In this video, Rob Hirschfeld and Greg Althaus provide operators real-world examples of how best to migrate your provisioning platform to Digital Rebar Provision. This blog highlights one of these migration ideas.
Scenario
10 Servers running in multiple subnets
DHCP Server
Cobbler Provisioning Tool
Migration Process
Setup Digital Rebar Provision (DRP) in the Network
Create a new subnet with DHCP server installed
Operate the DHCP in reservation mode
Run DRP to discover the entire network across subnets without DHCP access
Create a mapping of infrastructure including MAC address to IP address
Migrate DRP control server by server
Turn off old DHCP server control for a specific MAC address and turn it on for new DHCP server
Reboot the specific MAC address node and DRP will manage the provisioning for that specific server
Confirm reset server and continue to manage the changeover server by server
Other Options
Continue to manage Cobbler for existing infrastructure and use DRP for all new nodes
Split provisioning services based on application being deployed
Watch the full video below to hear other scenarios presented for migration options.
Internal business units continue to bypass traditional IT in many organizations creating shadow IT leaving corporate data unsecured, networks exposed through unknown entry points, and the possibility of wasting IT resources by paying for services already provided by the company. CIOs must regain control of their IT sprawl to ensure security, resource allocation, and operational control of the business.
RackN offers IT leaders a new way forward to take back control of their services by establishing a solid foundation capable of managing internal data centers, external hosting services, public clouds, and even the upcoming edge infrastructure opportunity.
Issue : IT & Business Conflict on IT Service Delivery and Ownership
Shadow IT – corporate services (internal and external) are delivered without the knowledge or control of the IT department
Public Clouds – services are delivered via 3rd party hardware that may have noisy neighbors, unknown geographic location, and other issues requiring IT management
Impact : Loss of Operational Control of IT
IT Business Alignment – IT must engage with the overall business as more than just a delivery mechanism. IT is now a strategic MUST at the executive table
Operational Failure – Without operational control and management companies are highly vulnerable to attacks and an inability to deliver on customer needs
RackN Solution: Operational Flexibility & Excellence for Service Delivery
Operations Excellence – RackN’s foundational management ensures IT can operate services regardless of platform (e.g. data center, public cloud, etc)
Revitalize the Data Center – RackN delivers cloud-like operational capabilities for existing data centers offering internal business units less reason to create shadow IT
Coming direct from Cambodia is a rare podcast with Jim Plamondon, the creator of how software platforms were built at Microsoft via APIs and developer evangelism. In this podcast, he talks about the early history of developer evangelism at Apple and Microsoft, the current state of open source, and the upcoming competitive industry coming from China and its roots in the third world.
Highlights
Soviet Agriculture and Technology Market Comparison
Why NeXT and Apple Failed with Software Industry but iPhone Succeeded
China Industry Takeover is Coming: Product Price Points
Books referenced in the podcast (links to Amazon, we have no agreement with them based on your click/purchase):
Note – If you are easily offended by language please consider skipping this podcast J
Topic Time (Minutes.Seconds)
Introduction 0.0 – 0.33
Creator of Developer Evangelism 0.33 – 4.58 Plamondon Files 4.58 – 5.53
Working with Hostile Community 5.53 – 7.02
Android vs iOS Platform 7.02 – 7.46
Study: Apple vs Windows 7.46 – 9.13
PC Industry – Mostly All Alive 9.13 – 10.00
Open Source has same Struggles 10.00 – 12.21 (Focus on individual not yechnology)
Cargo Cult & Hype Cycle 12.21 – 16.11 (VR and AI are on version 3; not new at all)
Security Breach 16.11 – 17.01
Back to Hype Cycle 17.01 – 19.03 (Markets find a solution that makes profits)
Latest thoughts on Open Source 19.03 – 23.25 (Zipf’s Law)
Time Buying Strategy 23.25 – 25.07 (e.g. IBM Server response to Amazon S3)
Microsoft Anti-Trust & Apple Mgmt 25.07 – 28.45 (NeXT Failure)
iPhone walled Garden Worked 28.45 – 31.10
Android will defeat iPhone 31.10 – 32.33
Internet Competition dead? 32.33 – 36.07 (Here comes China)
Alibaba moves West 36.07 – 39.45 (Take over 3rd world then US/Europe)
Per Capita Income Averages 39.45 – 43.55 (Own tiny consumer market than move up)
China and Open Source 43.55 – 47.18
Western vs Asian Gov’ts 47.18 – 49.50 (Go learn Mandarin)
Wrap Up 49.50 – END
Podcast Guest: Jim Plamondon
Jim Plamondon is a retired Technology Evangelist, noted for formalizing Microsoft’s Technology Evangelism practices in the 1990’s.
Welcome to the weekly post of the RackN blog recap of all things Digital Rebar, RackN, Edge Computing, and DevOps. If you have any ideas for this recap or would like to include content please contact us at info@rackn.com or tweet RackN (@rackngo)
Virtually everybody is interested in doing DevOps these days, but more than that, there is tremendous pressure to do DevOps right. After all, the IT landscape is littered with technologies and initiatives that seemed to promise great things but, for one reason or another, failed to deliver.
When it comes to DevOps, the concept is solid – faster, more agile, development, lower costs, a better user experience – so the only thing that can really foul it up at this point is execution. And since DevOps requires not just a new technology but a new way of managing people and processes, there are many ways in which execution can spell the difference between success and failure.
If cloud computing has been at the top of CIO’s minds for the last dozen years, Edge Computing is now taking its place. For those not yet familiar with the term, edge computing processes data at the edge of the network, as close to the point of its creation as possible. Take for example autonomous cars, they are full of embedded technologies, sensors and communication systems continuously generating data. If they have to send the data that they collect through systems like GPS, Lidar (a surveying method that measures distance to a target by illuminating that target with a pulsed laser light) and video cameras (they keep track of the positions of other vehicles, look out for pedestrians and obstacles) to the cloud for processing and then wait for analysis and insight before action is taken…well, accidents can happen. Much of the data that is collected at the edge of the network needs to be processed in real time by edge computing so analytics can be done and knowledge can be transferred in places where split seconds matter.
The Linux Foundation this week announced the formation of the LF Networking Fund, or LFN, an initiative to combine the multiple open source networking projects currently under its supervision.
Host to many of the top open source networking projects, The Linux Foundation said it was time to streamline how it oversees its various ventures, said Arpit Joshipura, general manager of networking and orchestration at The Linux Foundation.
This Integration Gap presents significant challenges to DevOps teams looking to deploy a variety of platforms with their chosen Orchestration tool. We seamlessly integrate the Control and Provision layer with any Orchestration or Platform chosen providing a single foundational platform to manage your infrastructure.
We’ve built a SaaS-based platform that brings the efficiency and automation of the cloud into your existing infrastructure. It’s called RackN – making provisioning, control, and orchestration simple. We built it to give organizations like yours the benefits you see others getting through public clouds like AWS and Google. Things like compliance, repeatability, scalability, security, and speed. It’s a platform made to overcome the difficult operational challenges of physical infrastructure.
Obtain access to the latest RackN technology with support and training from the RackN team. Additional services for customized engagements are available. Start your 30-day trial of RackN software today.
L8ist Sh9y Podcast
In this week’s podcast, we speak with Tim Crawford from AVOA who is ranked as one of the Top 100 Most Influential Chief Technology Officers (#4) and Top 100 Cloud Expert and Influencer. He focuses on several interesting topics:
* CIO selection of new technology for enterprise
* Challenges for Enterprise to patch and upgrade software/hardware
* Edge Computing – what it is, CIO thinking
* Vendor Landscape
* Open Source for CIOs – when to use and why
The learnings from these experiences led the RackN founders to analyze the current state of the provisioning to platform marketplace which is currently a jumble of disconnected tools that have been architected and released over the past 20 to 30 years. As you can see in the diagram below, there exists an Integration Gap between the limited number of Provision/Control tools and a large selection of Orchestration/Platforms.
This Integration Gap presents significant challenges to DevOps teams looking to deploy a variety of platforms with their chosen Orchestration tool. We seamlessly integrate the Control and Provision layer with any Orchestration or Platform chosen providing a single foundational platform to manage your infrastructure.
With a solid foundation built on Digital Rebar and RackN, operators can proactively choose how far up the stack they wish to deploy without being locked in from old tools. For example, Digital Rebar can simply provision a Windows or Linux OS, an Ansible or Chef environment, or continue up the stack to a complete Kubernetes Cluster.
This flexibility from a single Provision and Control platform meets the needs of operators faced with complexity in heterogeneous infrastructure, clouds, and edge computing. This foundation enables IT to take advantage of new deployment concepts such as Immutable Infrastructure.
Get started today with our 30-day trial to see how Digital Rebar and RackN can automate your provisioning and control technology to meet the rapidly accelerating demands on internal IT teams.
Over the past few years we spent time with a wide variety of IT organizations to better understand the challenges they face deploying and enabling solutions. Two key themes emerged from these conversations:
Zero-Touch (or as close as possible) Infrastructure
Manual Inventory and Processes Don’t Scale and are Error Prone
With these two fundamental concepts in mind, we developed a highly targeted solution built on technology from the Digital Rebar open source community:
Digital Rebar Provision(DRP) provides a light-weight and easy to deploy API driven system to drive machines though a complete life-cycle.
DRP is designed around the concept of composition; the ability to build units of function that can be added to workflows so that infrastructure can be built and rebuilt consistently with fast error paths to discover problems.
RackN and the community offer content packages built for DRP to meet the needs of operators.
DRP operation follows a workflow pattern for machines from discovery to provisioned to decommission. This workflow approach allows operators to stage infrastructure provisioning with checks at critical stages of the process. There are 5 common workflows built into the tool; however additional workflows can be created and customized:
Workflow 1 : DISCOVERY
Workflow 2 : INSTALL
Workflow 3 : DECOMMISSION
Workflow 4 : MAINTENANCE
Workflow 5 : RESTART
Over the next few weeks, I will be posting detailed blogs about each workflow stage providing insight into why this architecture was chosen and the benefits to operators. If you are interested in learning more about the Digital Rebar community or getting started with our RackN technology built on Digital Rebar I encourage you to click below:
In this week’s podcast, we speak with Tim Crawford from AVOA who is ranked as one of the Top 100 Most Influential Chief Technology Officers (#4) and Top 100 Cloud Expert and Influencer. He focuses on several interesting topics:
CIO selection of new technology for enterprise
Challenges for Enterprise to patch and upgrade software/hardware
Edge Computing – what it is, CIO thinking
Vendor Landscape
Open Source for CIOs – when to use and why
Topic Time (Minutes.Seconds)
Introduction 0.0 – 0.35
Tim’s Background and Work 0.35 – 1.55
When to select a new technology? 1.55 – 4.39 (Find Something Valuable and Try)
Signs company selected wrong 4.39 – 7.31
Security Vulnerabilities 7.31 – 11.03 (Risk vs Reward)
Patching is a MUST? Maybe Not 11.03 – 19.40 (Patching/Upgrading are Disruptive)
Edge Computing Intro 19.40 – 22.45
Why CIOs need to know Edge 22.45 – 28.27 (Aircraft Example)
Is Edge diff than Cloud to CIO? 28.27 – 30.20
Does Edge need to be defined? 30.20 – 32.00 (Stop Defining & Talk How to Use Them)
Don’t need a new edge paradigm 32.00 – 34.25 (Tech vs Business Goals)
Hybrid 34.25 – 36.57 (Hybrid is Heterogeneity)
Vendor Landscape Convergence 36.57 – 40.30 (Best of Breed)
Open Source and CIOs 40.30 – 45.30 (OS is Free Like a Puppy)
Wrap-Up 45.30 – END
Podcast Guest
Tim Crawford, AVOA
Tim Crawford is ranked as one of the Top 100 Most Influential Chief Information Technology Officers (#4), Top 100 Most Social CIOs (#7), Top 20 People Most Retweeted by IT Leaders (#5) and Top 100 Cloud Experts and Influencers. Tim is a strategic CIO & advisor to CIOs, large global enterprise organizations across a number of industries including financial services, healthcare, high-tech and major airlines. Tim’s work differentiates and catapults organizations in transformative ways through the use of technology as a strategic lever.
Tim is an internationally renowned CIO thought leader in the areas of IT transformation, Cloud Computing, Data Analytics and Internet of Things (IoT). Tim has served as CIO and other senior IT roles with global organizations such as Konica Minolta/ All Covered, Stanford University, Knight-Ridder, Philips Electronics and National Semiconductor.
Tim’s extensive experience includes strategic planning, organizational development, governance, program and portfolio management that aligns with business strategy. Additional experience includes mergers and acquisitions, business development, strategic sourcing, compliance, information security and risk management.
Tim serves on the Board of Directors for Modius and on the Advisory Board for CloudVelox. Tim holds an MBA in International Business with Honors and a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Information Systems both from Golden Gate University.
Welcome to the weekly post of the RackN blog recap of all things Digital Rebar, RackN, Edge Computing, and DevOps. If you have any ideas for this recap or would like to include content please contact us at info@rackn.com or tweet RackN (@rackngo)
In 2017, more companies than ever before decided to start their DevOps journey. As with anything new, there’s a learning curve: The trick is identifying missteps before they become bad habits, because habits can be hard to break.
As you refine your DevOps strategies for the new year, it’s important to take a critical look back and seek out these troublemakers. These issues may not be obvious – so we asked business leaders and DevOps practitioners to help, by sharing their wisdom on the worst DevOps behaviors standing in the way of success.
Read on for the top 10 offenders. If you’re guilty of any of these, now is the time to kick these bad habits to the curb and maximize DevOps success in 2018.
CONNECTED devices now regularly double as digital hoovers: equipped with a clutch of sensors, they suck in all kinds of information and send it to their maker for analysis. Not so the wireless earbuds developed by Bragi, a startup from Munich. They keep most of what they collect, such as the wearers’ vital signs, and crunch the data locally. “The devices are getting smarter as they are used,” says Nikolaj Hviid, its chief executive.
Bragi’s earplugs are at the forefront of a big shift in the tech industry. In recent years ever more computing has been pushed into the “cloud”, meaning networks of big data centres. But the pendulum has already started to swing: computing is moving back to the “edge” of local networks and intelligent devices.
There are so many terms floating around IT worlds today. Just as you start to figure out DevOps, DevSecOps or Secure DevOps jumps onto your radar. It’s certainly not a new term by today’s standard of “new,” but it doesn’t have the same notoriety that DevOps has.
DevSecOps is as simple as it sounds, it is the conscious integration of security into the DevOps process. With the news about Meltdown and Spectre, having the most efficient security processes is critical. The mindset of both DevOps and DevSecOps is essentially the same, increase collaboration and efficiency. One question you might be asking is, what is the benefit of DevSecOps versus DevOps alone?
An interesting paradox in technology is our desire to obsess over the latest shiny (Note our L8istSh9y Podcast) object promising the moon; however, we tend to hold on to our reliable, dependable solutions that become outdated. A great example of this reliance on outdated technology is the well-known Linux provisioning tool Cobbler.
Cobbler was built specially for Linux in the pre-cloud days with version 2.2.3-1 released in June 2012. The product continues on a schedule of 2 releases a year with the last update in September 2017. There is no commercial support, minimal development and hardly anyone keeping the lights on. In today’s security landscape, that’s not a safe place for a critical infrastructure service.
The Digital Rebar community has taken the learnings from the Cobbler community.
We’ve built a SaaS-based platform that brings the efficiency and automation of the cloud into your existing infrastructure. It’s called RackN – making provisioning, control, and orchestration simple. We built it to give organizations like yours the benefits you see others getting through public clouds like AWS and Google. Things like compliance, repeatability, scalability, security, and speed. It’s a platform made to overcome the difficult operational challenges of physical infrastructure.
Obtain access to the latest RackN technology with support and training from the RackN team. Additional services for customized engagements are available. Start your 30-day trial of RackN software today.
L8ist Sh9y Podcast
In this week’s podcast, we speak with Dave McCrory, VP of Engineering for Machine Learning at GE Digital. He focuses on several interesting topics:
• Data Gravity Overview
• Data “Training” – Monetization – Application Usage in Edge
• Multi-Tenancy in Edge?
UPCOMING EVENTS
Follow the latest info on RackN and Digital Rebar events at www.rackn.com/events
An interesting paradox in technology is our desire to obsess over the latest shiny (Note our L8istSh9y Podcast) object promising the moon; however, we tend to hold on to our reliable, dependable solutions that become outdated. A great example of this reliance on outdated technology is the well-known Linux provisioning tool Cobbler.
Cobbler was built specially for Linux in the pre-cloud days with version 2.2.3-1 released in June 2012. The product continues on a schedule of 2 releases a year with the last update in September 2017. There is no commercial support, minimal development and hardly anyone keeping the lights on. In today’s security landscape, that’s not a safe place for a critical infrastructure service.
The Digital Rebar community has taken the learnings from the Cobbler community.
We’ve built a modern PXE provisioning tool to handle today’s heterogeneous data centers and clouds as well architecting future provisioning needs for the upcoming edge computing rollouts. We believe that our new provisioning utility offers Cobbler users an easy path forward from their existing provisioning to modernize with an active, growing community focused on security, scalability, bare metal, heterogeneous infrastructure, etc.
Here are some key concepts around Digital Rebar that substantially enhance your Cobbler solution:
A small stand-alone Golang binary with no external dependencies – this provides operators the flexibility to place the provisioning tool anywhere including a network switch, Raspberry Pi or server as well as processor independence such as ARM or Intel.
API first approach based on 12-Factor App methodology – making the API a first-class citizen allows the CLI to be dynamically generated from the API ensuring 100% coverage of API implementations within the CLI
Composable content – Digital Rebar is architected with the concept of small, simple modules being assembled quickly to customize a unique and complex solution. This approach permeates of all the “Content” components that create the foundational building blocks for composable provisioning activities.
Flexible and Integrated DHCP – automating provisioning requires managing next boot instructions in a way to coordinates with install workflow. It’s time to stop maintaining MAC tables and spreadsheets.
Secure and Auditable – The Digital Rebar API was built with security in mind with key features like limited use and duration tokens. We’ve also built a comprehensive logging and event system so you can finally bring your provisioning into your operational processes.
Easy Migration / Complete Coverage – Built with Cobbler users in mind, the template system for Digital Rebar is intuitive with fixes where Cobbler needed them. Check out our Cobbler vs Digital Rebar Feature Comparison Table.
We encourage Cobbler users to visit the Digital Rebar community home page and learn more about our technology. You can immediately get started with our technology or visit our YouTube page to see recent demonstrations of Digital Rebar including our Kubernetes deployment demonstration.
In this week’s podcast, we speak with Dave McCrory, VP of Engineering for Machine Learning at GE Digital. He focuses on several interesting topics:
Data Gravity Overview
Data “Training” – Monetization – Application Usage in Edge
Multi-Tenancy in Edge?
Topic Time (Minutes.Seconds)
Introduction 0.0 – 0.33
Data Gravity 0.33 – 4.36 (CTO Advisor Podcast)
Latency vs Volume of Data 4.36 – 9.00 (Data Gravity Mathematics)
Day Job at GE 9.00 – 11.25
Training the Data in the Field 11.25 – 14.38
Core Data Centers 14.38 – 18.03
Half-Life on a Data Model 18.03 – 19.27
Keep the Data? Plane Example 19.27 – 24.58 (Data Inertia)
Monetize Data in Motion 24.58 – 29.45 (Uber Credit Card)
Data at the Edge for App Usage 29.45 – 36.40 (Augmented Reality Example)
Portability of Processing and Platforms 36.40 – 41.45
Scale Needs Multi-Tenant 41.45 – 46.00
Wrap-Up 46.00 – END
Podcast Guest
Dave McCrory, VP of Engineering for Machine Learning at GE Digital
Currently I’m the VP of Engineering for the ML division of GE Digital. Our group creates scalable, production ready solutions for the Internal Business Units of GE. We focus on solving complex Industrial IoT problems using Machine Learning in industries such as Aviation, Energy, Healthcare, and Oil & Gas to name a few.
Rob Hirschfeld 