In Ubuntu Server Edition 9.10: No hardware required, Matt Zimmerman announces that from now on, "every release of Ubuntu Server Edition is simultaneously available on EC2".
Amazon's EC2 documentation says: "the ability to create and publish kernels and ramdisks is restricted to Amazon EC2 and selected vendors". Canonical appears to be one of those vendors. Their newest EC2 AMI's contain modules from an Ubuntu build of linux-xen (2.6.27-23).
Eric Hammond, who has been for a while making both Ubuntu and Debian images for EC2 says
Historically on EC2, neither Debian nor Ubuntu have had completely Debian and Ubuntu stacks from the kernel up. Instead, we've had to make do with patching the runtime on top of older kernels (2.6.16, 2.6.18, 2.6.21) built for other distros (Fedora Core).
Amazingly, we've managed to hold this together and keep it running well for a couple years on EC2.
He goes on to describe current problems with eg, Debian's new udev version and the available EC2 kernels. Furthermore, anticipating today's news:
When the point comes where I am not publishing the base Ubuntu server AMIs, it will not make sense for me to publish new Debian AMIs either.
Those wanting to run Debian on EC2 will be stuck with duct-taping together Debian with the available kernels.
Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe Ubuntu is actually working with Debian's kernel team, and will be letting them use Canonical's access to publish AKI's of official Debian kernels. Or maybe Ubuntu is working with Debian's kernel team to include identical linux-xen kernel in Debian, so the Ubuntu AKI's could be used.
But appearances are that this is another case where Ubuntu has managed to take a situation that was less than ideal for all concerned, and turn it into an advantage for Ubuntu, while at the same time being a unfixable loss for Debian.
My mouse's perspective is that a) we maybe only have so many losses left in us (altho we did get thru that whole dinosaur thing ok!) and b) King Kong is still oddly dependent on his mammilian heritage to be up there with his head in the cloud, tearing at Godzilla and stamping on us.
"Maybe Ubuntu is actually working with Debian's kernel team, and will be letting them use Canonical's access to publish AKI's of official Debian kernels. Or maybe Ubuntu is working with Debian's kernel team to include identical linux-xen kernel in Debian, so the Ubuntu AKI's could be used."
Nope.
If Eric Hammond stops publishing Debian AMIs, there is no reason why someone with an interest in Debian and EC2 (say, a Debian developer like yourself) could not pick up where he left off, and even use his images as a base to work from.
Such a person could even go as far as to write an email to Amazon and ask them about what would be required to publish Debian kernels, and work with the Debian kernel team to provide a suitable kernel. One could even use the Ubuntu EC2 kernel tree as a base, or share patches with it, or use the Ubuntu AKI to bootstrap.
In short, I don't see why you interpret this as a conflict between Debian and Ubuntu, or why you think Debian is incapable of "fixing" its kernels for EC2. Instead of lamenting the fact that Canonical has done some work to improve Ubuntu, why not improve Debian? You are welcome to use our work as a reference or to use the code directly.
Anytime you have these concerns about Ubuntu, or just want more information about what we're doing so that you can more easily copy the work into Debian, you can always email me. I'll give you my phone number as well if you prefer to talk that way. I noticed it this time, but in general, writing on your blog about it is not the best way to get my attention.
Hi Joey,
I'm a bit confused by the idea of this being an "unfixable loss for Debian". The only major change here is that Eric is no longer preparing AMIs for Debian, which doesn't require any special privileges on Amazon - anyone who wants to have a Debian AMI can continue to prepare one. Other than that, I would think that having 2.6.27 AKI/ARI available is a good thing for Debian on EC2, since this kernel is nearer the ones shipped in lenny (and available in squeeze), so should simplify the process of preparing a Debian AMI in the first place (i.e.: ideally it's nothing more than debootstrapping onto a loopback image at this point)?
There is nothing whatsoever which is exclusionary about the work we have done to support EC2, and therefore we have done nothing which prevents Debian from doing the same thing. 100% of the source code for the Ubuntu EC2 bits is open source, published on Launchpad. That is the real work which was done, as publishing it on EC2 is trivial. If you need help putting the technical pieces together, I would be glad to walk you through it.
The fact that Amazon limits the capability to publish new kernels has nothing to do with Canonical or Ubuntu, though. That is their choice, and their business. However, if a commercial agreement of some kind is required, isn't this why SPI exists? Or perhaps a third party company which is run by one or more Debian developers?
You make it seem like you're looking for reasons why Debian can't do this, instead of finding a way that it can. This kind of self-pity isn't going to help Debian achieve its goals.