Client Meeting: Week 7

About the meeting

Date: 2025-08-26
Time: 13:58-14:53
Participants: León Jaramillo, Jerónimo Acosta, Juan Sebastián Jácome, Paula Llanos, Luis Torres
Recording: Link to SharePoint

AI-generated content disclaimer

The following is an AI-generated summary of the meeting based on the transcript.

Luis Miguel, Paula Ines, and the team explained progress to Leon Jaramillo on installing OpenStack using different methods, detailing technical challenges and solutions, with Juan Sebastian contributing to Terraform integration.
Installation Methods: Luis Miguel and Paula Ines described using both Colansible and DevStack. DevStack is lighter and developer-oriented, while Colansible is more complete and production-ready.
Technical Issues: The team faced static file loading problems in Horizon (CSS) due to accidental overwrites and Apache permission issues. Logs were reviewed, and file ownership was adjusted to fix the problem.
Infrastructure Requirements: Minimum requirements discussed were 8–16 GB RAM, 40–70 GB disk, and two network interfaces. Performance and costs of Azure were compared against local or institutional alternatives.
Terraform Integration: Juan Sebastian confirmed the OpenStack provider for Terraform, enabling automated provisioning of private cloud resources.

Leon Jaramillo suggested the team seek access to university servers, recommending contact with Professor Edwin Montoya to request resources and avoid high cloud costs.
University Contact: The team agreed to reach out to Edwin Montoya, professor of distributed systems, to explore access to university servers.
Formal Request: Leon Jaramillo drafted and sent a formal email to Edwin Montoya describing the project and requesting guidance and resources. The team will follow up and attempt a direct meeting.
Advantages of Local Infrastructure: Benefits include avoiding cloud costs and leaving infrastructure available for future student projects, increasing institutional impact.
Alternative Options: If university access is denied, the team considered personal hardware, with Luis Miguel offering his computer for deployment.

Leon Jaramillo guided the team on institutional and commercial impacts, suggesting a business model and positioning the project as a potential VMware alternative.
Institutional Impact: The project could serve as a VMware replacement at the university, enabling more open infrastructure management and long-term academic use.
Business Model: Leon explained viable business models for private cloud solutions, where companies save costs by migrating from public clouds to self-hosted solutions supported by third parties.
Business Plan: Luis Miguel asked about creating a business plan; Leon confirmed its relevance, particularly if offering support and maintenance services is considered.

Luis Miguel and Leon Jaramillo discussed validation strategies, emphasizing functional testing and external group participation.
Testing Strategies: Best validation would be allowing other groups to deploy on the infrastructure, complemented by resilience, reliability, and latency tests. Professors will be consulted for appropriate testing methodologies.

University Infrastructure Request: Consult Professor Edwin Nelson Montoya about accessing a permanent server or VM at the university to deploy the private cloud with OpenStack, and specify minimum requirements. (Luis Miguel, Paula Ines, Juan Sebastian)
Email Communication: Send Leon Jaramillo the email address of Professor Edwin Nelson Montoya and team members’ emails for inclusion in formal communication. (Luis Miguel)
Technical Specifications: Verify and define minimum hardware and OS requirements for installing OpenStack with Kolla Ansible, and consider requesting additional resources if possible. (Luis Miguel, Paula Ines, Juan Sebastian)
Infrastructure Testing and Validation: Consult the course professor on possible methods for testing infrastructure, including workflows and attributes such as resilience and reliability. (Luis Miguel)