Open Systems. DBMS. 2015, Volume 23, Number 1COVER FEATURES
OpenStack
Automating the Management of Testing Environments

Companies often buy equipment for «future proofing» thus insuring themselves against possible mishaps caused by an ill preparedness of testing environment infrastructure, which usually leads to expensive systems standing idle. Application management solutions like Murano OpenStack could provide more efficient resource utilization by means of fast deployment of new software and products.
Valery Bezrukov, Yuri Konov, Ilya Stechkin ({vbezrukov, ykonov, istechkin}@mirantis.com), director of business development, manager, cloud infrastructure architect, Mirantis

Practical Use of OpenStack as a Virtual Service Platform
Companies working in mass market are looking for platforms capable of supporting high-load cloud services that provide expenditures transparency, as well as lower the costs of IT maintenance and development. One such platform is Ru-Stack, created using OpenStack technologies.
Yaroslav Farobin (farobin@servionica.ru), department manager, Servionica

OpenStack and Group Policy Model
The use expansion of OpenStack is hindered by a lack of interoperability with existing systems supporting critical business processes as well as by the absence of cooperation between new and traditional services. Group policy model offered by Cisco simplifies the coexistence of services built on top of OpenStack with other corporate services.
Dmitry Khoroshikh (dkhorosh@cisco.com), business development manager, Cisco Systems

PLATFORMS
Challenges and Opportunities for Data-Intensive Computing in the Cloud
Now running mostly on high-performance computers, data-intensive applications pose several important challenges as they move toward cloud deployment.
Eun-Sung Jung (esjung@mcs.anl.gov), postdoctoral researcher, Rajkumar Kettimuthu (kettimut@mcs.anl.gov), project leader, Mathematics and Computer Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory

Lossless Data Storage
The importance of data integrity is increasingly recognized by businesses and other organizations. Many of them have bought some components of backup systems, yet only few have fully integrated solutions. HP BURA covers all data backup and archiving processes down to backing up the data stored on individual workstations and mobile devices.
Alexey Polyakov (Aleksey.Polyakov@hp.com), manager of data storage systems department, HP

DBMS
Scalable Log Data Store
The amount of data that companies have to store today is constantly growing, which raises the issue of optimizing the storage. A lion’s share of those data consist of various log files that currently often have no use at all, but still could be useful in the future. How Apache Hadoop can be employed for efficient log data storing and subsequent processing?
Dmitry Morozov (morozov@custis.ru), lead expert on engineering IT infrastructure solutions, CUSTIS Group

DBMS: a Problem of Choice
Today, Russia faces a pressing problem of losing dependence on external technology, which is especially important for information systems used in public sector. Usually, a database constitutes a key part of such systems. The issues of choosing and evaluating databases for the creation of platforms allowing the seamless and efficient development and maintenance of critical solutions become increasingly urgent.
Sergey Muraviev (s.muraviev@kret.com), head of secure radioelectronic IT unit, Sergey Dvoryankin (s.dvoryankin@kret.com), department director, Igor Nasenkov (nasenkov@kret.com), deputy CEO, KRET

SOFTWARE ENGINEERING
Open Architecture of Information Systems
Modern information systems increasingly interact with each other rather than with their users. What should be done for equally efficient interaction with both users and other machines? One solution is through using an Open Architecture of Information Systems.
Dmitry Volkov (vdv@stacksoft.ru), director of business development, Stack Soft

INTEGRATION
Big Data and Organization Design
Big Data have changed the traditional view of the role of information in an organization, opening new opportunities, and creating the conditions for the emergence of new business models based on the use of information as a valuable asset. At the same time, Big Data require changes in information governance to create conditions for the integration of this new concept with the goals and objectives of the enterprise.
Svetlana Maltseva (smaltseva@hse.ru), professor, National Research University - Higher School of Economics

OPINION
Import Substitution: Means or Ends?
Issues of import substitution in software area are actively debated now in Russia, yet as a rule, this is done in vague and broad wording that eschew setting clear objectives and criteria. However, radical changes in Russian software industry require an extremely pragmatic approach and a clear understanding of what should be done.
Konstantin Seleznyov (skostik@relex.ru), lead software engineer, Vitaly Maximov (vitamax@relex.ru), deputy CEO, Relex Group

Import Substitution: Risks and Illusions
The issue of import substitution in Russia is highly debated these days with free software, including databases, being offered as a kind of silver bullet. It is stated that free databases are less costly and more reliable, secure, faster, and powerful than commercial ones, and that the migration onto them is seamless. A three decades experience of using Oracle database shows that this is not true.
Alexander Lashmanov (alexander.lashmanov@fors.ru), CEO, I-FORS

OS MEETING ROOM
Open Data is Property of the People

Why should public administration open their data, what barriers are there that prevent doing this, and why businesses need open data?
Natalya Dubova (dubova@osp.ru), Scientific Editor, Open Systems. DBMS

STANDARDS
Enabling the Internet of Things
Merging the virtual World Wide Web with nearby physical devices that are part of the Internet of Things gives anyone with a mobile device and the appropriate authorization the power to monitor or control anything.
Roy Want (roywant@gmail.com), Bill N. Schilit (schilit@gmail.com), research scientists, Scott Jenson (scott@jenson.org), user experience strategist, Google

OS ACADEMY. LIBRARY
«Phoenix» is Ready to Take Off

Natalya Dubova (dubova@osp.ru), Scientific Editor, Open Systems. DBMS

From Open Systems to Open Government
The October, November and December issues of Computer Magazine (IEEE Computer Society, Vol. 47, No. 10, 11 and 12, 2014) cover the topics of interoperability in e-government, network management from the cloud, and underutilized IT resources.
Sergey Kuznetsov (kuzloc@ispras.ru), professor, Moscow State University

Milestones in the History of Russian Computing Machinery
Gelya Ruzaykin