What it does

The Elastic Server® platform is an on-demand service that enables you to get your computing infrastructure virtualized, and cloud-ready for the public, private, and hybrid clouds of your choosing. It provides the ability to assemble, manage and deploy a virtualized application stack that is dynamically defined and built on-demand from component libraries consisting of open source, commercial source, and proprietary customer code.

It dramatically improves the quality and consistency of cloud server assemblies at the same time that it reduces time to market. The speed and agility Elastic Server enables in harnessing virtualized and cloud infrastructures allows organizations to reclaim resources typically spent on infrastructure maintenance, allowing instead effort on new initiatives that will differentiate their businesses.

What is it for?

Virtualization has quickly given rise to the notion of public, private and hybrid cloud computing centers. The need to capture one's middleware and server application stacks as an abstract "bill of materials" that can quickly be targeted at multiple execution contexts (clouds using different types of hypervisors, hardware, and operating systems) has become a necessity.

The Elastic Server factory makes this a reality. Define your server bill of materials, and then use the ES platform to capture that information, automate the assembly of your cloud servers, and reproduce them as needed with speed and quality. The Elastic Server solution enables you to get your infrastructure cloud-ready, while ensuring you have the ability to target the public, private or hybrid clouds of your choosing.

How does it do it

The built-to-order model from the computer hardware industry served as inspiration for the Elastic Server factory-like automated production line. CFT and the greater Elastic Server community provide the raw materials in the form of Operating System ISO images and individual software components. The user selects the components for inclusion in their Elastic Server from the available libraries. The factory then pushes the user's selected bundles in to the image with our enterprise-tested tools. This final image is formatted into the chosen virtualization configuration and made available for download or deployed to the specified compute cloud. Community behavior becomes a source of input to the software factory’s rule base, allowing deep insight into which design patterns are most commonly used, as well as which components are gaining in popularity or waning, allowing organizations insight in how to allocate support, engineering, business development, and manufacturing integration resources.

Which Edition is right for me?

The Edition matrix above quantifies the differences between the Elastic Server Editions. We are continually growing the Edition choices as we add more features and options to the Elastic Server factory.

The Community Edition offers an expanded feature set to the simple evaluation Guest account. In additions to greater build limits, the Community Edition offers simple sharing features, greater operating system choices, and limited cloud deployment options.

The Personal Edition give users all the cloud/virtual server assembly benefits of the Community Edition plus the added flexibility of production use Elastic Servers, expanded sharing features, and the ability to create Elastic Server sites. With custom Elastic Server sites users can source their own component supply chain and create their own server design center.

Can I see it in action?

The Guest Edition is a perfect way to evaluate the Elastic Server platform. While the Guest Account looses all saved progress once the browser session is terminated, it is a great way to explore the basic features of the factory. No registration is required just visit the Elastic Server factory home and start exploring! The only thing Guest users are required to provide is an email address when building an Elastic Server. This email address is used only to deliver the build confirmation email.

Users looking to get some background context before diving into the factory are encouraged to take a look at the QuickTip movie library for topic based walkthroughs.

Don't hesitate to contact us for a detailed web conference walkthrough.

Why does it matter?

Cloud computing and virtual infrastructure are dramatically changing the computing landscape. Some see its impact as equivalent to the emergence of the Personal Computer, or the Internet itself, as a force in changing how businesses will be run. Those organizations that capitalize on this transition in safe and effective ways will gain business advantage; lowered operating expenses per business IT initiative and the ability to execute more business relevant initiatives with the same overall set of resources.

The Elastic Server platform is there to help make this transition possible. It provides a repository or 'forge' for multi-sourced software components, a manufacturing plant for one-click building and deployment of tried and tested virtual and cloud application stacks from menu-based portals, and a content management system for component assemblies providing life-cycle management and rapid provisioning.