text:
Planet Linux Australia
Clinton Roy: clintonroy
First day of miniconfs, I spent some of my time at the kernel miniconf and some at the Debian miniconf.
That night the ghosts dinner was on, caught up with a couple of Melbourne friends.
Filed under: diary
Simon Lyall: Linux.conf.au 2015 – Day 2 – Session 3 – Sysadmin
Alerting Husbandry – Julien Goodwin
- Obsolete alerts
- New staff members won't have context to know was is obsolete and should have been removed (or ignorened)
- Unactionable alerts – It is managed by another team but thought you'd like to be woken up
- SLA Alerts – can I do something about that?
- Bad thresholds ( server with 32 cores had load of 4 , that is not load ), Disk space alerts either too much or not enough margin
- Thresholds only redo after complete monitoring rebuilds
- Hair trigger alerts ( once at 51ms not 50ms )
- Not impacting redundancy ( only one of 8 web servers is down )
- Spamming alerts, things is down for the 2925379857 time. Even if important you've stopped caring
- Alerts for something nobody cares about, eg test servers
- Most of earlier items end up in "don't care" bucket
- Emails bad, within a few weeks the entire team will have a filter to ignore it.
- Undocumented alerts – If it is broken, what am I supposed to do about it?
- Document actions to take in "playbook"
- Alert acceptance practice, only oncallers should e accepting alerts
- Need a way to silence it
- Production by Fiat
Managing microservices effectively – Daniel Hall
- Step one – write your own apps
- keep state outside apps
- not nanoservices, not milliservices
- Each should be replaceable, independantly deployable , have a single capability
- think about depandencies, especially circular
- Packaging
- small
- multiple versions on same machine
- in dev and prod
- maybe use docker, have local registry
- Small performance hit compared to VMs
- Docker is a little immature
- Step 3 deployment
- Fast in and out
- Minimal human interaction
- Recovery from failures
- Less overhead requires less overhead
- We use Meso and marathon
- Marathon handles switches from old app to new, task failure and recover
- Early on the Hype Cycle
- Extra Credit Sceduling
- Chronos within Mesos
- A bit newish
Corralling logs with ELK – Mark Walkom
- You don't want to be your bosses grep
- Cluster Elastisearch, single master at any point
- Sizing best to determine with single machine, see how much it can hadle. Keep Java heap under 31GB
- Lots of plugins and clients
- APIs return json. ?pretty makes it looks nicer. The " _cat/* " api is more command line
- new node scales, auto balancers and grows automatic
- Logstash. lots of filters, handles just about any format, easy to setup.
- Kibana – graphical front end for elastisearch
- Curator, logstash-forwarder, grokdebugger
FAI — the universal deployment tool – Thomas Lange
- From power off to applications running
- It is all about installing software packages
- Central administration and control
- no master or golden image
- can be expanded by hooks
- plan your installation and FAI installs the plan
- Boot up diskless client via PXE/tftp
- creates partitions, file systems, installs, reboots
- groups hosts by classes, mutiple classes per host etc
- Classes can be executables, writeing to standard output, can be in shell, pass variables
- partitioning, can handle LVM, RAID
- Projected started in 1999
- Supports debian based distributions including ubuntu
- Supports bare metal, VM, chroot, LiveCD, Golden image
Documentation made complicated – Eric Burgueno
- Incomplete, out of date, inconsistent
- Tools – Word, LibreOffice -> Sharepoint
- Sharepoint = lets put this stuff over here so nobody will read it ever again
- txt , markdown, html. Need to track changes
- Files can be put in version control.
- Mediawiki
- Wiki – uncontrolled proliferation of pages, duplicate pages
- Why can't documentation be mixed in with the configuration management
- Documentation snippits
- Same everywhere (mostly)
- Reusable
- Transclusion in mediawiki (include one page install another)
- Modern version of mediawiki have parser functions. display different content depending on a condition
- awesomewiki.co
Simon Lyall: Linux.conf.au 2015 – Day 2 – Session 2 – Sysadmin Miniconf
Mass automatic roll out of Linux with Windows as a VM guest – Steven Sykes
- Was late and missed the start of the talk
etcd: distributed locking and service discovery – Brandon Philips
- /etc distributed
- open source, failure tolerant, durable, watchable, exposed via http, runtime configurable
- API – get/put/del basics plus some extras
- Applications
- Locksmith, distributed locks used when machines update
- Vulcan http load balancer
- Leader Election
- TTL and atomic operations
- Magical stuff explained faster than I can type it.
- Just one leader cluster-wide
- Aims for consistence ahead of raw performance
Linux at the University – Randy Appleton
- No numbers on how many students use Linux
- Peninsula Michigan
- 3 schools
- Michigan Tech
- research, 7k students, 200CS Students, Sysadmin Majors in biz school
- Linux used is Sysadmin courses, one of two main subjects
- Research use Linux "alot"
- Inactive LUG
- Scripting languages. Python, perl etc
- Northern Michigan
- 9k students, 140 CS Majors
- Growing CIS program
- No Phd Programs
- Required for sophomore and senior network programming course
- Optional Linux sysadmin course
- Inactive LUG
- Sysadmin course: One teacher, app of the week (Apache, nfs, email ), shell scripting at end, big project at the end
- No problem picking distributions, No problem picking topics, huge problem with desperate incoming knowledge
- Kernel hacking. Difficult to do, difficult to teach, best students do great. Hard to teach the others
- Lake Superior State
- 2600 students
- 70 CS Majors
- One professor teaches Sysadmin and PHP/MySQL
- No LUG
- Not a lot of research
- What is missing
- Big power Universities
- High Schools – None really
- Community college – None really
- Usage for projects
- Sometimes, not for video games
- Usage for infrastructure
- Web sites, ALL
- Beowuld Clusters
- Databases – Mostly
- Obstacles
- Not in High Schools
- Not on laptops, not supported by Uni
- Need to attract liberal studies students
- Is Sysadmin a core concept – not academic enough
- What would make it better
- Servers but not desktops
- Not a edu distribution
- Easier than Eclispe , better than visual studio
Untangling the strings: Scaling Puppet with inotify – Steven McDonald
- Around 1000 nodes at site
- Lots of small changes, specific to one node that we want to happen quickly
- Historically restarting the puppet master after each update
- Problem is the master gets slow as you scale up
- 1300 manifests, takes at least a minute to read each startup
- Puppet internal caching very coarse, per environment basis (and they have only one prod one)
- Multiple environments doesn't work well at site
- Ideas – tell puppet exactly what files have changed with each rollout (via git, inotify). But puppet doesn't support this
- I missed the explan of exactly how puppet parses the change. I think it is "import" which is getting removed in the future
- Inotify seemed to be more portable and simpler
- Speed up of up to 5 minutes for nodes with complex catalogs, 70 seconds off average agent run
- implementation doesn't support the future parser, re-opening the class in a seperate file is not supported
- Available on github. Doesn't work with current ruby-inotify ( in current master branch )
Russell Coker: Systemd Notes
A few months ago I gave a lecture about systemd for the Linux Users of Victoria. Here are some of my notes reformatted as a blog post:
Scripts in /etc/init.d can still be used, they work the same way as they do under sysvinit for the user. You type the same commands to start and stop daemons.
To get a result similar to changing runlevel use the "systemctl isolate" command. Runlevels were never really supported in Debian (unlike Red Hat where they were used for starting and stopping the X server) so for Debian users there's no change here.
The command systemctl with no params shows a list of loaded services and highlights failed units.
The command "journalctl -u UNIT-PATTERN" shows journal entries for the unit(s) in question. The pattern uses wildcards not regexs.
The systemd journal includes the stdout and stderr of all daemons. This solves the problem of daemons that don't log all errors to syslog and leave the sysadmin wondering why they don't work.
The command "systemctl status UNIT" gives the status and last log entries for the unit in question.
A program can use ioctl(fd, TIOCSTI, …) to push characters into a tty buffer. If the sysadmin runs an untrusted program with the same controlling tty then it can cause the sysadmin shell to run hostile commands. The system call setsid() to create a new terminal session is one solution but managing which daemons can be started with it is difficult. The way that systemd manages start/stop of all daemons solves this. I am glad to be rid of the run_init program we used to use on SE Linux systems to deal with this.
Systemd has a mechanism to ask for passwords for SSL keys and encrypted filesystems etc. There have been problems with that in the past but I think they are all fixed now. While there is some difficulty during development the end result of having one consistent way of managing this will be better than having multiple daemons doing it in different ways.
The commands "systemctl enable" and "systemctl disable" enable/disable daemon start at boot which is easier than the SysVinit alternative of update-rc.d in Debian.
Systemd has built in seat management, which is not more complex than consolekit which it replaces. Consolekit was installed automatically without controversy so I don't think there should be controversy about systemd replacing consolekit.
Systemd improves performance by parallel start and autofs style fsck.
The command systemd-cgtop shows resource use for cgroups it creates.
The command "systemd-analyze blame" shows what delayed the boot process and
"systemd-analyze critical-chain" shows the critical path in boot delays.
Sysremd also has security features such as service private /tmp and restricting service access to directory trees.Conclusion
For basic use things just work, you don't need to learn anything new to use systemd.
It provides significant benefits for boot speed and potentially security.
It doesn't seem more complex than other alternative solutions to the same problems.
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Simon Lyall: Linux.conf.au – Day 2 – Session 1 – Sysadmin Miniconf
Configuration Management – A love Story – Javier Turegano
- June 2008 – Devs want to deploy fast
- June 2009 – git -> jenkins -> Puppet master
- But things got pretty complicated and hard to maintain
- Remove puppet master, puppet noop, but only happens now and then lots of changes but a couple of errors
- Now doing manual changes
- June 2010 – Thngs turned into a mess.
- June 2011 – Devs want prod-like development
- Cloud! Tooling! Chef! – each dev have their own environment
- June 2012 – dev environments for all working in ec2
- dev no longer prod-like. cloud vs datacentre, puppet vs chef , debian vs centos, etc
- June 2013 – More into cloud, teams re-arranged
- Build EC2 images and deploy out of jenkins. Eaither as AMI or as rpm
- Each team fairly separate, doing thing different ways. Had guilds to share skills and procedures and experience
- June 2014 – Cloudformation, Ansible used by some groups, random
Healthy Operations – Phil Ingram
- Acquia – Enterprise Drupal as a service. GovCMS Australian Federal Government. 1/4 are remote
- Went from working in office to working from home
- Every week had phone call with boss
- Talk about thing other than with work, ask home people are going, talk to people.
- Not sleep, waking up at night, not exercising, quick to anger and negative thinking, inability to concentrate
- Hadn't taken more than 1 week off work, let exercise work, hobbies was computer stuff
- In general being in Ops not as much of an option to take time off. Things stay broke until fix
- Unable to learn via Osmosis, Timing of handing over between shifts
- People do not understand that computers are run by people not robots
- Methods: Turn work off at the end of the day, Rubber Ducking, exercise
Developments in PCP (Performance Co-Pilot) : Nathan Scott
- See my slides from yesterday for intro to PCP
- Stuff in last 12 months
- Included in supported in RHEL 6.6 and RHEL 7
- Regular stable releases
- Better out of the box experience
- Tackling some long-standing problems
- JSON access – pmwebd , interactive web charts ( Graphite, grafana )
- zero-install look-inside containers
- Docker support but written to allow use by others
- Collectors
- Lots of new kernel metrics additions
- New applications from web devs (memcached, DNS, web )
- DB server additions
- Python PMDA interfaces
- Monitor work
- Reporting tools
- Web tools, GUIs
- Also improving ease of setup
- Getting historical data from sar, iostat
- www.pcp.io
Security options for container implementations – Jay Coles
- What doesn't work: rlimits, quotas, blacklisting via ACLs
- Capabilities: Big list that containers probably shouldn't have
- Cgroups – Accounting, Limiting resource usage, tracking of processes, preventing/allowing device access
- App Armor vs selinux – Use at least one, selinux a little more featured
Michael Still: Kilo Nova deploy recommendations
Please understand that none of these are hard rules -- what I seek is for you to consider your options and make informed decisions. Its really up to you how you deploy Nova.
Operating environment
- Consider what base OS you use for your hypervisor nodes if you're using Linux. I know that many environments have standardized on a given distribution, and that many have a preference for a long term supported release. However, Nova is at its most basic level a way of orchestrating tools packaged by your distribution via APIs. If those underlying tools are buggy, then your Nova experience will suffer as well. Sometimes we can work around known issues in older versions of our dependencies, but often those work-arounds are hard to implement (and therefore likely to be less than perfect) or have performance impacts. There are many examples of the problems you can encounter, but hypervisor kernel panics, and disk image corruption are just two examples. We are trying to work with distributions on ensuring they back port fixes, but the distributions might not be always willing to do that. Sometimes upgrading the base OS on your hypervisor nodes might be a better call.
- The version of Python you use matters. The OpenStack project only tests with specific versions of Python, and there can be bugs between releases. This is especially true for very old versions of Python (anything older than 2.7) and new versions of Python (Python 3 is not supported for example). Your choice of base OS will affect the versions of Python available, so this is related to the previous point.
- There are existing configuration management recipes for most configuration management systems. I'd avoid reinventing the wheel here and use the community supported recipes. There are definitely resources available for chef, puppet, juju, ansible and salt. If you're building a very large deployment from scratch consider triple-o as well. Please please please don't fork the community recipes. I know its tempting, but contribute to upstream instead. Invariably upstream will continue developing their stuff, and if you fork you'll spend a lot of effort keeping in sync.
- Have a good plan for log collection and retention at your intended scale. The hard reality at the moment is that diagnosing Nova often requires that you turn on debug logging, which is very chatty. Whilst we're happy to take bug reports where we've gotten the log level wrong, we haven't had a lot of success at systematically fixing this issue. Your log infrastructure therefore needs to be able to handle the demands of debug logging when its turned on. If you're using central log servers think seriously about how much disks they require. If you're not doing centralized syslog logging, perhaps consider something like logstash.
- Pay attention to memory usage on your controller nodes. OpenStack python processes can often consume hundreds of megabytes of virtual memory space. If you run many controller services on the same node, make sure you have enough RAM to deal with the number of processes that will, by default, be spawned for the many service endpoints. After a day or so of running a controller node, check in on the VMM used for python processes and make any adjustments needed to your "workers" configuration settings.
- Estimate your final scale now. Sure, you're building a proof of concept, but these things have a habit of becoming entrenched. If you are planning a deployment that is likely to end up being thousands of nodes, then you are going to need to deploy with cells. This is also possibly true if you're going to have more than one hypervisor or hardware platform in your deployment -- its very common to have a cell per hypervisor type or per hardware platform. Cells is relatively cheap to deploy for your proof of concept, and it helps when that initial deploy grows into a bigger thing. Should you be deploying cells from the beginning? It should be noted however that not all features are currently implemented in cells. We are working on this at the moment though.
- Consider carefully what SQL database to use. Nova supports many SQL databases via sqlalchemy, but are some are better tested and more widely deployed than others. For example, the Postgres back end is rarely deployed and is less tested. I'd recommend a variant of MySQL for your deployment. Personally I've seen good performance on Percona, but I know that many use the stock MySQL as well. There are known issues at the moment with Galera as well, so show caution there. There is active development happening on the select-for-update problems with Galera at the moment, so that might change by the time you get around to deploying in production. You can read more about our current Galera problems on Jay Pipe's blog .
- We support read only replicas of the SQL database. Nova supports offloading read only SQL traffic to read only replicas of the main SQL database, but I do no believe this is widely deployed. It might be of interest to you though.
- Expect a lot of SQL database connections. While Nova has the nova-conductor service to control the number of connections to the database server, other OpenStack services do not, and you will quickly out pace the number of default connections allowed, at least for a MySQL deployment. Actively monitor your SQL database connection counts so you know before you run out. Additionally, there are many places in Nova where a user request will block on a database query, so if your SQL back end isn't keeping up this will affect performance of your entire Nova deployment.
- There are options with message queues as well. We currently support rabbitmq, zeromq and qpid. However, rabbitmq is the original and by far the most widely deployed. rabbitmq is therefore a reasonable default choice for deployment.
- Not all hypervisor drivers are created equal. Let's be frank here -- some hypervisor drivers just aren't as actively developed as others. This is especially true for drivers which aren't in the Nova code base -- at least the ones the Nova team manage are updated when we change the internals of Nova. I'm not a hypervisor bigot -- there is a place in the world for many different hypervisor options. However, the start of a Nova deploy might be the right time to consider what hypervisor you want to use. I'd personally recommend drivers in the Nova code base with active development teams and good continuous integration, but ultimately you have to select a driver based on its merits in your situation. I've included some more detailed thoughts on how to evaluate hypervisor drivers later in this post, as I don't want to go off on a big tangent during my nicely formatted bullet list.
- Remember that the hypervisor state is interesting debugging information. For example with the libvirt hypervisor, the contents on /var/lib/instances is super useful for debugging misbehaving instances. Additionally, all of the existing libvirt tools work, so you can use those to investigate as well. However, I strongly recommend you only change instance state via Nova, and not go directly to the hypervisor.
- Avoid new deployments of nova-network. nova-network has been on the deprecation path for a very long time now, and we're currently working on the final steps of a migration plan for nova-network users to neutron. If you're a new deployment of Nova and therefore don't yet depend on any of the features of nova-network, I'd start with Neutron from the beginning. This will save you a possible troublesome migration to Neutron later.
Testing and upgrades
- You need a test lab. For a non-trivial deployment, you need a realistic test environment. Its expected that you test all upgrades before you do them in production, and rollbacks can sometimes be problematic. For example, some database migrations are very hard to roll back, especially if new instances have been created in the time it took you to decide to roll back. Perhaps consider turning off API access (or putting the API into a read only state) while you are validating a production deploy post upgrade, that way you can restore a database snapshot if you need to undo the upgrade. We know this isn't perfect and are working on a better upgrade strategy for information stored in the database, but we will always expect you to test upgrades before deploying them.
- Test database migrations on a copy of your production database before doing them for real. Another reason to test upgrades before doing them in production is because some database migrations can be very slow. Its hard for the Nova developers to predict which migrations will be slow, but we do try to test for this and minimize the pain. However, aspects of your deployment can affect this in ways we don't expect -- for example if you have large numbers of volumes per instance, then that could result in database tables being larger than we expect. You should always test database migrations in a lab and report any problems you see.
- Think about your upgrade strategy in general. While we now support having the control infrastructure running a newer release than the services on hypervisor nodes, we only support that for one release (so you could have your control plane running Kilo for example while you are still running Juno on your hypervisors, you couldn't run Icehouse on the hypervisors though). Are you going to upgrade every six months? Or are you going to do it less frequently but step through a series of upgrades in one session? I suspect the latter option is more risky -- if you encounter a bug in a previous release we would need to back port a fix, which is a much slower process than fixing the most recent release. There are also deployments which choose to "continuously deploy" from trunk. This gets the access to features as they're added, but means that the deployments need to have more operational skill and a closer association with the upstream developers. In general continuous deployers are larger public clouds as best as I can tell.
libvirt specific considerations
- For those intending to run the libvirt hypervisor driver, not all libvirt hypervisors are created equal. libvirt implements pluggable hypervisors, so if you select the Nova libvirt hypervisor driver, you then need to select what hypervisor to use with libvirt as well. It should be noted however that some hypervisors work better than others, with kvm being the most widely deployed.
- There are two types of storage for instances. There is "instance storage", which is block devices that exist for the life of the instance and are then cleaned up when the instance is destroyed. There is also block storage provided Cinder, which is persistent and arguably easier to manage than instance storage. I won't discuss storage provided by Cinder any further however, because it is outside the scope of this post. Instance storage is provided by a plug in layer in the libvirt hypervisor driver, which presents you with another set of deployment decisions.
- Shared instance storage is attractive, but it comes at a cost. Shared instance storage is an attractive option, but isn't required for live migration of instances using the libvirt hypervisor. Think about the costs of shared storage though -- for example putting everything on network attached storage is likely to be expensive, especially if most of your instances don't need the facility. There are other options such as Ceph, but the storage interface layer in libvirt is one of the areas of code where we need to improve testing so be wary of bugs before relying on those storage back ends.
Thoughts on how to evaluate hypervisor drivers
As promised, I also have some thoughts on how to evaluate which hypervisor driver is the right choice for you. First off, if your organization has a lot of experience with a particular hypervisor, then there is always value in that. If that is the case, then you should seriously consider running the hypervisor you already have experience with, as long as that hypervisor has a driver for Nova which meets the criteria below.
What's important is to be looking for a driver which works well with Nova, and a good measure of that is how well the driver development team works with the Nova development team. The obvious best case here is where both teams are the same people -- which is true for drivers that are in the Nova code base. I am aware there are drivers that live outside of Nova's code repository, but you need to remember that the interface these drivers plug into isn't a stable or versioned interface. The risk of those drivers being broken by the ongoing development of Nova is very high. Additionally, only a very small number of those "out of tree" drivers contribute to our continuous integration testing. That means that the Nova team also doesn't know when those drivers are broken. The breakages can also be subtle, so if your vendor isn't at the very least doing tempest runs against their out of tree driver before shipping it to you then I'd be very worried.
You should also check out how many bugs are open in LaunchPad for your chosen driver (this assumes the Nova team is aware of the existence of the driver I suppose). Here's an example link to the libvirt driver bugs currently open. As well as total bug count, I'd be looking for bug close activity -- its nice if there is a very small number of bugs filed, but perhaps that's because there aren't many users. It doesn't necessarily mean the team for that driver is super awesome at closing bugs. The easiest way to look into bug close rates (and general code activity) would be to checkout the code for Nova and then look at the log for your chosen driver. For example for the libvirt driver again:
$ git clone http://git.openstack.org/openstack/nova $ cd nova/nova/virt/driver/libvirt $ git log .
That will give you a report on all the commits ever for that driver. You don't need to read the entire report, but it will give you an idea of what the driver authors have recently been thinking about.
Another good metric is the specification activity for your driver. Specifications are the formal design documents that Nova adopted for the Juno release, and they document all the features that we're currently working on. I write summaries of the current state of Nova specs regularly, which you can see posted at stillhq.com with this being the most recent summary at the time of writing this post. You should also check how much your driver authors interact with the core Nova team. The easiest way to do that is probably to keep an eye on the Nova team meeting minutes, which are posted online.
Finally, the OpenStack project believes strongly in continuous integration testing. It (s/It/Testing) has clear value in the number of bugs it finds in code before our users experience them, and I would be very wary of driver code which isn't continuously integrated with Nova. Thus, you need to ensure that your driver has well maintained continuous integration testing. This is easy for "in tree" drivers, as we do that for all of them. For out of tree drivers, continuous integration testing is done with a thing called "third party CI".
How do you determine if a third party CI system is well maintained? First off, I'd start by determining if a third party CI system actually exists by looking at OpenStack's list of known third party CI systems. If the third party isn't listed on that page, then that's a very big warning sign. Next you can use Joe Gordon's lastcomment tool to see when a given CI system last reported a result:
$ git clone https://github.com/jogo/lastcomment $ ./lastcomment.py --name "DB Datasets CI" last 5 comments from 'DB Datasets CI' [0] 2015-01-07 00:46:33 (1:35:13 old) https://review.openstack.org/145378 'Ignore 'dynamic' addr flag on gateway initialization' [1] 2015-01-07 00:37:24 (1:44:22 old) https://review.openstack.org/136931 'Use session with neutronclient' [2] 2015-01-07 00:35:33 (1:46:13 old) https://review.openstack.org/145377 'libvirt: Expanded test libvirt driver' [3] 2015-01-07 00:29:50 (1:51:56 old) https://review.openstack.org/142450 'ephemeral file names should reflect fs type and mkfs command' [4] 2015-01-07 00:15:59 (2:05:47 old) https://review.openstack.org/142534 'Support for ext4 as default filesystem for ephemeral disks'
You can see here that the most recent run is 1 hour 35 minutes old when I ran this command. That's actually pretty good given that I wrote this while most of America was asleep. If the most recent run is days old, that's another warning sign. If you're left in doubt, then I'd recommend appearing in the OpenStack IRC channels on freenode and asking for advice. OpenStack has a number of requirements for third party CI systems, and I haven't discussed many of them here. There is more detail on what OpenStack considers a "well run CI system" on the OpenStack Infrastructure documentation page.
General operational advice
Finally, I have some general advice for operators of OpenStack. There is an active community of operators who discuss their use of the various OpenStack components at the openstack-operators mailing list, if you're deploying Nova you should consider joining that mailing list. While you're welcome to ask questions about deploying OpenStack at that list, you can also ask questions at the more general OpenStack mailing list if you want to.
There are also many companies now which will offer to operate an OpenStack cloud for you. For some organizations engaging a subject matter expert will be the right decision. Probably the most obvious way to evaluate which of those companies to use is to look at their track record of successful deployments, as well as their overall involvement in the OpenStack community. You need a partner who can advocate for you with the OpenStack developers, as well as keeping an eye on what's happening upstream to ensure it meets your needs.
Thanks for reading so far! I hope this document is useful to someone out there. I'd love to hear your feedback -- are there other things we wished deployers considered before committing to a plan? Am I simply wrong somewhere? Finally, this is the first time that I've posted an essay form of a conference talk instead of just the slide deck, and I'd be interested in if people find this format more useful than a YouTube video post conference. Please drop me a line and let me know if you find this useful!
Tags for this post: openstack nova
Related posts: One week of Nova Kilo specifications; Specs for Kilo; Juno nova mid-cycle meetup summary: nova-network to Neutron migration; Juno Nova PTL Candidacy; Juno nova mid-cycle meetup summary: scheduler; Juno nova mid-cycle meetup summary: ironic
Simon Lyall: Linux.conf.au – Day 2 – Keynote by Eben Moglen
Last spoke 10 years ago in Canberra Linux.conf.au
Things have improved in the last ten years
- $10s of billions of value have been lost in software patent war
- But things have been so bad that some help was acquired, so worst laws have been pushed back a little
- "Fear of God" in industry was enough to push open Patent pools
- Judges determined that Patent law was getting pathological, 3 wins in Supreme court
- Likelihood worst patent laws will be applied against free software devs has decreased
- "The Nature of the problem has altered because the world has altered"
The Next 10 years
- Most important Patent system will be China's
- Lack of rule of law in China will cause problems in environment of patents
- Too risky for somebody too try and stop a free software project. We have "our own baseball bat" to spring back at them
The last 10 years
- Changes in Society more important changes in software
- 21st century vs 20th century social organisations
- Less need for hierarchy and secrecy
- Transparency, Participation, non-hierarchical interaction
- OS invented that organisation structure
- Technology we made has taken over the creation of software
- "Where is BitKeeper now?" – Eben Moglen
- Even Microsoft reorganises that our way of software making won
- Long term the organisation structure change everywhere will be more important than just it's application in Software
- If there has been good news about politics = "we did it", bad news = "we tried"
Our common Values
- "Bridge entire environment between vi and emacs"
- Without PGP and free software then things could have been worse
- The world would be a far more despotic place if PGP was driven underground back in 1993. Imagine today's Net without HTTPS or SSH!
- "We now live in the world we are afraid of"
- "What stands between them and us is our inventions"
- "Freedom itself depends on how we make use of the technologies we are creating." – Eben Moglen
- "You can't trust what you can't read"
- Big power in the wrong is committed against the first law of robotics, they what technology to work for it.
- From guy in twitter – "You can't trust what you can't read." True, but if OpenSSL teaches us anything you can't necessarily trust what you can
- Attitudes in under-18s are a lot more positive towards him than those who are older (not just cause he looks like Harry Potter)
- GNU Project is 30 years old, almost same age is Snowden
- We can't control the net but opportunity to prevent others from controlling it
- Opportunity to prevent failure of freedom
- Society is changing, demographics under control
- But 1.6 billion people live in China, America is committed to spying, consumer companies are committed to collecting consumer information
- Collecting everything is not the way we want the net to work
- We are playing for keeps now.
linux.conf.au News: Tuesday Keynote Speaker - Professor Eben Moglen
Today we have our first Keynote speaker - Professor Eben Moglen, Executive Director of the Software Freedom Law Center and professor of Law and Legal History at Columbia University Law School.
Professor Moglen's presentation is scheduled for 09:00 am Tuesday, 13 January 2015 so don't be late.
Professor Moglen has represented many of the world's leading free software developers. He earned his PhD in History and his law degree at Yale University during what he sometimes calls his "long, dark period" in New Haven.
After law school he clerked for Judge Edward Weinfeld of the United States District Court in New York City and for Justice Thurgood Marshall of the United States Supreme Court. He has taught at Columbia Law School since 1987 and has held visiting appointments at Harvard University, Tel Aviv University and the University of Virginia.
In 2003 he was given the Electronic Frontier Foundation's Pioneer Award for efforts on behalf of freedom in the electronic society.
The LCA 2015 Auckland Team
Jeremy Visser: Floppy drive music
Some time in 2013 I set up a rig to play music with a set of floppy drives. At linux.conf.au 2015 in Auckland I gave a brief lightning talk about this, and here is a set of photos and some demo music to accompany.
The hardware consists of six 3.5″ floppy drives connected to a LeoStick (Arduino) via custom vero board that connects the direction and step pins (18 and 20, respectively) as well as permanently grounding the select pin A (14).
The LeoStick is then connected via USB to a laptop, where the Moppy software (not written by me) is loaded onto the LeoStick and its companion Java software is run on the laptop.
The Moppy software expects MIDI format music as input. For me, I use Rosegarden to create and edit the MIDI files.
Music must be specially arranged for use with the floppies. Floppy drives have a useful range of only one octave, and notes must typically be shortened to be distinguished. As a general rule, halve the length of the note that would otherwise be played. In some cases if a particular part is not loud enough, I double it with a second floppy drive (usually playing an octave above/below rather than in unison, as balance issues are usually fundamental to the particular octave).
Each MIDI channel means a separate floppy drive. In Rosegarden, even though it is possible to play multiple notes simultaneously on a single MIDI channel, this is not supported by Moppy. MIDI channels must be numbered sequentially (this is a drop-down option in Rosegarden) unless my patch is used.
It is possible to arrange music by starting with a ready-made MIDI file obtained from public domain sources such as Mutopia Project or IMSLP. In this case it is vital to reorchestrate the music.
Rosegarden's "Split by pitch" feature makes it much more efficient to transcribe piano music (or music that contains multiple parts in one MIDI channel) by allowing you to separate the top-most or bottom-most notes into separate channels. Rinse and repeat until you have filled all your floppy MIDI channels.
And here are the recordings:
Please be aware that I had a very limited recording setup, and the above recordings are (a) full of noise, and (b) incredibly soft. Crank that volume up!
Simon Lyall: Linux.conf.au – Day 1 – Session 3 – Containers
Building a PaaS with Docker, Kubernetes, and Hard Work – Steven Pousty
- Slides – bit.ly/1AFGACa
- All about Openshift
- So why a new Paas?
- Project Atomic – stripped down RHEL install, everything else as a container. ostree file system, same kernel as RHEL
- Kubernetes intro
- Kubernetes Daemon – Routing for services
- Sceduler etc
- Openshift
- Built-in software defined networking – OpenVSwith , HAPRoxy load balancing etc
- Takeaway
- PAAS seems to be cool again
Galera with Docker: How Synchronous Replication and Linux Containers Mesh Together – Raghavendra Prabhu
- I got lost in the talk
Cloud, Containers, and Orchestration Panel - Katie Miller
- Steven Pousty , Bran Philips ,
Tycho Andersen
Tycho Andersen
Tycho Andersen
Tycho Andersen
Tycho Andersen
- Standard is Dockers to lose and they might manage it
- 3-4 years before we should standardise them. Need to experiment first.
- The kernel API imposes some limits on diversity
- Lots of other stuff
Simon Lyall: Linux.conf.au 2015 – Day 1 – Session 2 – Containers
AWS OpsWorks Orchestration War Stories – Andrew Boag
- Autoscaling too slow since running build-from-scratch every time
- Communications dependencies
- Full stack rebuild in 20-40 minutes to use data currently in production
- A bit longer in a different region
- Great for load testing
- If we ere doing again
- AMI-based better
- OPSWorks not suitable for all AWS stacks
- Golden master for flexable
- Auto-Scaling
- Not every AMI instance is Good to Go upon provisioning
- Not a magic bullet, you can't broadly under-provision
- needs to be throughly load-tested
- Tips
- Dual factor authentication
- No single person / credentials should be able to delete all cloud-hosted copies of your data
- Looked at Cloudformation at start, seemed to be more work
- Fallen out of love with OpsWorks
- Nice distinction by Andrew Boag: he doesn't talk about "lock-in" to cloud providers, but about "cost to exit". – Quote from Paul
Slim Application Containers from Source – Sven Dowideit
- Choose a base image and make a local version (so all your stuff uses the same one)
- I'd pick debian (a little smaller) unless you can make do with busybox or scratch
- Do I need these files? (check though the Dockerfile) eg remove docs files, manpages, timezones
- Then build, export, import and it comes all clean with just one layer.
- If all your images use same base, only on the disk once
- Use related images with all your tools, related to deployment image but with the extra dev, debug, network tools
- Version the dev images
- Minimise to 2 layers
- look at docker-squash
- Get rid of all the sourc code from your image, just end up with whats need, not junk hidden in layers
- Static micro-container nginx
- Build as container
- export as tar , reimport
- It crashes
- Use inotifywait to find what extra files (like shared libraries) it needs
- Create new tarball with those extra files and "docker import" again
- Just 21MB instead of 1.4GB with all the build fragments and random system stuff
- Use docker build as last stage rather than docker import and you can run nginx from docker command line
- Make 2 tar files, one for each image, one in libs/etc, second is nginx
Containers and PCP (Performance Co-Pilot) - Nathan Scott
- Been around for 20+ years, 11 years open source, Not a big mindshare
- What is PCP?
- Toolkit, System level analysis, live and historical, Extensible, distributed
- pmcd daemon on each server, plus for various functions (bit of like collectd model)
- pmlogger, pmchart, pmie, etc talk (pull or poll) to pmcd to get data
- With Containers
- Use –container= to grab info inside a container/namespace
- Lots of work still needed. Metrics inside containers limited compared to native OS
The Challenges of Containerizing your Datacenter – Daniel Hall
- Goals at LIFX
- Apps all stateless, easy to dockerize
- Using mesos, zookeeper, marathon, chronos
- Databases and other stuff outside that cloud
- Mesos slave launches docker containers
- Docker Security
- chroot < Docker < KVM
- Running untrusted Docket containers are a BAD IDEA
- Don't run apps as root inside container
- Use a recent kernel
- Run as little as possible in container
- Single static app if possible
- Run SELinux on the host
- Finding things
- Lots of micoroservices, marathon/mesos moves things all over the place
- Whole machines going up and down
- Marathon comes with a tool that pushes it's state into HAProxy, works fairly well, apps talk to localhost on each machines and haproxy forwards
- Use custom script for this
- Collecting Logs
- Not a good solution
- can mount /dev/log but don't restart syslog
- Mesos collects stdout/stderror , hard to work with and no timestamps
- Centralized logs
- rsyslog log to 127.0.0.1 -> haproxy -> contral machine
- Sometimes needs to queue/drop if things take a little while to start
- rsyslog -> logstash
- elasticsearch on mesos
- nginx tasks running kibana
- Troubleshooting
- Similar to service discover problem
- Easier to get into a container than getting out
- Find a container in marathon
- Use docker exec to run a shell, doesn't work so well on really thin containers
- So debugging tolls can work from outside, pprof or jsonsole can connect to exposed port/pid of container
BlueHackers: Is depression a kind of allergic reaction? | The Guardian
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/jan/04/depression-allergic-reaction-inflammation-immune-system"A growing number of scientists are suggesting that depression is a result of inflammation caused by the body's immune system" An interesting idea, worth further research I think. The article content is clear that the scientists don't regard it as a possible single cause, which is sensible as physical and psychological factors as well as environmental ones are likely to play a role.
Simon Lyall: Linux.conf.au 2015 – Day 1 – Session 1 – Containers
Clouds, Containers, and Orchestration Miniconf
Cloud Management and ManageIQ – John Mark Walker
- Who needs management – Needs something to tie it all together
- New Technology -> Adoption -> Proliferation -> chaos -> Control -> New Technology
- Many technologies follow this, flies under the radar, becomes a problem to control, management tools created, management tools follow the same pattern
- Large number of customers using hybrid cloud environment ( 70% )
- Huge potential complexity, lots of requirements, multiple vendors/systems to interact with
- ManageIQ
- Many vendor managed open source products fail – open core, runt products
- Better way – give more leeway to upstream developers
- Article about taking it opensource on opensource.com. Took around a year from when decision was made
- Lots of work to create a good open source project that will grow
- Release named after Chess Grandmasters
- Rails App
LXD: The Container-Based Hypervisor That Isn't - Tycho Andersen
- Part of Openstack
- Based on LXC , container based hypervisor
- Secure by default: user namespaces, cgroups, Apparmor, etc
- A daemon that doesn't hypervisory things
- A framework for maintaining container based applications
- It Isn't
- No network configuration
- No storage management – But storage aware
- Not an application container tool
- handwavy difference between it and docker, I'm sure it makes sense to some people. Something about running an init/systemd rather than the app directly.
- Features
- Snapshoting – eg something that is slow to start, snapshot after just starts and deploy it in that state
- Injection – add files into the container for app to work on.
- Migration – designed to go fairly fast with low downtime
- Image
- Public and private images
- can be published
- Roadmap
- MVP 0.1 released late January 2015
- container management only
Rocket and the App Container Spec – Brandon Philips
- Single binary – rkt – runs everywhere, systemd not required
- rkt fetch – downloads and discovers images ( can run as non-root user )
- bash -> rkt -> application
- upstart -> rkt -> application
- rkt run coreos.com/etcd-v2.3.1
- multiple processes in container common. Multiple can be run from command line or specified in json file of spec.
- Steps in launch
- stage 0 – downloads images, checks it
- Stage 1 – Exec as root, setup namespaces and cgroups, run systemd container
- Stage 2 – runs actual app in container. Things like policy to restart the app
- rocket-gc garbage collects stuff , runs periodicly. no managmanent daemon
- App Container spec is work in progress
- images, files, compressed, meta-data, dependencies on other images
- runtime , restarts processes, run multiple processes, run extra procs under specified conditions
- metadata server
- Intended to be built with test suite to verify
linux.conf.au News: linux.conf.au 2015 is low live #BeHere #lca2015
Registration is downstairs (level 0) at the Owen G Glenn Business School at the University of Auckland.
We look forward to seeing you there, and we even have a coffee cart in the vicinity to keep those caffeine levels up.Map of Owen G Glenn Building (OGGB)
Look for redshirts around the University - they will be happy to point you in the right direction!
Sridhar Dhanapalan: Twitter posts: 2015-01-05 to 2015-01-11
- Channeling Positive Tablet Usage To Foster Childhood Development http://t.co/AUPzuVT6Bd #edutech #edtech 15:33:00, 2015-01-11
- No gays, no blacks, no fat people: film advertising betrayals http://t.co/kEehdtQtoM 11:20:13, 2015-01-10
- Repeat after me: the Australian economy is not like a household budget http://t.co/GLjP5KkViX #auspol 17:27:06, 2015-01-09
- Anti-piracy organisation caught breaching copyright http://t.co/0uL7fn4lEf 09:42:00, 2015-01-09
- Should we be tracking our children? http://t.co/Czo7LodhbM 19:32:09, 2015-01-08
- Toyota has announced that it will freely share almost 6,000 patents it owns covering hydrogen fuel cell technology. http://t.co/1xE7WSBwRM 17:27:08, 2015-01-08
- This person isn't just a nutter — she is responsible for putting countless lives at risk. http://t.co/oBp03ZiFwe 18:32:27, 2015-01-07
- A history of video games in five anecdotes http://t.co/4Qu2nN2Q1c 15:33:00, 2015-01-07
- I returned from holiday a couple of days ago and am catching up on messages. I have a replacement phone, so I can take calls again. 09:42:07, 2015-01-07
- Children with access to smartphones, tablets in bedroom get less sleep, US study finds http://t.co/IHB09TNXvh #edutech #edtech 09:42:02, 2015-01-06
Clinton Roy: clintonroy
Spent the better part of the morning buying shorts that somehow didn't make the trip with me…
Registered for linux.conf.au, looks like I might get two t-shirts if the second batch of corrected printing comes in on time.
Dinner with old friends at an Indian place here. Managed to thank Paul McKenny for librcu.
Filed under: diary
Clinton Roy: clintonroy
Spent most of the day at the Auckland War memorial/museum. There's an emphasis on natural history, Maori culture and conflict history. There's a lot of stuff in the museum and I was running out of puff by the end of it.
Filed under: diary
Clinton Roy: clintonroy
Flew to Auckland for my fourteenth linux.conf.au.
Somehow ended up with a ticket that didn't give me a meal during the flight.
Filed under: diary
linux.conf.au News: Conference registration opens 2pm today #BeRegistered
Registration this year will be downstairs (level 0) at the Owen G Glenn Business School at the University of Auckland.
We look forward to seeing you there, and we even have a coffee cart in the vicinity to keep those caffeine levels up.Map of Owen G Glenn Building (OGGB)
Follow the yellow path starting on Level 1 (see map below) to the rego desk which is on level 0 (downstairs).
The map below shows the level 0 (downstairs) of the OGGB building
Look for redshirts around the University - they will be happy to point you in the right direction!
Ben Martin: Terry 2.0: The ROS armada begins!
The main gain to ROS is the nodes that other people have written. If you want to convert RGBD to a simulated laser scan in order to do 2d navigation then that's already available. If you want to make a map and then use it then that code is already there for you. And the visualization for these things. I'm not sure I'd have the time to write from scratch a 3d robot viewer and visualize my cut down 'fake' 2d laser scan data from the Kinect in OpenGL. But with ROS I got the joy of seeing the scan change in real time as Terry sensed me move in front of it.
I now have 3d control of the robot arm happening, including optional sinusoidal encoding of movements. The fun part is that the use of sinusoidal can be enabled or disabled without any code changes. I wrote that part as a JointTrajectory shim. For something to use smoother movement all it has to do is publish to that shim instead of directly to the servo controller itself. The publish and subscribe parts of the IPC that ROS has are very easy to get used to and allow breaking up the functionality into rather small pieces if desired.
The arm is one area that is ROS controlled, but not quite the way I want. It seems that using MoveIt is indicated for arm control but I didn't manage to get that to work as yet. The wizard only produced an arm that would articulate on one joint, so more tinkering is needed in that area. Instead I wrote my own ROS node to control the arm. It's all fairly basic trig to get the gripper at an x,y,z relative to the base of the arm. And an easy carry over to fix the gripper at a horizontal to the base no matter what position the arm is moved to. But in the future the option to MoveIt will be considered, can't hurt to have two codepaths to choose from for arm control.
As part of the refresh I updated the pan unit for the camera platform.Previously I used a solid 1/4 inch shaft with the load taken by a bearing and the gearmotor turning the shaft directly from below it. Unfortunately that setup has many drawbacks; no ability to use a slip ring, no torque multiplication, difficulty using an axle end rotary encoder IC to gain real world position feedback. The updated setup uses a 6 rpm gearmotor offset with a variable motor mount to drive a 24 tooth brass gear. That mates with an 80 tooth gear which is affixed to a hollow 1/2 inch alloy tube. As you can see at the top of the image, I've fed the tilt servo cable directly into the inside of that tube. No slip ring right now, but it is all set to allow the USB cable to slip through to the base and enable continuous rotation of the pan subsystem. So the Kinect becomes a radar style. One interesting aside is that you can no longer manually rotate the pan system because the gearmotor, even unpowered, will stop you. The grub screw will slip before the axle turns.
As shown below, the gearmotor is driven by an Arduino which is itself connected to a SparkFun breakout of the TB6612FNG HBridge IC. This combo is attached using double sided 3M tape to a flat bit of channel. Then the flat bit of channel is bolted to Terry. I've used this style a few times now and quite like it. A single unit and all it's wires can be attached and moved fairly quickly.
At first I thought the Arudino gearmotor control and the Web interface would be a bit outside the bounds of ROS. But there is an API for Arduino which gives the nice publish and subscribe with messages that one would expect on the main ROS platform. A little bit of python glue takes the ttyUSB right out of your view and you are left with a little extension from the main ROS right into the MCU. I feel that my 328 screen multiplexer will be updated to use this ROS message API. Reimplementing packeting and synchronization at the serial port level becomes a little less exciting after a while, and not having to even think about that with ROS is certainly welcome.
Below is the motherboard setup for all this. Unfortunately many of the things I wanted to attach used TTL serial, so I needed a handful of USB to TTL bridges. The IMU uses I2C, so its another matter of shoving a 328 into the mix to publish the ROS messages with the useful information for the rest of the ROS stack on the main machine to use at its will.
The web interface has been resurrected and extended from the old BBB driven Terry. This is the same Bootstrap/jQuery style interface but now using roslibjs to communicate from the browser to Terry. I'm using WebSockets to talk back, which is what I was doing manually from the BBB, but with ROS that is an implementation choice that gets hidden away and you again get a nice API to talk ROS like things such as publishing and subscribing standard and custom messages.
The below javascript code sends an array of 4 floats back to Terry to tell it where you want to have the arm (x,y,z,claw) to be located. The 4th number allows you to open and close the claw in the same command. The wrist is held horizontal to the ground for you. Notice that this message is declared to be a Float32MultiArray which is a standard message type.The msg and topic can be reused, so an update is just a prod to an array and a publish call. You can fairly easily publish these messages from the command line too for brute force testing.
var topic_arm_xyz = new ROSLIB.Topic({
ros : ros,
name : '/arm/xyzc',
messageType : 'std_msgs/Float32MultiArray'
var msg = new ROSLIB.Message({
data : [ x,y,z, claw ]
topic_arm_xyz.publish( msg );
The learning curve is a bit sharp for some parts of ROS. Navigation requires many subsystems to be brought up, and at first I had a case that the robot model was visualized 90 degrees out of phase to reality. Most of the stuff is already there, but you need to have a robot base controller that is compatible. It is also a trap for the new players not to have a simple robot model urdf file. Without a model some parts of the system didn't work for me. I'd have liked to have won with the MoveIt control, and will get back to trying to do just that in the future. I think I'll dig around for shoe string examples, something like building a very basic three servo arm with ice cream sticks and $5 servos would make for an excellent example of MoveIt for hobby ROS folk. Who knows, maybe that example will appear here in a future post.


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21-40 of 150 items from 2015 « Prev | Next »
25 January 2015 7:49 PM, PST | Hitfix | See recent Hitfix news »
Park City, Utah -- Jeffrey Tambor knows there's some responsibility that comes with playing a transgender character in a popular television show. That's why he's committed to "doing it right." The recent Golden Globes winner -- for playing Maura on "Transparent" -- was on hand on the red carpet at Sundance, to promote his latest film "The D Train" co-starring Jack Black. But he also reflected on how much further understanding of the transgender community needs to go. "I shook for the first season... it's a huge responsibility, and I want to do it right for the transgender community.... just the other day, someone said something very stupid to me, and I went, 'Wow we still have to keep doing this, keep getting the message out,' because there's a fear of the 'other' and so much ignorance," he said. "It's important." While the Amazon Prime series certainly took a lot out of him, »
- Katie Hasty
25 January 2015 12:47 PM, PST | The Wrap | See recent The Wrap news »
TheWrap Party Report catches Wu-Tang Clan, Nick Nolte and Kevin Bacon turning heads Saturday, while Michael Fassbender's "job" keeps him away from Utah
%u201CIs Ben Silverman somewhere in here?%u201D Donovan Leitch shouted in to the microphone in the sweaty basement of Cisero%u2019s just before midnight on Saturday night.
Leitch was on stage fronting a supergroup that included Mark McGrath, Dave Kushner, Jane%u2019s Addiction%u2019s Chris Chaney, and Matisyahu. If Ben Silverman was in the room, he was as quiet as his emails, even if a pocket of jacketed bros cheered the shout-out. »
- Mikey Glazer
25 January 2015 11:48 AM, PST | The Wrap | See recent The Wrap news »
The online retail giant may roll out its first film this year, vice-president Roy Price says on CNN's "Reliable Sources"
Online retail giant Amazon aims to produce 12 movies a year once it ramps up, Amazon Studios vice-president Roy Price said Sunday on CNN's "Reliable Sources."
Amazon is pushing rapidly into Hollywood and last week announced that it would make and acquire movies for theatrical release as well as offer them for streaming online. Amazon is battling Netflix, Hulu and others for dominance in the booming video-on-demand sector.
Price said the first release could come this year, and that »
- Todd Cunningham
25 January 2015 10:38 AM, PST | ScreenDaily | See recent ScreenDaily news »
Sundance: The distributor has picked up Us rights to Jarrad Paul and Andrew Mogel's comedy starring Jack Black and James Marsden. At time of writing reports were circulating that Spc had taken the Us and territories on The Diary Of A Teenage Girl.
IFC Films plans a nationwide theatrical release this year on the story of the head of a high school reunion committee who persuades a celebrity alumnus to attend.
Jeffrey Tambor, Mike White, Kathryn Hahn and Kyle Bornheimer round out the key cast.
Paul and Mogel directed The D Train from their screenplay and David Bernad, Mike White, Jack Black, Priyanka Mattoo, Ben Latham-Jones and Barnaby Thompson produced.
IFC brokered the deal with UTA Independent Film Group and Wme Global on behalf of the filmmakers.
Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions' Stage 6 Films picked up the film at the start of production and will distribute the film internationally. »
- email@example.com (Jeremy Kay)
25 January 2015 10:20 AM, PST | The Wrap | See recent The Wrap news »
Jarrad Paul and Andrew Mogel wrote and directed the film, which co-stars James Marsden
IFC Films has ponied up $3 million to acquire U.S. rights to Jarrad Paul and Andrew Mogel's comedy "The D Train," which stars Jack Black, James Marsden, Jeffrey Tambor, Mike White, Kathryn Hahn and Kyle Bornheimer.
"The D Train" premiered this weekend in the U.S. Dramatic Competition Section at Sundance. IFC plans to roll the film out in theaters nationwide this year.
Mogel and Paul wrote the original screenplay for the film, which was produced by David Bernad, Mike White, Jack Black, Priyanka Mattoo, »
- Jeff Sneider
24 January 2015 3:52 AM, PST | Variety - Film News | See recent Variety - Film News news »
Funny and sad isn't the easiest combination to pull off, and while both descriptors fit "The D Train" well enough, this dark comedy might just as well be described as edgy and soft, audacious and coy, a largely enjoyable letdown. Starring Jack Black as a chronic loser who decides to save his high-school reunion by securing the attendance of the class celebrity (a terrific James Marsden), Jarrad Paul and Andrew Mogel's directing debut puts an impressively daring spin on the modern bromance, finding a unique and undeniably funny point of entry into familiar squirm-inducing realms of male bonding, competitiveness and insecurity. Yet while the startling central twist stands to generate considerable pre-release curiosity for this decently commercial entry, it also allows this slick but shaky effort to peak too soon.
Paul and Mogel, who also share credit for the screenplay, lay the groundwork with expert slyness. Their sad-sack »
- Justin Chang
23 January 2015 3:35 PM, PST | PEOPLE.com | See recent PEOPLE.com news »
Amazon announced Thursday that it will offer the entire first season of the hit series Transparent for free. This weekend, you'll be able to stream all 10 episodes of the two-time Golden Globe winner without spending a dime. The catch? The offer only lasts for 24 hours. "This Saturday, all Episodes of #Transparent will be available Free for 24 hours only! Let the countdown begin!" the show posted on its official Twitter account. This Saturday, all Episodes of #Transparent will be available Free for 24 hours only! Let the countdown begin! pic.twitter.com/0jPRYwAWc6— Transparent (@transparent_tv) January 22, 2015 The TV series was a »
- Candace Stewart
23 January 2015 4:04 AM, PST | The Guardian - TV News | See recent The Guardian - TV News news »
The Golden Globe-winning comedy drama from Amazon is free in the UK and Us for 24 hours. Clear your diary and settle down for a spellbinding treat
• Interview: Jeffrey Tambor – 'People come up to me and discuss their own transitions'
Do you have plans this Saturday night? Cancel them. Amazon has announced that on 24 January, for one day only, viewers in the UK and Us will have free access to the first season of the Golden Globe-winning Transparent.
That's an urgent five hours of binge-watching to fit into your weekend. But it will be worth it. I came to Transparent late. In a world overflowing with television it's difficult to keep track of everything and shows inevitably fall through the cracks – Transparent got added to the great list of shows to catch up with later. Surely, I thought, it can't be that great?
Continue reading »
- Sarah Hughes
22 January 2015 5:35 PM, PST | Gold Derby | See recent Gold Derby news »
To celebrate its recent wins at the 72nd annual Golden Globes, Amazon is making its new show "Transparent" available for free. It's just for one day only this Saturday with all 10 episodes at no charge. Amazon is also making its prime membership available for just $72 instead of the normal $99 during that same 24-hour period. The program won as Best TV Comedy Series and for Jeffrey Tambor as Best TV Comedy Actor on January 11. The plot centers around an older transgender woman and her California family. It co-stars Judith Light, Gaby Hoffmann, Amy Landecker, Jay Duplass, and Melora Hardin. L.A. Times -Break- A new photo gallery looks back at the previous 20 ceremonies of the Screen Actors Guild Awards and its all-time winners. At the top are Alec Baldwin and Julianna Margulies with eight trophies each. Other overachieving champs are: Anthony Edwards (6), Allison Janney (6), Julia Louis-Dreyfus (6), Ty Burrell (5), Edie Falco (5), Tina Fey (5), James Gando. »
22 January 2015 2:30 PM, PST | Slash Film | See recent Slash Film news »
Amazon's Transparent got some much-deserved attention at this year's Golden Globes, when the HFPA declared it the year's best comedy and star Jeffrey Tambor comedy's best actor. But unless you have an Amazon Prime subscription, or a generous friend who does, you probably haven't had the opportunity to check it out. Well, this weekend is […]
The post Amazon Offering 'Transparent' for Free This Weekend appeared first on /Film. »
- Angie Han
22 January 2015 1:28 PM, PST | E! Online | See recent E! Online news »
Amazon is still celebrating the big Golden Globes win for its original series Transparent, and the online retailer wants the rest of the world to join in. Currently, the show is available to Amazon Prime customers (who pay $99 a year for the privilege of instant video and free shipping), but the rules will loosen for one day only. On Saturday, January 24, Transparent will stream for free for 24 hours. For anyone who doesn't have enough time to catch the series in its entirety over the weekend, Prime memberships will also be offered for $72—to celebrate the 72nd annual Golden Globes, of course. News: Jeffrey Tambor dedicated his Golden Globe to the transgender community The show, written »
22 January 2015 10:00 AM, PST | Tubefilter.com | See recent Tubefilter News news »
Looking for something to do this weekend? Amazon has a suggestion. On Saturday, January 24th, all ten episodes of the award-winning dramedy Transparent will be available for free on Amazon Instant Video.
Normally, viewers who wish to watch Amazon's catalog of original programs must own an Amazon Prime account, which costs $99 per year. For one day only, Amazon will waive not apply that requirement to its most acclaimed series, which received widespread critical praise when it debuted in September 24th.
The impetus for this promotion is Transparent's recent success at the Golden Globe Awards. It won a trophy for Best TV Series - Comedy or Musical, and star Jeffrey Tambor also earned a win in the Best Actor - Comedy or Musical category. Those two victories were Amazon Video's first ever award triumphs. Since the Globes, interest in Transparent has soared, and its viewership has increased several times over. »
- Sam Gutelle
22 January 2015 9:53 AM, PST | Flickeringmyth | See recent Flickeringmyth news »
Scott Davis on films to look out for at Sundance 2015…
It's the most wonderful time of the year, when many of Hollywood's big hitters gather together to be awarded a variety of different prices on the Awards circuit, culminating with the 87th Academy Awards on February 22nd. But on Thursday weekend in west USA (namely Utah) the Sundance Film Festival kicks off again, and many of the world's best independent films will get their debuts to the public, and the press, over the next few weeks.
Staff Writer Scott Davis takes a look at some of the films making their debuts, and digs deep to find the next gems that could be coming out way in 2015.
When an aging travel writer sets out to hike the 2,100-mile-long Appalachian Trail with a long-estranged high school buddy, the duo learn that some roads are better left untraveled. »
- Scott J. Davis
22 January 2015 9:12 AM, PST | Entertainment Tonight | See recent Entertainment Tonight news »
The 2015 Sundance Film Festival kicks off Thursday and with it come some of the most groundbreaking, experimental, and challenging independent films from Hollywood and around the world.
From films about infamous psychological experiments to degenerate gamblers, and the post-apocalyptic worlds to ill-fated emotional journeys, these are the nine films from this year's Sundance Film Fest that we can't wait to watch.
1. The Stanford Prison Experiment
Sundance Film Festival
Starring: Billy Crudup, Ezra Miller, Kyle Patrick, Tye Sheridan. (Dir. Kyle Patrick Alvarez)
What It's About: The Stanford Prison Experiment tells the real life story of an infamous psychological study examining the effects of imprisonment. Two dozen student volunteers are randomly assigned to be guards or prisoners in this mock jail and, as the experiment unfolds, the students begin to disturbingly fall into their roles.
Why We Want To See It: The real experiment was a frightening yet fascinating examination of psychological conditioning and the man who ran the »
22 January 2015 8:25 AM, PST | Indiewire | See recent Indiewire news »
Amazon is looking to take advantage of its recent free publicity in a big way. After winning two Golden Globes for its new dramedy series "Transparent" earlier this month — Best Comedy Series and Best Actor in a Comedy Series, Jeffrey Tambor — the streaming service is making Jill Soloway's show available for free on one day only. Subscribers and non-subscribers alike can head over to Amazon.com/Transparent or use their Amazon Instant Video apps to watch all 10 episodes of the first season this Saturday, January 24 from 12:01am to 11:59pm (Et). Read More: The Golden Globes Tell Us Everything About the Entertainment Industry in 2015 The shopping giant turned streaming service is looking to convert a few viewers as well. Anyone who likes what they see on Saturday — or just wants to take advantage of free two-day shipping on purchases — can buy an Amazon Prime subscription for the discounted »
- Ben Travers
22 January 2015 7:40 AM, PST | The Wrap | See recent The Wrap news »
Golden Globe-winning Jeffrey Tambor comedy hopes to drum up more Prime members with Saturday push
Amazon knows what it has in "Transparent": Already a twice Golden Globe-winning comedy, and now possibly the best piece of marketing material to sell its Prime membership on.
Ignoring the short-term implications and focusing on the longer-term opportunity, the online retailer is making all 10 episodes of "Transparent" free for 24 hours starting on Saturday — so cancel any weekend plans.
The company is also offering Amazon Prime for $72, it tweeted out on Thursday morning.
Also Read: 21 Buzziest Streaming Shows: From 'Marco Polo' to 'Transparent' (Photos)
"Transparent" stars Jeffrey Tambor, »
- Tony Maglio
21 January 2015 9:20 PM, PST | IF.com.au | See recent IF.com.au news »
Subscription streaming service Stan will launch on Australia Day, going head-to-head with Presto Movies/Presto TV and getting two months. head start on Netflix.s Australian debut.
Among the exclusive offerings at launch will be two Amazon Studios productions, Transparent, a comedy-drama about a Los Angeles family whose father (Jeffrey Tambor) reveals he is transgender; and Mozart in the Jungle, the tale of a young oboist in New York and her relationship with the orchestra.s volatile conductor, starring Gone Girl.s Lola Kirke and Gael Garcia Bernal.
Another exclusive, the Breaking Bad prequel Better Call Saul starring Bob Odenkirk as a sleazy lawyer, Jonathan Banks and Michael McKean, will premiere on February 9, fast-tracked from the Us.
A joint venture between Nine Entertainment Co and Fairfax Media, Stan will use the network to cross-promote Transparent. The first two episodes will screen on Nine at 10 pm on Tuesday January 27.
All the »
- Don Groves
21 January 2015 9:05 AM, PST | PEOPLE.com | See recent PEOPLE.com news »
Laverne Cox, Sam Smith and Transparent are among the nominees for the 26th Annual GLAAD Media Awards, the nation's Lgbt media advocacy organization announced Wednesday. A total of 144 English- and Spanish-language nominees are being recognized for their fair, accurate and inclusive representations of the Lgbt community and the issues that affect their lives. Cox, the Orange Is the New Black star who was the first openly transgender actress to be nominated for an Emmy Award, is being recognized for the documentary Laverne Cox Presents: The T Word. Smith, the "Stay with Me" crooner who recently went public with his new boyfriend on Instagram, »
- Wade Rouse, @waderouse
21 January 2015 9:05 AM, PST | PEOPLE.com | See recent PEOPLE.com news »
Laverne Cox, Sam Smith and Transparent are among the nominees for the 26th Annual GLAAD Media Awards, the nation's Lgbt media advocacy organization announced Wednesday. A total of 144 English- and Spanish-language nominees are being recognized for their fair, accurate and inclusive representations of the Lgbt community and the issues that affect their lives. Cox, the Orange Is the New Black star who was the first openly transgender actress to be nominated for an Emmy Award, is being recognized for the documentary Laverne Cox Presents: The T Word. Smith, the "Stay with Me" crooner who recently went public with his new boyfriend on Instagram, »
- Wade Rouse, @waderouse
21 January 2015 3:01 AM, PST | Deadline | See recent Deadline news »
America's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender media-advocacy group has pulled back the curtain on the nominees for its 26th annual GLAAD Media Awards.
The Weinstein Company's Best Picture Oscar contender The Imitation Game is up for Outstanding Film, Wide Release alongside Sony Classics' Love Is Strange, CBS Films' Pride, Roadside's The Skeleton Twins and Warner Bros' Tammy. Gunning for the top prize for limited-release movies are Dear White People (Lionsgate), Life Partners (Magnolia Pictures), Lilting (Strand Releasing), The Way He Looks (Strand) and Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow (Film Movement).
The organization this year expanded its nominees for Outstanding Comedy and Drama Series to 10. Among the shows going for the gold are Amazon Prime Video's rookie series Transparent — which won star Jeffrey Tambor a surprise Golden Globe last week — ABC's freshman drama How To Get Away With Murder, Netflix's Orange Is The New Black, »
- The Deadline Team
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subset: commoncrawl


text:
Silly doing my Bowie thing, though I was browsing last.fm and I found this user:
KaileenaFarah's Music Profile – Users at Last.fm
She listens to Bowie 600 times every week. It's impossible to beat that... but he's already in third place on my list. And, I am eating, living, and sleeping Bowie. It's in my head all day and I think last night I had a dream I was hiding in his closet, going through his clothes until he caught me and gave me a ride in his convertible.
But other than Bowie, I have (finally) something to drive so that I can work more than 2 minutes from my house. Now I just need to find said job and pass the interview instead of being made fun of by the interviewer. Once, I had an interviewer gleek on me and act like nothing happened.
I hate this town.


text:
If you own a nice new MacBook or MacBook Pro, it's a safe bet that style matters as much to you as function. Some bag makers--the smart ones--get this about Mac users. Be.ez, makers of the $89 LAbesace Lime Drop (don't ask us how to pronounce that--we have no idea either) shoulder bag, can safely be counted in the former category.
Simple, curved, and nearly seamless, the sleek silvery-gray Lime Drop looks like a messenger bag from "Star Trek." There are no superfluous pockets or tags, not even a logo, creating a uniform unibody look that stylistically matches the aluminum MacBooks to a T. The bag's bottom curves upward, creating a permanent bulge that's intentional: the interior is reinforced to keep the bag's shape intact when carrying peripherals.
Instead of a buckle, the waterproof nylon exterior zips closed (the concealed zipper is waterproof as well). Inside is where its "Lime Drop" name kicks in, as the entire inner lining is made of blindingly bright neon yellow-green material. While very clubber-cool, some old-school and more rugged-going bag aficionados might want something less high-gloss.
An open laptop pocket with Velcro strap holds a 13- or 15-inch MacBook (we tested the Lime Drop 15, although a 13-inch version is also available). Adjacent to that are a second document pocket and a front compartment with pen and ID holders, and a small zippered pouch. The zip-over top flap has a diagonally zipping padded outer pocket, good for an iPhone, iPod, assorted keys, coins, or USB gadgets, and it has an inner zippered mesh pouch. The bag's rear has a side-zippering narrow pocket that's perfect for an AC adapter or cables.


text:
All this talk about gun control
It's just a smoke screen by the gun grabbers to leverage the force of government against law-abiding gun owners, who they hate with a passion. Never mind criminals, the police will get them, right? How civilized of them. If they want to enforce "gun control" then they should get off their butts and get busy doing it on their own. Gun controllers, put some courage in you convictions and start knocking on doors! You are 90% of the US population, are you not? Clearly your overwhelming majority should carry the day!
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text:
The Hotshot Whiz Kids
The Hotshot Whiz Kids
Buffalo, NY
Description: The Hotshot Whiz Kids Comedy Podcast is a Comedy Podcast broadcast from Buffalo NY. It features Stand Up comedian Mike Cline Jr and his long time friend Mark Davila in a conversation style format. The show premiered in July 2010 and the audience has stead
Now Playing
The Hotshot Whiz Kids Comedy Podcast Minisode 68
It's Wednesday and the guys are talking about webcams and the business of webcamming. Cline asks mark what he would do if he found out his Mom was a cam girl.
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text:
I give it a 6
Submitted by Ira Freeman on Sat, 09/21/2013 - 09:12. Permalink
Because her "am I free to go, am I being detained" obstinance worked, contrary to what you believe. You could tell she was nervous and it interfered with her getting a 9 rating. Good for her for standing up for her rights and not cowering like a chicken.
"It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere".
It's hard not to be a menace to society when half the population is happy on their knees. - unknown
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text:
A delayed addition to the 2014 gallery section…
Something About the Grass Always Being Greener
oil and ink on canvas
36″ x 36″
A delayed addition to the 2014 gallery section…
Something About the Grass Always Being Greener
oil and ink on canvas
36″ x 36″
I've received some really incredible gifts and oddities over the years, but the box I opened from Adam this afternoon knocked me full-on legit speechless for at least a few minutes. I'm a nervous talker, so running out of sounds to make is a rare occurrence. I can't really remember the last time I was rendered mute.
It contained a beautifully made devil-come-jackal marionette and the evidence of some character probing done behind my back under the casual scrutiny of a class of 6 year olds attached to a clipboard.
I can't believe how cool this is. Thank you Adam x This is so much better some some poxy house painting. You win at gifts.
(Sammy is my favourite)
I'm excited about this.
Curated by Gary Pressman of Corpro Gallery and Andrew Hosner of Thinkspace, '20 Years Under the Influence of JUXTAPOZ' is a group show celebrating exactly what it says on the tin.
Opens Feb 22nd – April 19th at LAMAG; Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery
4800 Hollywood Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90027
To attend the opening, please email
Submit full names and get there as close to the opening at 6:00PM to assure entrance since the museum can only admit to capacity.
Jacob got out in perfect time
Frank: Sad because he lost his lunch
Over the next week I'll be adding new and old work to my big cartel shop. Varied mediums and sizes. No previews on this occasion, I'm just jumping in- the content on my instagram feed is more or less what you'll find, along with a few unseens.
It feels fucking crass doing this while my cat, my best guy, my fuzzy son has been missing for 5 days. I can't yet tell whether the shame of assuming 'business as usual' is warranted or absurd. I'm coming down on both sides of that fence and it feels just like a wooden post in the pants. Ideal Brown and I have delivered 500 flyers and have ordered 500 more. I've contacted vets, schools, shelters, charities and visited our old place daily. I've spoken to builders, kids and moms. I've begged twitter and grovelled for retweets and facebook shares. If you think me a fool, don't worry; I agree with you 100%. I've hung up his blanket and parked an old suitcase in the back yard in the hope that he catches the scent. I walk around and whistle until I run out of puff. I've received calls from strangers, texts and emails of advice and support from friends as well as people I've never met and it's frankly heartwarming that so many people care. I appreciate it more than I can say. Thank you to everyone who has helped. If I stop too long and actually think about what's going on, I lapse into panic mode so I appreciate all the voices who have interrupted that with positivity.
I think that when I was investigating acrylic gouache colour, I might've been taken in by the Japanesque range from Turner. In fact, I'm sure of it.
I detest acrylic, but then I do most mediums that I can't 'master'. Master…what a loose word. I consider myself a master at nothing but eating and breathing. Most days I can barely put one foot in front of the other.
Anyway, I'm learning, through flesh cats.
My first etching goes on sale tomorrow!
"I'm Coming Back Tomorrow To Look For More"
limited edition of 25
64.5cm x 70cm (inc border)
Somerset radiant white velvet 330gsm
Available Feb 5th from Black Rat Projects 11am GMT
I'm very pleased to say that I'll have a new painting (above) in '20 Years Under The Influence of Juxtapoz' at the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery. The group show, which has been guest curated by Gary Pressman and Andrew Hosner, opens Feb 22.
Their Apparent Sense of Purpose Caused in Her an Uncharacteristic Moment of Restraint
30″ x 30″
oil and ink on canvas
My latest Horror House;
IT' Sewer: The Barrens, Derry.
Please feel free to get in touch to discuss any Horror House commission ideas.
I returned home expecting the cloud of concern and disquiet of last year to have dissipated, restoring me to my regular excited-and-anxious-about-everything self, but instead I came home caring less about the need to worry.
My bucket 'o good ideas is as empty as it ever was, save for that one now-shrivelled nugget that was left out too long in the sun.
Unrelated: If I started writing about Thailand, I'd never stop, despite the fact that it's a topic already thoroughly covered on every bored, single, white girl's blog. Don't worry; the last thing I'm looking for on holiday is 'myself'. We went to a goddamn sky bar and loved it, for fuckssake.
I can see the appeal of becoming a travel writer. One of the safe ones that doesn't deal with the things you can't un-see that clash with your Western ideals. No bags of live [___] or small cages stuffed with [___] or all those godforsaken, begging amputees.
Ideal Brown says "hey" on messenger and I elect to wait 2 minutes before responding so I can go to the loo and wash the powdered charcoal off my fingers after breaking open three capsules to take with water owing to the fact that my gut has bloated beyond reasonable boundaries, forcing me to sit with my jeans undone while I work.
So that's me, with a chronically embarrassing stomach navigating the halls of the building with black shit all over my mouth and hands with my pants undone and who cares because it's just another Tuesday night and lets not pretend that my wearing shoes and socks at the same time isn't a notable leap of common decency.
How many times a year can you reasonably decide you're so tired that you need to nap?
I don't mean deserve a nap, I mean the-walls-are-trembling-jelly-and-there's-lemon-juice-in-your-eyes NEED a nap.
Like accidentally die in a house fire you started sort of tired.
My FIND YOUR OWN MONEY full timer four-year anniversary was yesterday (pop the champagne- I've not yet signed on) and I've taken 3 at-work naps in that time. I know because my guilt-meter is sensitive. The most recent ended about 39 minutes ago and I feel filthy for it.
The other two times I thought I was coming down with something and was only right once, which is awful because the justification and mild self pity smooths out all the wrinkles.
I don't know why I feel bad, because I remember the build up to each show like the pain of an injury. I've suffered some serious stress related accelerated ageing to my eyes and hands and it totally matters to me. The line is usually 'I don't know where my next salary will come from, but I love every second of my job' which is funny only when I sit back and consider the toll my face is taking for all this love. FUCK.
Maybe it's all this being alone for 11 hours of the day nonsense. Maybe I need a fresh deadline. Maybe I need my fear back. Maybe I should check my bank acco- okay, I'm awake.