Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Server Edition Released

Canonical, on April 27 2010, announced the release of the Ubuntu 10.0.4 LTS server Edition release. This release includes extended security and maintenance updates free of charge to all users for five years. Ubuntu 10.04 LTS is the successor of the widely acclaimed Ubuntu 8.04 LTS. Ubuntu 10.04 LTS will be available for free download from Thursday 29 April.
   
Ubuntu 10.04 LTS will also spot a larger network of open-source and proprietary application providers certifying their applications on Ubuntu Server Edition than ever before. About 100 organizations have signaled their intent to certify applications on the platform, including Alfresco, Ingres, IBM, VMware, Zimbra, Yahoo! and many others with more expected to follow post-launch. Dell has announced its intention to support Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Server Edition and will offer Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud as an option on its PowerEdge-C product line - servers specifically designed for building cloud environments.



New features in Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Server Edition.

•    Direct upgrade path for Ubuntu 8.04 LTS and Ubuntu 9.10 users

                   No need to rip and replace, in-place upgrades

• Stability and security enhancements for LTS including:

                 o    Five years of security and maintenance updates free to all users
                 o    AppArmor security by default on key packages
                 o    Kernel hardening (memory protection, module loading blocking, address space               layout              randomisation)
                 o    Uncomplicated Firewall extended to all common services
                 o    Encrypted Home and Private directories

• Multiple added or updated applications and packages since 8.04 LTS available as install options, including:

                o    CouchDB
                o    Puppet
                o    Eucalyptus
                o    Django 1.1
                o    OpenJDK6
                o    Tomcat 6
                o    MySQL 5.1
                o    ClamAv
                o    SpamAssassin
                o    Samba 3.4
                o    Python 2.6
                o    Nagios 3
                o    Ruby
                o    PowerNap
                o    PHP 5.3
                o    KVM 84
                o    Libvirt 0.7.5
                o    RabbitMQ 1.7

• Virtualization enhancements, including:

                o    Building on Libvirt and KVM for simple deployment and management. KVM now supports:
                o    Kernel Samepage Merging (KSM) memory aggregation
                o    Live migration of virtual machines
                o    Automated and fast image creations with VMBuilder 
                o    Ubuntu as Virtual Machine (VM) supported for VMWare, Xen, KVM, Virtualbox, EC2 and UEC

• Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud (UEC) and Amazon EC2 enhancements, including:

                o    UEC as well as EC2 images are included in five years of free security and support updates
                o    Minimal installation profile for minimum footprint VMs optimised for EC2 and UEC 
                o    Ubuntu EC2 images can be booted from EBS 
                o    Multi-language AWS library support
                o    Easily customized and frequently refreshed images at boot time for super flexibility using cloud-init
                o    Puppet, a configuration management framework, can be used to mass control instances from their start

• Advanced storage capabilities built in, including

               o    RAID support from the installer
               o    iSCSI and multipath support and booting

• Simpler to mass deploy and manage

               o    Puppet integration in the cloud or as an add-on
               o    Version control configuration changes (integrated with Puppet), provides history and accountability
               o    Many new and improved installation profiles
               o    Built-in package mirroring and network installation tools

• Improved management from Canonical's Landscape, including: 

               o   Mass registration
               o   Managing both physical servers and VMs

• Managing Cloud instances on both UEC and EC2, including:

               o  Security credentials and zones
               o  Elastic Block Storage (EBS) and Walrus storage elements
               o  Elastic IPs management
               o  Cloud topology monitoring

• Scheduled maintenance (shutdowns and restarts, package updates and script execution) 

               o  Direct view into server configuration
               o  Logical groupings of machines for ease of administration