Open Source Software Spotlight

From your underlying open source server operating system to the open source tools that help you get your job done, open source software is likely a critical part of your IT infrastructure. This ServerWatch section will keep you abreast of the latest releases, reviews and various troubleshooting tips.

Piston Cloud Raises $12.5 Million for OpenStack Cloud Tech

Open source OpenStack cloud vendor gets a little help from Cisco in a new round of funding.

VMware Pumps $30 Million into Puppet

VMware makes strategic investment in open source-based configuration management technology - what does it all mean?

Mirantis Raises $10 Million for OpenStack Services

Founder says he has turned down acquisition offers as his company continues to grow by helping others build OpenStack public clouds.

What's on the Horizon for the OpenStack Grizzly Cloud?

As the open source cloud project continues to grow,  new projects could land in the next release.

VMware vSphere Embraces OpenStack

VMware CTO Steve Herrod tells OpenStack that he want to join the party.

OpenStack Open Source Cloud Distributions Take Shape

Ubuntu, SUSE and Red Hat explain how the nascent market for packaged cloud server distributions is beginning to shape up.

Ubuntu Helps Accelerate OpenStack Deployments

Mark Shuttleworth details what it takes to deliver OpenStack in production, in 3 minutes or less.

Cisco Debuts Its Own OpenStack Distribution

The networking hardware giant releases a key open source cloud distribution.

Red Hat Integrates OpenStack with Linux Platform and Management Tools

With OpenStack Folsom now officially available, Red Hat reveals how it's putting the open source cloud technology together for an Enterprise release.

Can OpenStack Overcome Its Cloudy Climate?

Will political in-fighting and dissent over open and closed cloud platform alternatives prevent cloud providers from helping make the cloud enterprise a reality?

Piston's Airframe Arrives for OpenStack Private Cloud Systems

The company looks to stand out by making it easier for organizations to jump on the OpenStack bandwagon.

Apache Deltacloud Hits Open Source Cloud Server Milestone

Different cloud server technologies all come together and get abstracted in Deltacloud 1.0.

Rackspace Finally Goes Public with OpenStack Cloud Servers

After more than two years of promoting the open source OpenStack project, Rackspace is finally ready to deliver it for its own cloud customers.

Open Source OpenStack ARMs the Cloud

The cloud will no longer be confined to just the realm of x86 servers as OpenStack turns two.

Open Source OpenStack Moving Forward as Folsom Nears

Is it officially the summer of OpenStack?  Work on governance as well as technology continues to accelerate.

SUSE Linux Building Commercial Open Source OpenStack Offering

The new OpenStack private cloud will take full advantage of SUSE Studio and cloud management capabilities.

NASA Ditching Open Source OpenStack? Not So Fast

While Amazon boasts that NASA is saving $1M by moving to AWS, the truth is a bit more complex.

Puppet Partners with EMC on Open Source Razor

New provisioning tool takes aim at bare metal server deployments.  

IaaS Meets PaaS: Piston Brings Cloud Foundry Platform to OpenStack

A new open source project lets Cloud Foundry PaaS run on OpenStack IaaS.

Puppet Configures OpenStack

Open source cloud platform now has open source configuration options.

OpenStack Essex Delivers Cloud Dashboard

Latest open source OpenStack release provides new management, security, storage and compute features.

Citrix Walks Away from OpenStack, Moves to Apache CloudStack

Citrix kills its commercial OpenStack efforts, claiming it wasn't Amazon compatible; OpenStack execs disagree.

Puppet Enterprise 2.5 Takes Aim at Infrastructure

The latest release of Puppet goes beyond simple server and application configuration.

13 Free Network and DNS Tools

These 13  free network and DNS tools will go a long way toward helping you administer, troubleshoot, manage and secure your network.

OpenStack Debuts TryStack

Open source cloud computing platform gets a new on-ramp with TryStack effort.

Dell Leans on SUSE for OEM Linux Solutions

What's sitting inside your Dell OEM solution? If it's Linux, then it's likely to be SUSE.

Cloudera Expands Hadoop Management for the Enterprise

Cloudera Enterprise 3.7 debuts providing enterprise tools for managing Big Data.

Fedora 16 Goes Exploring With Verne

New Linux release embraces OpenStack and improved GNOME desktop.

Use s3cmd for Managing Amazon S3 Storage from the CLI

If you're looking to script backups or other operations, a reliable CLI tool that works with S3 is a must. s3cmd fits the bill.

Opscode Brings Chef to Windows

The open source server configuration management tool makes the leap to Windows, enabling automation for both Linux and Windows.

Zend Debuts PHPcloud

New cloud service for PHP developers takes flight with tools to help build and test cloud applications.

Use httperf for Server Benchmarking

Prototyping Web applications? Trying to test and tune your Web servers? httperf makes it easy to test HTTP server workloads.

Ubuntu 11.10 Ocelot Heads to the Cloud

New Ubuntu release builds in OpenStack, Juju and updated Unity interface on the desktop.

There's a New GNU fdisk in Town

The latest GNU fdisk is now in alpha. Not anywhere ready for production, but ready for the adventurous to take out for a spin.

Rackspace Opens Up OpenStack With Planned Foundation

A new open source foundation is set to take shape.

Kernel Developers Share Security Tips

Learn tips for keeping your Linux system safe in this post-kernel.org-breach world.

Engine Yard Brings JRuby to Cloud

Java on Ruby implementation takes a big leap forward enabling deployment of production supported cloud.

Piston Computing Secures OpenStack

A new take on OpenStack debuts with automated deployment and security baked in.

Give Yourself a Menu in Vim

Completing filenames when using Vim in command mode can be tricky. These tips will make it a simpler task.

Puppet Enterprise 2.0 Expands Configuration Management

Configuration management tool gets new reporting user interface and  faster synchronization.

OpenStack Diablo Open Source Cloud Platform Accelerates High-Availability

Identity, networking, management and high-availability get a boost in new release of open source cloud platform.

User Limits Made Easy

Linux admins looking for an easy way to set hard and soft limits for users will find much to like about the pam_limits module. With pam_limits, you can set parameters on system resources on a per-user (or per-group) basis for all variables--from the maximum number of files a user can have open to the amount of CPU time.

A Look at the Compgen Bash Builtin

Linux and other Unix-type systems contain a wealth of features under the surface. Oftentimes, however, these features are non-obvious and hard to find. Compgen, a GNU Bash builtin that shows all possible completions, is one such feature.

HP's OpenStack Cloud Goes Into Private Beta

OpenStack ecosystem continues to grow, but how do you move data across different OpenStack vendors?

Boost WordPress Performance With W3 Total Cache

Is your hardware inadequate for your site? Throwing more resources at it may not be the best answer. For WordPress sites, W3 Total Cache is an inexpensive way to wring the most out of what you already have.

Rename and Copy Files Easily in Your Text Editor

Renameutils is aptly named. The easy-to-use collection of utilities makes renaming files as easy as using your favorite text editor.

Try collectlfor System Monitoring

When it comes to collecting system status data, sar is a veritable workhorse. It is not, however, without its limitations. If you're in the market for a utility that also handles NFS, Slab data, and sub-second intervals, consider collectl.

HP Joins OpenStack

HP joins Dell, Citrix, Cisco, Ubuntu and more than 86 other vendors in the land-grab rush for open source stack superemacy.

Monitor Progress with Pipe Viewer

For sys admins, running a process can feel like driving cross-country without a road map. Pipe Viewer is one way to answer the question, 'are we there yet?'

Recover and Preserve Data With GNU ddrescue

With GNU ddrescue you need never worry about the impact of optical media degradation on your data.

Whip Up Regular Expressions With Txt2regex

Understanding regular expressions is important for anyone who spends time doing system administration or programming. If that describes you and regexes are not your strong suit, txt2regex is an excellent tool to have handy.

Red Hat Previews JBoss Application Server 7

New open source middleware Java Server release nears completion.

Load Testing and Benchmarking With Siege

Ready to roll out a site, but not sure how it will perform in real-world use? Consider Siege, an open source load-testing and benchmarking utility that will help stress test your setup before exposing it to the world.

WS02 Updates Middleware Servers

Moving messages from .NET to Java platforms get easier with new middleware messaging engine.

ActiveState Expands Platform-as-a-Service Cloud Tech for Perl

Perl cloud vendor run by a 15 year old entrepreneur gets snapped up.

5 Tips for Managing Debian Packages

Debian's package tools makes it easy to install and manage packages. For more complex tasks, however, tools are not as well-advertised. Here are five options worth checking out.

Detach Processes With Disown and Nohup

Have a long-running job you want to "detach" from the terminal? Don't use tmux or Screen? If you haven't started the job yet, nohup is an easy to use option, and if you must stop a job in the middle, there's disown.

Track Issues With Roundup

No matter what the size is of your IT environment, issue tracking is a critical component of system administration. If you're looking for a simple issue tracking system that can be scaled as your shop grows, check out Roundup, an interesting solution that is easy to both test out and deploy.

Citrix Adopts OpenStack for Project Olympus

Citrix formally announces the name and direction of their OpenStack open source cloud virtualization stack initiative

DenyHosts: Keep on Knocking but You Can't Come In

DenyHosts makes it easy to ward off unauthorized SSH connection attempts. The utility blocks attempts to connect to your server via SSH after too many failed attempts or from a blacklisted host.

Discover Rootkits With Unhide

When your system is rooted, you can't trust most utilities to show processes from the rootkit. To identify the problem, check out unhide and unhide.rb.

This Week's Linux Top 5: Red Hat, Ubuntu, Attachmate and More

Red Hat rolls out new cloud services at the Red Hat Summit, Ubuntu's CTO calls it quits, Attachmate makes some post-acquisition moves and takes aim at the Mono Project, and more.

Track Multiple Files Simultaneously With MultiTail

The tail utility is one of the most useful admin tools, but it's limited and outdated. Bring your log-watching capabilities into the 21st century and view multiple logs at one time with MultiTail.

ActiveState Stackato Delivers Perl and Python to the Cloud

ActiveState chooses VMware's Cloud Foundry instead of Red Hat OpenShift for new platform.

Red Hat Debuts CloudForms and OpenShift for Cloud Deployment

New solutions for creating and managing clouds announced, but they're not all open source -- yet.

Simplify Perl Module Management With CPAN Minus

Perl may not be glamorous, but its modules are often hard to avoid. Oftentimes, the standard CPAN shell makes using them more difficult than it needs to be. If that's the case for you, consider switching to CPAN Minus.

Get More Out of Git: Use Gist With Vim

If you use git to collaborate, you probably also know about Gist, a Pastebin-type service from Github. But did you also know, that if you're a Vim user you can get even more out of it with the script Gist.vim?

OpenStack Cactus Advances Open Source Cloud Computing

OpenStack expands with new API to create extensions.

This Week's Linux Top 5: Groklaw, GNOME, KDE and More

Groklaw declares 'mission-accomplished', KDE and GNOME have some news of their own, Android stays open and more.

Use Telnet to Troubleshoot

Telnet remains a useful, albeit insecure, way to troubleshoot Linux-powered servers.

Pretty Python Plotting With CairoPlot

Data aficionados constantly on the lookout for better ways to display charts and graphs will appreciate CairoPlot, Python-based plotting software pretty enough to impress even the most jaded Mac user.

Scientific Linux 6.0 Released

Linux adoption in the scientific community is very high. For the many organizations that want Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.0 but don't want to pay for it or wait for the next release of CentOS, Scientific Linux is worth a look.

Use Linux and WebDAV to Facilitate Online Collaboration

There are many options for online collaboration, but WebDAV remains a useful and straightforward way to share files. Software support at both the server and client ends sweetens the deal further.

Introduction to tmux: A GNU Screen Alternative

Need to run multiple sessions in the same terminal but aren't fond of screen? Consider tmux, open source software that offers Emacs and vi-style keybindings.