Try Open Source Apps on the Cloud

Click2try lets you run select open source applications on a virtual platform over the web, thus saving the time spent in deploying and testing on individual systems, before deciding to deploy it

Thursday, September 03, 2009

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A lot of times there is a need to test applications before you want to actually deploy them. And testing an application often means provisioning a server for it, deploying the required OS and later the application. Instead of going through this lengthy process, you can use the Click2try service.

It has an application catalog, which contains a list of open source applications that are available. Currently it has around 56 applications such as WordPress, eGroupware, SugarCRM, Openbravo and OpenERP. Whenever a user selects a particular application, click2try starts a virtual appliance of that application on its servers.

There are three plans available: first is free evaluation, where you can try an application for 4 hours or 7 days, whatever comes first. For continual access you can subscribe to the paid packages: for USD 40, you can get 1GB of disk space whereas for USD 60, the disk space available is 10GB with the ability to run 2 concurrent applications and access rights for 2 users.

How to use
Using click2try is simple, just sign up on the URL. Next, browse through the application catalog to select the application you wish to try. For trying out the application, you need a browser and Java 1.6 update 5.7.11 or above. Once you have selected an application, click on 'Try This Application' button. This will launch the application in a new window.

It will take a little while for the application to start for the first time, as a virtual machine of the application you have chosen, will be loaded on the click2try platform. Once an application has been loaded, the right side of the browser window will display the credentials required to start the application.

Postbook application running inside Cent OS, being used through Click2try.	Here, you can manage VM image of the application. You can also perform functions like compress, copy, etc.

You can manage an application from the application manager, where you can copy, shutdown, or delete, compress VM image of your application.Here you can also view alerts issued and disk space being used.

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