With the latest innovations discovered in technology, nearly all technology related news, or web hosting articles contain terminology related to cloud webhosting, cloud computing, or plainly “the cloud”. All these jargons are basically referring to the same idea, an all of them focus on the increasing inclination towards cloud hosting in the server world.

Besides being extremely popular, companies, governments or non-profit organizations have many other reasons to fall upon to invest in cloud computing. The economical and technical benefits make it very alluring, however, when adopting cloud hosting technology, also take into consideration:

No. 1: SaaS (Software as a Service) – SaaS too, just like cloud, is a term one comes across in hosting discussions. As the term clearly entails, the client buys a subscription for software hosted by the service supplier. The hardware and software of the server remain under ownership of the host.

No. 2: Cloud Application Platform: Here, the supplier does the groundwork needed for the software, but does not supply the software itself. This concept is parallel to models of conventional managed server hosting. The main variation however is that the supplier can customize the platform in order to meet the precise growth needs of the client.

No. 3: Open Cloud: This selection provides clients with the opportunity to develop their own cloud or their own application framework by the supplier, due to it being free and open source software. To some extent, there is not much difference between Open Cloud and the above mentioned application (SaaS & Cloud Application Platform), however here the client has the authority, even after the contract ends, since it is an open platform.

No. 4: Private Cloud: This term is similar to that of traditional hosting as the client is basically operating on a dedicated server. The service and software supplied by the service provider are equal to other cloud services, and often times, the supplier may run the server even if it’s situated under the clients property.

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2. Why Cloud Hosting is Better than Shared hosting, VPS and Dedicated Servers?
3. EPiServer Cloud Offers Rapid Marketing Solutions

Original: 4 Considerations When Adopting Cloud Hosting Technology

Red Hat, an open source software developer has recently introduced a new program called Red Hat CloudForms. According to the statement that came out on Wednesday, this program will help develop and control infrastructure as a service, private and hybrid clouds.

A detailed life cycle control with the power to develop merged clouds has been chosen from a great variety of accessories to create this program. This cloud builder which is founded on Red Hat’s technology has given the company the capability to profit from the flexibility offered by the cloud as well as the power to manage their application portfolio.

Technical issues faced by the first cloud products like the price and complications, the virtual server produced as well as the serious security matters have now been solved with the advent of CloudForms. Clients now find themselves at ease since they do not have to control so many virtual servers on their own. Instead they find it simpler to now construct and control complicated multi-tier applications.

The press release that came out stated, “administrators know and control the applications, their configurations and where they are allowed to execute,” therefore the problems that come with the cloud such as security have been greatly minimized. The structure of CloudForm is much more flexible than either Microsoft’s or VMware’s cloud builders.

A study by NetworkWorld states that “Red Hat’s claim does raise the question of how Microsoft and VMware products can be integrated with Red Hat if they’re not open in the first place.”

“With CloudForms, Red Hat is changing what CIOs expect from private clouds,” says Scott Crenshaw, vice president and general manager of cloud business at Red Hat. “With its leadership in enterprise operating systems and middleware, Red Hat gives users an easier way to build hybrid clouds and manage what they really care about: applications.  Red Hat CloudForms also lets them deploy and manage their applications on any type of server: physical, virtual and public cloud. This is very different than cloud products from virtualization-only vendors, which focus on managing virtual machines, not applications, thus creating significant new complexity and costs.  By allowing users to manage applications, not just VMs, Red Hat makes the promise of cloud real, by reducing management complexity and increasing IT agility and innovation.”

The future plans of the organization include growing the program CloudForms to incorporate a wide range of services to increase application flexibility from cloud to cloud as well inaccessible things like storage abstraction and messaging. For now, Cloud Forms is available in a beta version but will soon be accessible by all by the end of 2011.

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Original: Red Hat Introduces Hybrid Cloud Computing Platform Software

Information technology experts for the United States House of Representatives decided to move their 520 websites to a Drupal open-source web hosting platform. Drupal was selected because it is the preferred web hosting type for House of Representative websites. Drupal is open-source software with high compatibility to many social networking and Web 2.0 applications. Many other Government organizations are utilizing Drupal, including the White House.

The House of Representatives currently hosts 520 websites for its leadership, officials, administrative services, members and committees. These sites are hosted on a mixture of proprietary and open-source content management systems. House information technology professionals are working in conjunction with other experts to ensure the transfer of files is successful. These experts include, Ingalls Information Security, Acquia Inc. and Phase2 Technology.

The team of experts developed, confirmed and delivered the Drupal 7 platform to be used by the House of Representatives. On January 5^th, the Drupal implementation went live with a small portion of websites. Others will be rolled out in a timely fashion. The goal of the platform is to standardize web presence utilizing Drupal.

The House of Representatives Chief Administrative Officer is searching for preferred vendors to help each House member produce a website. The primary goal of this solicitation is to create a list of prequalified vendors. Other goals include:

• Notifying vendors of the Drupal platform transition
• Acquiring feedback regarding proposed web service agreements
• Connecting qualified vendors to House offices in need of web services

Once this list is compiled, each House of Representative member will be given the choice to select a vendor to assist them with the development of a website. This type of list tends to be humungous so each member or committee will have plenty of options to choose from.

When the Government began searching for a platform, they decided on Drupal because the software could meet their requirements of hosting hundreds of different websites full of content and with individual features. Drupal allows for the ability to implement websites efficiently.

Since other federal departments have made the switch to Drupal-based platforms, it is inevitable the entire Government will eventually switch. Drupal provides many features that are attractive to the United States Government. If successful, many Americans will witness the success and perhaps switch to Drupal for their own person or business use. This is another example of a content management system consolidating information for easy access and use.

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1. WhiteHouse.gov To Use Drupal
2. Are You Doing it With Drupal?
3. The Power of Drupal Explored

Original: Sections of the Government Moving to Drupal

Having a good content management system is crucial to the success of any online business. With so many to choose from, it can be hard to decide which ones will live up to their promises. In fact, it can be difficult just to find the top three! Below we’ve given you an overview of the three best content management systems; Drupal, Joomla, and Mambo. The information below should aid you in conducting your own thorough investigation, based on your needs.

Drupal

Drupal has quickly become one of the most popular content management systems. It’s recent popularity boom is due to the fact that it is an open-source software, which means it can be improved by any developer with an interest in doing so. Drupal has been said to be a perfect solution for people who are building community-based websites such as forums. This is because one of it’s most notable features is it’s user permissions system. With it’s extensive administrative control, webmasters can control every aspect of their forum. Drupal is also preferred over Joomla in terms of development because it is easier to interact with and expand.

Joomla

Joomla has also gained popularity because of it’s powerful features and easy user interface. While Joomla also includes forum managing features, these features are not it’s strongest points. Among the more notable features of this CMS is it’s administrative functionality for image galleries, search engine optimization, shopping carts, and forum management. Some users choose Joomla over Drupal due to it’s user-friendly interface. Although there is some learning curve involved with Joomla it is often described as the easiest CMS around.

Mambo

The Mambo content management system was one of the first popular open source content managements systems. While it has been around for quite some time now, it still have a group of developers backing it that maintain it’s functionality and reliability. Even though it was one of the pioneer content management systems, it has fallen somewhat behind the newer CMS softwares available. The primary reason for it’s recently decreased popularity is it’s code incompatibility due to it’s age. For this reason many developers shy away from developing applications that can be used with Mambo. With each new advance in the consent management industry, Mambo becomes more obsolete.

Making the Decision

The first thing you’ll want to do when investigating your options, is go to the main site of each of the content management systems above. Make sure you review all of their features and ensure you’re going to be able to fulfill all of your needs by using the software. Even though one of the softwares may be more suitable for you it is still likely that you will need to install additional applications. It is very unlikely that you will find all of the desired features within one CMS, therefor you’ll want to do some research and find out which CMS has the compatible applications you need. Once you’ve made your decision, you can install the CMS of your choice simply with the Fantastico program.

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1. The Advantages of a Good Content Management System
2. Plone – A Python Based Content Management System
3. WordPress Content Management System

Original: The Best Content Management Systems Reviewed

Open-source software has really made a name for itself in recent times, now prevalent in the form of multimedia players, operating systems and web applications.  In fact, companies around the world are leveraging this type of software to maintain their day to day business operations.  Open-source programs can suite a variety of needs across a broad range of industries and market segments.  One area this software has truly settled into is e-commerce, in particularly, the shopping cart.

Open-source shopping cart software offers a cost effective alternative to traditional commercial solutions.  Perhaps the biggest draw to these programs is that they provide the online merchant with the ability to customize the software to satisfy the unique requirements of their business.  This is all made possible active communities that make templates, modules and various other components widely available in addition to their continuous efforts to enhance the project.

What to Look for

When shopping for any software, open-source or proprietary, it is important for merchants to thoroughly research and evaluate the product before sending it into deployment.  Because there is no single solution that works for every store, it is crucial to select a cart based on individual needs.   With that said, here some critical features you want to look for in an open-source product:

Product Capacity - An online store owner must be able to determine limitations for their product capacity.  For instance, if you have a catalog compromised of more than 500 products but the shopping cart only supports 200, you should know right then and there that the software cannot suit your requirements.  The good thing is that most open-source shopping carts offer support for an unlimited number of products.

System Performance – A lagging, sluggish online store is one of the fastest ways to send your customers surfing to the competition.  For this reason, you need to perform due diligence to make sure your shopping cart delivers an optimal performance.  A lot of this depends on server configuration, but the software itself should definitely be evaluated for performance before you make the final decision.

Community Support – An open-source shopping cart usually comes with no official form of technical support or customer service, which essentially means that there is no hotline to call up whenever you experience problems.  Therefore, you need to find a piece of software that is backed by a strong community of developers and users who solidly back the project.  While the quality of support can never be guaranteed, it is still a good idea to check online in the appropriate forums to access the atmosphere and measure how long it takes for users to generate a response.

Payment Gateway Compatibility – If you want to be able to accept and process credit and debit card payments, then you will need an open-source solution that supports third-party payment gateways.  Although this needs to be considered in your research, it should be comforting to know that many open-source shopping carts are compatible with the major payment gateway service providers.

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1. Open-Source Software to Watch for in 2009
2. Microsoft Launching an Open-Source CMS?
3. A Closer Look at the Open-Source CMS

Original: How to Evaluate Open-source Shopping Carts

100% green web hosting, eco-friendly servers, solar and wind powered services – the list of environmentally friendly products is growing every day.  One of the newest hot phrases flung around lately is “organic software.”  Exactly what is organic software and how is it implemented into hosted web sites?

The actual meaning

The term “organic software” is simply a rephrasing of open source software that is available to download off of the internet.  The software is designed, developed and distributed freely all the while offering complete accessibility to its source code.  Because it is available for free download, there is no manufacturing process put into the creation of software disks.  You are left with software that makes no carbon footprint or impact on the environment.  When we think of the word “organic” we are left with the impressions of something home-grown, without the use of chemicals.  In a bit of a leap, the word organic in this case is used to convey simply “home-grown”.  So, instead of the mouthful of “free to download open source software,” we can use the term “organic software.”

Software that is organic

Armed with our new, shorter and more eco-friendly phrase, we can now go on the hunt for software that fits this bill.  In the realm of web hosting, there are literally thousands of programs out there that could be classified as organic software.  Drupal is one such program – a content management system that is developed and designed by a community of developers and is available to freely download.  vTiger is an organic customer relationship management piece of software.  Some examples of organic design programs are Gimp, Picasa2 and Nvu.  A fantastic web server program that definitely can be categorized as organic software is WAMP – Windows Apache MySQL PHP combined into an easy and simple to use server program.  All of these programs are open source and are all free to download.

Firefox is the newest to proclaim

Mozilla Firefox has recently put out to the public that it is a 100% piece of organic software.  The company states that it can claim this due to Firefox having been created by thousands spanning the globe, the company itself is non-profit and it completely exposes the internal workings (code) of its product.  Mozilla firmly believes that by ensuring that the developing community has access to Firefox’s coding, it can only continue to become a better and better product and this benefits all Firefox browser users.

Same song, different dance

It certainly seems like organic software really isn’t something new.  Open source technology and programs have been available for many years.  However, the reasoning behind the new phraseology lays within the push to be greener, more ecologically friendly.  Businesses, software creators, software programmers and even web hosting companies are quickly realizing this is a hot issue and are doing their level best to jump on the bandwagon.  What it all comes down to is organic software is just the newest spin on an already eco-friendly system called open source programming.

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1. Open-Source Software to Watch for in 2009
2. Common Web Hosting Software Programs
3. Factors to Consider for Your Web Server Software

Original: What Is Organic Software?

Building on established trends
Cloud computing builds on established trends for driving the cost out of the delivery of services while increasing the speed and agility with which services are deployed. It shortens the time from sketching out an application architecture to actual deployment. Cloud computing incorporates virtualization, on-demand deployment, Internet delivery of services, and open source software. From one perspective, cloud
computing is nothing new because it uses approaches, concepts, and best practices that have already been established. From another perspective, everything is new because cloud computing changes how we invent, develop, deploy, scale, update, maintain, and pay for applications and the infrastructure on which they run. In this chapter, we examine the trends and how they have become core to what cloud
computing is all about.
Virtual machines as the standard deployment object
Over the last several years, virtual machines have become a standard deployment object. Virtualization further enhances flexibility because it abstracts the hardware to the point where software stacks can be deployed and redeployed without being tied to a specific physical server. Virtualization enables a dynamic datacenter where servers provide a pool of resources that are harnessed as needed, and where the
relationship of applications to compute, storage, and network resources changes dynamically in order to meet both workload and business demands. With application deployment decoupled from server deployment, applications can be deployed and scaled rapidly, without having to first procure physical servers.
Virtual machines have become the prevalent abstraction — and unit of deployment — because they are the least-common denominator interface between service providers and developers. Using virtual machines as deployment objects is sufficient for 80 percent of usage, and it helps to satisfy the need to rapidly deploy
and scale applications. Virtual appliances, virtual machines that include software that is partially or fully
configured to perform a specific task such as a Web or database server, further enhance the ability to create and deploy applications rapidly. The combination of virtual machines and appliances as standard deployment objects is one of the key features of cloud computing. Compute clouds are usually complemented by storage clouds that provide virtualized storage through APIs that facilitate storing virtual machine images, source files for components such as Web servers, application state data, and general business data.

The on-demand, self-service, pay-by-use model
The on-demand, self-service, pay-by-use nature of cloud computing is also an extension of established trends. From an enterprise perspective, the on-demand nature of cloud computing helps to support the performance and capacity aspects of service-level objectives. The self-service nature of cloud computing allows organizations to create elastic environments that expand and contract based on the workload and target performance parameters. And the pay-by-use nature of cloud computing may take the form of equipment leases that guarantee a minimum level of service from a cloud provider. Virtualization is a key feature of this model. IT organizations have understood for years that virtualization allows them to quickly and easily create copies of existing environments —sometimes involving multiple virtual machines — to support test, development, and staging activities. The cost of these environments is minimal
because they can coexist on the same servers as production environments because they use few resources.
Likewise, new applications can be developed and deployed in new virtual machines on existing servers, opened up for use on the Internet, and scaled if the application is successful in the marketplace. This lightweight deployment model has already led to a “Darwinistic” approach to business development where beta versions of software are made public and the market decides which applications deserve to be
scaled and developed further or quietly retired. Cloud computing extends this trend through automation. Instead of negotiating with an IT organization for resources on which to deploy an application, a compute
cloud is a self-service proposition where a credit card can purchase compute cycles, and a Web interface or API is used to create virtual machines and establish network relationships between them. Instead of requiring a long-term contract for services with an IT organization or a service provider, clouds work on a pay-by-use, or payby-the-sip model where an application may exist to run a job for a few minutes or hours, or it may exist to provide services to customers on a long-term basis. Compute clouds are built as if applications are temporary, and billing is based on resource consumption: CPU hours used, volumes of data moved, or gigabytes of data stored. The ability to use and pay for only the resources used shifts the risk of how much
infrastructure to purchase from the organization developing the application to the cloud provider. It also shifts the responsibility for architectural decisions from application architects to developers. This shift can increase risk, risk that must be managed by enterprises that have processes in place for a reason, and of system, network, and storage architects that needs to factor in to cloud computing designs.
Infrastructure is programmable
This shift of architectural responsibility has significant consequences. In the past, architects would determine how the various components of an application would be laid out onto a set of servers, how they would be interconnected, secured, managed, and scaled. Now, a developer can use a cloud provider’s API to create not only an application’s initial composition onto virtual machines, but also how it scales and
evolves to accommodate workload changes. Consider this analogy: historically, a developer writing software using the Java™ programming language determines when it’s appropriate to create new threads to
allow multiple activities to progress in parallel. Today, a developer can discover and attach to a service with the same ease, allowing them to scale an application to the point where it might engage thousands of virtual machines in order to accommodate a huge spike in demand.
The ability to program an application architecture dynamically puts enormous power in the hands of developers with a commensurate amount of responsibility. To use cloud computing most effectively, a developer must also be an architect, and that architect needs to be able to create a self-monitoring and self-expanding application. The developer/architect needs to understand when it’s appropriate to create a new thread versus create a new virtual machine, along with the architectural patterns for
how they are interconnected. When this power is well understood and harnessed, the results can be spectacular. A story that is already becoming legendary is Animoto’s mashup tool that creates a
video from a set of images and music. The company’s application scaled from 50 to 3,500 servers in just three days due in part to an architecture that allowed it to scale easily. For this to work, the application had to be built to be horizontal scaled, have limited state, and manage its own deployment through cloud APIs. For every success story such as this, there will likely be a similar story where the application is not
capable of self-scaling and where it fails to meet consumer demand. The importance of this shift from developer to developer/architect cannot be understated. Consider whether your enterprise datacenter could scale an application this rapidly to accommodate such a rapidly growing workload, and whether cloud computing could augment your current capabilities.
Applications are composed and are built to be composable
Another consequence of the self-service, pay-by-use model is that applications are composed by assembling and configuring appliances and open-source software as much as they are programmed. Applications and architectures that can be refactored in order to make the most use of standard components are those that will be the most successful in leveraging the benefits of cloud computing. Likewise, application
components should be designed to be composable by building them so they can be consumed easily. This requires having simple, clear functions, and well-documented APIs. Building large, monolithic applications is a thing of the past as the library of existing tools that can be used directly or tailored for a specific use becomes ever larger.
For example, tools such as Hadoop, an open-source MapReduce implementation, can be used in a wide range of contexts in which a problem and its data can be refactored so that many parts of it can execute in parallel. When The New York Times wished to convert 11 million articles and images in its archive to PDF format, their internal IT organization said that it would take seven weeks. In the mean time, one
developer using 100 Amazon EC2 simple Web service interface instances running Hadoop completed the job in 24 hours for less than $300. (This did not include the time required to upload the data or the cost of the storage.)
Even large corporations can use cloud computing in ways that solve significant problems in less time and at a lower cost than with traditional enterprise computing.
Example Web application deployment
As an example of how the combination of virtualization and self service facilitate application deployment, consider a two-tier Web application deployment into a cloud (Figure 1):
1. A developer might choose a load balancer, Web server, and database server appliances from a library of preconfigured virtual machine images.
2. The developer would configure each component to make a custom image. The load balancer would be configured, the Web server populated with its static content by uploading it to the storage cloud, and the database server appliances populated with dynamic content for the site.
3. The developer layers custom code into the new architecture, making the components meet specific application requirements.
4. The developer chooses a pattern that takes the images for each layer and deploys them, handling networking, security, and scalability issues.

Example cloud-based deployment of an application onto a two-tier Web server architectural pattern.

For a description of how this feat was
accomplished, please visit: http://open.
blogs.nytimes.com/2007/11/01/self-serviceprorated-
super-computing-fun/

5. The secure, high-availability Web application is up and running. When the application needs to be updated, the virtual machine images can be updated, versioned, copied across the development-test-production chain, and the entire infrastructure redeployed. Cloud computing assumes that everything is
temporary, and it’s just as easy to redeploy an entire application than it is to manually patch a set of individual virtual machines. In this example, the abstract nature of virtual machine images supports a
composition-based approach to application development. By refactoring the problem, a standard set of components can be used to quickly deploy an application. With this model, enterprise business needs can be met quickly, without the need for the time-consuming, manual purchase, installation, cabling, and configuration of servers, storage, and network infrastructure.
Services are delivered over the network
It almost goes without saying that cloud computing extends the existing trend of making services available over the network. Virtually every business organization has recognized the value of Web-based interfaces to their applications, whether they are made available to customers over the Internet, or whether they are internal applications that are made available to authorized employees, partners, suppliers,
and consultants. The beauty of Internet-based service delivery, of course, is that applications can be made available anywhere, and at any time. While enterprises are well aware of the ability to secure communications
using Secure Socket Layer (SSL) encryption along with strong authentication, bootstrapping trust in a cloud computing environment requires carefully considering the differences between enterprise computing and cloud computing. When properly architected, Internet service delivery can provide the flexibility and security required by enterprises of all sizes.
The role of open source software
Open source software plays an important role in cloud computing by allowing its basic software elements — virtual machine images and appliances — to be created from easily accessible components. This has an amplifying effect:
• Developers, for example, can create a database appliance by layering MySQL software onto an instance of the OpenSolaris™ Operating System and performing customizations (Figure 2). Appliances such as these enable cloud computing applications to be created, deployed, and dynamically scaled on demand. Consider, for example, how open source software allows an application such as that created by Animoto to scale to 3,500 instances in a matter of days.

Figure 2. Appliances can be created by layering open source software into a virtual machine image and performing customizations that simplify their deployment. In this example, a database appliance is created by layering MySQL software on top of the OpenSolaris Operating System.
• The ease with which open source components can be used to assemble large applications generates more open source components. This, in turn, makes the role of open source software even more important. The need, for example, to have a MapReduce algorithm that can run in a cloud-computing environment, was one
of the factors stimulating its development. Now that the tool has been created, it is being used to further raise the level at which developers ‘program’ cloud computing applications.

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Original: The Nature of Cloud Computing

When big companies launch their new commercial software, they do so with press releases, conferences and other hoopla that adds to the hype.  When new open-source products are introduced, even some of the popular ones are launched with far less fanfare.  The community involved with this type of software are usually too busy developing and testing their projects to roll out all the bells and whistles that come along with a marketing campaign.  This is often the case with some of the most remarkable programs.  Although we have already zoomed through a good portion of 2009, there are still a number of big open-source projects that have yet to be released.  We have gathered up some of the most notable in this article.

New Linux Platforms

Linux fans have a lot to look forward to as there are major plans in the works for this open-source operating system.  Already launching Ubuntu 9.04 in April of this year, the Ubuntu development team is also looking to introduce 9.10 in October 2009.  Some of the new features promised are integration with Amazon’s EC2 API, which will allow users to set up their own cloud with open tools, and a kernel mode for enabling a seamless, flicker-free startup.  In addition, Red Hat is slated to release Fedora 11 sometime this summer, complete with many new updates.  According to the developers, the system will boot up and shut down faster and also include improved support for fingerprint readers.

Scripting Tools and Languages

In December of 2008, the development communities of Merb and Ruby on Rails made an agreement to merge instead of maintain parallel development initiatives.  Their goal was to preserve the advanced features and flexible configuration of Merb along with the ease of use and enhanced productivity that has made Rails such a hit among developers.  Called Rails 3, the new project will incorporate various features and concepts of Merb, including its JavaScript libraries, object relational models and template languages.  Although Rails 3 didn’t make its May 2009 beta release date, developers may want to keep their ear to the ground to see when it does hit the market.

More Open-Source Projects to Keep an Eye On

MariaDB – This project is a community-developed branch of MySQL.  The brainchild of Michael “Monty” Widenius, MySQL AB and Monty Program AB founder, the database is said to be powered by the Maria storage engine.

CodeIgniter 2.0 - Designed for coders who desire a more user-friendly and elegant toolkit, CodeIgniter 2.0 is a PHP framework that leaves a minimal footprint and allows developers to create full-featured web-based applications.

Dojo 1.3 – This tool set is an all-in-one solution for developers who need to create dynamic web applications, particularly those who want to become masters at DHTML and JavaScript coding.  Said to be released in the very near future, Dojo 1.3 offers a new lightning fast CSS selector query engine as well as all new widgets and components.

There is a slew of open-source software projects set to hit the market and we haven’t even scratched the surface.  Others include software for mobile platforms, business apps, enterprise collaboration and many more.  With so much on the plate, there is bound to be an open-source application you’ve been looking forward to coming very soon.

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1. A Closer Look at the Open-Source CMS
2. Factors to Consider for Your Web Server Software
3. Common Web Hosting Software Programs

Original: Open-Source Software to Watch for in 2009