[yellowdog-announce] Terra Soft Ships Black Lab v2.1 with Advanced Cluster Mngt Technologies: PRESS RELEASE 2002 09/04

[Terra Soft Media Relations]

FULLY REDESIGNED BLACK LAB v2.1 OFFERS BPROC, SUPERMON, BLAST

Loveland, Colorado -- 4 September 2002 -- Terra Soft Solutions, Inc., the 
leading developer of integrated PowerPC Linux solutions is proud to announce 
Black Lab v2.1 for YDL, a radical departure from previous versions of Terra 
Soft's cluster management suite.

Black Lab v2.1 is a cluster build and management suite for HPC clusters
running Yellow Dog Linux. It offers single-click installation and
configuration, automated updates through apt-get, a graphical user interface 
designed for both new and savvy cluster managers, control of multiple 
clusters, and for those who prefer --command line control.

"We have completely redesigned the foundation on which Black Lab operates. 
Previous versions were based upon ssh while this release incorporates BProc 
3.0, Los Alamos National Lab technology that enables a low overhead, highly 
scalable cluster control system designed to operate with hundreds, even a 
thousand nodes," explains David Gelvin, lead Black Lab developer at Terra 
Soft.

At the heart of the new Black Lab is a unique PowerPC Linux kernel with both 
BProc 3.0 and Supermon built-in. Supermon provides near-realtime "life-signs" 
from each node such as available swap, memory, and CPU load averages. More 
than two dozen parameters are immediately available from the Black Lab 
Control Center graphical user interface.

Gelvin continues, "BProc automatically migrates applications and shared 
libraries from the server to selected nodes. This allows each node to operate 
with a minimal installation of Linux on its local drive. In fact, entire 
clusters can operate without drives local to the nodes, reducing complexity, 
power consumption, and mean time between failure."

Black Lab enables node drive reformatting and installation in approximately 
three minutes. Administrators may modify or design their own server-side node 
images to build nodes with only the software required for the intended 
function. Node images may install a full compliment of applications and 
libraries, just local swap, or net-boot a drive-less node.

More information about Black Lab v2.1 is available from: 
http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/products/blacklab/

In addition, Black Lab includes an AltiVec optimized YDL version of the 
bioinformatics library "Genentech BLAST", built upon the National Center for 
Biotechnology Information (NCBI) tool suite and popularized by Apple Computer 
earlier this year.

Finally, Black Lab includes a single-click, no configuration installation of 
the renowned Mandelbrot Fractal Set generator. Mandelbrot offers an 
aesthetically pleasing internode communication and CPU performance benchmark.

Black Lab v2.1 is available now from the Terra Soft online Store: 
http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/store/

Terra Soft Solutions, Inc. is a leading developer of integrated solutions for 
PowerPC. Yellow Dog Linux, the flagship product, has boosted viability of 
Linux on PowerPC microprocessors with support for Apple Xserve, GVS 9000, the 
briQ, and other PowerPC-based desktop, embedded, and HPC computers. Black Lab 
is an HPC cluster node buildand management suite.

For more information, visit http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/