EMC has recently announced the release of Project CoprHD (“copperhead”), an open source version of EMC ViPR Controller embracing open development and a free “no restrictions” download for non-production use of its ScaleIO software.
Open source software is increasingly becoming a focal strategy for enterprise organisations to retain control of their business and innovate quickly to respond to changing demands in the market. Open source software and open development practices enable organisations to avoid platform lock-ins, participate in projects and modify software to suit their needs while enjoying the benefits and access to a community of like-minded developers. Commercial software developers can benefit through leveraging an ecosystem of developer partners to help stimulate community-driven innovation around their existing platforms.
ViPR Controller is storage automation software that centralises and transforms EMC and third-party storage into a simple, extensible and open platform and EMC will continue to sell the commercial version of Project CoprHD, the EMC ViPR Controller, as a fully supported offering.
Jeremy Burton, President Products and Marketing, EMC Corporation, “For anyone left confused, today’s announcements prove this is not your father’s EMC. By offering access to Project CoprHD, the open source version of EMC ViPR Controller and free downloads of EMC ScaleIO – two key enabling pieces of our Software-Defined Storage portfolio – EMC has turned a corner by delving more deeply into open, collaborative software development with our customers, partners, developers and competitors. This represents a massive shift in our strategy that we believe will help accelerate our customers’ efforts to develop new application-centric business models.”
Project CoprHD makes the code for ViPR Controller – all the storage automation and control functionality – open for community-driven development and enables customers, partners, developers and other storage vendors to access, expand and contribute to Project CoprHD’s breadth and depth of features and functionality. Positioned in the data centre as a single, open control plane for multivendor storage.
EMC is also investing engineering and community resources to contribute and support Project CoprHD. In addition, EMC also recently launched EMC {code}, the Community Onramp for Developer Enablement. EMC {code} is a technical evangelism team focused on enabling the DevOps community with EMC technology by contributing to open projects and DevOps events. Project CoprHD and EMC {code} are two essential components to EMC’s overall open source strategy.
EMC ScaleIO offers a software-only solution that turns existing server storage into shared block storage to help empower IT organisations with flexible and scalable performance and capacity on demand. EMC also announced the ScaleIO Product Community on the EMC Community Network (ECN). The ScaleIO Product Community is designed to be an interactive information exchange platform for technical support, questions for ScaleIO experts, product documentation, downloads, user guides, FAQs and training. Through this community, EMC will allow customers, partners and developers to download EMC ScaleIO software for free for non-production use, without restrictions on time or capacity.
