TMCnet News

OpenStack® Juno Release Available Today
[October 16, 2014]

OpenStack® Juno Release Available Today


AUSTIN, Texas --(Business Wire)--

The tenth release of OpenStack, the most widely supported open source software for building public and private clouds, is available today. The latest release of the open source cloud software, called Juno, adds enterprise features such as storage policies, a new data processing service that provisions Hadoop and Spark, and lays the foundation for OpenStack to be the platform for Network Functions Virtualization (NFV), a major transformation driving improved agility and efficiency in telco and service provider data centers.

*** Register for today's Juno Webinar at 9am PDT. ***

The Juno release continues a trend for OpenStack in which the project's twice-annual releases have focused on stability, operational improvements and performance, reflecting the growing number of users who are running OpenStack in production.

Data Processing Service to Deploy Hadoop, Spark

This latest release adds a new data processing service to the existing suite of cloud capabilities, including Compute, Object and Block Storage, Networking, Orchestration, Identity and Database Services. All services are available through open APIs and a web-based Dashboard.

The new data processing capability automates provisioning and management of big data clusters using Hadoop and Spark. Big data analytics are a priority for many organizations and a popular use case for OpenStack, and this service lets OpenStack users provision needed resources more quickly.

Storage Policies Offer Greater Control

Also new in this release, storage policies for Object Storage give users more control over cost and performance within their storage environment. Storage policies allow enterprise deployers and application developers to decide how they want to store, replicate and access data across different backends and geographical regions. They also provide the ability for public cloud providers to offer storage service tiers.

NFV Subteam Focuses on Networking for Large Deployments

NFV represents a massive shift in how many networking and telco services are developed and deployed. An NFV development team was formed in May at the OpenStack Summit and has identified nine use cases to run NFV workloads on top of OpenStack environments. Initial features arrived in the Juno release, and additional NFV-related work will continue over coming releases.

Enhanced Deployment, Operation, Scaling Features

Across the platform, the Juno release contains numerous updates and enhancements that make it easier to build, operate, scale and upgrade OpenStack clouds. Compute components allow easier upgrades with less impact to the applications users are running, and include an additional driver for managing bare metal hardware directly. There were also significant updates to metering and monitoring capabilities that provide faster and more efficient performance.

Additional Juno Features

  • OpenStack Compute (Nova) Operational updates to Compute include improvements for rescue mode that enable booting from alternate images with the attachment of all local disks. Also, per-network settings are now allowed by improved nova-network code; scheduling updates to support scheduling services and extensibility; and internationalization udates.
  • OpenStack Networking (Neutron): Neutron features support for IPv6 and better third-party driver testing to ensure consistency and reliability across network implementations. Release enables plug-ins for the back-end implementation of the OpenStack Networking API and blazes an initial path for migration from nova-network to Neutron. Supporting Layer 3 High Availability, the networking layer now allows a distributed operational mode.
  • OpenStack Identity Service (Keystone): Federated authentication improvements allow users to access private and public OpenStack clouds with the same credentials. Keystone can be configured to use multiple identity backends, and integration with LDAP is much easier.
  • OpenStack Orchestration (Heat): In Juno, it is easier to roll back a failed deployment and ensure thorough cleanup. Also, administrators can delegate resource creation privileges to non-administrative users.
  • OpenStack Dashboard (Horizon): Apache Hadoop clusters can now be deployed with a few mouse clicks, giving users the ability to rapidly scale data processing based on custom parameters. The RBAC system is extended to support Compute, Networking and Orchestration.
  • OpenStack Database Service (Trove): A new capability included in Juno allows users to manage relational database services in an OpenStack environment.



Highlighted Use Cases

OpenStack now has enterprise, telco and service providers across a diverse number of industries, including Financial Services, Retail, Manufacturing, Web, SaaS (News - Alert), and Government & Research. Selected use cases that highlight the diversity of workloads supported with agile cloud infrastructure built with OpenStack include:


Summary of Contributions

The Juno release is the result of a global collaborative software development effort. Code, reviews and bug fixes were provided by 1,419 unique contributors either working independently or affiliated with 133 companies. During the six-month development cycle, 342 new features were added, and 3,219 bug fixes were made. Nearly 500,000 lines of documentation modified, along with a new Architecture Design Guide.

Top companies contributing code to the Juno release were Red Hat, HP, IBM, Mirantis, Rackspace, SUSE, OpenStack Foundation, B1 Systems, VMware, NEC (News - Alert) and independents. Top users contributing code included Yahoo!, Time Warner Cable and eBay (source: http://activity.openstack.org).

OpenStack Kilo Roadmap

The next release of OpenStack, called Kilo, is expected April 30, 2015. New capabilities in the Kilo release will include a fully integrated Bare Metal provisioning service (code-named Ironic), which is currently available for users via a Compute driver. Projects in incubation, expected to land in late 2015 and beyond, include the following:

  • Manila (shared file system)
  • Zaqar (queue service)
  • Designate (DNS service)
  • Barbican (key management)

Webinar Today

The OpenStack Foundation will host a webinar today at 9am PDT via BrightTALK to discuss the Juno release in greater depth. Register at: https://www.brighttalk.com/channel/11969.

OpenStack Summit Paris

The next OpenStack Summit takes place November 3-7 at Le Palais des Congrès in Paris, France. Users and developers will share deployment case studies, devops best practices, showcase what's new in the OpenStack vendor ecosystem, and develop the roadmap for the 11th release, Kilo. Headline sponsors include Ericsson, Huawei (News - Alert), Intel and Red Hat, along with 90+ other sponsors and exhibitors. The event will feature presentations from a wide range of OpenStack developers and users, representing telcos, enterprises, and government.

About OpenStack

OpenStack is the most widely supported open source software for building public and private clouds. OpenStack clouds enable businesses to rapidly roll out new products, add new features, and improve internal systems while preventing technology lock-in. Hundreds of the world's largest brands rely on OpenStack to run their businesses.

OpenStack is backed by the independent OpenStack Foundation and a global community of more than 16,000 individual members and 400 supporting organizations across 140 countries. For more information and to join the community, visit http://www.OpenStack.org.


[ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]