| HP unveils Carrier Grade Debian |
Jun. 05, 2006
In a move calculated to expand Carrier Grade Linux's (CGL's) developer and user communities, HP has registered Debian's "Sarge" distribution with version 2.02 of the OSDL's CGL specification, and started a Carrier Grade subproject within Debian. Debian-CGL offers an intermediary choice between commercial CGL distributions and "rolling your own," according to the OSDL.
HP has long used Debian as the basis for custom Linux OSes delivered to its telecom customers. Alan Meyer, R&D manager for Linux/OSS at HP, explains, "Red Hat and SUSE are our premier partners. If a customer can meet their needs with [these] off-the-shelf distros, great. If not, we start with Sarge, and based on customer RFQs, create a modified version of Linux that we deliver electronically to them."
He adds, "Debian has been a wonderful strategic move for us. What we're seeing is that Linux is becoming an integral part of the roadmap for NEPs-compliant hardware. And on that hardware, for Linux, overwhelmingly it's Debian that we offer." (NEPs = network equipment providers)
HP's Debian-using customers include Motorola and other large TEMs (telecommunications equipment manufacturers) that Meyers declined to enumerate. However, to give a sense of Debian's large and growing role within telecom, he noted, "The factoid we like to share is that within three years, as our current projects get deployed worldwide, we estimate that 30 percent of all mobile phone calls worldwide will touch HP CX2600 servers running Debian."
 HP's CX2600 servers are "Carrier grade" versions of its Itanium-based RX2600 "Rack" servers, fitted with 12-volt power supplies, and shortened to fit in 19-inch racks, which enlarges them from 1U to 2U systems. Although not based on open standards such as ATCA -- HP's ATCA products are just beginning to reach market, Meyers says -- the CX2600 systems have a fundamentally PC-like architecture that supports standard Linux distributions such as Debian well.
Examples of HP telecom systems likely to run Debian include:- HLRs (home location registries), which are in-memory databases that associate phone numbers with a user's home location
- Basestation controllers, which control cell phone towers in cities and atop roadside mountains
- MSCs (mobile switching centers), which help set up and tear down calls, and ensure that call times and charges are authorized and accounted for
About 30 percent of all telecom equipment will run Linux by the end of this decade, according to OSDL estimates based on data from Venture Development Corp. (VDC). Linux use is growing at 26 percent per year, compared to baseline OS growth of 19 percent, the the OSDL says.
The CGL registration process, and Debian's level of "compliance"
At base, Debian Sarge actually fails to provide several key CGL 2.02 requirements. However, the distribution can be enhanced to meet nearly all requirements, through the installation of several kernel patches and applications that, as yet, have not been added to Sarge's mainline tree of ".deb" packages. These enhancements are well-documented in Sarge's CGL registration document, a simplified version of which is available here.
The OSDL's General Spokesperson, Bill Weinberg, noted, "What's significant here is that [in registering Sarge], they've merged fairly diverse technology sources, [and have shown that] CGL implementations can be free and open. It's a work in progress."
Meyers notes that while Debian currently falls short in a few areas, largely due to unpackaged applications, the distribution more than atones in other areas, where it goes well beyond baseline CGL 2.02 requirements. Additionally, Meyers believes that CGL registration and the Debian-CGL project founded by HP will lead to carrier-class enhancements from Debian's enormous community, which includes numerous maintainers employed by HP. Meyer said, "This will allow a broader funnel of people to work on CGL, and allow HP developers to do carrier grade development in a Debian context. We can deliver improvements to the customers, and the improvements can go back upstream, and ultimately flow into other distributions."
Meyer says the "biggest hump" in completing Sarge's CGL registration was the completion of tests measuring compliance with the Linux Standards Base (LSB). HP chose to outsource this and other testing procedures to Progeny, an engineering services company whose founder, Ian Murdoch, works closely with the Free Standards Group, the organization that maintains the LSB. Murdoch, incidentally, also founded the Debian project itself and served as its project leader for several years prior to founding Progeny. Progeny first patched Debian's glibc for LSB compliance in February of 2004.
The current Debian project leader, Anthony Towns, stated, "CGL registration marks an important milestone in Debian's support for Linux in communications infrastructure. With the assistance of our industry partners in meeting OSDL's CGL specifications, we look forward to better addressing the needs of the increasing market for Linux systems in telecommunications."
Steve Geary, director of Linux/OSS R&D at HP, stated, "For a number of years HP has used Debian to deliver fully-supported Linux solutions. This was a strategic decision from HP to use Debian in its own customer deployments, and now these key solutions will be available to a larger audience through the OSDL CGL offering, providing greater confidence in today's global communications networks."
By the way... what exactly is CGL registration?
Carrier Grade Linux specifications define functionalities that are desirable for meeting the reliability, maintainability, and availability requirements of systems deployed in telecommunications and other demanding applications. Each specification release comprises several layers of functionality, ranging from mandatory to optional.
The OSDL does not use the word "compliance" in connection with CGL specifications. Rather, distributions are "registered" through the publication of a form explaining how they can be configured to meet the specification's requirements and recommendations.
Weinberg notes that mandatory or "priority 1" requirements are not added to CGL specifications unless proof of an implementation exists in open source. This means that CGL specifications are inherently designed to be within the grasp of completely free distributions such as Debian, while still leaving room for commercial opportunities with regard to integration, quality assurance, and feature extensions. "Some of the registration requirements have explicit costs... but the barriers to entry have to do with technical excellence," Weinberg said.
One "explicit cost" conspicuously absent is actual OSDL membership. Debian is the second non-OSDL member to register a distribution, after FSMLabs.
Currently, the OSDL's list of carrier grade registrants includes eight distributions registered with 2.x versions of the CGL spec. Registrations with 3.2, the first registerable 3.x spec, are expected to appear next quarter.
The CGL registration process is described in greater detail here.
Weinberg stated, "The Debian-based CGL platform represents an ideal balance between 'roll-your-own' Carrier Grade Linux solutions and available commercial options. The OSDL welcomes Debian's registration and anticipates it having a strong and positive impact on CGL adoption. Thanks to the hard work of Debian developers and HP's many contributions, telecom equipment providers can now also look to a very complete community-based CGL distribution."
Availability
Carrier Grade Debian is available now, to anyone interested in assembling it from the sources cited in its registration form, a simplified version of which is available here.
Additional details about Carrier Grade Debian can be found at the Debian-CGL Wiki.
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