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All told, we wound up with around 95 attendees. Zenoss was our platinum sponsor providing the venue, breakfast, lunch and non-alcoholic drinks. Rackspace and Reductive Labs were the Gold sponsors and Spiceworks, Opscode, and Bitnami were all Silver sponsors. Opscamp Austin seemed to have a really good mix of vendors and non-vendors enabling the sessions to have a good mix. Some other vendors that were in attendance were DTO Solutions, Groundworks Open Source and Cloudswitch. We were also fortunate to have some of the big guns like IBM and Dell, and let’s not forget our favorite analyst, Michael Cote from Redmonk (also a media Sponsor). Here is a link to the Redmonk “IT Management Guys” podcast we did at the after hours free drinks party.

The conference really started to kick into gear once the un-panel started. Monitoring seemed, as it usually does, to dominate the discussion. However, it set the stage nicely for the rest of the conference. In classic “CloudCamp” style we setup the open session agenda for the rest of the day based out of two themes that evolved from the un-panel, Configuration Management and Monitoring. To make it sound cooler, we called the themes Service Delivery and Service Assurance.

On the service delivery side we talked about how to identify services and workloads. Some of the participants described their process of trying to take workloads and define them into ensembles. We even started a little bit of an “Agile Operations” discussion. Later in the afternoon we had an operations tool chain session that seemed to get a little heated; however, no harm, no foul. This reminds me of a great quote “Strong opinions loosely held.”

Over on the service assurance side, we had some great discussions about monitoring with plenty of experts from Zenoss, Groundwork, and IBM. One of the early sessions focused on a discussion about “agents” for monitoring. This lead into the age old agentless vs. agent based discussion. There was also a fair amount of non-open source enterprise people to contribute from the IBM Tivoli, IBM Micromuse, and BMC Patrol perspectives.

I saw a lot of video cameras and flips floating around, so I am sure there will be a lot of Youtube and Blip.tv videos showing up in the next few weeks. Opscamp will try to coordinate a summary links page for all the blogs, podcasts, and videos that surface up.

Opscamp Austin was sort of like a “Beta” for future Opscamps. We had a few bugs in the beginning transitioning from the lighting talks to unpanel to open sessions. However, we collected some positive feedback on how to make this a little smother for the next time. I think Opscamp Austin proved that this new CloudCamp vertical called Opscamp is ready for GA. We look forward to seeing you in a city near you.

Chef “Bootcamp Workshop” Sprint

Ignition Alley, Monday February 8th – 10th (9am to 5pm)

If you are interested in learning more about the Chef open source project feel free to join us in defining and developing the Chef bootcamp training material.

Georgia Tech ATDC , Tuesday February 8th ( 7pm to 9pm)

Configuration Management and Provisioning in the Cloud using Chef

Ignition Alley, Monday February 10th (11:39am to 12:30pm)

Configuration Management and Provisioning in te Cloud using Chef

Georgia Tech ATDC , Tuesday February 10th ( 7pm to 9pm)

AltRUG

Event Details

The event will be held in an unconference format starting with an Unpanel discussion about cloud computing followed by a self-organizing conference format where topics are proposed and then voted on by the attendees.

Saturday, January 30, 2010
8:00 am – 5:00 pm

Spider House Cafe
2908 Fruth St.
Austin, TX 78705

While attendance is free, RSVP is required: http://www.opscamp.org/austin

Event Sponsors

This free event is being made possible by the generous donations from the following sponsors:
• Bitnami - Cloud Deployable Software Stacks
• Reductive Labs - Open Source Data Center Automation
• Zenoss - Unlegacy IT Management Emphasizing Virtualization and Cloud Management

Supporting Quotes

Dave Nielsen, co-Founder CloudCamp

“With rapid change occurring in IT operations, we realized that a place is needed where operations personnel and sysadmins can meet to share their experiences, challenges and solutions. OpsCamp is organized as an unconference which encourages the open exchange of ideas around next generation technologies and strategies for IT Operations. End users, IT professionals and vendors are all encouraged to participate.”

John M. Willis, Author of Cloud Computing and Systems Management Blog, co-hostIT Management Podcast and the Cloud Cafe

“While the cloud has lowered the barrier to entry for businesses to own a data center; it has not decreased the complexity of managing complex applications and data center operations.  OpsCamp is about exploring the opportunity to intersect ideas like agile development, continuous deployment, and data center operations to promote the rise of a new movement that breaks down the traditional walls between development and operations (i.e., DevOps).”

Mark Hinkle, VP of Community, Zenoss

“Operations personnel and sysadmins are becoming programmers because of the virtualization/cloud and automation trend where everything is managed through an API. The line between application developers and IT operations is becoming blurred. Many of the principles that apply to Agile application development translate to operations. So if you are a developer with a interest for system administration, or a systems administrator interested in development, OpsCamp is the place to be.”

Michael Coté, Analyst at Redmonk, co-host IT Management Podcast

“After many years of steady pace in the IT world, the tools and technologies used to do the daily work of operations are rapidly changing. Thanks to virtualization and cloud computing moving mainstream, new, hopefully better ways to deliver IT are emerging. These things aren’t always fully baked yet, but the thought-leaders and early adopters are quickly crystallizing. OpsCamp is an exciting chance to get involved in these conversations whether you want to start directing this shift in operations, figure out if it works for you, or just check it out. And, not only is it free, it’s in a damn fine spot: Austin.”

Luke Kanies, Founder of Puppet and Reductive Labs

“OpsCamp is a great opportunity to share expertise and experience in managing operations in the cloud.  The unconference setting provides a perfect mix between learning and sharing, and the intimate setting guarantees everyone gets something out of it.”

Erica Brescia, CEO, BitRock and Bitnami Project Lead

“In rapidly evolving disciplines such as how to deploy and manage software in the cloud, the one-way dialogue found at typical conferences just doesn’t cut it. OpsCamp will give early adopters and innovators the opportunity to share best practices and guide the development of the next generation of cloud operations tools and services.”

About CloudCamp

CloudCamp is an unconference where early adapters of Cloud Computing technologies exchange ideas. With the rapid change occurring in the industry, we need a place we can meet to share our experiences, challenges and solutions. At CloudCamp, you are encouraged you to share your thoughts in several open discussions, as we strive for the advancement of Cloud Computing. End users, IT professionals and vendors are all encouraged to participate. For more information about future CloudCamp events visit http://www.cloudcamp.org/schedule.

About Zenoss

Zenoss is a leading commercial open source provider of Unlegacy IT enterprise management products. Zenoss Enterprise is a single model-based product that enables organizations to seamlessly manage physical, virtual and cloud based infrastructure with unprecedented power, agility and value. Leveraging a commercial open source model, Zenoss products monitor over one million network and server devices daily and are used in over 25,000 organizations in 180 countries around the world. Commercial customers include leading companies such as Rackspace, VMware, WebMD, LinkedIn, Tyco Electronics, Carlson, Motorola and Deutsche Bank. To learn more about Zenoss’ award-winning IT operations management software, visit http://www.zenoss.com.

About Reductive Labs

Reductive Labs provides a comprehensive set of enterprise-class software, support and services directly from the developers of the Puppet project. With a global team of trained and experienced experts, Reductive Labs can deliver training, consulting, and technical support services to help customers deploy, develop and maintain their infrastructure. Customers get access to features, tools and technical support not otherwise available. For a single annual fee, a Reductive Labs subscription offers a unique combination of support, sophisticated management tools, and reduced total cost of ownership (TCO), making it a must-have for enterprise-level deployments and mission-critical applications. For more information about Puppet and Reductive labs visit ReductiveLabs.com

Bitnami

BitNami.org simplifies the process of deploying web applications natively, virtually and in the cloud. Each BitNami Stack contains an application that is fully integrated with all of the software it requires to run. BitNami Stacks are available free of charge as native installers, virtual machine images and cloud templates, so they can easily be deployed in any environment. Popular BitNami-packaged applications include Drupal, Joomla!, Wordpress, SugarCRM, Alfresco, Redmine, Subversion and many more. For a complete list, visit BitNami.org/Stacks.
For additional information please contact the conference organizers:

John M. Willis – john@opscode.com
Mark Hinkle – mrhinkle@zenoss.com
Damon Edwards – damon@dtosolutions.com

For sponsorship opportunities contact Dave Nielsen:

Cloudcamphaiti is going to be a great event.  We are going to have some of the biggest names in cloud computing present and we will also have a panel session and open discussion based on the on the “How The Cloud Can Help”  theme.  This is a great opportunity to learn, participate and help.

CloudCamp Haiti is a virtual unconference held as a public webinar. CloudCamp-in-the-Cloud builds upon the popular CloudCamp format by providing a free and open place for the introduction and advancement of cloud computing. For this event, we are raising funds to donate to the aid effort in Haiti.

Using an online meeting format attendees can exchange ideas, knowledge and information in a creative and supporting environment, advancing the current state of cloud computing and related technologies.

Please help us spread the word, twitter, facebook, IM, tell your neighbours and friends. Hashtag #CloudCampHaiti or copy and paste this post.

Registration: http://cloudcamp-haiti-2010.eventbrite.com/

Date/Time:
- Jan 20th 11:00am – 2:00pm Eastern Standard Time (EST)

Location:
- Online (GotoMeeting)

Get involved:
If you are interesting in getting involved as a presenter contact John Willis (john.willis AT zabovo.com) If you are interested in sponsoring contact Dave Nielsen (dave AT platformd.com).

Agenda:

11:00am – 11:30am – Sign in and registration (Main Room)
11:30am – 11:45am – Introductions & Overview (Main Room)
11:45am – 12:30pm – Lightning Talks (Main Room)

Lightning Talks – TBD

12:30pm – 1:00pm Unpanel Choosen by attendee’s of CloudCamp Haiti (Main Room)
1:00pm – 2:00pm Break Out Sessions – Round 1

1. Unconference Room #1: main gotomeeting room (TBD)
2. Unconference Room #2: 2nd gotomeeting room (TBD)

2:00pm – 2:30pm CloudCamp Haiti Wrap up (Back in “Main Room”)

Organizers:
- John Willis
- Reuven Cohen
- Dave Nielsen

Interested in sponsoring?

Labels: cloudcamp, Haiti

Cloud Hero of 2009

Beaker Chris Hoff

I predicted this early in 2008 (see And the 2009 Cloudie Award Goes To…)

Most Influential Cloud Bloggers

randybias Randy Bias of Cloudscaling

Randy has done some fantastic blog posts this year on cloud computing.  There are few people out there that can match his total understanding of infrastructure computing.

ruv Reuven Cohen of Enomaly

Love him or or not, his blog always has in depth coverage coverage of the latest announcements on cloud computing.  It is one the first places I go to figure out the impact of something new in cloud computing.

Top IaaS

Amazon

Sorry folks, no one even comes close to these guys on the IaaS.

Rackspace

Despite a few missteps here and there, these guys are the only folks on Amazon’s radar.

Top PaaS

Rightscale

Still the one-and-only on-ramp to the cloud (IaaS)…

Heroku

I am sure there are a lot of other great PaaS’s out there; however the “Cloudies” is not a democracy.  Every customer of these guys raves about their service.

Top SaaS

SalesForce.Com

Blah, Blah, Blah

Google Apps

I guess you could call them the Amazon.com of SaaS.

Best Private Cloud Vendors

Eucalyptus

Running in Nasa, Eli Lilly and a few other places puts them in the lead at this point.

Canonical

A close second to Eucalyptus.  Backed by Canonical with Ubuntu server and KVM it makes for a great story…

Best Cloud Application Providers

RabbitMQ

They got clowns the the left and jokers to the right.  RabbitMQ stuck in the middle with you.

Appistry

They have a great story down at FedEx and Bob and Sam are some of the nicest guys you will ever meet.

Best Cloud Orchestration Tools in the Cloud

Chef

Zenoss is to Nagios as Chef is to Puppet. Oh yea I am an adviser for Opscode.

Puppet

What can I say, Puppet is the Nagios of open source configuration management.

Best Monitoring Tools in the Clouds

Zenoss

Zenoss is the Zenoss of open source monitoring.  They added some great cloud (Amazon) monitoring features this year.

collectD

The dirty little secret of cloud monitoring.  Rightscale uses CollectD for monitoring.

Best Security Solutions for the Cloud

VPN Cubed

First is usually best.  Plus you gotta luv the CohesiveFT dudes…

AWS VPC

Best of the rest.

Best Cloud Builders

CohesiveFT

Elastic Server gets it done in 09.

rPath

Best Cloud New Comers

WebappVM

Very cool new PaaS.

Cloudant

CoudchDB as a Service.. Ya gotta luv it.

Best Open Source in the Clouds

Opennebula

This project is where Eucalyptus was about 1 year ago.

Best Languages used in the clouds

Ruby

Java

Biggest Cloud Disappointment in 2009

Snoracle

Congrats… Two years running.

Best Killer Apps in the Cloud

Soasta

350k eFile’s in 22 hours all on AWS… Tough to beat these guys.

Cloudswitch

Zero touch movement of enterprise legacy application to Amazon EC2.  Sounds like a winner to me.

Best Cloud Startup Success Stories

Flightcaster

These guys are paving the road for the avg folk like me to do “Big” things with data.

Best New Cloudy Terms

Nosql

“Not Only SQL?”

Meatcloud Manifesto

Give me an API or give me death.

Worst Cloud CTO

Russ Daniels CTO at HP

Best Cloud CTO

Adam Jacob

I am biased; however, I think Chef from Opscode is the most exciting thing to happen to “enterprise systems management” in many years. Adam and Jesse have assembled a freaking great team.

Best Cloud Analysts

monkchips

cote

Best Cloud Innovation in 2009

Chris K Wensel – Cascading

Best David vs. Goliath Cloud Vendor

OpenQRM

Best Cloud Tweet

Meatcloud Manifesto

Best Cloud Arguments

Cisco v HP

samj v Everyone

New Awards in 2009

Best Cloud Presentations

Simon Wardley – Cloud Computing Why it Matters

Chris Hoff - The Frogs Who Desired a King: A Virtualization & Cloud Computing Fable

Rookie of the Year

lmacvittie Lori MacVittie

cloudbzz JohnTreadway

Best Cloud Argument (Redemption)

GeorgeReese

George was right.. Austoscaling doesn’t matter.

Best Cloud Philosopher

joeweinman

Best Cloud Evangelists

jeffbarr

davenielsen

Best Agile Infrastructure Dudes

patrickdebois

cread

Honorable Mention

jamesurquhart

gevaperry

vambenepe

KrisBuytaert

zoopster

• IBM developerWorks : IBM Tivoli Monitoring – Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) about IBM Tivoli Monitoring V6.2.1 on Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
• measuring measures: Flightcaster Open-sources Crane – A big concern with the modern JVM languages like Scala and Clojure is the ability to scale out from the single JVM address space into distributed environments. Different approaches include a distributed JVM (terracotta), distributed actors (akka), message queues (AMQP/rabbitmq), or solutions for specific computational models, like hadoop.
• Sonoa’s Mobile App Accelerator Looks To Cut Load Times By 90% – The day you got your brand new iPhone 3GS, Palm Pre, or Motorola Droid, there’s a fair chance you thought your days of endless loading screens was behind you. After all, each of these comes equipped with a high-powered processor capable of running 3D games and multitasking. Yet the loading screens persist. Operating system shortcomings aside, one of the biggest culprits is actually out of your phone’s hands entirely: the fault lies with backend server calls, as the apps you’re using request data from online servers. Sonoa Systems, the company behind Apigee, thinks it has the answer. It has built a cloud based service designed to helps companies optimize the data being sent to their mobile apps. And it says it can make these load times up to ten times faster.

• Powerful New Amazon EC2 Boot Features – All Things Distributed – Today a powerful new feature is available for our Amazon EC2 customers: the ability to boot their instances from Amazon EBS (Elastic Block Store).

  Customers like the simplicity of the AMI (Amazon Machine Image) model where they either choose a preconfigured AMI or upload their own AMI into Amazon S3. A wide variety of operating systems and software configurations is available for use. But customers have also asked us for more flexibility and control in the way that Amazon EC2 instances are booted such that they have finer grained control over for example what software configurations and data sets are available to the instance at boot time.

• Installation – Scalr Documentation – Package names and installation methods vary. Consult the OS-specific installation guide if provided. A list of available OS-specific guides can be found at OS Specific Installation Guides.
• Phurnace Recognized as a “Comprehensive Solution” in the Automation Space – Phurnace Deliver™, the company’s flagship product, provides comprehensive support for IT operations staff and developers during complex enterprise Java deployments to decrease errors, streamline deployments and avoid the downtime and outages that come with manual or script-based processes. The product also troubleshoots and identifies problems and then remediates immediately. The current user approach of paging through the console or building cumbersome scripts can be reduced or eliminated with Phurnace, therefore freeing up limited IT resources for more value-added tasks.

• Google Partners with Canonical for Chrome OS – PC World – Some people may see Google's Chrome operating system as competing with existing Linux desktop distributions. Canonical, the company behind popular Linux distribution Ubuntu, isn't one of them. They're working with Google to make Chrome.
• Brin: Google’s OSes likely to converge | Webware – CNET – Many Google observers were puzzled when the company announced plans for Chrome OS in July, coming amid growing acceptance of the company's Android operating-system project as a smartphone and Netbook OS. After all, why design an open-source operating system with the goal of reinventing the personal computing experience when you're currently developing another open-source operating system with the goal of reinventing the mobile computing experience?
• Pragmatic Programming Techniques: NOSQL Patterns – Over the last couple years, we see an emerging data storage mechanism for storing large scale of data. These storage solution differs quite significantly with the RDBMS model and is also known as the NOSQL. Some of the key players include …