Contributing € 12
Libre VPS 1 GB RAM, 1 CPU core, 25 GB SSD storage, 1 month subscription
1 TB transfer, unlimited network in, 100 Mbps network out. Special campaign price.
> 03 Co-financiers
About this project
An eco-friendly data center that is based on 100% on libre software and runs libre-friendly hardware
Show list of needs
Infrastructure
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Minimum | Optimum |
|---|---|---|
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Phase 0: World's first libre datacentre!
Includes all essential infrastructure. Such as a great Internet connection with 10 GigE fiber connections (two separate paths to the building), Internet routing hardware, modular battery UPS in the case of short power outages, a diesel power generator that kicks in at longer outages, a modular and direct free or adiabatic cooling system, depending on the building. Additional compressor cooling for hot days, raised floor or top-of-the-rack air conveyance, electric power infrastructure and network cabling, server racks and switch cabinets and powerful libre-friendly Vikings D16 servers. Last not least, wom(en)-power to build and expand our front- and back-ends and employ sysadmins/technicians who take care of Vikings' infrastructure.
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€ 520.000 | |
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Phase 1: Data-Center - Cooling Redundancy
Phase 1 will implement redundant (>= 2n) direct-free or indirect adiabatic cooling and also double the cooling-power of the whole data center. Builds upon the technology used in phase 0.
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€ 120.000 | |
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Phase 2: Data-Center - Flywheel instead of battery UPS
Phase two will enable us to use flywheel technology instead of the battery-powered uninterruptable power supplies (UPS). Using kinetic energy located on the data-center floor itself, the flywheel provides constant power and ride-through, with significant reduction of footprint, operating costs and a higher energy efficiency (no additional cooling needed, too). The flywheel also eliminates the need for maintenance of space-hungry battery storage systems and greatly improves the ecological impact. Battery UPSs need constant cooling, more space and use lead-acid batteries which lead to environmental concerns (though most of their parts are being recycled).
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€ 75.000 | |
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Phase 3: Data-Center – Second Power Generator for redundancy
Additional power generator for improved reliability. Will be integrated into our power grid, in the case of long power outages.
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€ 45.000 |
Task
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Minimum | Optimum |
|---|---|---|
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Software Development: Allow to run the Vikings D16 Server with 256 GB RAM
Fixes a bug that allows to improve the RAM capacity from 128 GB to 256 GB RAM.
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€ 15.000 | |
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Software Development: openBMC baseband management console for the Vikings D16 Server
Additional development of a BMC solution for the Vikings D16 server based on the openBMC project. Empowering you to control your server even when it's off or doesn't have a network connection. The software will be released under a libre license, giving everybody the freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software.
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€ 30.000 | |
| Total | € 520.000 | € 805.000 |
Necessary
Supplemental
General information
Most hosting providers don't care about your freedom or your privacy. Since the Summer of Snowden what we have feared had become true: almost all modern hardware platforms used for hosting contain potential backdoors or exploitable bugs.
Vikings plans to change that. We will build a state-of-the-art data center that will cover all your hosting needs; based on fully libre[1] software, libre boot firmware and performant libre-friendly hardware. We will always respect your freedoms and your privacy - we don't spy on you.
Vikings will provide great services like email, VPS (virtual private servers), VPN (virtual private networks), dedicated servers and co-location.
No matter if you're a private user, a seasoned sysadmin or a large company, Vikings shuts out the middle-men and provides hosting services directly from the data center.
In short: 100% libre software, ranging from the server's boot firmware to the operating system and on to the software on top of that. With Vikings, security and privacy comes per default and you are in control of your computing and always will be.
Another goal is to perfect and release the software we're going to develop to run our platform, including the parts you won't see, as fully libre software.
More details are provided below the Services section.
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Services
All our services share the following basic features. They will be:
- based on 100% libre software and libre-friendly hardware with Libreboot, including our front- and back-ends
- running with certified green energy
- ad-free
- as secure as humanly possible
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backed with xkcd/705 & 806 compliant[2] customer service
There won't be exeptions. Never. Ever.Email
- between 2 and 25 GiB email storage included (upgradeable)
- IMAP support
- unrestricted user names
- between 5 and 25 custom aliases
- up to 75 MiB attachments included in all tariffs
- no promo message signature, we don't tamper with your data
- we will never read your email (many large providers scan your emails and sell your data - we don't!)
- quite effective anti-spam measures with standard tools, such as DNS-based blackhole lists
- no more spam folders you need to watch (unless you really want to)
- web-mailer will be included (may be introduced after a short delay)
- possible to stay completely anonymous, even we won't know your name
Virtual Private Servers - VPS
- between 1 and 80 GB of RAM (more available soon)
- between 25 and 200 GB SSD storage included (upgradeable)
- between 1 and 20 CPU cores
- SSDs only
- redundant & fast internet connection
- based on the qemu-kvm virtualization solution
- choice of distribution (we will begin with Debian images and expand from there)
- between 2 and 30 TB traffic inclusive (depending on tariff)
- /64 IPv6 subnet included
- 1 dedicated IPv4 address included (upgradeable)
- reverse DNS administration
Virtual Private Networks – VPN
- a VPN encrypts your connection and provides you with an IP address of Vikings'; protecting your privacy
- based on openVPN
- no traffic limit
- no logging of your connections
- up to 1 Gbps bandwidth per VPN
- IPv6 support
- possible to stay completely anonymous, even we won't know your name
Dedicated servers / Root servers
- rent your unshared server hosted in Vikings' data center
- based on Vikings D16 server-grade server hardware with libre boot firmware
- up to 32 CPU cores with up to 3.4GHz
- up to 128GB ECC RAM (256GB ECC RAM will be available soon)
- hard drive: SSDs and spinning rust available, software-RAID 1
- between 15 and 150 TB traffic inclusive (depends on tariff)
- /64 IPv6 subnet included
- 1 dedicated IPv4 address
- reverse DNS entries
Note: We only offer two configuration types during the campaign, which can be upgraded with add-on packages if needed.
Colocation
* self-contained rack segments with 11 or 23U compartments, up to a full rack with approx. 45U
* rack size at least 600mm x 1000mm / 23.6" x 39.7"
* 1 Gbps-port to router (upgradeable)
* 2 x 16A to 4 x 16 A, depending on rack size (upgradeable) @ 230 V power supply
* access to the colocation floor
* access to separate work area
* uninterrupted power supply (UPS)
* diesel power generator
* IPv6 subnet (/56) at no cost
* IPv4 subnet on request
* power charge based on power consumption (approximately 0,29 EUR/kWh incl. tax), no additional charge for costs of cooling etc.
* reverse DNS entries
* backup space available on request==========================================================
Vikings D16 Server
The "libre heart" our project will run on. The Vikings D16 server is a modern, re-branded ASUS KGPE-D16 G34 (AMD) server mainboard. The libre boot firmware was developed and released in 2016 on coreboot and then ported to Libreboot. It is one of the first perfomant server hardware that is actually available with libre boot firmware today. It is a good fit for hosting because of its versatility,efficiency and performance.
It runs without CPU microcode updates and/or binary blobs and allows:
- up to 2 CPUs with up to 3,4 GHz and 32 CPU cores
- 256 GB RAM (read more below)
- SATA and SAS connections and more
Vikings already runs the Vikings D16 server in a test environment and a few live servers. It is a stable system, as one would expect from high-end server hardware and we are very happy with it.
There are two additional development goals we have integrated into this campaign as stretch-goals:
- fix a bug/regression that allows to run the board with 256 GB RAM instead of currently 128 GB of RAM (currently more is possible, but unstable)
- develop a BMC (Baseboard Management Controller) module based on openBMC. This would allow to control the server when it's off or unreachable. You will get a remote screen and watch or control many other useful features, such as controlling fan speeds, sensor management, firmware flashing etc.
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Environment
Vikings aims to be as environmentally-friendly as possible. Almost 100% of the energy used inside a data center is converted to heat. As a result, the cooling of the server room is one of the critical aspects in operating a data center. Vikings will either use indirect adiabatic cooling, direct free cooling, indirect free cooling, riverine water or a combination of the aforementioned systems, depending on what's most suitable at the location we will choose. All methods have in common that they need very little or no mechanical cooling at all throughout the year, reducing the environmental impact to a minimum.
A stretch goal is to ban battery based UPSs out of the data center and rely on flywheel based UPSs instead. With the effect that less space is needed, no additional cooling is required so that the UPS can be placed inside the server room. What's more, a flywheel requires little maintenance over a long time period and offers a potential quick return on investment, allowing us to offer even better prices to you. Last, but certainly not least, the flywheel protects the environment as battery UPSs use lead-acid batteries that need replacement roughly every three years (though they are being recycled to a certain degree).
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"United in Diversity"
Very much in this spirit, we don't just want to provide our services to all. We also want you to be able to control your services and read our website in your favorite language. We will provide our website and front-ends in your language, beginning with the most common and then gradually improving the number of supported languages over time. Potentially, our support will also be able to communicate with you in multiple languages. The languages currently spoken are English and German. We're also able to communicate in basic French (CEFRl[3] level B1) and basic Dutch (level A2).
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DIN EN 50600 Compliance of the Data Center
The data center will be built in accordance to the European norm "DIN EN 50600 Information technology - Data center facilities and infrastructures", creating market transparency and comparability with regard to the most important parts of the data center itself, while it provides us with a basic, best-practice framework.
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Risks & Challenges, or: What could go wrong?
With a project of this very high complexity, there are numerous potential failure points. Our partners and us have significant experience regarding the building blocks of the project. We have tried to anticipate potential errors in planning and execution (as it is currently possible without knowing exactly yet where the location will be).
For the most part, all locations are quite similar and the plans and ideas we have can be adapted to each location or changed if needed.
That being said, certain unknowns still remains:
- Monetary goal
While libre software is important and the very basic foundation of our project, an attractive price tag for our backers and potential customers is just as important. That's why we have designed our data center to be modular from the start. That being said, we are planning to launch with a certain size that will allow us to offer our services at competitive prices. We have also included a small monetary buffer for unforseen expenses and would like to further the goals of libre software and our community as possible. Moreover, potentially develop and/or support new libre hardware and software on a long-term basis.
We are aware that the aforementioned points could risk the campaign's success, but we prefer being safe than sorry because a lot of people have spoken to us over the past weeks and they want our project to happen. We don't want to disappoint them by ceasing to exist after only a short time because we set our campaign goal to low.
- Time goal
Our video communicates an optimistic time-frame from the end of the campaign to completion of the project (three months). Because there is some uncertainty about the location, we can't plan for all eventualities, which could lead to parts that are not immediately available. Since we will be developing software for our front- and back-ends, there may also be further risks of delay ahead.
Should a delay occur, we will most likely either be able to circumnavigate or use a backup plan, keeping a potential delay to a minimum. As soon as we see that our campaign will be successful, we will begin to execute our plans.
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Choosing a reward & Payment
Goteo can accept credit cards, PayPal and bank transfer. We don't have a say in which payment providers they accept and the fact that a certain payment method is available, doesn't mean we endorse it.
Because this is a crowdfunding campaign, any reward you choose won't actually be charged until the campaign reaches the funding goal. If we don’t reach that goal, no credit cards will be charged and paid rewards by means other than credit card will be refunded.
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Video Show Notes
[1] On the present hardware platform, the "Vikings D16 Server", we currently use Libreboot (https://libreboot.org/) or de-blobbed coreboot (https://www.coreboot.org/) that replaces the proprietary boot firmware with libre boot firmware. Non-free BIOS/UEFI firmware often contains backdoors, can be slow and have severe bugs, where you are left helpless at the mercy of large companies. By contrast, libre boot firmware allows everyone to use, study, adapt and share software, with true control and ownership over their hardware technology. Often libre boot firmware is faster, more secure and more reliable than most non-free firmware, and can provide advanced features (such as encrypted /boot/, GPG signature checking before booting your kernel, ability to load an OS from the flash chip, and more).
[2] Freedom on the Net Survey Results, see https://freedomhouse.org/sites/default/files/FH_FOTN_2015Report.pdf
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References
[1] "Libre"
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Libre software compared with free software
The English language is special in this regard. The adjective “free” is used in one of two meanings: "for zero price" (gratis) and "with little or no restriction" (libre). This ambiguity of “free” can cause issues where the distinction is important, like in our case. Vikings provides their services “free as in freedom”, not “free as in free beer”. Our products come at a price – but they won't cost you your freedom :) This is the reason why we usually use the term "libre software" instead of "free software". -
Open-source software compared with libre software
Nearly all open source software is libre software. Practically speaking, the two terms describe the same category of software, but they stand for different values. To put it simply, open source is a development methodology and libre software is a social movement. For the libre software movement, libre software is an ethical imperative, essential respect for the users' freedom. It is said that the philosophy of open source considers issues in terms of how to improve software in a practical sense only.
While we prefer the term "libre software" over the term "open-source software" for various reasons, we understand and respect that others may not for their own reasons. In fact, we will not concern ourselves with petty terminology or patronize people for using specific terms; Vikings' only concern is user-freedom to the maximum possible. So, long live libre and open source software!
[2] xkcd/705 & xkcd/806 compatibility
- We take pride in our devotion to duty and providing ardent support. If you want to know what that means, take a look here:
https://xkcd.com/705/
https://xkcd.com/806/
[3] "Common European Framework of Reference for Languages", https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Reference_for_Languages
Main features and goals of the crowdfunding campaign
In short: 100% libre software, ranging from the server's boot firmware to the operating system and on to the software on top of that. With Vikings, security and privacy comes per default and you are in control of your computing and always will be.
Why this is important
Most hosting providers don't care about your freedom or your privacy. Since the Summer of Snowden what we have feared had become true: almost all modern hardware platforms used for hosting contain potential backdoors or exploitable bugs.
Vikings plans to change that. We will build a state-of-the-art data center that will cover all your hosting needs; based on fully libre[1] software, libre boot firmware and performant libre-friendly hardware. We will always respect your freedoms and your privacy - we don't spy on you.
Goals of the crowdfunding campaign
Vikings will provide great services like email, VPS (virtual private servers), VPN (virtual private networks), dedicated servers and co-location.
No matter if you're a private user, a seasoned sysadmin or a large company, Vikings shuts out the middle-men and provides hosting services directly from the data center.
==========================================================
Team & Partner Network
Vikings currently consists of a very small team, but is also supported by experienced partners. Our partners help us building the data center and developing the software for our platform. It is planned that some of our partners/team-members will be introduced during the campaign.
Once the campaign has ended successfully, we plan to expand our team and hire system administrators, developers and technicians. Some of the job vacancies will allow remote work from anywhere.
Social commitment
Shared materials
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Libre and gratis tech wiki
Up do date articles and a how-to wiki from sysadmins for sysadmins, users, businesses and everybody else.CC - Attribution - ShareAlike
Creative Commons License with attribution that only allows sharing under identical licensing conditions -
Front- and Backend Software
We will release the software we build our business on, for everybody to run, study, redistribute and modify.Affero General Public License
Affero General Public License for open networked software