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Last week, HPE alerted us of a critical software bug that would cause SSDs to fail after three point seven years of use. The problem is not that there was a firmware bug, those happen all the time, but how little HPE provided to fix the problem. It basically throws the fix back to the operator to run scripts on each server.

SSDs are an example of firmware that is not typically managed by vendor out of band (HPE iLO, Dell DRAC) tooling. PDU, Fan, GPU, FPGA, and NIC firmware are also examples of deep firmware that must also be managed.

When we formed RackN 5 years ago, we thought that operators would want to make sure their server firmware was patched; however, in spite of a string of critical patches, firmware continually falls under the threshold of must manage software. This is remarkable because it is a well known performance and failure point for infrastructure.

We’ve spent the last few years trying to understand why the hardware is so often ignored in the infrastructure equation and refuse to accept that “it’s too hard” as the answer.

Instead, our industry has failed to treat firmware as part of an integrated infrastructure stack. We’ve accepted poor APIs and controls from vendors. We’ve fostered a belief that virtualization shields us from hardware. We’ve accepted the cloud “your not smart enough to run a data center” marketing. We’ve allowed these fallacies to make us complacent.

We need to treat firmware patching as part of a continuously integrated data center mindset. Where we can perform source-code controlled migrations of systems that allow us to safely and quickly make deep changes as part of regular deployment cycles.

Fully integrated provisioning is not fantasy: At RackN, we’re helping operators implement exactly these processes. It’s not magic, but it does require system level processes that prioritize workflows, inventory, discovery and integration to coordinate physical and application lifecycle.  It’s time for everyone to start thinking this way because this SSD patch is just the latest in an increasingly urgent string of firmware updates.

RackN is excited to announce v4 of Digital Rebar.  In this fourth generation, we recognize the project’s evolution from provisioner into a data center automation platform.  While the external APIs and behavior are NOT changing (v4.0 and v3.13 are API compatible), we are making important structural changes that allow for significant enhancements to scale, performance and collaboration.

This important restructuring enables Digital Rebar to expand as a community platform with open content.

RackN is streamlining and inverting our license model (see chart below) by making our previously closed content and plugins open and taking commercial control of our implementation behind the open Digital Rebar APIs.  This change empowers both expanding community and sustaining commercial engagement.

Over the last 2 years, our operator community around Digital Rebar and RackN content has frequently asked for source access to our closed catalog of content and plugins while leaving core development exclusively to RackN.  We believe that providing open, collaborative access is critical for the growth of the platform; consequently, Generation 4 makes these critical components available.

RackN will curate and support foundational content packs and plugins in the open.  They include items including operating system templates, out of band management (IPMI), image deploy, classification and our server life-cycle (RAID/BIOS) components.  We will be working with the Digital Rebar community to determine the right management model for items in this broad portfolio of content.

The RackN implementation powering the Digital Rebar API will be significantly enhanced in this generation.

We are integrating powerful new capabilities like multi-site management, 10,000+ machine scale, single-sign-on and deeper security directly into the implementation.  These specialized enhancements to the platform enable an even broader range of applications. Since the community has focused on contributing to platform content instead of the core; we believe this is the right place to manage the commercial side of sustaining the platform.

Please note that our basic commercial models and pricing plans are not changing.  We are still maintaining Digital Rebar and RackN binaries free for operators with up to 20 machines.  The change also allows us to enable new classes of use such as non-profit, academic and service provider.

Thank you to the Digital Rebar community!  We are handing you the keys to revolutionized data center operations.  Let’s get started!