Introduction to Ansible Builder

Hello and welcome to another introductory Ansible blog post, where we'll be covering a new command-line interface (CLI) tool, Ansible Builder. Please note that this article will cover some intermediate-level topics such as containers (Ansible Builder uses Podman by default), virtual environments, and Ansible Content Collections. If you have some familiarity with those topics, then read on to find out what Ansible Builder is, why it was developed, and how to use it. 

This project is currently in development upstream on GitHub and is not yet part of the Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform product.  As with all Red Hat software, our code is open and we have an open source development model for our enterprise software.  The goal of this blog post is to show the current status of this initiative, and start getting the community and customers comfortable with our methodologies, thought process, and concept of Execution Environments.  Feedback on this upstream project can be provided on GitHub via comments and issues, or provided via the various methods listed on our website.  There is also a great talk on AnsibleFest.com, titled “Creating and Using Ansible Execution Environments,” available on-demand, which Continue reading

Introduction to Ansible Builder

Hello and welcome to another introductory Ansible blog post, where we'll be covering a new command-line interface (CLI) tool, Ansible Builder. Please note that this article will cover some intermediate-level topics such as containers (Ansible Builder uses Podman by default), virtual environments, and Ansible Content Collections. If you have some familiarity with those topics, then read on to find out what Ansible Builder is, why it was developed, and how to use it. 

This project is currently in development upstream on GitHub and is not yet part of the Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform product.  As with all Red Hat software, our code is open and we have an open source development model for our enterprise software.  The goal of this blog post is to show the current status of this initiative, and start getting the community and customers comfortable with our methodologies, thought process, and concept of Execution Environments.  Feedback on this upstream project can be provided on GitHub via comments and issues, or provided via the various methods listed on our website.  There is also a great talk on AnsibleFest.com, titled “Creating and Using Ansible Execution Environments,” available on-demand, which Continue reading

Cloudflare Certifications

Cloudflare Certifications
Cloudflare Certifications

At Cloudflare, we prioritize initiatives that improve the security and privacy of our products and services. The security organization believes trust and transparency are foundational principles that are ingrained in what we build, the policies we set, and the data we protect. Many of our enterprise customers have stringent regulatory compliance obligations and require their cloud service providers like ourselves to provide assurance that we meet and exceed industry security standards. In the last couple of years, we’ve decided to invest in ways to make the evaluation of our security posture easier. We did so not only by obtaining recognized security certifications and reports in an aggressive timeline, but we also built a team that partners with our customers to provide transparency into our security and privacy practices.

Security Certifications & Reports

We understand the importance of providing transparency into our security processes, controls, and how our customers can continuously rely on them to operate effectively. Cloudflare complies with and supports the following standards:

Cloudflare Certifications

SOC-2 Type II / SOC 3 (Service Organizations Controls) - Cloudflare maintains SOC reports that include the security, confidentiality, and availability trust principles. The SOC-2 report provides assurance that our products and underlying infrastructure are secure Continue reading

Learning Networking Fundamentals at University?

One of my readers sent me this interesting question:

It begs the question in how far graduated students with a degree in computer science or applied IT infrastructure courses (on university or college level or equivalent) are actually aware of networking fundamentals. I work for a vendor independent networking firm and a lot of my new colleagues are college graduates. Positively, they are very well versed in automation, scripting and other programming skills, but I never asked them what actually happens when a packet traverses a network. I wonder what the result would be…

I can tell you what the result would be in my days: blank stares and confusion. I “enjoyed” a half-year course in computer networking that focused exclusively on history of networking and academic view of layering, and whatever I know about networking I learned after finishing my studies.

Learning Networking Fundamentals at University?

One of my readers sent me this interesting question:

It begs the question in how far graduated students with a degree in computer science or applied IT infrastructure courses (on university or college level or equivalent) are actually aware of networking fundamentals. I work for a vendor independent networking firm and a lot of my new colleagues are college graduates. Positively, they are very well versed in automation, scripting and other programming skills, but I never asked them what actually happens when a packet traverses a network. I wonder what the result would be…

I can tell you what the result would be in my days: blank stares and confusion. I “enjoyed” a half-year course in computer networking that focused exclusively on history of networking and academic view of layering, and whatever I know about networking I learned after finishing my studies.

Introducing Docker Engine 20.10

We are pleased to announce that we have completed the next major release of the Docker Engine 20.10. This release continues Docker’s investment in our community Engine adding multiple new features including support for cgroups V2, moving multiple features out of experimental including docker run --mount and rootless, along with a ton of other improvements to the API, client and build experience. The full list of changes can be found as part of our change log

Docker engine is the underlying tooling/client that enables users to easily build, manage, share and run their container objects on Linux. The Docker engine is made up of 3 core components:

  • A server with a long-running daemon process dockerd.
  • APIs which specify interfaces that programs can use to talk to and instruct the Docker daemon.
  • A command line interface (CLI) client docker.

For those who are curious about the recent questions about Docker Engine/K8s, please have a look at Dieu’s blog to learn more. 

Along with this I want to give a huge thank you to everyone in the community and all of our maintainers who have also contributed towards this Engine release. Without their contribution, hard work and support we Continue reading

Server Spending Holds Up Despite Every Damned Thing

Our increasingly networked and compute-intensive lives is driving the server business, and despite the cornucopia of fear, uncertainty, and doubt that spans the globe, the appetite for compute as expressed in shiny racks of servers or metal pizza boxes or an occasional tower sitting in a closet or under a desk continues despite the kind of consumption we have not seen since the dot-com boom.

Server Spending Holds Up Despite Every Damned Thing was written by Timothy Prickett Morgan at The Next Platform.

FCC’s 5G-frequency auction prompts $2 billion in bids on the first day

Licenses for premium wireless bandwidth sought by service providers to build out high-performance 5G networks is being auctioned off by the Federal Communications Commission, potentially grossing up to $50 billion and enabling features that enterprises desire most. 5G resources What is 5G? Fast wireless technology for enterprises and phones How 5G frequency affects range and speed Private 5G can solve some problems that Wi-Fi can’t Private 5G keeps Whirlpool driverless vehicles rolling 5G can make for cost-effective private backhaul CBRS can bring private 5G to enterprises The spectrum on the block is a piece of what’s known as the C-band, specifically the 280MHz-wide swath of it from 3.7GHz to 3.98GHz. It provides wider channels that support faster connections and lower latency than other ranges available to carriers, analysts say.To read this article in full, please click here

5G-frequency auction prompts $2 billion in bids on the first day

Licenses for premium wireless bandwidth sought by service providers to build out high-performance 5G networks is being auctioned off by the Federal Communications Commission, potentially grossing up to $50 billion and enabling features that enterprises desire most. 5G resources What is 5G? Fast wireless technology for enterprises and phones How 5G frequency affects range and speed Private 5G can solve some problems that Wi-Fi can’t Private 5G keeps Whirlpool driverless vehicles rolling 5G can make for cost-effective private backhaul CBRS can bring private 5G to enterprises The spectrum on the block is a piece of what’s known as the C-band, specifically the 280MHz-wide swath of it from 3.7GHz to 3.98GHz. It provides wider channels that support faster connections and lower latency than other ranges available to carriers, analysts say.To read this article in full, please click here

Supporting Open Source Projects at Docker

At Docker, we are committed to building a platform that enables collaboration and innovation within the development community. Last month, we announced the launch of a special program to expand our support for Open Source projects that use Docker. The eligible projects that meet the program’s requirements (ie. they must be open source and non-commercial) can request to have their respective OSS namespaces whitelisted and see their data-storage and data-egress restrictions lifted.

The projects we’re supporting, and the organizations behind them, are as diverse as they are numerous, ranging from independent researchers developing frameworks for machine learning, to academic consortia collecting environmental data to human rights NGOs building encryption tools. To date, we’re thrilled to see that more than 80 non-profit organizations, large and small, from the four corners of the world have joined the program. 

Here are but a few diverse projects we’re supporting: 

The Vaccine Impact Modelling Consortium aims to deliver more sustainable, efficient, and transparent approach to generating disease burden and vaccine impact estimates. 

farmOS is a web-based application for farm management, planning, and record keeping. It is developed by a community of farmers, developers, researchers, and organizations with the aim of providing a standard Continue reading

How Social Networking Has Changed in the Past Year Due to COVID-19

From the beginning of this year, people started working from home to reduce the spread of COVID-19. The routines of practically everyone changed one afternoon. More and more people’s work and daily lives have changed to working online and working from home.

How Social Networking Changed Since COVID-19 Began

In the beginning, resources helped social managers and teams navigate their responses to handle COVID-19. After posts were uploaded at the beginning of the year, using different social media platforms, we were able to get more information about the spread of the virus. For people and users of social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and others, optimal send times were used.

Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn had a lot more users because of the pandemic. Lots of them made use of these platforms to handle their jobs and to send them to appropriate individuals all around the world.

COVID-19 Changed the Prime Posting Times for Social Media Sites

The data that got pulled for the yearly review showed the best times to upload necessary data. From the middle of April 2020, the most important times to upload different things on social media and to go online first changed. In different Continue reading

The deal with DMCA 1201 reform

There are two fights in Congress now against the DMCA, the "Digital Millennium Copyright Act". One is over Section 512 covering "takedowns" on the web. The other is over Section 1201 covering "reverse engineering", which weakens cybersecurity.

Even before digital computers, since the 1880s, an important principle of cybersecurity has been openness and transparency ("Kerckhoff's Principle"). Only through making details public can security flaws be found, discussed, and fixed. This includes reverse-engineering to search for flaws.

Cybersecurity experts have long struggled against the ignorant who hold the naive belief we should instead coverup information, so that evildoers cannot find and exploit flaws. Surely, they believe, given just anybody access to critical details of our security weakens it. The ignorant have little faith in technology, that it can be made secure. They have more faith in government's ability to control information.

Technologists believe this information coverup hinders well-meaning people and protects the incompetent from embarrassment. When you hide information about how something works, you prevent people on your own side from discovering and fixing flaws. It also means that you can't hold those accountable for their security, since it's impossible to notice security flaws until after they've been exploited. At the Continue reading

Why We’re Helping to Measure the Internet

Here at the Internet Society, we’ve always known that the Internet can be an integral part of our existence. 2020 has shown us that we need stable, reliable, and available Internet for everyone, everywhere.

Much of our work – and the work of the organizations that facilitate the smooth functioning of the Internet – is focused on helping to increase the Internet’s reach, reliability, resilience, availability and security. One of the ways we can track whether these efforts are working is to collect and measure data on various facets of the Internet. This helps to build up a bigger picture of the Internet’s development over time and the resulting data can be used to inform and support policy, investment, and education.

Internet Insights

The Internet Society Insights platform was launched in December 2020 to provide a curated set of insights to help everyone gain deeper, data-driven insight into the Internet. We’re collating data from several trusted organizations – data partners – and will examine Internet trends, generate reports, and tell data-driven stories on how the Internet is evolving.

In this blog, we catch up with some of our data partners and prominent members of the Internet measurement community to find out more about why Continue reading

Freeze Your Credit Reports Before Identity Thieves Open Credit In Your Name

I found out today that I’m a victim of identify theft. Specifically, the bad guys have gotten a hold of my name, SSN, and probably other fun tidbits of my personal information. My best guess is that this is a result of the Equifax breach, not that it matters.

How Did I Notice The Identity Theft?

I am enrolled in a free credit monitoring service that notifies me when things happen on my credit report. (I’m not recommending a particular monitoring service. The one I’m using is tied to a bank where I’m a customer, and it’s good enough.) There were two “hard inquiries” listed within a few days of each other.

There are hard and soft inquiries. As I understand it, a hard inquiry means you’ve applied for credit, and the lending institution is trying to figure out whether or not they’ll extend you the money. If you see a hard inquiry and you’re not applying for credit, that’s a red flag. Soft inquiries are for things like pre-approved credit card offers that you didn’t ask for but receive in the mail anyway.

One of the hard inquiries was from the Small Business Association government agency. The thief Continue reading

New Report Explores COVID-19’s Impact on the Internet in Afghanistan, Nepal, and Sri Lanka

During the COVID-19 pandemic, many have shifted their day-to-day activities to online. To sustain the spike in Internet traffic, fast and affordable Internet service are now more critical than ever.

Yet, Ookla Insights shows that Internet speed in Afghanistan, Nepal, and Sri Lanka has declined since the pandemic. A new Internet Society report, The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Internet Performance in Afghanistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka, examines the impact of this fall in the performance and quality of Internet services in these countries on online users.

Informed by an online survey, taken by two hundred Internet users – predominantly tech-savvy city dwellers with access to the Internet – the report reveals there is a decline in Internet performance in the three countries. It shows that though the performance decline frustrated online users, more are increasingly spending on high-speed Internet.

The research advocates for governments and Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to take advantage of the situation and accelerate efforts to increase network capacity and reliability to address the performance gaps.

Here are some highlights from The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Internet Performance in Afghanistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka.

Fall in Internet Performance

Around 50-80% of Continue reading

Cloudflare’s privacy-first Web Analytics is now available for everyone

Cloudflare’s privacy-first Web Analytics is now available for everyone
Cloudflare’s privacy-first Web Analytics is now available for everyone

In September, we announced that we’re building a new, free Web Analytics product for the whole web. Today, I’m excited to announce that anyone can now sign up to use our new Web Analytics — even without changing your DNS settings. In other words, Cloudflare Web Analytics can now be deployed by adding an HTML snippet (in the same way many other popular web analytics tools are) making it easier than ever to use privacy-first tools to understand visitor behavior.

Why does the web need another analytics service?

Popular analytics vendors have business models driven by ad revenue. Using them implies a bargain: they track visitor behavior and create buyer profiles to retarget your visitors with ads; in exchange, you get free analytics.

At Cloudflare, our mission is to help build a better Internet, and part of that is to deliver essential web analytics to everyone with a website, without compromising user privacy. For free. We’ve never been interested in tracking users or selling advertising. We don’t want to know what you do on the Internet — it’s not our business.

Our customers have long relied on Cloudflare’s Analytics because we’re accurate, fast, and privacy-first. In September we released a Continue reading