Amahi Blog

We have been busy updating several of your favorite Amahi applications over the past few weeks.

One of the most frequent issues that we hear about is the need to update an application to a newer version but the data from the old version may be essentially lost, unless you know how to back it up with things like phpMyBackup or phpMyAdmin (which can be error-prone).

No more! Steps have been taken to help protect your data for upgrade. Keeping with our data integrity mantra, we are proud to announce a new feature to Amahi!

We have deployed a new feature called “autobackup” for a selected group of applications.  These apps will automatically back up the existing database when select applications are uninstalled. When you install the new version, your data is imported, automatically!

These apps include some big ones like Drupal, Horde, FengOffice, eyeOS and Gallery. We are working to make this feature available to all apps that have data going forward. Tell us your favorite application you would like to see this feature for and we will do that first.

We hope you enjoy the updated versions for your HDA. It’s your network and Amahi helps you run it easily!

Thank you for your continued support!

The Amahi Team

The news is out – Amahi will be at Computex in Taiwan, in the Intel pavilion.

Amahi will be demonstrating the latest release of the Home Digital Assistant (HDA) home server running on an Intel Atom processor N270 series for embedded computing. The HDA is what Intel calls an “Open Consumer Applications Platform.” A new class of device  integrating a home server with home router functionality. The demonstration will take place in the Intel pavilion from June 2nd to 6th, 2009.

Above: Partial image of Intel Demo Brief with Amahi at Computex 2009

The demonstration will showcase an HDA operating in the booth at Computex as well as VPN access to a remote system (in California). The demo will cover:

• the basic platform functionality for user and share creation, and networking control
• one-click application installation
  • applications demonstrated will include media management, media serving, photo galleries, video surveillance applications and more!
• cross platform support for Linux, Windows and Apple client machines will be highlighted

We have heard from many new users that they had no idea Amahi exists (there has been little if any marketing to date). This show might be what just changes that perception.

This is an exciting time for the community and Amahi – enjoy it!

The home networking space is starting to evolve. Many device manufacturers and creating targeted devices to meet specific needs. Even AT&T is marketing a simple device, the AT&T home manager. Of course this is a limited, “fixed” device. A home with Amahi and any browser capable device (netbook, iPhone or even a desktop) delivers all the functionality of the “Home Manager” plus a whole lot more. Take the applications announced today: there are even a few home inventory applications!

So, on to the meat of today’s message: thanks to the community (special thanks to damato, rampage and those  members of the tester sub-community) the flow of one-click installable applications available on Amahi continues.

The new applications being announced today (in now particular order) are:

As the number of applications expands on Amahi, the team is feeling the pressure to make it easier for the community to:

1. find the specific application that does exactly what is wanted
2. review applications (there are already multiple applications that do the same/similar “jobs”)
3. propose new applications to add

Be rest assured, we are doing our best to get this done for you. And, to tease those who are actually reading this, there is some exciting news coming in early June. Stay tuned!

Now someone famous is asking for Amahi, and he does not even know it!

Scott Adams recent blog entry addresses his personal need for a home server. Quoting him directly:

If you’re wondering where the next economic boom will come from, I think it will involve a central computer for your home that handles all of your entertainment, home controller, and computing needs.

Before you rush to tell me “That already exists,” and then provide links to things that only do a few functions, let me assure you that it doesn’t exist. But there is no reason to think it won’t be developed in the future.

I came to this conclusion while searching for a home system that would deliver recorded TV shows and music (iTunes) to several rooms in the house, with each room controlling its own content. I was surprised to learn that no such thing exists.

Not surprisingly, as a member of the Amahi community, I take offense at the comment “let me assure you that it does not exist.” It does exist – Amahi is designed with just this objective in mind!

Scott lists his immediate requirements as delivering recorded TV as streaming music (iTunes). Well, those in the community know that MythTV (backend server) for recording and streaming TV is in alpha for one-click deployment on Amahi, and AmahiTunes is already available as a one-click install for streaming music from/to iTunes.

Scott continues in his blog to dream about more advanced home control: lighting, video games, home security, climate control, etc. Well, Amahi already delivers on some of these (eg. video surveillance with ZoneMinder one-click installer), and as an expandable platform it is only a matter of time before the open source community packages more solutions for one-click deployment.

My question for Scott Adams is, “What would Dilbert say about the quality of research Scott did searching for a home server?”

The rebellion strikes back!

The Amahi team is proud to announce the launch of the Amahi Web App Gallery.

That’s right! Once you have installed Amahi you can simply visit the list of available applications and install them on your home server with a single click!

Watch the screencast of the one-click installer in action with Gallery 2 the after the break below!

Applications being released with this announcement include:

• Gallery2 , popular photo gallery application
• uShare, UPnP and DLNA audio/visual media server
• Jinzora, easy to use media streaming and management solution
• Wordpress, the leading blogging application
• MediaWiki, the same Wiki package that got Wikipedia going!
• Transmission, slick bit torrent client
• SABnzbd , simple to use binary news reader
• AjaXplorer, amazing, full featured, browser based, file navigator
• WebVNC, remotely control your server through a browser
• and more … with many others coming soon!

Packaging applications for one-click install is pretty simple. Indeed, one Linux n00b in the community (with some help in IRC channel) packaged the Jinzora media server!

If you have a favourite application you’d like to make available through one-click install see our how to contribute an application page.

Many many thanks to our great community for helping Amahi get to this important stage!

And now, back to Star Wars analogies – the Rebels have more applications in our gallery than the Empire. Let’s work to keep it that way!

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