[kordless]

I'm working on a highly distributed cloud framework that implements a Bitcoin operated OpenStack deployment. Basically, you install OpenStack at your house or small data center, launch a small instance with some Open Source code that turns the instance into a virtual appliance controller, and then join a pool of other providers/users. The pool operator provides search functions (like geo) and Bitcoin addresses so others can launch a server by just paying coin to a given address. No usernames, no passwords. Secure, reliable payments for providers to get ROI on excess/hobby capacity. Fast, easy, and dirt cheap.

The initial pool run by myself will provide low trust, low cost, highly transient instances. Chaos Monkey model. Market prices will likely fluctuate based on instance launch demand.

The concept encourages multiple pools running the code, so there will be future opportunity in building up a brand that attracts a given set of infrastructure providers and/or service companies to band together and coop. This could be done to leverage features like geo location, excess capacity requirements, feature sets, or trust levels through accreditation. Think about a handful of Silicon Valley companies sharing infrastructure among themselves and being able to balance the costs through Bitcoin. They could also share cooperatively in the areas of operational competence and security, given they have a good relationship between the companies (which many do).

For me, it's been a long haul working on the concept, especially considering I had to get OpenStack accessible for the average user. Now I'm mostly done with my OpenStack scripts, I'm finally cranking out the code for the controller and have it launching instances by sending in Bitcoin to the instance addresses. It's pretty slick when you use it.

More work has to be done, so it'll be a few months before I do a general release of the first pool. If you or anyone else is interested in this concept, building a new pool brand, or building the services that need to be build around it, hit me up. My email is in my profile.

[akg_67]

Like your concept. I am very interested in OpenStack myself, more look at it as a building block for private cloud. Sounds like you are trying to create a NOVA pool for virtual instanced from excess available CPU/memory capacity of the participant users. Not sure you really need to have OpenStack to achieve this. What will happen to all the virtual instances running on a NOVA node if a participant user turns off their NOVA node? Also, how are you going to handle shared storage side of OpenStack?

About 12 years ago, I was trying to do something similar pooling together excess storage capacity and tried to position as solution for SMB and consumer market (big mistake). A positioning and solution focusing on Disaster Recovery and enterprise most probably would have been more successful.

[kordless]

Here's the whitepaper: https://github.com/StackMonkey/xovio-pool/blob/master/whitep....

Each provider (a user) installs their own OpenStack cluster, which includes a nova controller. That cluster runs a virtual appliance who's job is to watch a given Bitcoin address for payments. If it sees a payment it either starts an instance or resets a counter to keep an instance running. Payments by users are taken by the pool operator. The pool then starts micro drips to the instance, in most cases half a cent or so.

The pool I'm going to run will be at stackmonkey.com. If a provider shuts off their controller, something crashes, or there's a rig failure, only a small percentage of the total number of instances will be affected. Payments won't matter because the instance costs are so low, and the drip can be turned off when the appliance stops responding to the pool controller.

OpenStack makes this handy because it handles all the heavy lifting for starting and stoping instances, doing network setup, images, instance sizes, etc.

Initial audience for this low trust pool will be hackers, developers, testers, tor nodes, individuals, etc. Very low cost, highly ephemeral instances.

There's a video here: https://vimeo.com/86717476

[akg_67]

Thanks for the whitepaper and video. So, at high level the resource provider is accepting Bitcoin instead of dollars to provide a virtual instance to a customer. Does this sums up what you are trying to do?

I have hard time imagining who might be the customer that will be willing to run their virtual instance on low trust ephemeral pool and for what purpose. What are some use cases for your solution? Is there such a low trust ephemeral pool already in existence that accepts dollars? Why would someone use this solution over just launching a VPS or EC2 instance?