OpenApp images launched

Because OpenPanel is an elegant and light solution a large number of OpenPanel users are using it to host a single site or web application.

These users did get a lot of unused multi-site OpenPanel functionality however, while at the same time missing some functionality. Think about the possibility to change access setting in the application or to arrange backups. After the environment was configured it is sometimes difficult to keep the software up to date.

OpenApp is a series of Ubuntu 10.04 LTS based packages. Each package offers one popular application and runs a single-site version of OpenPanel that is optimised for the relevant application. These configurations are alos available as VMware images on our download page. OpenApp is ideal for owners of serious websites and developers. It could be used by cloud providers to enhance their offering of configuration alternatives.

Deploy – You can easily deploy an openapp image by taking an Ubuntu 10.04 install and execute “apt-get install openapp-[joomla / rails / wordpress etc.]“. Alternatively you can download and deploy the relevant image.

Update – We will keep the packages up to date so the system software will be easy to update using “apt-get (dist-)upgrade”. The application can be updated using its own interface.

Backup – You can create tarball based backups to rebuild your server or to create a clone of your environment.

Tuning – openapp Tuning automatically tunes the database and web server to optimise performance on the WordPress, Joomla, MySQL and Ruby images.

We currently offer the following configurations:

• WordPress
• Joomla
• Ruby on Rails
• MySQL

The 4 images we currently offer will soon be expanded with Drupal, Apache Tomcat and Symphony appliances. After that we will add more popular applications. We will also make it easier to manage backups and updates via the interface.

Even though these packages carry a 1.0 label, they’re pretty fresh. We expect that they are mostly bug free, but any feedback is welcome. We would especially like to hear it if you get stuck anywhere and do not know what to do.