Cartika gets nominated for a very prestigious Computerworld/SNW award
I was (and still am) quite thrilled to discover earlier today, that Cartika has been nominated for an award handed out by Computerworld/SNW. We are amongst a group of 5 finalists in the “Best Practices in Virtualization and Cloud Computing” category. The list of all available awards and their finalists can be seen here:
Computerworld/SNW Best Practices Awards Program
Our specific category and competition is as follows:
Best Practices in Virtualization and Cloud Computing:
- Almaviva Tele Sistemi Ferroviari (TSF) – Rome, Italy
- Applied Materials – Austin, Texas
- Cartika IT Solutions Inc. – Toronto, Canada
- Gilbarco Veeder-Root – Greensboro, North Carolina
- Sprint – Overland Park, Kansas
Some pretty stiff competition – and we wish all of our fellow finalists all the best. However, we have faith and confidence in our solutions, our technology and our offering. We have worked very hard to produce a best of breed Cloud Computing platform as a Service, and we greatly appreciate the recognition from an organization like Computerworld for being amongst the best in the world with respect to our innovation and implementation. Please wish both myself and the entire Cartika team the best of luck in Dallas on October 13th !
Cartika Adopts Ksplice Uptrack “Rebootless” Technology as Value Added Service for ALL Cartika Linux Hosting Customers
New capability gives customers unprecedented security and availability, with rebootless and automatic Linux kernel updates, at no extra charge. How does your provider protect you from root level Operating System exploits? Cartika servers, powered by KSplice, are automatically patched and updated against all new exploits – all without a reboot.
Toronto, Canada and Dallas, Texas, MONTH 09, 2010 — Cartika Inc, a leading provider of Web hosting services, announced it has adopted Ksplice Uptrack’s “rebootless” and automated Linux update technology, bringing its customers a new class of best-of-breed dedicated and virtual server offerings.
Cartika Internal Servers Upgraded over the last 2 nights
So, in preparing for our next round of Linux updates for all of our customer facing servers – we needed a production guinea pig to test on. Sure, we have gone through all of our required testing in devel environments. Everyone assured me things were good to go. So, here comes the litmus test – ok team – lets schedule the updates with our clients, announce all of the new fancy toys we will be giving them, and lets get going. This is when, as a business owner, you learn the true nature of the team you have accumulated. After years and years of going through this process, you quickly learn to spot confidence, or lack there of – in an initiative you push out. After getting a very strong sense that the team was nervous with proceeding, I asked what was wrong? The answers I got back, made it quite clear that everyone was confident – the required testing was done, but, there was an underlying sense of concern.
KSplice Agreement Signed
We have been watching KSplice for quite some time. Very intriguing product, but, most certainly a niche offering for those with only the highest uptime expectations and zero tolerance for any outages. What Ksplice does is offer a solution for Linux Kernel updates without requiring a physical reboot of the server. The issue for us with KSplice was 2 fold. 1) it was pretty expensive and 2) they did not offer CloudLinux support. The issue for price, at least for us, was not the actual sticker price – it is fair value for the very innovative service they offer. The issue for us was one of standardization. When dealing with an environment as dynamic as ours is, standardization, where ever possible – is a critical and key component to delivering the services we offer at the standard we and our customers expect. We were able to cut a deal with KSplice which made sense for both Cartika and KSplice which involved a large up front investment and commit on our part, but, ensured long term cost certainly and viability of this solutions as a standard within our environment. I simply must thank KSplice for the work they did here – listening to our requirements, understanding our environment and structuring a deal like this which benefits both companies now and in the future. We are very pleased to announce that KSplice will be available for ALL Linux hosting customers. This includes shared hosting customers, VPS, Cloud and Dedicated server customers – we are even including this as a value added service within our self managed offerings – at absolutely zero additional cost to our customers. Please check our forums for additional announcements and scheduling regarding the implementation of KSplice