Yesterday we released some new Windows Operating System images to the GoGrid Image repository. What is notable here is that GoGrid has extended our Windows Server breadth in the Cloud and we are the first to market with the ability to instantiate Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008 cloud servers with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Express, Standard and Workgroup editions. Also added is support for FastCGI.

The following Windows Server images were added:

Windows Server 2008

• Web Servers:
  • 32-bit with Internet Internet Information Services 7 (IIS7), FastCGI and Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Express
  • 32-bit with IIS7, FastCGI and Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Express
• Database Servers:
  • 64-bit with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Workgroup^[1]
  • 64-bit with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Standard^[2]

Windows Server 2003

• Database Servers:
  • 64-bit with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Workgroup^[3]
  • 64-bit with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Standard^[4]

The full list of GoGrid Operating Systems and Images can be found either on the GoGrid site or the GoGrid wiki. For your convenience, here is the list of currently available Operating Systems and Images:

Windows Server 2008

• New!! Windows Server 2008 32 bit IIS7 + Fast CGI + MSSQL 2005 express
• New!! Windows Server 2008 32 bit IIS7 + Fast CGI + MSSQL 2008 express
• New!! Windows Server 2008 (64-bit) w/ MSSQL 2008 Workgroup
• New!! Windows Server 2008 (64-bit) w/ MSSQL 2008 Standard

• Windows Server 2008 (32-bit) w/ IIS 7.0 + PHP 5.2 + MSSQL 2005 Express
• Windows Server 2008 (32-bit) w/ IIS 7.0 + PHP 5.2 + ASP.NET + MSSQL 2005 Express
• Windows Server 2008 (32-bit) w/ IIS 7.0 + PHP 5.2 + MySQL 5.0
• Windows Server 2008 (32-bit) w/ Apache 2.2 + PHP 5.2 + MSSQL 2005 Express

• Windows Server 2008 (32-bit)
• Windows Server 2008 (32-bit) w/ IIS 7.0
• Windows Server 2008 (32-bit) w/ IIS 7.0 + MSSQL 2005 Express
• Windows Server 2008 (32-bit) w/ IIS 7.0 + ASP.NET + MSSQL 2005 Express

• Windows Server 2008 (64-bit)
• Windows Server 2008 (64-bit) w/ IIS 7.0
• Windows Server 2008 (64-bit) w/ IIS 7.0 + MSSQL 2005 Express
• Windows Server 2008 (64-bit) w/ IIS 7.0 + ASP.NET + MSSQL 2005 Express

Windows Server 2003

• New!! Windows Server 2003 (64-bit) w/ MSSQL 2008 Workgroup
• New!! Windows Server 2003 (64-bit) w/ MSSQL 2008 Standard

• Windows Server 2003 (32-bit) w/ IIS 6.0
• Windows Server 2003 (32-bit) w/ IIS 6.0 + ASP.NET + MS SQL Server 2005 Express
• Windows Server 2003 (32-bit) w/ MS SQL Server 2005 Express
• Windows Server 2003 (32-bit) w/ MSSQL 2005 Workgroup
• Windows Server 2003 (32-bit) w/ MSSQL 2005 Standard

• Windows Server 2003 (64-bit) w/ IIS 6.0
• Windows Server 2003 (64-bit) w/ IIS 6.0 + ASP.NET + MS SQL Server 2005 Express
• Windows Server 2003 (64-bit) w/ MSSQL 2005 Express

CentOS Linux

• CentOS 4.4 (32-bit) w/ Apache 2.2 + PHP5
• CentOS 4.4 (32-bit) w/ MySQL 5.0

• CentOS 4.5 (32-bit) w/ Ruby on Rails
• CentOS 4.5 (32-bit) w/ PostgreSQL 8.2

• CentOS 5.1 (64-bit) w/ Apache 2.2
• CentOS 5.1 (64-bit) w/ Apache 2.2 + PHP 5.1
• CentOS 5.1 (64-bit) w/ Apache 2.2 + PHP 5.1 + MySQL 5.0
• CentOS 5.1 (64-bit) w/ MySQL 5.0
• CentOS 5.1 (64-bit) w/ PostgreSQL 8.1

Red Hat Enterprise Linux

• RHEL 4 (32-bit) w/ Apache 2.2 + PHP5
• RHEL 4 (32-bit) w/ Apache 2.2 + MySQL 5.0 + PHP 5.2
• RHEL 4 (32-bit) w/ MySQL 5.0
• RHEL 4 (32-bit) w/ PostgreSQL 8.2

• RHEL 5.1 (64-bit) w/ Apache 2.2
• RHEL 5.1 (64-bit) w/ Apache 2.2 + PHP 5.1
• RHEL 5.1 (64-bit) w/ Apache 2.2 + PHP 5.1 + MySQL 5.0
• RHEL 5.1 (64-bit) w/ MySQL 5.0
• RHEL 5.1 (64-bit) w/ PostgreSQL 8.1

The GoGrid API which was recently put under a Creative Commons license has also been updated to support these new images.

The addition of the FastCGI component opens a new framework for high performance and reliability. FastCGI provides a high-performance alternative to the Common Gateway Interface (CGI) which is a typical way of linking external applications with Web Servers.

Currently GoGrid has 26 Windows images (16 Windows Server 2008 and 10 Windows Server 2003) and 19 Linux images (9 CentOS and 9 Red Hat Enterprise Linux). We will be continually growing this list as well as adding new Linux Operating Systems soon.

1. $99.99/month [↩]
2. $299.99/month [↩]
3. $99.99/month [↩]
4. $299.99/month [↩]

Today, Sarah Perez of ReadWriteWeb posted the question, “Do you trust the cloud?” to FriendFeed and wrote about her findings in the article “In Cloud We Trust?” The problem is, I believe the question itself was too vague. But this “finger to the air to test the wind direction” did spark quite a bit of discussion and further made me realize that the public in general doesn’t fully yet understand the full spectrum of Cloud Computing (and this was even within a social media/tech-savvy audience).

As is evident from the 90+ comments that popped up within 18 hours of posting the question, people have a lot to say about the subject. The important thing to consider here is the lack of granularity of the question and the range of responses. To really ask and analyze the question better, one must fine-tune it more to the detailed components of what makes up Cloud Computing, namely: Cloud Applications, Cloud Platforms, Cloud Aggregators, Cloud Extenders and Cloud Infrastructure. My guess is, most people responding to the question don’t truly understand the differences between these layers in the Cloud. Perhaps better, more focused questions would have been:

• “Do you trust Cloud Applications like Flickr, Facebook and Gmail?”
• “Do you trust Google or others with your critical data?”
• “Do you see yourself using the Cloud as your primary or ancillary IT strategy?”

It seemed to me that the common thread within the FriendFeed responses was that of FUD: Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt. The question itself is phrased with an inherent FUD factor which can quickly skew the resulting answers. However, I do think that this question is important from a consumer standpoint, that of the everyday user of Gmail or Evernote or DropBox, for example. The biggest commonality that I saw from reading through all of the comments was that of “backups.” My read is that people are concerned that their data will be lost in some way, either by a company pulling the plug or a hard-drive crashing or just not being able to physically “touch” it.

From a consumer standpoint, this article is appropriate. As the amount of data that consumers produce in the form of emails or photos for example, continues to grow almost exponentially, they are realizing that storing this un-replaceable data in a single location is risky. Many back up this priceless data on external hard-drives or CDs/DVDs. Some seem to be venturing to the “Cloud” as a secondary redundancy, by using Cloud Storage to solve this.

There is a sliding scale at work here with consumers only starting to adopt the significantly easier side of Cloud Computing, namely Cloud Applications. Consumers have been using Cloud Applications longer than they actual realize: Gmail, Flickr, and Online Banking being some everyday examples. When you think about it, Google has been in the Cloud for some time, even before the term “Cloud Computing” was coined with their various services: Google Docs, Gmail, Picasa, and Google Notebook. Consumers are now venturing into new waters with their use of Cloud Storage and Synchronization solutions like: Microsoft’s Live Mesh, DropBox, and even Amazon’s S3.

The middle of the scale (or of the Cloud Pyramid pictured previously) is that of Cloud Platforms. Here we have a blend of both consumer and corporate adoption. Two examples of these that both consumers and business are aware of are SalesForce and Facebook. Everybody has heard of Facebook, right? They are one of the consumer leaders in the Cloud Application segment. The only way they have become so “successful” is with their Cloud Platform offering. With a little bit of programming knowledge and some information on their “proprietary” platform, developers can quickly create applications that run within the Facebook framework. Similarly, many business users know and use SalesForce (another prime example of a Cloud Application). They, too, have a Cloud Platform service called Force.com. Businesses can integrate their applications and service offerings into the SalesForce.com framework using Force.com.

On the other end of the scale are the complex and robust Cloud Infrastructure solutions offered by GoGrid (as a “cloudcenter“) and Amazon’s Web Services (as “Infrastructure Web Services”). Most consumers have not given this part of the Cloud much thought since it typically doesn’t affect their daily lives unless so directed by their work. However, Enterprise, SMBs and even Startups are seeing the increased value in tapping into ability to harness raw compute power and on-demand “disposable” IT infrastructures.

But to get back to the theme of the ReadWriteWeb article, the spin is still very consumer-oriented with little focus on business. Sarah does bring up some good points:

“For many, the cloud is no more trustworthy, than a hard drive on their own machine.”

“Companies need to show us more stability and security…”

“At the end of the day, just labeling services as “cloud computing” applications isn’t enough to change people’s mindsets about what it means to really move to the cloud.”

I agree whole-heartedly with the third statement above. Just because something is has the “cloud” moniker does not mean that it will be the end-all solution. Those of us within the Cloud Computing industry need to prove the worth of this shift, whether it be from dramatic cost savings to ease-of-use to the on-demand nature of the Cloud.

But I would like to offer some points that came out of my reading and interpretation that can be applied across the board, regardless if you are a Cloud-using or Traditional-IT Consumer or Business:

• Understand what IT solution you are choosing – do research, ask questions of the provider, ask end users, read industry publications & become an “expert”
• Individual experiences vary – Just because something works (or doesn’t work) for someone else, doesn’t mean that it will (or won’t) for you
• “Trust” is extremely subjective – people felt the same way about eCommerce and online banking – that trust level seems to have increased over time through mainstream adoption; the same will happen with Cloud Computing
• Backups are critical – be sure that you employ a multi-tiered and redundant backup strategy that works for you. For example, at GoGrid, we offer the ability to use a Cloud front-end (for web applications) and multiple solutions for data storage (persistent storage on all Cloud web servers, Cloud Storage and Cloud Connect to enable private dedicated connections to traditional managed, hosted hardware). However, with any solution you choose, ensure that you have a strategy that is multi-provider.
• Don’t just “port” to the Cloud – if you are doing your own hosting, chances are that you have over-purchased your IT and much of it is under-utilized. If you decide to move to the Cloud, don’t just mirror your current environment as you will inherit the inefficiencies that you currently have. Look to optimize your resources and program in dynamic scalability.
• Test your new IT Infrastructure Solution – if you can, experiment with any new IT technology before you fully deploy it! Obviously, this is much more expensive and difficult to do if you need to do this on bare-metal servers or other IT hardware. The Cloud, however, lets you really “try before you buy.” (Hint: talk to a GoGrid Sales Rep and they give double the initial free trial credit you get.)

Just a quick note to the media, when you ask a question, know that you may be working in a bubble. I often forget that I’m in a very tech-heavy industry. I frequently “converse” with a very vocal and extremely niche-oriented crowd. Consumers have a right to “fear” what they don’t know or understand and will do so naturally. While I do think that the trust-factor of the Cloud as presented by this article and the leading question is a bit troublesome for me, I also know that the concerns that users have are valid and must be listened to. I commend Sarah for her use of Social Networking to quickly get a pulse. I am also encouraged that the “awareness campaign” will bring more disclosure and transparency to the Cloud industry, but I also want to be sure that there is an accuracy in reporting when media outlets discuss only the pitfalls of a particular technology without carefully presenting all sides of the story.^[1].

1. See a similar themed post from 2008 on an NPR story. [↩]

Yesterday, GoGrid’s VP of Technology Strategy, Randy Bias, gave a presentation titled “Managing Storage in the Cloud” which discusses some of the challenges facing companies looking to using Cloud Storage as a storage solution. Highlights include:

• Cloud Computing Overview
• Why Storage in the Cloud?
• Storage Today
• Management Challenges
• Future/Vision

The presentation was at the SNIA Winter Symposium ’09 in San Jose, CA.

For those who missed it, we have included the presentation below:

Direct link to Randy’s presentation: “Managing Storage in the Cloud“.

Randy and I encourage you to ask any questions you may have about this presentation’s content as well as around Cloud Storage in general. Please be sure to leave a comment to this post.

Today GoGrid did something big, significantly smaller than the 2009 Obama Inauguration of course, but significant enough within the Cloud Computing community to warrant some attention. Today we released our GoGrid cloudcenter Application Programming Interface (API) specification under a Creative Commons license. This is particularly important to developers, system integrators, IT professionals and other companies as it allows them to openly copy, modify, distribute and republish our Cloud Computing API.

The Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike 3.0 license, under which the GoGrid cloudcenter API now falls, allows for the ability to:

• Share, distribute, display and perform the work
• Make derivative works

The GoGrid cloudcenter API re-use must, however, fall under the following Share Alike licensing conditions:

• There must be full attribution to GoGrid, author and licensor
• There is no implied endorsement by GoGrid of any works derived from the API usage or rework
• After any transformation, alteration or building upon this work, any distribution must be under the same, a similar or a compatible license
• You must make it clear to others about the terms of this license. The best way to do this is by linking to the GoGrid Wiki API page (link below)
• Any of the conditions mentioned previously can be waived with permission from GoGrid

Details on the GoGrid cloudcenter OpenSpec API license can be found within the GoGrid site and is specific to the API only. All content provided on the Wiki in the API “namespace” is covered by this Share Alike license, specifically under this URL: http://wiki.gogrid.com/wiki/index.php/API. Note however, this license applies only to content provided within the namespace plus any pages constrained by the URL plus a colon (“:”). For example:

INCLUDED under the license:

• http://wiki.gogrid.com/wiki/index.php/API:Anatomy_of_a_GoGrid_API_Call
• http://wiki.gogrid.com/wiki/index.php/API:Common_API_Call_Patterns
• http://wiki.gogrid.com/wiki/index.php/API:PHP_API_Developer_Home

NOT INCLUDED under the license:

• http://wiki.gogrid.com/wiki/index.php/API_Getting_Started_Guide

FAQs

1. How can I use it?
   Anything that falls under the http://wiki.gogrid.com/wiki/index.php/API including anything within the namespace constrained by a colon is considered free-use under the Creative Commons license. You are free to view and edit, as well as re-work and re-publish changes to the API as you see fit.
2. How can’t I use it?
   You cannot modify and re-publish or resell the GoGrid cloudcenter API without including attribution to GoGrid. We recommend that you do include a document, publically published and accessible, that discusses what changes were made to the GoGrid cloudcenter API.
3. How do I publish changes?
   Any changes to or modifications of or repackaging of the GoGrid cloudcenter API should be documented on a public server and must include a link back to the GoGrid cloudcenter API documentation on the wiki.
4. Do I need to notify you when I make a change?
   We encourage you to notify us when you publish modifications to the API. We will also monitor links or trackbacks to the GoGrid API documentation. Notification, however, is not a requirement. Documentation and attribution is, however, required.
5. How do you notify me when GoGrid makes a change to the spec?
   We recommend that you regularly check the API namespace within the GoGrid wiki for changes or updates to the OpenSpec API.
6. Why is it important to notify GoGrid of changes?
   In our effort to work towards driving standards, interoperability and transparency within the Cloud Computing Marketplace, communication between and by users and developers using the API will aid in a broader acceptance and usage within the community.

If you have additional questions regarding this information, feel free to leave a comment to this article.

It is our vision and goal within GoGrid to foster community building and collaboration within the Cloud Computing market. Our commitment to this vision is evident with this release of the GoGrid cloudcenter API under the Creative Commons Share Alike license.

Last week, my colleague Randy Bias, introduced the concept of the “cloudcenter” and it has gotten some good commentary, traction and feedback. Most basically put, a cloudcenter (e.g., GoGrid) is a “datacenter in the Cloud” with features, systems, processes and functionality that sysadmins and IT Operations folks are accustomed to. But I feel that the concept needs to be explored a bit more as well as from some different angles.

I attended a technology meetup on Tuesday night in San Francisco where GoGrid is a sponsor. People were packed elbow-to-elbow in the space and I had lots of time to talk about GoGrid and our vision of Cloud Computing to many. A few times, I was asked the common questions “How do you compare to Amazon EC2?” as well as “Are you a competitor to Amazon Web Services (AWS)?” To those people who asked, I gave the following answer (probably not as well articulated though):

Both Amazon and GoGrid are Cloud Infrastructure or Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) providers. We both reside within the bottom layer of the Cloud Pyramid, a term I coined last year to help explain Cloud Computing in an “over simplified” way. Both of our companies do essentially the same thing: providing elastic and dynamically scalable computing resources and infrastructure that is consumed on a self-service basis billed by usage. But how this infrastructure is provided is nuanced differently.

This broad definition warrants further explanation. First, my answer to the “competition” question. Personally, I don’t view AWS exactly as a competitor. They have provided incredible space validation as well as attracted new users to the Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) model. In fact, I would almost go as far as to categorize them as a “soft partner.” Here are a few reasons why I think this:

• we share the same generalized space of Cloud Computing,
• we offer similar feature-sets and functionality within the Cloud, and,
• we are driving towards a common goal of moving IT infrastructure into a “greener,” more cost-effective and much more efficient environment.

By sharing similar ideas and broad goals, GoGrid and Amazon play off each other well. So, if you group our marketing, sales and engineering efforts and pit them against more traditional infrastructure deployments, we are working together on this front: Cloud vs. self-hosted, traditional datacenters. We are an unofficial and non-formalized “soft-partner.” But that is the 10,000 foot view (from way up in the Clouds).

Let’s bring this down to a 100 foot view. This is where differentiation begins. As Randy outlines, there are two segments within the Cloud Infrastructure layer: Infrastructure Web Services and Cloudcenters. Infrastructure Web Services are characterized by specific Cloud services that can be consumed together or individually. That is to say, you can use EC2, for example, for raw compute power on its own, or couple it together with S3 for dynamic storage. The key here is that you have to work to integrate the two as a single offering, which requires programming and non-standard “glues” or protocols to connect it all together^[1]. I like to describe this as an a la carte offering, you essentially pick and choose what Amazon Web Services you want, develop the integration points and proceed from there.

On the other hand, the idea of cloudcenters is that the “solution” is provided for you, in the manifestation of “a datacenter in the sky.” Within the cloudcenter you are presented with tools, infrastructure and environments that are familiar to sys-admins and IT operations folks, but with all of the benefits of the Cloud: dynamic, pay-as-you-go, scalable hardware infrastructure that YOU are in full control of and can manage easily through a Web GUI or programmatically through an API. At the core of a datacenter or cloudcenter is the idea that you have various components available for managing your “physical” infrastructure (albeit “in the cloud”):

• hardware-based load balancers^[2]
• hardware-based firewalls^[3]
• Windows Server 2003/2008
• Linux Servers^[4]
• Persistent Storage^[5]
• Cloud Storage^[6]
• Dedicated Private Networks (VLANs)
• Hybrid Infrastructure connections (Cloud Connect)
• Infrastructure management (DNS, DHCP, etc.)

The distinction is clear, right? Or still “cloudy”? Let’s think of it a bit differently in terms of building a house. Using Infrastructure Web Services is akin to working with several contractors to put together different portions of your house (e.g., electrical, plumbing, sheet rock, etc.). YOU act as the general contractor to pull it all together, manage the process, identify what item needs to work with the other, etc. A cloudcenter, on the other hand, acts as the “general contractor” for you by telling what options are available and then seamlessly engineering and integrating these items within a single point of reference and management.

Geva Perry had some good commentary on Randy’s initial post on the idea of cloudcenters. I’m intrigued with the idea of a “Cloud Spectrum” which does work with his idea about the blurring of the Cloud with regards to the various offering.

However, I still stand by the distinction between Infrastructure Web Services as a “pick & choose” offering and Cloudcenters being an “all-in-one” model. Providing “raw infrastructure” within a controlled environment presents time and cost-savings that are visible on the other end of the spectrum. That is to say, Cloud Applications (SaaS) & Cloud Platforms (PaaS) are easy to use because the functionality is siloed  in a restrictive feature set. If you follow Perry’s spectrum model, the further left you go (towards SaaS), the higher the ease-of-use and time savings. The further to the right, the more flexibility your Cloud environment is, but the harder it is to “put together.” However, I would like to offer a slight twist to Perry’s Cloud spectrum idea because the idea falls apart a bit due to the multi-dimensionality of the axes. Obviously depending on the cloudcenter provider, ease-of-use does factor in, forcing the spectrum to become somewhat bent. GoGrid provides Cloud Infrastructure with the same characteristics of that of SaaS and even some PaaS vendors in terms of ease-of-use. So, while the spectrum idea works as you go towards the right with complexity and flexibility increasing, it splits apart as you move toward (and hit) EC2 and GoGrid. This is probably the subject of another post as I would like to explore this concept in greater detail. The bottom line is, with a GoGrid cloudcenter, you not only get flexibility and full control of your Cloud Infrastructure, but you also receive it “wrapped up” within a cohesive and easy interface normally present within the SaaS end of the spectrum.

What is your read on cloudcenters vs. Infrastructure Web Services? I would love to get your view on this.

1. S3 not accessible via CFS/NFS; SQS doesn’t all for JMS or STOMP protocols [↩]
2. Currently available & free [↩]
3. To be released in 1Q09 [↩]
4. RHEL, CentOS and soon Ubuntu and others [↩]
5. Available on every Cloud server [↩]
6. Dynamically scalable, 10GB Free, mountable storage [↩]