For those of you that don't know yet, TurnKey Linux has released a new build of their core base appliance which is used to make all of the excellent opensource virtual appliances available on their website. Don't be confused, although the title does say "2009.10-2", this was just release on the 14th of April. Looks like they've made a few changes. Here's the summary from the changelog.

• Installed all security updates (see manifest for package versions).
• Install security updates on firstboot (except when running live).
• Trick webmin into not checking for upgrades (managed by apt).
• Included latest version of inithooks and updated scripts.
• Included wget as per common request.

The link to download the new core is in the JeOS.box.

Enjoy.

-D

Finally, as of 3-30-10, you can now download a Fedora 11 JeOS from StormGrind via their StormFolio, "...a set of appliances with projects from JBoss umbrella". They have both the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of the Fedora 11 JeOS each in RAW and VMWare format, along with EC2 AMIs. Although this not an officially supported release of Fedora, I'm sure many of you out there will appreciate it regardless.

I'm sure some of you that are reading this understand my pain, and if you have already tried in vain to find a location to download the elusive Fedora AOS, you've come across some very apparent dead ends. I'm now going to explain our frustration to the world for the benefit of all mankind. Maybe someone who cares will do something about it.

Early on, Fedora coined their own term for the stripped down OS, calling it an AOS or Appliance Operating System. This image is referred to as a Fedora Spin and in more than one place on the internet, you're instructed to download it at ThinCrust.

ThinCrust says they currently have the official build for the Fedora 10 AOS and then tell you that if you want to download it, you have to download it from the Fedora Spins Project. They then give you instructions for how to set it up *after* you have downloaded it. (They do list the EC2 AMI's for both the Fedora 9 AOS and Fedora 10 AOS, but no links to images of any kind on the page.)

Once on the Fedora Spins page..... there is *clearly* no Fedora 10 AOS Spin listed on the page, of the 7 to choose from. Well, maybe it's not on the font page, we can probably dig a little bit and find it somewhere.... right?.....wrong.

Doing some more digging, I headed over to the Fedora Wiki page to look into some documentation concerning the AOS. Lo and behold, there is information there about Fedora 11 and 12 too! But wait, to download it, you only have to go to.... THE FEDORA SPINS PROJECT? Gaaah!! DEAD END!

 But wait... there's a saving grace. On the Fedora Wiki Page you can find the direct link to the Kickstart file needed to build your own version of the Fedora AOS. All you have to do now is go to the Tooling page on the ThinCrust site and follow the directions, (you will have to follow those directions on a linux platform of course). Although ThinCrust *does* offer you a link to the KickstartPool, they rely on your own curiosity to eventually lead you to the AOS specific "Kickstart" file you need, instead of linking you directly to it.

If all you want to do is just download the pre-built officially supported AOS, should you really have to go through hell and back!?! Even the BitTorrent download information site does not include an AOS image! I can't imagine people who are considering choosing Fedora as their platform, think to themselves, "Wow, I can't wait to start developing after I wade through this pile of mind numbing cyclical hyperlinks!" 

Well, now you don't.

Now, you can ditch the quest for the holy AOS, head over to StormGrind, and download the Fedora JeOS instead. 

Thank God.

-D

P.S.

I've added a link to the JeOS.box for the Fedora 11 JeOS, and StormGrind says they're also currently working on the Fedora 12 JeOS which should be out soon! I'll let you know when it pops up. 

The OpenSolaris JeOS has finally joined the ranks along with the many, many different Ubuntu JeOS revisions listed in the Virtual Appliance Marketplace on the VMWare website. Although following the first link to the OSOL JeOS in this post eventually leads you to a download page that takes you back to the same link that I have posted in the JeOS.box, it's still a good place to grab a quick look at the general overview and tech specs of this JeOS condensed in to one small little place. There's even a section for review (which is currently empty) so you can either read or submit your own experiences working with this JeOS.

This visibility will be good for promoting the consideration of OSOL to the virtual appliance community, but currently this JeOS is in a prototype phase which may steer more serious app developers away until it's officially supported by Sun, as described on their website...

"Since the reduced set of pre-installed packages is not yet qualified as an official starting point in testing of the Sun-managed OpenSolaris distribution, this image is positioned as a **prototype**. A future version of the image may be considered an officially supported starting point once the installed package set is considered to be a supported combination and building and testing of the image are integrated into the Sun-managed OpenSolaris release process." - OpenSolaris JeOS Project Page

Nonetheless, it should draw more attention to the active community, which has been recently updating their Wiki as well. One interesting tidbit on the wiki is that the OpenSolaris JeOS Prototype does include both 32-bit and 64-bit architectures in a single VM image, which is not mentioned on their virtual appliance marketplace page.

-D

Welcome to the first post @ the.JeOS! This site is dedicated to being a central hub for information regarding development of existing and new JeOS's, as well as cool new Virtual Appliances. There will also be how-to's and tutorials that will help those of you who are completely new to virtualization, step-by-step through the process of configuring your own JeOS.box!

I'm still working on getting more of the basics up on the site, but in the meantime, you can click on JeOS.box in the navigation menu to download all the free JeOS's available right now. I'm always looking to add more to the collection so if there are any that I missed, feel free to shoot me an email and I'll add it to the page!

If you don't see something on the website that you think *should* be on the website, let me know and I'll try to do what I can to include it.

I will be updating the website constantly, so add me to your RSS and stay tuned!

-D