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- Deployment of a new segment of the backend servers that support the Smart Servers.
Smart Layer 1.0 - Oct 14, 2010
Want to know more about Smart Layer and Smart Servers?
Your new Smart Server is powered by Smart Layer, a new server provisioning technology developed by iWeb. To know more about Smart Layer, we invite you to read the complete Smart Layer update thread on our forums.
Smart Layer
This is the first stable release (1.0) of iWeb's new Dedicated Server provisioning platform called Smart Layer. Smart Layer is a software that enables datacenter automation & virtualization. The first version of Smart Layer is the result of a tremendous development effort by a product team that grew from 3 to 26 between April 2009 and October 2010. It is at the heart of iWeb's future growth strategy and embraced by the whole iWeb team of 200 at this time. Smart Layer is an ongoing effort and many new features are planned for the future.
The concept behind Smart Layer & Smart Servers.
Smart Layer is meant to abstract the physical layer from the datacenter enabling automated provisioning of different aspects of the datacenter from network and switches to power and servers. It is meant to bring cloud flexibility to real hardware-based dedicated servers.
As stated on our Web site, a small amount of RAM is reserved for the Smart Layer system
RAM | Smart Layer
--------------------
2GB | 0.5GB
4GB | 0.6GB
6GB | 0.7GB
8GB | 0.8GB
12GB | 0.8GB
24GB | 1.1GB
Datacenter automation is made possible through three modules of the Smart Layer software, the modules are called :
* The Smart Layer Orchestrator
* The Smart Layer Services
* The Smart Layer OS
Smart Servers, powered by the Smart Layer
A Smart Server is a new generation of dedicated server bringing cloud computing advantages to the dedicated server and eliminating cloud computing's resource limitations. Customer buy and use a Smart Server the same way they would have bought a classic Dedicated Server except that the Smart Layer OS sits between the physical server hardware and the Smart Server.
In fact, a Smart Server is a Virtual Machine residing inside the Smart Layer OS, on a single piece of server hardware, and using 100% of the physical server resources. There is always only one Smart Server per physical server making the product very similar to classic dedicated servers.
The Smart Layer Orchestrator
The Smart Layer Orchestrator manages and assigns server inventories and manages the links between the datacenter and the servers.
Version 1.0 set of functionalities :
- Datacenter space availability management, creation and assignation.
- Adding a server in the available server pool.
- Physical server specifications management.
- Links server availability with the online order process.
- Power outlet (PDU) availability, assignation and control.
- WAN Network availability, assignation and control.
- LAN Network availability, assignation and control.
- Smart Layer OS and agent deployment to prepare for Smart Server provisioning.
- VLAN, IP addresses and MAC addresses management, assignation and control.
- Server to server migration base linking functionalities.
The Smart Layer Services
The Smart Layer Services allow for communication between the Orchestrator and the Smart Layer OS and Agent.
Version 1.0 set of functionalities :
- Smart Server OS Installation, Reload and Reinstallation.
- Support for CentOS deployment (32 and 64 bits)
- Support for Debian deployment (32 and 64 bits)
- Support for Ubuntu deployment (32 and 64 bits)
- Support for cPanel deployment with CentOS
- Service for enabling and disabling WAN Network
- Service for enabling and disabling LAN Network
- Service for power reboot (physical server)
Smart Layer OS
The Smart Layer OS resides on a flash memory data storage from which the physical server boots every time it is powered on. Smart Layer OS runs Xen® and enables for the creation of the Smart Server. A single Smart Server resides inside the OS.
- Support for SUPERMICRO hardware.
- Support for Intel Core 2 Duo processors
- Support for Intel Core 2 Quad processors
- Support for up to 48GB RAM
- Software RAID-1 support.
- Auto-update capabilities.
- Smart Server creation.
- Smart Server reboot functionality
