wrote “pojos in action”

- why java?

– 22% market

– grails?

– spring, hibernate, terracotta, scala

– java’s community is growing

- cloud

– 18 months experience

– learning curve

— ephemeral storage

— elastic ips

– cloudtools?

— provide amis preconfiged w/ java stack: apache/tomcat/mysql

– cloudfoundry

— a hosted service

— targeted at jvm community

— monitoring ans automated management

— support

– features

— you provide war files + sql scripts

— written in jvm language

— portable

— run your apps on your amazon instance

— you can use your favorite framework

– demo

— define a name

— upload a .war file

— .war file is stored in s3

– example

— grails app

— short-term

— fluctuating load: sat/sun 4 servers, mon-fri 1 server

— a perfect candidate for amazon ec2

— app deployed by the developers

– conclusion

— contribute to cloudtools

– tiers

— db

— terracotta caching

— ap server

— ?

– QA

— what if my app needs to run solo? not yet

— ejb/j2e apps?

—- you shouldn’t be using it.

—- not yet

—- ibm will build AMIs for pop software

pre-talk

- next month: hypervisor showcase

– ms hyper-v

– vmware

– citrix xensource

- upcoming

– 3/3 java sig: running java apps on ec2

– 6/3 security sig/cloud services

– 40% off etech w/ code: et09ffd

– oscon in san jose

– interop

– salesforce talk

– cloudcamp?

– new version of app engine released last night

 

right scale

- michael cramdell, ceo of rightscale

– cloud deployment platform

– 10k users

– 300k servers

— features

—- automated management: reduced admin overhead

—- cloud neutrality

—- transparency

– sits btwn amazon, gogrid, rackspace, etc and cloud apps

– customers: animoto, sling, woot

- history

– pre-public w/ amazon cto 

– taught grad class w/ ror apps launched on ec2, but students would leave servers up.  so rightscale was built to automate instance spin up/down

– motivation

— forking a server

— pay as you go. foundations google and yahoo have built(!)

— just launch a server

– cost analysis

— 1 server for 1 yr on ec2 = $876

— 1 programmer for 1 day = $400- $1000

— throw servers not humans at problems

– classic dilemmas

— over building hardware = wasted money

— peak vs. avg utilization

– new mindset

— plan for failure

— focus on automation

— servers are disposable

– great for business

— 45 day float on bill

— no need to buy hardware

— no techcrunch

— ideal for spike-y usage

– barriers to customers

— fear of lock-in

— security

— loss of control

— overhead of moving

– customer needs

— fast onboarding

— expertise

— portability

– layers

— saas: most lock-in

— paas

— rightscale

 

- overview of deployment

– 4 x app servers

– launched dynamically

– httperf used to simulate load

– rule based scaling

– cloud computing is built on the shoulders of virtualization

— amazon uses syslog to create persistent logs from virtual servers

— cost = time to change x live images x time to retrieve, launch, change, x stored images

— server templates are base images w/ dynamic personalities, app server, web server, grid comput, etc.

— centos base images 

— on launch, download a list of programs that define personality

— clusters are based on templates, not hardware

– backend processing

— animoto has a web front end that farms off video rendering to grid backend

– failover

— for DBs,  promote slave and launch new slave

— amazon’s ebs volumes?

— mmulti-zone deployment

– all pop stacks supported

– animoto scaled from 50 to 3500 servers in 3.5 days

– clouds surpase traditional hosting

— multi server sizwes

- reasign ips

– multi failure zones

— multi geo

— dosk volumes

– layered arch

— cloud neutrality

— automation engine

— temopaltes

— apis

— web ui

– agile deployment

– partner oriented company

– ecosystem:

— rightscale under – customers, software vendors, cloud providers

— email michael@rightscale.com for a free tshirt

- qa

– do we need an account w/ amazon?  yes. 

– whats are the common features in the base image? 

— ec2 -> launch a server

— bigtable, sdb -> proprietary = lock-in

– scaling relational dbs?

— sharding dbs

— not yet fully solved

— most customers use traditional relational DBs for legacy reasons

— new datastores are being used for more specific apps

– rightscale like azure fabric controller? not really clear

– security compliance for enterprise customers? 

— clouds aren’t the best yet

— saas70?

– legacy apps?

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- os templates

- iframes

- multi-invite modal

- asynch notifications w/o confirmation modals

- osml

- lightweight js lib osapi.*

- activites

– apps can post to friends’ update feeds

- notifications

– app to person messages

– customizable templates

- rich media support

– photo uploads

- osml

– data piplining

— replace 20 lines of js w/ a single osml tag

– custom tags

– subviews for navigation w/in a view

- look for preso on slideshare

- opensocial apps are free for 6 months

- servers run solaris

- netbeans supports php, java

- virtualbox?

- network.com?

- sun will be releasing a compute and storage cloud services

- joyent features

– root access

– php, ruby, etc.

- a lot of code gets thrown out -> if you see yourself writing a lot of code or spending a lot of time on a feature, stop.

- most of the panelists make all their money on virtual money and almost no money on banner ads

- take advantage of best-practices

– gift giving

– reverse bell-curve pricing to qty sold

– limited edition goods

– aftermarket for virtual goods

- create and control scarcity

– check out user-generated scarcity

- create games across profiles

- don’t raise prices.  set expectations and leave yourself an open door by saying items are offered at this price only for a limited time

- offerpal?

- currency inflation

– ingame currency vs outside market

– use metrics to track sinks and sources

- 2 guys
- appengine
- 37 million installs in one year

- 600 million opensocial users

- 800K installs in 3 weeks on hives

– $3.60 ecpm vs. $0.1 on orkut

- take advantage of user-transaltion

- take advantage of all the opensocial containers

– insulation from containers failing

– unknown niches

- virality

– invites are ignored

– personal messages are super effective

– user-created/-customized invites are also effective

- buddypoke is 1000 lines of code

- hosting

– joyent, aws, sun scale too, but developers still need to do a lot of work

- global audience

– test on a 10-year-old laptop

– use internet cafe

– 99% windows

– linux 0.50%

– use virtual box for ubuntu

- opensocial to facebook

– use an iframe fb app

– abstract out js com layer

– add hooks

– if u use fbml, you’ll have to rewrite your ui

- app diversity

– no more gifting apps

– try to partner

– most sites want quality

- user generated content

– best way to grow apps

– bpoke has 2500 videos

- virality

– push images to activity stream

– invite policies vary container to container

– tailor content for specific sites

— traffic doubles the day after launch

- take advantage of all the features

— proxy flash files to container

— move as much of the hit off our servers to container’s server

— bpoke does a billion page views per week

— benefit from container server’s locality

— only hit server if viewer is ower

- monetization

– just use banner ads

— target different countries

– virtual currency

— peanut labs?