eLxr is an open source, enterprise-grade Linux distribution designed to address the specific challenges of near-edge networks and workloads.

For years, modern workloads have shifted to the cloud, with AWS being the most popular. And although this shift has cut down operating costs significantly, millions, if not billions, of dollars still are wasted to maintain all those virtual instances—even when they are not in use.

The cloud has become synonymous with all things data storage. It additionally equates to the many web-centric services accessing that same back-end data storage, but the term also has evolved to mean so much more. This weekend join us as we explore the cloud. CloudWatch Is of the Devil, but I Must Use It by Corey Quinn Let's talk about Amazon CloudWatch.

Let's talk about Amazon CloudWatch. For those fortunate enough to not be stuck in the weeds of Amazon Web Services (AWS), CloudWatch is, and I quote from the official AWS description, "a monitoring and management service built for developers, system operators, site reliability engineers (SRE), and IT managers." This is all well and good, except for the part where there isn't a single named constituency who enjoys working with the product. Allow me to dispense some monitoring heresy.

AI: open source's next big win.

Could the world's idle computers make the $200 billion cloud computing industry obsolete? In the final years of the Obama administration, it seemed that the world was witnessing the emergence of an odd alliance between the largest establishment tech companies and the traditionally anti-establishment community of independent techies. The highest profile case involved Apple and other major corporations siding with civil rights organizations to advocate against weakening device encryption on behalf of law enforcement, and it it led to a hope that these companies were finally seeing the profit potential in having secure, satisfied customers. That hope has now evaporated in the face of continuous betrayals of user trust, and rather than take it lying down, tech users are looking into alternative solutions that put them in control.

Nextcloud could be the first step toward replacing proprietary services like Dropbox and Skype. In its simplest form, the Nextcloud server is "just" a personal, free software alternative to services like Dropbox or iCloud. You can set it up so your files are always accessible via the internet, from wherever you are, and share them with your friends. However, Nextcloud can do so much more.

How to get started with AWS, install Apache, create an EFS volume and much more. The cloud is here to stay, regardless of how you access data day to day. Whether you are uploading and sharing new photos with friends in your social-media account or updating documents and spreadsheets alongside your peers in your office or school, chances are you're connecting to the cloud in some form or another.

An in-depth breakdown of the technologies involved in making up the cloud and a survey of cloud-service providers. The cloud has become synonymous with all things data storage. It additionally equates to the many web-centric services accessing that same back-end data storage. But the term also has evolved to mean so much more.

Linux Journal's April issue takes a Deep Dive Into the Cloud. Articles in this issue include:  

Vendor lock-in has moved from corporate infrastructure into the cloud, only this time many are all too happy to embrace it.

Duo Security has released CloudMapper, an open-source tool for visualizing Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud environments. When working with AWS, it's common to have a number of separate accounts run by different teams for different projects. Gaining an understanding of how those accounts are configured is best accomplished by visually displaying the resources of the account and how these resources can communicate. This complements a traditional asset inventory.