Cloud image use cases

[Matt Micene]

>
> So what I'm really after is what sets Fedora Cloud apart from every
> other distro cloud image.  What usecases is it better at than {Ubuntu,
> SuSE, <whatever>}.


Given that logic, Fedora should stop everything but Atomic.  The Cloud
image should be Fedora optimized for the cloud instance experience, just
like Workstation is Fedora optimized for the desktop user experience. It
shouldn't be massively different for Cloud than Server, b/c the use case
between Server and Cloud isn't that large.

Fedora should have a "typical" answer for what use cases are better than
XYZ distro, that isn't dependent on a (frankly) edge use case like a
container specific platform.  Atomic is a new and interesting thing, with a
very small and specific purpose and design.  That's a good thing and
shouldn't be used as an argument against the Cloud image.  Or even as a
comparison.


> > Depends: for end-users, it could mean a smaller bill each month on
> storage.
>
>

I'm not a fan of this argument for minimizing the Cloud experience as the
real cost of "magnetic" storage in most cloud providers is small.  If
pulling Python saves 1GB of on disk installed OS space, then users in a AWS
environment save $0.24 a month / server in the most expensive storage in
the most expensive region (Sao Paolo if you're curious).  And I'm sure we
aren't shaving that much off the image.  I have to think the level of
engineering required to majorly redesign things around minimization efforts
are likely mis-placed if end user cost is the main metric.

That's where the Stack&Env WG work is important for us, as it could become
> an asset against our other offers.
>

This ^^^  I'm a firm believer that the SCL work that got dropped is a huge
value when we want to talk about differentiating Fedora as a Cloud or
Server platform.  The ability to cleanly separate system requirements from
end-user platforms is huge.  I think the Cloud SIG should be jumping up and
down on getting SCLs back on track.

- Matt M

On Fri, Jul 10, 2015 at 11:42 AM, Josh Boyer <jwboyer at fedoraproject.org>
wrote:

> On Fri, Jul 10, 2015 at 11:26 AM, Joe Brockmeier <jzb at redhat.com> wrote:
> > On 07/10/2015 12:59 PM, Josh Boyer wrote:
> >>
> >> The atomic image is squarely targeted at being small, and for running
> >> containers.  It is somewhat positioned as a CoreOS solution.  With
> >> that being the case, I'm curious how the cloud image is different and
> >> not a repetitive image simply not using the atomic mechanisms.
> >
> > That's sort of a key difference -- atomic == I can't just dnf install
> > things. cloud == I can add on what I want the way I'm used to doing.
> > (e.g., not containerized)
>
> Yes, absolutely.  However, if that is the only difference then I'm not
> sure how compelling it is when you compare it to all the other images
> provided elsewhere that let you do that already.  Conversely, atomic
> is compelling _because_ of the Atomic platform.  Atomic has novelty
> (for now), decent technical advantages, and a lot more marketing
> behind it.
>
> So what I'm really after is what sets Fedora Cloud apart from every
> other distro cloud image.  What usecases is it better at than {Ubuntu,
> SuSE, <whatever>}.  How should it be positioned so the people want to
> use it over those, etc.  Fedora, in the Cloud space, is still behind
> in market share compared to the rest of the Linux world.  I'm really
> curious if that can be overcome, or if instead the focus should be on
> Atomic entirely because it has a better chance.
>
> (To be fair, Workstation and Server also have the same questions to
> answer in comparison to their peers.  However, they have both history
> and familiarity on their side.  Fedora has traditionally been a
> "desktop" OS and Server can feed off of RHEL which dominates the
> enterprise space.  Cloud doesn't share that luxury.)
>
> josh
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