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Tag: devops

  • Blue Medora Announces VMware vRealize Orchestrator Plug-In for F5 BIG-IP Solutions

     

     GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. June, 27 2016 – Blue Medora, a leading innovator in enterprise cloud and data center management, today announced the release of the VMware vRealize Orchestrator Plug-In for F5 BIG-IP™.

    Working together, F5 Networks and Blue Medora simplify and automate the process of provisioning BIG-IP Software-Defined Application Services™. In addition, organizations can seamlessly provision BIG-IP services as part of the natural workflow of provisioning applications and networks with NSX.

    The BIG-IP® system from F5 Networks helps secure and improve the reliability of applications in the cloud, data centers, and software-defined networking environments. The vRealize Orchestrator (vRO) Plug-In for F5 BIG-IP is part of Blue Medora’s VMware portfolio that consolidates IT management across VMware vRealize to optimize health, reduce risk and increase efficiency.

    “By integrating vRealize Orchestrator with F5 BIG-IP, IT administrators are accelerating the application deployment process and decreasing deployment time from days to minutes,” said Mike Kelly, CTO at Blue Medora. “With the new Blue Medora vRO extension, administrators have full control of BIG-IP objects and commands through the well-established iControl® API. Easy-to-use vRO workflows, provided out-of-the-box, standardize and streamline application deployment.”

    “Combined development work between Blue Medora and F5 continues to pay dividends for shared customers,” said Calvin Rowland, senior vice president of Business Development at F5 Networks. “Collaboration with industry leaders like Blue Medora in our partner ecosystem helps ensure that integrations and plug-ins are designed to optimize joint deployments. With today’s announcement, vRO and BIG-IP provide an agile services framework to support SDN technologies.”

    The vRealize Orchestrator Plug-In for F5 BIG-IP is immediately available from Blue Medora and resellers. Blue Medora and F5 Networks will host a webinar on June 29th to demonstrate the benefits of VMware vRealize Orchestrator Plug-In for F5 BIG-IP.

    About Blue Medora

    Blue Medora software solutions tie together data from virtualized and cloud-based databases, applications and services with the critical underlying compute, storage and network infrastructure to create a unified view of the infrastructure. These capabilities are delivered as value-added platform extensions for VMware’s vRealize Operations, New Relic and Oracle Enterprise Manager Cloud Control platforms.

    Blue Medora’s products enable administrator teams to work collaboratively on the infrastructure to avoid downtime, resolve performance problems and make predictive insights using advanced analytics. Blue Medora believes true visibility into business critical applications is only achieved when enterprise cloud management systems communicate without barriers.

    For more information, visit www.bluemedora.com

    F5, BIG-IP, Software-Defined Application Services, and iControl are trademarks or service marks of F5 Networks, Inc., in the U.S. and other countries. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners. The use of the words “partner,” “partnership,” or “joint” does not imply a legal partnership relationship between F5 Networks and any other company.

    Media Contacts

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    Touchdown PR

    Email: bluemedora@touchdownpr.com

    Phone: (512) 547-0921

    Phone: +44 (0) 1252 717040

     

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  • Resin.io Secures $9 Million in Funding to Accelerate Growth of Next Generation IoT DevOps Platform

    DFJ, GE Ventures, Ericsson, and Aspect Ventures Make Strategic Investment in Emerging Start-Up to Modernize Deployment to Connected Devices

    SEATTLE, WA–(Marketwired – Jun 27, 2016) – Resin.io, provider of a modern DevOps management platform for connected devices, today announced that it has secured $9 million in funding from DFJ, GE Ventures, Ericsson, and Aspect Ventures. Resin.io was founded in 2013 with a mission to use linux containers and other open technologies to simplify the way developers build, deploy, and manage software for IoT devices. Since then, businesses across a range of vertical industries have adopted the resin.io platform to safely and iteratively deliver software over the air for security patches, new feature deployments and device configuration changes. The new round of funding will be used to expand the company’s product footprint, grow its open source community, and broaden its global reach through new strategic partnerships and channels.

    “As billions of complex devices come online, IoT project leaders are faced with the dual challenges of safety and speed. They must securely maintain mission-critical remote devices, while also delivering new software features and functionality to their customers,” said Alexandros Marinos, Founder & CEO of resin.io. “Resin.io is a modern software deployment and management platform that builds on Docker, Git, Yocto and other open technologies to solve these challenges. With the support of GE Ventures and Ericsson we are exceptionally well positioned to help IoT project leaders use software as a strategic advantage.”

    The management challenge for IoT devices is impacting companies across every major industry. Whether it’s a major retailer employing industrial lighting systems across hundreds of stores, a manufacturing firm struggling to keep track of expensive inventory in real-time, or the next generation of connected home devices that require frequent firmware updates, the massive scale and complexity of these connected devices is causing a slew of new problems for companies with wide-scale IoT deployments. With resin.io, device fleet owners can corral all of their connected devices into a unified console, enabling developers to iterate faster, securely push updates to hundreds or thousands devices at once, and gain ongoing visibility into the overall health of their device fleet.

    “Advancing the Industrial Internet requires the ability to deploy and manage software in remote environments,” said Sam Cates, Director at GE Ventures, a unit of General Electric Co. (NYSE: GE). “Resin.io is uniquely positioned to bring the speed and safety of DevOps to the Industrial Internet and we are excited to help them do so.”

    “In a world of end-point liberation, software becomes the means of innovation and where billions of connected devices perform increasingly complex tasks, traditional over the air (OTA) update approaches are simply not enough,” said Diomedes Kastanis, VP, and Head of Technology and Software Solutions for Ericsson. “We are thrilled to support resin.io as it helps transform entire industries with the ability to safely deploy new software containers whenever and wherever is necessary.”

    About Resin.io

    Resin.io brings modern DevOps tools and practices to the Internet of Things. Resin.io’s software deployment and management platform makes it simple to deploy, update, and maintain code running on Linux-based connected devices regardless of their location. With Resin.io, businesses and developers can jumpstart their IoT projects and applications quickly, slashing development time, cost and management overhead. Resin.io has offices in Seattle, Washington, London, England and Athens, Greece. For more information go to https://resin.io

    CONTACT INFORMATION

    • Press Contact for Resin.io
      Robert Nachbar
      Kismet Communications
      206-427-0389
      Email Contact

  • DevOps Connect: CD Summit and Jenkins Days Fall Schedule Announced

     Call for Speakers Open for Seven Events Produced in the US and Europe, By devopsy.kinsta.cloud and Sponsored by CloudBees and IBM

     Boca Raton, June 21, 2016 – devopsy.kinsta.cloud, where the world meets DevOps, along with premier sponsors, CloudBees, the enterprise Jenkins Company and IBM, today announced that their DevOps Connect: CD Summit/Jenkins Days roadshow will continue this fall with Seven Dates in the US and Europe. The call for speakers to present at these events is now open (links at bottom).

    DevOps Connect: CD Summit/Jenkins Days are two day events focused on continuous integration (CI) and continuous delivery (CD), as the fundamental best practice for enterprise software delivery. The events feature one day of hands on workshops on Jenkins, IBM, DevOps Fundamentals, and DevOps transformation. The second day is highlighted by morning keynote presentations, followed by a multi-track format of sessions in the afternoon featuring technical discussions, related business/management topics and Jenkins. Also included are networking lunch, refreshments and after event reception.

    The fall event series includes:

    • Atlanta, October 5-6
    • Denver, October 12-13
    • Austin, November 16-17
    • Seattle, December 5-6
    • Los Angeles, December 15-16
    • Berlin, TBA
    • Amsterdam, TBA

    These events are designed for enterprise IT managers and buyers along with developers, engineers, sys admins, and architects. With three main tracks focused on IT managers, technical engineers, and Jenkins practitioners, attendees will get access to the best minds in CD, CI, and DevOps. The presenters are experienced developers, build managers, quality assurance leads, DevOps practitioners, IT managers/executives, architects and IT operations professionals who are recognized within the DevOps community.

    “These CD Summits/Jenkins Days are a great way for novices and experienced DevOps teams to learn about the latest trends, best practices and open source technologies like Jenkins”, said Andre Pino, VP of Marketing CloudBees. “These events will complement the international Jenkins Word Event being held in Santa Clara in September and are a great way to learn about latest developments in the Jenkins community.”

    About DevOps Connect

    If you would like to find out more information about DevOps Connect or CD Summit and Jenkins Days, please visit http://www.devopsconnect.com

    About devopsy.kinsta.cloud

    Launched in 2014, devopsy.kinsta.cloud has quickly established itself as an indispensable resource for DevOps education and community building. We make it our mission to cover all aspects of DevOps—philosophy, tools, business impact, best practices and more.

    Our site is the largest collection of original content related to DevOps on the web and one of the top result for DevOps-related search terms. Our content includes in-depth features, bylined articles, blog posts and breaking news about the topics that resonate with IT readers interested in DevOps: teamwork through improved IT culture, continuous integration, automated deployment, agile development and infrastructure-as-code among them.

    devopsy.kinsta.cloud is comprised of thought leaders who understand both DevOps and how to create compelling, informative content. The team behind devopsy.kinsta.cloud has real-world experience in technology, cloud, online media, DevOps, IT and startups.

    About CloudBees

    CloudBees (www.cloudbees.com), the enterprise Jenkins company, is the continuous delivery (CD) leader. CloudBees provides solutions that enable DevOps teams to respond rapidly to the software delivery needs of the business. Building on the strength of Jenkins, the world’s most popular open source continuous delivery hub and ecosystem, the CloudBees Jenkins Platform provides a wide range of CD solutions that meet the unique security, scalability and manageability needs of enterprises. The CloudBees Jenkins Platform supports many of the world’s largest and most business-critical deployments.

    Backed by Matrix Partners, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Verizon Ventures, CloudBees was founded in 2010 by former JBoss CTO Sacha Labourey and an elite team of continuous integration, continuous delivery and DevOps professionals. Follow CloudBees on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+.

    About IBM

    https://www.ibm.com/ibm/devops/us/en/

     

    For Media inquiries contact:

    Miles Blatstein

    miles@devops.com

    For Sales inquiries contact:

    Parket Yates

    Parker@devops.com

  • It’s Time to End the Automated Tests Arms Race

    It’s Time to End the Automated Tests Arms Race

    I grew up during the end of the Cold War. During that time, I remember hearing that there were enough nuclear weapons to destroy the world 20 times over. That always seemed silly to me. Wasn’t once or twice plenty? Wasn’t it more important to have the fastest and most effective weapons rather than to simply have the most weapons? Before I could devise a satisfactory explanation, “Rocky IV” was released, successfully ending the Cold War.

    Number of Automated Tests:  The New Iron Curtain

    Now, 30 years later, I’m beginning to notice another arms race taking place. At a recent DevOps conference, I saw speaker after speaker boasting about the number of automated tests their respective shops were running daily. Again, I was confused. Those numbers provide no real information. What’s more important than the quantity of tests you are executing is the efficacy of those tests and the speed of execution. Why did no presenter have those numbers? It felt like Cold War braggadocio all over again.

    issues_arms-race_nuclear Why do I care? Shouldn’t I view the embracing of test automation as a good thing, regardless of the metric used to measure it? When creating a culture of automation, test counts do serve a purpose. First of all, It’s a simple metric. Just count the number of tests and dance in the self-exulting joy of your automation prowess. It also shows the power of automation compared to manual execution. So what’s the problem? The reason I care is this: Test-case count, while simple to gather and easy to understand, puts the focus on irrelevant data and ignores more critical information, similar to judging a military on number of weapons alone (yes, I’m forcing the analogy). Number of test cases executed daily isn’t just the wrong metric; it’s the wrong unit of measurement! Trying to determine a development shop’s test automation maturity by counting number of tests executed daily is like trying to determine how many gallons a good developer weighs. It’s just nonsensical data that doesn’t answer the important questions:

    • What percentage of your code base is covered by your automated tests? If you knew that your 5,000 tests only covered 15 percent of your code, would you still stand on a stage at a conference and boast?
    • How long do your tests take to run? If it takes all night to execute the suite, then you can kiss multiple releases a day goodbye.

    Using Proper Metrics, or the Strategic Defense Initiative

    So what are the automated metrics we need to worry about? I have a few favorites, in no particular order:

    • Test execution time: Speed matters. A decrease in testing time allows for an increase in number of test iterations, an increase in features per release, an increase in release frequency, etc.
    • Percentage of code covered: The tool you use to get this number doesn’t matter. The key thing is that you have a standard way to track this metric and whether you are trending upward. This trend gives you the next important metric …
    • Automation progress: How fast is the discipline growing? When are you projected to hit the point where all tests that can be automated have been automated?
    • Defect density: While this isn’t specific to automation, the trend in this metric helps show the benefit of automated testing. Bonus points for having a pre-automation baseline.
    • Number of automated test executions: WHAT? Hey, sometimes you have to parade the military through Red Square to put on a show of strength. This isn’t a bad metric when used in conjunction with the others. But it is not enough by itself!

    Keep on Rockin’ in the Free World

    By focusing on the above metrics and not solely on test execution counts, you will ensure you are moving in the right direction in terms of test automation. Similar to how Gorbachev moved the Soviet Union in the right direction with his policies of perestroika and glasnost. OK, OK. The analogy is officially dead.

  • REP SPOTLIGHT: ITSM Academy

    REP SPOTLIGHT: ITSM Academy

    DevOps Institute: Tell us a little about your organization.

    ITSM Academy: Since the early DevOps Days in the U.S., ITSM Academy has been involved in the DevOps community. We are proud to be the first DOI REP in The Americas. We offer DOI’s full line of training, in our open-enrollment public (virtual) classrooms as well as on-site. All instructors have completed thorough Train-the-Trainer programs and we are achieving phenomenal pass rates.

    DevOps Institute: What other topics do you teach or consult on?

    ITSM Academy: For the last 12+ years, ITSM Academy has offered the full ITIL catalog. These courses are all developed in house, and licensed to other organizations. Our groundbreaking Certified Process Design Engineer (CPDE) course is also developed by our in-house team.

    DevOps Institute: What type of interest in DevOps are you seeing in your region?

    ITSM Academy: Enterprise organizations are embracing DevOps and agile service management and attending our courses to help build sustainable programs.

    DevOps Institute: How do you think DevOps contributes to the business’ value stream?

    ITSM Academy: At its core, DevOps is about a shift in culture. Organizations have a tendency to focus on tools, or the automation of manual tasks. Taking a big-picture approach, starting with reviewing existing processes and being willing to re-engineer, is where the real value comes in. Organizations that are coupling DevOps training with the Certified Process Design Engineer (CPDE) course are seeing equipping their teams for success.

    DevOps Institute: What topic area in DevOps excites you the most?

    ITSM Academy: Improvement of the flow of work between software developers and IT operations professionals. Enriched workflows enable IT organizations to deliver greater business value by improving the ability to more quickly design, develop, deploy and operate reliable software and services.

    DevOps Institute: Why should enterprises and individuals consider formal DevOps training?

    ITSM Academy: DevOps is a philosophy, not a “tool” to be learned. DevOps foundation training helps teams start on the same page, with common vocabulary and goals.

  • Internet Pioneer Discusses Creation, Expectations and Security of DNS on its 33rd Birthday

    “The Internet community has let legacy infrastructure designs constrain the future.”

    Carlsbad, CA – June 23, 2016 – 33 years ago today, Paul Mockapetris, inventor of the Internet Domain Name System  watched the DNS take its first steps.  This critical development would open up what may be the world’s most utilized and important technological development for a mass audience. Did he understand the importance or impact that DNS would have when it was created?

    “I think I saw the potential importance more clearly than the traditional ARPAnet era folks, who were busy replacing the old NCP protocols with IP and TCP,” noted Mockapetris, now Chief Scientist at ThreatSTOP.  “So I was very happy to take on the design job and build something quite beyond the task given me.”

    By 1983, he had already spent 15 years designing distributed systems at what would become the Media Lab at MIT, Draper Labs, IBM, and the Distributed Computer System at UC Irvine. So he did expect his creation to be used across the Internet to manage a distributed operating systems and applications. DNS was really meant to manage a heterogeneous distributed, federated cloud and its services.

    Something Mockapetris did not expect was the whole marketing and branding of names. “I guess I should have taken some classes in business and marketing,” he joked.  His biggest surprise was that the research agencies in the late 80s and 90s didn’t see naming systems and DNS in particular as merely the first steps in an Internet naming architecture. The original design had many places where next steps and additional mechanisms were indicated, and never were taken.  Recent work in named data networking has revived this field a bit.

    “If I’d been told in 1988 what the DNS would eventually be used for, I would have said it wasn’t possible,” said Dr. Paul Vixie, Internet pioneer and CEO of Farsight Security, Inc. “Almost all Internet activities, whether for good or evil, begin with a DNS lookup.  Defenders who can monitor, and control, and investigate their use of DNS can by extension monitor, and control, and investigate their relationship to the Internet itself.”

    The DNS was introduced during the transition from the ARPAnet to the IP/TCP based Internet, and was the largest single architectural innovation of that transition. As a critical infrastructure, DNS has been subjected to many attacks and misuse, but in today’s hardened form, it is seen as an essential tool for implementing security.

    Security was intentionally left out of the initial design, along with several other functions.  DNSSEC is a next step, but is very heavy weight and doesn’t solve current problems like DDoS. 

    “The Internet community has let legacy infrastructure designs constrain the future,” notes Mockapetris. “For example, the 512 byte datagram limit of 1983 should be more like 500 Megabytes if we adjust for the million-fold increase in transmission speed in today’s Internet, though I’d settle for 512K bytes.  We are giving up on datagrams because of DDoS – while I understand the argument, I’m not ready to surrender yet.  There’s a lot of room for innovation here.  It’s as if we are requiring DNS to support paper tape and floppy disks.”

    Mockapetris now provides guidance to the ongoing product innovation process for ThreatSTOP, and leads research into DNS-based security. “Effective security requires real-time threat intelligence that is distributed to all of an enterprise’s enforcement devices whether they are routers, firewalls, application delivery controllers, or servers. DNS is an ideal vehicle,” said Mockapetris. “Fielding powerful, scalable security tools that leverage the ubiquity of DNS to protect organizations of all sizes is critical.”

    About ThreatSTOP

    ThreatSTOP is a network security company offering a cloud-based threat protection service that protects every device and workload on a network from cyberattacks and data theft. It can protect any network, from virtual cloud networks to branch LANs to the largest carrier networks. The service leverages market-leading threat intelligence to deflect inbound and outbound threats, including botnet, phishing and ransomware attacks, and prevents data exfiltration. For more information visit www.threatstop.com.  

    CONTACTS:   Michael Becce, MRB Public Relations, Inc.
    mbecce@mrb-pr.com | (732) 758-1100 x104

  • State of DevOps Report: Reaping Results

    State of DevOps Report: Reaping Results

    The newly released 2016 State of DevOps Report concludes that DevOps is “no longer a mere fad or buzzword,” but rather an established set of practices and cultural patterns. Yet, a closer look at this year’s findings reveals progress is far more substantial than any matters of perception.

    The report was conducted and analyzed by the experts of DevOps Research and Assessment (DORA) and sponsored by CA Technologies. Among its findings is proof that high-performing organizations that have embraced agile and DevOps methodologies deeply are outperforming massively those that have not. And the gap is widening.

    The State of DevOps Report also shows leading DevOps practitioners are appreciating benefits that span nearly every area of their business. If I know my colleague Gene Kim, he will assert this point exuberantly on our upcoming State of DevOps Report Webcast.

    It’s noteworthy that high performers are surpassing incredible milestones related to core elements of the applications life cycle. Examples include deploying code 200 times more frequently than low performers, driving 2,555 times faster lead times, 24 times faster recovery times and producing three times lower change failure rates. This is evidence that DevOps is having the desired outcome on applications delivery, software quality and organizational velocity. It also shows organizations truly committed to wholesale transformation of culture and process are actively succeeding.

    At the same time, the State of DevOps Report shows employees working at organizations enjoying this success are more satisfied with their jobs and more closely engaged with their companies. Chalk this up to the halo effect of operating in a fundamentally more sensible, innovative fashion. Cultural change is undoubtedly the greatest hurdle to DevOps advancement. Here’s proof that if you can navigate the process, your workers will be happier and more productive.

    Using Employee Net Promoter Score (eNPS) as a barometer, the report finds that employees in high-performing organizations were 2.2 times more likely to recommend their organization as a great place to work. They also were 1.8 times more likely to recommend their team as a great working environment. Previous studies have found that such an air of positivity can be directly correlated with improved business outcomes, researchers noted.

    Shifting the manner in which you build applications to better adapt to changing customer expectations is a necessity. That’s what began driving this movement years ago. That said, proof it also makes it easier to keep valued software engineering and IT operations employees should not be overlooked.

    In addition to positive conclusions on the impact of continuous delivery and improvement of test data management, the report offers some important metrics related to return on investment. This is nothing short of landmark, as for decades we have struggled to make a hard case for IT investment beyond implied competitive advantage. It actually was impressive that last year’s report highlighted such a “predictive relationship between IT performance and organizational performance.”

    One such new measurement of note is that high-performing teams occupy the least amount of time responding to unplanned work and rework—efforts widely recognized to be results of flawed processes. On a related note, DevOps leaders spend 49 percent of their time on new work‚ surely, in many cases, the next “must-have” feature which impacts competitive standing and, ultimately, the bottom line.

    This report is fantastic. It reaffirms powerfully that so many of the promises made about DevOps over the last few years are neither hype, nor overstated. The gap between the leaders and laggards is growing. Industry landscapes and business models are being redefined.

    This is critical transformational work that every organization must adopt to survive.

    Are you on board? Download the full State of DevOps Report here.

  • Visibility Drives Data-Driven Decision-Making

    Visibility Drives Data-Driven Decision-Making

    One of the biggest challenges of DevOps today is lack of visibility—especially shared visibility—into application delivery process and outcomes. A common data fabric allows all stakeholders to share visibility into DevOps processes, so they can more easily collaborate and communicate, use objective data to make decisions, and deliver better code faster.

    The DevOps Visibility Challenge

    A typical DevOps process relies on a loosely coupled tool chain. It includes separate tools for discrete functions including project management, source code control, provisioning and configuration, test execution and workflow automation. A tool chain approach adds much value, but becomes complex quickly. Also, it makes it difficult for stakeholders to get accurate insight into application delivery.

    This challenge is especially endemic to large and distributed enterprises. It’s even more difficult when there are thousands of developers and dozens of data centers across multiple geographies. Having duplicate tools, specialized teams, varying processes, distributed locations and multiple business units makes it even harder.

    As a result of this poor visibility into application delivery, stakeholders from business and IT:

    • Cannot manage the velocity of feature delivery. They cannot detect and fix slowdowns or bottlenecks in the process or allocate and prioritize resources. They also cannot plan for downstream activities or triage slowdowns and stoppages in the software development life cycle.
    • Cannot make objective decisions on quality. They risk releasing error-ridden software, slowing down response times, introducing security vulnerabilities, oversaturating infrastructure, damaging reputation and adding unnecessary costs.
    • Cannot properly collaborate on detection, diagnosis and remediation of production problems. They also cannot share an understanding of the impact of code changes on business key performance indicators. Customer satisfaction, customer signups, cart fulfillment rates and revenue all could be affected.

    Data Mining Enables Visibility

    To overcome these obstacles, successful DevOps teams are using objective metrics mined from machine data. That helps them gain insight into the end-to-end delivery cycle, from idea to release.

    Collecting, correlating and analyzing machine data from multiple sources gives dev and ops (and others) continuous insight. They can see the velocity, quality and business impact of application delivery. It provides individual contributors the data they need to be responsible for their own work, accountable to each other and aligned with business objectives. It enables managers to make data-driven decisions about workload prioritization, resourcing, scheduling, performance and value delivery.

    How to Get to Data-Driven DevOps

    Some of the key actions you can take to start on a journey of data-driven DevOps include:

    Measure your speed of application delivery: The machine data generated by your DevOps tool chain provides a wealth of information about all phases of the development cycle. It shows what is in development, close to release, in backlog and slowing you down. It shows which stages in the process are failing and what teams are most efficient. Consider mining and sharing velocity-related measures such as commit rates, sprint times and “idea to cash” time, to name a few.

    Measure the quality of your application code: Even if you are already using testing tools to understand release quality, there is more to quality than test coverage. Again, choosing the right KPIs is critical, as is sharing those measurements throughout your team(s). Some other key metrics may include the number and importance of defects, defect variance from release to release (or from team to team) and build/integration/deployment failures.

    Measure the business impact of application code: All too often organizations measure activity, but fail to align application delivery with business goals. As one customer recently told me, “Shipping crappy releases faster won’t help.” Business stakeholders especially are looking for business KPIs such as:

    • user signups or cancellations
    • customer satisfaction
    • cart fulfillment or abandonment
    • time on site
    • transaction failure rate
    • sales volume
    • application revenue
    • app downloads
    • offer open rates
    • customer satisfaction; and
    • customer acquisition costs

    Measure the human impact of DevOps: DevOps is mainly about people, so you must find ways to measure culture change, too. You can mine various applications for objective metrics such as number of sick days, “work from home” days and variance in team and individual productivity. However, machine data will not provide all the relevant KPIs; you will need subjective measures too, such as from “stay interviews,” feedback forms or surveys.

    Data-Driven DevOps with a Common Data Fabric

    A data-driven DevOps approach more effectively drives continuous improvement and higher levels of agility. It also helps achieve greater collaboration, improved security and compliance, and better alignment with business KPIs. These all occur while enabling rapid iteration and innovation.

    A common data fabric provides the objective measurement and shared visibility critical for a data-driven DevOps approach. With comprehensive and continuous visibility into key performance measures, provided through a shared data fabric, DevOps teams can:

    • Isolate “waste,” detect and correct slowdowns, and deliver applications faster
    • Correlate test and QA outcomes to find more problems sooner and improve code quality
    • React faster to detect and address problems that do get through to production; and
    • Use real-time insight to measure business impact and iterate faster on good change

     

  • Red Hat to Acquire API Management Leader 3scale

    Accelerates digital transformation with API driven hybrid-cloud architectures

    RALEIGH, N.C. — —

    Red Hat, Inc. (NYSE: RHT), the world’s leading provider of open source solutions, today announced that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire 3scale, a leading provider of application programming interface (API) management technology. By adding 3scale to its existing portfolio, including Red Hat JBoss Middleware, Red Hat OpenShift and Red Hat Mobile Application Platform, Red Hat strengthens its enablement of the API economy with simplified cloud integration and microservices-based architectures.

    3scale complements our existing middleware product portfolio and Red Hat OpenShift by enabling companies to create and publish APIs with tools such as Red Hat JBoss Fuse, and then manage and drive adoption of those APIs once they have been published.

    CRAIG MUZILLASENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, APPLICATION PLATFORMS BUSINESS, RED HAT

    In an era of digital transformation, agile development practices, and hybrid technology footprints, the API economy has become the norm. Forrester has estimated that 40 percent of U.S. companies will have API management solutions in 2020, spending $660 million in that year.1 Managed APIs are becoming strategic in the enterprise because they enable organizations to rapidly deliver new services that are easy to consume yet secure, scalable, and reliable, as well as enabling services (as APIs) to be monetized as products. Emerging architectures that decompose functionality into ever more finely-grained components–”microservices”–driven by mobile, the Internet of Things (IoT), and other trends, have further heightened the need for API management.

    3scale was founded in 2007 with a goal of enabling organizations of all sizes to successfully create, manage, and use APIs in a web-enabled world where APIs became paramount. Today, 3scale offers a hybrid cloud based API management platform, which separates the cloud management layer from the API gateway, providing customers with flexibility, performance, and scale. 3scale provides this API management platform within a self-service model at more than 700 organizations across multiple industries, including Campbell’s Soup; Cartera Commerce; CrunchBase; Johnson Controls; Oxford University Press; SITA; and the University of California, Berkeley. 3scale has offices in Barcelona and San Francisco.

    3scale and Red Hat began partnering in early 2015 to deliver a comprehensive platform for API-based application development. The joint solution combined the 3scale API Management Platform with technologies from Red Hat JBoss Middleware, Red Hat OpenShift and Red Hat Mobile Application Platform to provide an API-centric development, deployment, and management offering designed to accelerate application time-to-market. Red Hat JBoss Middleware customers will benefit from the hybrid-cloud capabilities from 3scale for modern architectures. Mobile application development in particular is highly API-centric and 3scale’s platform combined with the Red Hat Mobile Application Platform can lead to development and management simplicity at massive scales.

    Most recently, 3scale introduced a containerized version of their API Gateway for Red Hat OpenShift, enabling users to easily and consistently create applications with microservices distributed across diverse, hybrid environments. The combined power of Red Hat’s container application platform and 3scale’s API management capabilities enables customers to simplify and automate tasks, helping reduce errors while increasing flexibility and control.

    Red Hat has provided enterprises with leading open source platforms for building modern applications, integration and automation solutions. With the addition of 3scale’s API management solutions, and its existing middleware, container application platform, and mobile offerings, Red Hat can further simplify and accelerate customers’ digital strategies and accelerate time-to-market for API initiatives, and enable enterprises to innovate faster, in a smarter way.

    The acquisition is expected to have no material impact to Red Hat’s revenue for the second fiscal quarter ending August 31, 2016 (the “second quarter”), or its fiscal year ending Feb. 28, 2017 (“fiscal 2017”). Management expects GAAP operating expense to increase by approximately $3 million, or ($0.01) per share, in the second quarter and approximately $7 million, or ($0.03) per share, for fiscal 2017 as a result of the transaction. Management expects that non-GAAP operating expense will increase by approximately $1.5 million, or approximately ($0.01) per share, in the second quarter and approximately $5 million, or approximately ($0.03) per share, for fiscal 2017 as a result of the transaction. Red Hat calculates non-GAAP operating expense by subtracting from GAAP operating expense the estimated impact of non-cash share-based compensation expense, which is expected to increase by approximately $0.8 million for the second quarter, amortization of intangible assets, which is expected to increase by approximately $0.2 million for each of the remaining quarters in fiscal 2017, and transaction costs related to business combinations, which are expected to be less than $1 million in the second quarter. For Red Hat’s full forecast, including the expected impact of the transaction on GAAP and non-GAAP operating margin and GAAP and non-GAAP earnings per share, refer to the guidance provided in its June 22, 2016 earnings press release.

    The transaction is expected to close in June 2016, subject to customary closing conditions.

    Supporting Quotes
    Craig Muzilla, senior vice president, Application Platforms Business, Red Hat
    “APIs play an important role in helping to accelerate innovation and business growth in the digital economy. With digital transformation initiatives identified as a top priority for organizations today, API management has become the foundation for exposing those APIs for better use, performance, and value creation. 3scale complements our existing middleware product portfolio and Red Hat OpenShift by enabling companies to create and publish APIs with tools such as Red Hat JBoss Fuse, and then manage and drive adoption of those APIs once they have been published.”

    Steven Willmott, CEO, 3scale
    “We’ve already seen great customer success combining Red Hat’s excellent middleware platform with 3scale API management, and we see tremendous opportunity to benefit customers even more as they expand their API, middleware and microservices plans. We see this as a natural extension of our relationship, and we’re excited to be joining an organization with such a strong commitment to open standards, open source and spreading the benefits of technology.”

     

    1 Forrester Research, “Sizing The Market For API Management Solutions,” April 2, 2015.

    ABOUT RED HAT

    Red Hat is the world’s leading provider of open source software solutions, using a community-powered approach to provide reliable and high-performing cloud, Linux, middleware, storage and virtualization technologies. Red Hat also offers award-winning support, training, and consulting services. As a connective hub in a global network of enterprises, partners, and open source communities, Red Hat helps create relevant, innovative technologies that liberate resources for growth and prepare customers for the future of IT. Learn more athttp://www.redhat.com.

    FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS

    Certain statements contained in this press release may constitute “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements provide current expectations of future events based on certain assumptions and include any statement that does not directly relate to any historical or current fact. Actual results may differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements as a result of various important factors, including: risks related to the ability of the Company to compete effectively; the integration of acquisitions and the ability to market successfully acquired technologies and products; the ability to deliver and stimulate demand for new products and technological innovations on a timely basis; delays or reductions in information technology spending; the effects of industry consolidation; uncertainty and adverse results in litigation and related settlements; the inability to adequately protect Company intellectual property and the potential for infringement or breach of license claims of or relating to third party intellectual property; risks related to data and information security vulnerabilities; ineffective management of, and control over, the Company’s growth and international operations; fluctuations in exchange rates; and changes in and a dependence on key personnel, as well as other factors contained in our most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K (copies of which may be accessed through the Securities and Exchange Commission’s website at http://www.sec.gov), including those found therein under the captions “Risk Factors” and “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations”. In addition to these factors, actual future performance, outcomes, and results may differ materially because of more general factors including (without limitation) general industry and market conditions and growth rates, economic and political conditions, governmental and public policy changes and the impact of natural disasters such as earthquakes and floods. The forward-looking statements included in this press release represent the Company’s views as of the date of this press release and these views could change. However, while the Company may elect to update these forward-looking statements at some point in the future, the Company specifically disclaims any obligation to do so. These forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing the Company’s views as of any date subsequent to the date of this press release.

    ###

    Red Hat, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, the Shadowman logo, JBoss, and OpenShift are trademarks or registered trademarks of Red Hat, Inc.or its subsidiaries in the U.S. and other countries. Linux® is the registered trademark of Linus Torvalds in the U.S. and other countries.

  • Apica Announces Enhanced Integration with AppDynamics and New Relic Delivering Greater Actionable Insights

    Apica LoadTest Portal delivers integrated data to a single point to quickly and easily resolve website and application performance problems

    Stockholm, Sweden – June 22, 2016 – Apica, a leading provider of comprehensive performance testing and monitoring tools, today announced enhanced integration with AppDynamics and New Relic allowing in-depth data from each to be delivered to Apica’s LoadTest Portal. This allows joint users to quickly and easily see transactions and snapshots for any load test, create customized charts and enhance overall metric correlation.

    “Apica’s enterprise class performance testing combined with AppDynamics and New Relic’s data, can streamline visibility and add available metrics from either APM vendor to quickly find bottlenecks and identify problematic areas,” said Sven Hammar, CEO of Apica. “The joint data and metrics deliver the information needed to create customized charts and metrics ensuring development teams have the actionable insights necessary to be successful.”

    Ensuring updates and enhancements to your website requires greater visibility and data to ensure high capacity traffic and transactions happen as expected. Unfortunately, despite the best deployments web properties don’t always behave as expected whether under normal and peak load conditions. Apica makes it easier to combine all of its market leading LoadTest portal metrics with APM solutions data saving hours and even days to resolving these performance challenges.

    About Apica LoadTest:

    Apica LoadTest offers advanced scripting capabilities, a flexible SaaS platform for easy test executions, scheduling, automation and results analysis, GUI-supported scripting with no programming required, full API, and integration with APM tools including AppDynamics and New Relic.

    Apica will also be participating at this year’s Velocity 2016 event being held in Santa Clara June 20-23. If you want to learn more about what Apica is doing to improve testing and performance of websites, apps, video streaming and services stop by our booth #321. You can get hands on demos and participate in fun activities including pinball, free beer, T-shirts and a drone giveaway.

    DEMONSTRATIONS (Booth #321)

    • Apica LoadTest: Apica LoadTest offers advanced scripting capabilities, a flexible SaaS platform for easy test executions, scheduling, automation and results analysis, GUI-supported scripting with no programming required, full API, and integration with APM tools including AppDynamics and New Relic.
    • Apica Web Performance Monitoring (WPM): Apica’s website monitoring provides up-to-the-second, real browser monitoring so you can see what your visitors experience, in real time – from almost any location around the world.

    Connect with Us:

    Website: Apica

    Blog: https://www.apicasystem.com/blog/

    Twitter: https://twitter.com/apicasystems

    LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/apica-ab

     

    About Apica

    Apica provides the most comprehensive cloud and mobile application performance testing and monitoring tools, the largest testing and monitoring network, and access to battle-tested performance professionals. Since 2005, Apica has been shipping solutions that bring the capabilities of much more expensive solutions to modern APM solutions.  That’s why global leaders such as HBO, Virgin America, JPMC and Activision have chosen Apica as their performance testing and monitoring solution that completes their DevOps initiatives. Apica is based in Stockholm, Sweden and Santa Monica, CA, with offices in London and New York. To learn more about Apica, visit https://www.apicasystems.com