Image via CrunchBase
Recently I wrote about Groundwork Open Source, an enterprise level network monitoring tool built on top of Nagios. Today I am hearing that they are preparing themselves to target enterprises who are using private clouds. They are pretty close to offering a monitoring solution for Eucalyptus clouds. We all know that Eucalyptus is hot among the enterprises looking to implement cloud like capabilities, also known as private clouds, inside their datacenters. By focusing on Eucalyptus, GWOS is positioning themselves to sell to enterprises taking the Eucalyptus route to private clouds. Since there is not much information available to me at this moment, I couldn’t offer more details but I will post in this space once I hear from them.
On a related note, GWOS is announcing the release of Ubuntu based Enterprise Quickstart virtual appliance. Similar to their existing offerings, this is also priced right at a $59 per year price point. In fact, an Ubuntu based appliance makes complete sense to me. We are seeing a growth in the use of Ubuntu servers inside the enterprise datacenters. Similarly, Ubuntu servers have huge traction inside Amazon EC2 ecosystem. Even though Redhat has a big marketshare in the Linux server market, Canonical is pushing hard to compete with Redhat. In fact, their prospects improved dramatically when they tightly integrated Eucalyptus in their Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud edition. So, it makes complete sense for GroundWork Open Source to release an Ubuntu based network monitoring appliance.
Off late, I am focusing more on open source products like GWOS, Eucalyptus, etc.. In fact, I see these open source components as a necessary element for the evolution of an open federated cloud ecosystem. I see the next two years to be crucial for this and products like Eucalyptus, Ubuntu, GWOS, etc. are going to play an important role. Let us wait and see how this space shapes up.
