OStatic

There's news out of Canonical today that the release of Ubuntu 9.10 Server Edition -- codenamed Karmic Koala -- is just around the corner. It's the greenest release yet, with a heavy emphasis on power management and cloud computing tools.

Ubuntu 9.10 includes Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud (UEC), a system designed to help users build and support private clouds. It's underlying technology relies on Eucalyptus, an open source infrastructure for implementing cloud computing on clusters.

This week brought the news that IBM and Canonical have partnered on a suite of very inexpensive desktop applications aimed at netbooks for businesses in Africa. The suite of software runs on Canonical's Ubuntu Linux operating system, and, as CNet's Lance Whitney notes, offers open-standards-based e-mail, word processing, a spreadsheet application, communication tools, and social-networking features. There will also be features allowing users to collaborate in the cloud.

If you look at the pricing model for this offering in conjunction with the low prices of netbooks, this sounds like a very viable way to offer users good functionality while avoiding the much greater expense of Windows-based systems equipped with proprietary applications. In fact, as I've been reading the details of the plan, I wonder why the folks behind the beleagured One Laptop for Child initiative didn't see this coming.

When Mike Gunderloy wrote about Canonical's software and development platform, Launchpad, last year, he said even though it wasn't the only hosting service in town, [Its] features... especially the API and sharing bugs, make it a strong choice moving forward. Canonical's announcement today that it has opened Launchpad's source code puts another checkmark in the column of reasons software projects may want to consider using it for their hosting and collaboration needs.

Though Launchpad isn't the only software forge to share the code running its backend, it's certainly among the most well-known. SourceForge, GitHub and other large hosting services haven't made that leap yet, so this move by Canonical is sure to appeal to FOSS purists who want no association whatsoever with proprietary software or code.

While it may be a completely philosophical debate whether the universe is turtles all the way down, it's a lot less existential to imagine that the internet is clouds all the way up. In April, Canonical previewed its Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud (affectionately known as UEC), a system designed to simplify the creation, optimization, and management of cloud environments for private organizations. The interface and functionality of UEC is similar to the Amazon EC2 infrastructure, uses in-house hardware running Ubuntu Server Edition 9.04, and is powered by Eucalyptus Systems cloud computing tools.

Today Canonical officially launched the UEC service, including generalized tech support, consultancy and deployment services. Although UEC support is a joint offering from Eucalyptus Systems and Canonical, the Canonical team will act as the primary contact point in order to simplify and streamline support transactions.

As the Ubuntu Developer Summit (UDS) kicks into high gear, the hopes, dreams and plans for the upcoming Ubuntu 9.10 release are taking shape. Over at Ars Technica, Ryan Paul reports on Canonical developer Michael Casadevall's presentation highlighting some of the technical nuances of making Android applications run on Ubuntu Netbook Remix.

Ubuntu's popularity aside, it is still esoteric -- Google has the upperhand in non-open source enthusiast name recognition. This no doubt plays into netbook manufacturer's opting for Android on netbooks, even though (as Paul states) Android is still very much a smartphone platform. Android can be modified, of course, but Ubuntu (or any Linux distribution) are already lightweight desktops potentially requiring fewer modifications to work well on netbooks.

Will adding Android compatibility make Remix a more attractive platform option? Can it really hurt?