Pica8 to Offer Free Trial of Network OS 

Pica8, Inc. today announced a new initiative to simplify adoption of Linux-based network operating systems (OS) available on bare metal switches by enabling users to download Pica8’s network OS for free. Pica8 pioneered open networking when it introduced PicOS, the first network OS that enables customers to easily migrate from conventional networking to SDN using commodity switches.

“By offering a free-trial download of PicOS, we want to demonstrate that high-performance network hardware and software can be bought separately, just the as server industry has successfully shown through its supply chain model for many years,” said Olivier Vautrin, head of Product Line Management for Pica8.

PicOS is easy to install, leveraging the open-source Open Network Install Environment (ONIE) boot loader, as well as Zero-Touch Provisioning (ZTP) tools that simplify the on-boarding of PicOS on pre-qualified bare metal switches. A PicOS license can be turned on at any time, enabling the user to have full access to the hardware as well as having service and support bundled for a fully integrated package. Licensing options include perpetual (one time), site, and pre-loaded systems.

“Offering free trial downloads of its PicOS operating system lowers the barrier to entry for organizations wanting to explore SDN,” said Brad Casemore, director of research for datacenter networks at IDC. “Pica8 recognizes that SDN is still a relatively new development for many customers, and it’s trying to make the transition easier and more cost-effective with a full-featured OS that runs on a number of bare-metal switches.”

PicOS is the first bare metal compatible network operating system that enables customers to seamlessly and easily integrate conventional networking and SDN.  PicOS provides extensive support for traditional switching and routing protocols that is extendable by SDN and OpenFlow capacity through Pica8’s Open-vSwitch (OVS) implementation. PicOS offers a unique, comprehensive and flexible configuration management environment from either a Linux shell, a feature-rich command line interface (CLI) or a comprehensive set of APIs (JSON RPC and OpenFlow). PicOS runs as an application in user space in an un-modified Linux kernel, leveraging kernel thread protection and compatibility with DevOps tools such as Chef and Puppet that are popular with server and system administrators.