Sign up for our Technology Newsletter 
SUSE Goes OpenStack Cloud 5
SUSE has released OpenStack Cloud 5, the latest version of the its infrastructure-as-a-service private cloud distro.
Version 5 adds the OpenStack brand front and centre, and its credentials are based on the latest Juno build of the OpenStack open source platform.
This version includes enhanced networking flexibility, with additional plug-ins available and the addition of distributed virtual routing. This enables individual computer nodes to handle routing tasks together, or if needs be, clustering together.
Increased operational efficiency comes in the form of a new seamless integration with existing servers running outside the cloud. In addition, log collection is centralized into a single view.
As you would expect, SUSE OpenStack 5 is designed to fit perfectly alongside the company’s other products, including the recently launched Suse Enterprise Storage and Suse Linux Enterprise Server 12 as well as nodes from earlier versions.
Deployment has also been simplified as part of a move to standardise “as-a-service” models.
Also included is the company’s new Sahara data processing project designed to run Hadoop and Spark on top of OpenStack without degradation. MapR has released support for its own service by way of a co-branded plug-in.
“Furthering the growth of OpenStack enterprise deployments, Suse OpenStack Cloud makes it easier for customers to realise the benefits of a private cloud, saving them money and time they can use to better serve their own customers and business,” said Brian Green, managing director, UK and Ireland, at Suse.
“Automation and high availability features translate to simplicity and efficiency in enterprise data centers.”
Suse OpenStack Cloud 5 becomes generally available from today.
OpenSuse Goes Rolling
OpenSuse, the free Linux distribution forked from Suse Linux Professional and the basis for Suse Linux Enterprise, is switching to a rolling release model.
The development change will see daily builds released to keep the distribution at the cutting edge of development.
Announced by the Opensuse Project on Wednesday, the rolling release model for the development version of Opensuse, which is called Factory, will shorten the stabilisation process for releases and eliminate the need for pre-release or “milestone” builds, the project said.
Opensuse board chairman Richard Brown said that the project team was hopeful that the move would lead to more users of the software and more contributors to the code, which would have a knock-on effect on quality.
“With a daily fresh Factory distribution making it easier for those who want to preview and test, we hope to see more users and contributors, leading to faster fixes and even higher quality. Factory is critical as it provides the base technology for Opensuse and Suse Linux Enterprise, which is used by tens of thousands of organisations around the world,” he said.
The new development model balances responsibility among packagers, testers and end users while putting more emphasis on automated quality assurance. As a result, Opensuse Factory is no longer just the development branch of Opensuse but becomes a reliable, always-ready working distribution, according to the project.
The move also means that Opensuse is following a similar development model to Fedora, the cutting-edge Linux distribution sponsored by Red Hat that Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) is based upon.
More information on Opensuse Factory can be found on the project’s online portal. However, at the time of writing this was still showing a notice warning that the Factory repository is not guaranteed to be fully stable, and advising users to download the current release build.
An Opensuse spokesperson told stated that this is because the Factory build is primarily for developers and those keen to see the latest developments, and is not recommended for production environments.
OpenSuse Hacked
The openSUSE Forums were hijacked today by a Pakistani hacker who goes by handle H4x0r HuSsY. Apparently the hacker exploited the vulnerability in vBulletin 4.2.1 software which SUSE uses to host the forum. The problem is that the hack revealed that the openSUSE Forums were based on proprietary forum software.
The openSUSE team has denied that the users’ passwords were compromised by the hack.
“The credentials for your openSUSE login are not saved in our application databases as we use a single-sign-on system (Access Manager from NetIQ) for all our services. This is a completely separate system and it has not been compromised by this crack,” the team said.
What the cracker reported as compromised passwords where indeed random automatically set strings that are in no way connected to your the passwords.
While it was good that none of the user data was compromised open sourcers are scratching their collective heads and wondering if the attack would have happened if the outfit had been eating its own dogfood and used some nice open source technologies.