Docker Adds Multi-Host, Software-Defined Networking to Containers

Docker is adding software-defined networking (SDN) capabilities to strengthen the portability of multi-container distributed applications across multi-host IP networks. Along with networking capabilities, Docker is adopting a dynamic plugin architecture that provides an opportunity for direct platform extensibility for technology partners and developers. For example, Docker native SDN can be “swapped” with a third-party product. Initial plugin capabilities are in the areas of networking and storage volumes and are available for use from Cisco, Microsoft, Midokura, Nuage Networks, Project Calico, VMware and Weave for SDN and ClusterHQ for storage volumes.

“By bringing SDN directly to the application itself and into the hands of the developers, Docker is driving multi-container application portability throughout the application development lifecycle,” said Solomon Hykes, CTO and chief architect of Docker. “Individual developers, through a single command, can establish the topology of the network to connect discrete Dockerized services into a distributed application. And then through a set of commands be able to inspect, audit and change topology ‘on the fly.’”

Docker's SDN capabilities, which were developed through its recent SocketPlane acquisition, are being extended through the company's three orchestration tools (Docker Machine, Docker Compose and Docker Swarm). The SDN functionality is tied into DNS (domain name system) and VXLAN (virtual extensible LAN). DNS ensures that Dockerized services will be able to communicate without modification. VXLAN enables the creation of portable, distributed networks that allow an application’s microservices to reside on any member of a Swarm, a native Docker cluster.

Docker Compose defines the containers that comprise the distributed application and how they are connected together. Through integration with Docker Swarm, the multi-container application can be immediately networked across multiple hosts and can communicate seamlessly across a cluster of machines with a single command. Docker Swarm now has working integration with Mesos scheduling.

Docker is also announcing a collaboration with Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Amazon EC2 Container Service (ECS) to optimize the scheduling of Dockerized applications for Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2), and provides a native cluster management experience for Docker users. Amazon ECS integration with Docker Compose and Docker Swarm will make it easier for customers to launch tasks on Amazon ECS using the same APIs across their local dev environments.

Docker said its SDN functionality provides a new level of consistency in terms of how applications are networked through their full lifecycle. A development team can initially define the topology of its distributed application, while the networking team can, at a later stage, apply the sophisticated networking policy necessary to run an application with the highest level of availability and security in production. Even with these sophisticated policies in place, an operations team will have the freedom of choice – without reconfiguring the Dockerized application – to move the application from their private data center to any cloud.

http://www.docker.com

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Docker Contributes its Runtime to Linux Foundation's New Open Container Project

The major developers of software containers for virtual machines, including Docker and CoreOS, agreed to collaborate on a new Open Container Project under the auspices of the Linux Foundation.

Docker agreed to donate the co
de for its software container format and its runtime, as well as the associated specifications.

Additional founders of the OCP include Amazon Web Services, Apcera, Cisco,EMC, Fujitsu Limited, Goldman Sachs, Google, HP, Huawei, IBM, Intel, Joyent, Linux Foundation, Mesosphere, Microsoft, Pivotal, Rancher Labs, Red Hat and VMware.

Docker said that over the past two years, its image format and container runtime have emerged as the de facto standard, with support across every major Linux distribution, Microsoft Windows, every major public cloud provider, all leading virtualization platforms and most major CPU architectures, including: x86, ARM, z and POWER System p.

Containers based on Docker’s image format have been downloaded more than 500 million times in the past year alone and there are now more than 40,000 public projects based on the Docker format.

“Containers are revolutionizing the computing industry and delivering on the dream of application portability,” said Jim Zemlin, executive director of the Linux Foundation. “With the Open Container Project, Docker is ensuring that fragmentation won’t destroy the promise of containers. Users, vendors and technologists of all kinds will now be able to collaborate and innovate with the assurance that neutral open governance provides. We applaud Docker and the other founding members for having the will and foresight to get this done.”

http://www.opencontainers.org/

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Infinera Adds 100GbE to Cloud Xpress, along with NETCONF/YANG, MACSec

Infineraannounced the addition of 100 gigabit Ethernet (GbE) client services in its Cloud Xpress family of metro Cloud platforms.

The Cloud Xpress family, which Infinera announced last September and began shipping in December, is designed specifically to address the needs of Cloud service providers, Internet content providers, Internet Exchange service providers, large enterprises and other large-scale datacenter operators.  It leverages the company's unique oPIC-500 metro-optimized photonic integrated circuit to deliver DWDM datacenter interconnect services up to 500 Gbps in a compact two rack unit chassis.

The new Cloud Xpress with 100 GbE extends the hyper-scale density, simplified operations and low power of the existing Cloud Xpress family that operators can use to easily deploy and scale their networks. With the addition of the new platform, the Cloud Xpress family now supports 10 GbE, 40 GbE and 100 GbE client-side interfaces to match customer specific requirements.

Along with the introduction of the new Cloud Xpress with 100 GbE, Infinera announced important enhancements to the Cloud Xpress family including MACsec encryption for improved security, NETCONF & YANG support for Software Defined Networking (SDN) and ease of use, and LLDP discovery protocols enabling datacenter automation. NETCONF & YANG support enables smooth integration into datacenter automation and management systems; LLDP protocol awareness for auto-discovery of adjacent switches and routers across the WAN supports efficient connectivity validation and troubleshooting, and MACsec provides end-to-end encryption to keep data secure.

“The Cloud Xpress platforms are purpose-built for the datacenter interconnect market,” said Stu Elby, senior vice president, Cloud network strategy and technology, Infinera. “Based on Infinera's unique PIC and super-channel technology, the Cloud Xpress provides scale and simplicity while utilizing little power.”

http://www.infinera.com
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VMware to Support Docker Containers on its vSphere

VMware is previewing two key technologies for cloud-native apps running in Docker containers on VMware vSphere:

AppCatalyst --  an API and Command Line Interface (CLI)-driven hypervisor for replicating a private cloud locally on a desktop for building and testing containerized and microservices-based applications. The tool features Project Photon, an open source minimal Linux container host, Docker Machine and integration with Vagrant.

Project Bonneville -- software that enables the seamless integration of Docker container
s into the VMware vSphere platform and allow virtual administrators to use their existing operational and management processes and tools such as VMware vCenter Server without the need for new tools or additional training. Project Bonneville downloads containers from Docker Hub, and isolates and starts up each container in a virtual machine with minimal overhead using the Instant Clone feature of VMware vSphere. Together, Project Bonneville and Instant Clone will make virtual machines lightweight enough to support one container per virtual machine.

"Developers are rapidly adopting Docker to ship apps faster, whether to their private or public cloud infrastructures," said Scott Johnston, senior vice president of product, Docker. "VMware AppCatalyst and Project Bonneville will make it easier for developers and IT/operations teams alike to take advantage of existing management, compliance, networking and security processes and tools to run Dockerized applications."

http://www.vmware.com

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Portworx Targets Container-Aware Storage

Portworx, a start-up based in Redwood City, California, unveiled its solution for providing elastic, scale-out block storage natively to Docker containers.

Portworx PWX Converged Infrastructure for Containers allows Dockerized applications to execute directly on the storage infrastructure. It also enables Dockerized applications to be scheduled across machines and clouds, making possible the deployment of stateful, distributed applications.

Key Portworx PWX features:

●     Container-Aware storage enabling data persistence across nodes, container-level snapshots, and storage policies to be applied at container granularity.

●     Self-service IT through Software Defined Storage.

●     Converged Storage ensuring that containers run on storage nodes to maximize I/O performance.

●     An Elastic Storage Orchestrator auto scales block storage to meet application needs and moves underlying storage blocks across nodes to optimize performance and ensure high availability.

In addition, Portworx announced an initial funding round of $8.5 million led by the Mayfield Fund.

“Both stateless and stateful applications can benefit from containerization. Our goal was to build storage infrastructure for Docker containers from the ground up with a keen focus on the new requirements that containers and service oriented architectures create,” said Murli Thirumale, CEO of Portworx.  “Building storage with container level granularity ensures storage policies can be applied at the container level, enabling greater agility, application state consistency, high availability, rolling upgrades, and high performance.  In getting to this point, we had to break a few cherished notions about storage and traditional architectures.”

http://portworx.com/

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Rancher Labs Launches its Container Infrastructure Platform

Rancher Labs, a start-up based in Cupertino, California, announced the beta release of its platform for running Docker in production. It includes a fully-integrated set of infrastructure services purpose built for containers, including networking, storage management, load balancing, service discovery, monitoring, and resource management. Rancher connects these infrastructure services with standard Docker plugins and application management tools, such as Docker Compose, to make it simple for organizations to deploy and manage containerized workloads on any infrastructure.

Key Rancher features:

• Cross-host networking: Rancher creates a private software defined network for each user, allowing secure communication between containers across hosts and even clouds.
• Container load balancing: Rancher provides an integrated, elastic load balancing service to distribute traffic between containers or services.
• Storage Management: Rancher supports live snapshot and backup of Docker volumes, enabling users to backup stateful containers and stateful services.
• Service discovery: Rancher implements a distributed DNS-based service discovery function with integrated health checking that allows containers to automatically register themselves as services, as well as services to dynamically discover each other over the network.
• Service upgrades: Rancher makes it easy for users to upgrade existing container services, by allowing service cloning and redirection of service requests. This makes it possible to ensure services can be validated against their dependencies before live traffic is directed to the newly upgraded services.
• Resource management: Rancher supports Docker Machine, a powerful tool for provisioning hosts directly from cloud providers. Rancher then monitors host resources and manages container deployment.
• Native Docker Support: Rancher supports native Docker management of containers. Users can directly provision containers using the Docker API or CLI, as well as using Docker Compose for more complex application management functions. Third-party tools that are built on Docker API, such as Kubernetes, work seamlessly on Rancher.
• Multi-tenancy and user management: Rancher is designed for multiple users and allows organizations to collaborate throughout the application lifecycle. By connecting with existing directory services, Rancher allows users to create separate development, testing, and production environments and invite their peers to collaboratively manage resources and applications.

“Much of the excitement around Docker is its use as a universal packaging and distribution format,” said Sheng Liang, co-founder and CEO of Rancher Labs. “However, as users deploy containers across different infrastructures, they quickly realize that different clouds, virtualization platforms and bare metal servers have dramatically different infrastructure capabilities. By building a common infrastructure backplane across any resource, Rancher implements an entirely new approach to hybrid cloud computing.”

Rancher Labs recently announced $10 million in Series A funding from Mayfield and Nexus Venture Partners.

http://www.rancher.com

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Datawise.io Targets Network/Storage for Linux Containers

Datawise.io, a start-up based in San Jose, previewed its solution for delivering network and storage solutions for Linux containers.

Project 6 is software for deploying and managing Docker containers across a cluster of hosts, with a focus on simplifying on-premises environments. Datawise.io is making it easy to pack stateless and stateful applications onto the same environment by integrating Docker and Google’s Kubernetes with additional capabilities that provide:

• Highly-available cluster management, to aggregate resources and coordinate operations across multiple hosts 
• Simplified networking, so that containers maintain distinct IP network identities independently from hosts, and can easily locate each other  
• Persistent and temporary storage volumes, to make efficient use of local disks and minimize the need for external storage 
• Dynamic scheduling augmented with network and storage, so that resources available are efficiently utilized with minimal administration  

“At Datawise.io, we believe containers will revolutionize application development and datacenter operations,” said Jeff Chou, Datawise.io Co-Founder and CEO. “We are providing a preview of Project 6 now to get early community feedback which will be incorporated into other projects our team is working on.”

http://www.datawise.io

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Red Hat Appoints Frank Calderoni as CFO

Frank Calderoni has joined Red Hat as executive vice president, operations and chief financial officer.

Most recently, Calderoni served as executive vice president and CFO at Cisco Systems for seven years. From 2004 through 2014, he managed the financial strategy and operations of a company with more than 72,000 employees and total revenue for fiscal year 2014 of $47 billion. During his tenure at Cisco, the company went from $22 billion in revenue to $47 billion, and grew annual profits from $0.62 per share to $1.49 per share. With more than 30 years of experience, he has led high-performing finance organizations at global software and technology companies including Cisco, QLogic Corp., SanDisk Corp., and IBM.

Calderoni succeeds Red Hat executive vice president and CFO Charlie Peters, whose planned retirement was announced in December 2014, and who will remain with Red Hat until July 31.

http://www.redhat.com

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Verizon Offers Pay Increase in Labor Negotiations

Verizon is offering a pay increase to approximately 38,000 Verizon East Wireline Employees as part of a three year labor package it presented to the Communications Workers of America and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers

Verizon said its offer includes several key proposals:

Wages -- Provided there is a signed agreement by Aug. 1, upon ratification of a new contract there would be a 2 percent wage increase effective Aug. 2, 2015; a 2 percent increase one year later; and a $1,000 lump sum payment in the third year. The average annual salary and benefit package for a Verizon associate in the East is $130,000.  Verizon technicians in the New York City/Long Island region currently have an average total wage-and-benefit package worth in excess of $160,000 a year.

Pensions -- Pension-eligible associates would be given a choice of continuing to earn pension benefits under the defined benefit plan with some limitations and forgoing the existing 401(k) company match, or opting for the enhanced 401(k) plan currently offered to management employees (which includes a bigger company match and a profit-sharing contribution) with a frozen pension benefit. With the exception of union-represented employees hired since Oct. 28, 2012, employees under these collective bargaining agreements currently have both a defined benefit pension plan AND a 401(k) savings plan with a generous company match, a benefit structure that's from another era.

Healthcare -- Negotiating cost controls for the company's healthcare plans is essential. The cost of medical coverage for an East associate and one or more family members currently averages nearly $20,000 a year. In one of the company's East plans, the annual cost for this coverage is over $23,000 annually. By contrast, the national average for family healthcare coverage is about $16,800. The company is proposing an increase of $8.10 per week next year for individual healthcare premiums. Other reasonable cost controls are also important to help keep this Wireline business unit competitive.

Workforce management -- The company is seeking more flexibility in terms of managing the workforce consistent with customer demands.

"More than ever, we need contractual changes that position us to compete with new and emerging technologies," said Tami Erwin, president of Verizon's Consumer and Mass Business unit. "American consumers are communicating in new and innovative ways. The way we work and respond to our customers demands flexibility. Our contract rules and provisions need to be updated to reflect those changes."

http://www.verizon.com

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