The free version of KEMP Technologies’ popular LoadMaster™ application load balancer is now available for unlimited use, making it easy for IT developers and open source technology users to benefit from all the features of a full commercial-grade product at no cost. It can be downloaded at FreeLoadBalancer.com

Load balancing, security and traffic optimisation are all key enablers for application performance and functionality. Without these, application services will not perform as expected or have the required resilience.

During testing and development, open source and free components, including load balancers, are often used for a frictionless experience free of sales and procurement processes or the red tape that comes along with support and services contracts.

However, many of these solutions have limitations that make it impossible to truly replicate the interactions that will happen in a full production infrastructure once the development team creates the iterative link for the service or application to operations in the typical DevOps model.

KEMP’s new Free LoadMaster removes this challenge for the ‘application delivery’ piece of the puzzle by providing all of the core functionality available in the commercial version of the product at zero cost.

Now, a choice no longer has to be made between cost and functionality for development and test environments – whether on premise or in public cloud environments, such as Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure or VMware vCloud Air.

Peter Melerud, EVP of KEMP Technologies, says this flexibility and choice is a powerful enabler for emerging markets throughout Africa. “We speak of adding value to the growing domestic ADC market and operators that are investing into DevOps, which is a game-changer for businesses in competitive niche segments. Now, Kemp has demonstrated a new level of value within the DevOps arena. In a market that is driven by successful usage models and differentiated by strategic application, this offering represents a win-win for all parties.”

A cloud of opportunity

Emerging markets have an opportunity to invest in this technology to power up operations, leverage resources like the Cloud and acquire the flexibility and agility required to compete.

“DevOps is one of the top use cases for organisations migrating to off-premises cloud services, which we forecast to reach $200B by 2018,” said Cliff Grossner, Ph.D., directing analyst, data center, cloud and SDN at Infonetics Research, now part of IHS Inc. (NYSE: IHS). “Using exactly the same technology during app development and subsequent deployment brings agility to the DevOps process, streamlining application development and reducing costs. KEMP’s launch of a fully featured and free application load balancer is just one example of how it provides thought leadership in the ADC market.”

While many free and open source load balancers have a loose coupling between the underlying operating system and the actual load balancer, KEMP’s free LoadMaster is an optimized and hardened virtual appliance.

This keeps required host configuration to a minimum as well as allays concerns related to ensuring that the overall solution is configured correctly for protection against threats. Since application architecture and protocol usage can vary widely, a load balancer that has diverse capabilities is also important during mid-stage development.

Often times, open source and even entry-level commercial load balancers lack support for protocols other than HTTP/HTTPS and do not have the full breadth of capabilities that go along with modern application load balancers.

Free LoadMaster includes ALL of the core functionality expected from a commercial load balancer to enable full testing and validation of application interaction, including global site load balancing via KEMP’s GSLB functionality, authentication and single sign-on with the Edge Security Pack, and verification of custom web application firewall (WAF) rules prior to rolling them into production with the KEMP Web Application Firewall Pack (AFP) – all at no cost.

KEMP’s well-documented REST API (LMAPI) provides access to ~95% of all functionality inside of the product for workflow automation and scripting. Powershell and Java API wrappers provide flexibility for the language used to instantiate, instrument and integrate Free LoadMaster into common development and testing scenario workflows, and there are also plans to deliver a Puppet module in a future version. Community-driven and led support provides a venue for developer-centric collaboration and innovation on new use cases and methodologies in KEMP’s Help Center.

“In line with our core values, we are making application delivery technology even more accessible to the IT community with this free version of our flagship LoadMaster product,” stated Melerud. “We are looking forward to increased community engagement with this release and are happy to be able to contribute to the move to iterative application development models being adopted by organizations that are embracing DevOps principles.”