What We’ve Shipped: IP Re-Routing, Dynamic Billing & More
We’re constantly developing Bytemark Cloud with new features and enhancements based upon your feedback.
In the last month, we’ve made a wide range of changes, including some new features and some major changes behind the scenes to continue to improve reliability and performance.
I’m excited to share 2 major updates with you today, as well as several refinements to make Bytemark Cloud even easier to use.
IP Re-Routing
You can now re-route additional IP addresses within zones to the Panel, enabling continuous application deployment and other creative deployments.
Once re-routed, you’ll need to update your networking settings on your server – our support team is happy to assist with this. We’re so excited to see how you use this!
Dynamic Billing
When we launched Bytemark Cloud in June 2011, we started charging in-advance for Bytemark Cloud. This works perfectly when you rarely change your account and your Bytemark Cloud usage is consistently the same, using servers for months at a time.
In June 2018, the world has changed. Development is fast-paced and our customers expect to be able to use Bytemark Cloud dynamically, using our cloud servers as required, often for hours at a time. This leads to inconsistent usage patterns and complicated invoices.
I’m proud to share we’re now testing ‘Dynamic Billing’ for Bytemark Cloud in an invite-only private beta with eligible customers.
How it works
Whereas our in-advance billing refunds and re-issues invoices upon account changes, ‘Dynamic Billing’ charges you for your total usage at the end of the month, calculated per minute. Not only does this simplify invoices, but it also enables you to monitor your server usage closely, ensuring your infrastructure is efficient and on budget.
Update: beta testing has since closed and dynamic billing is now the default for all new customers. Find out what changes we made following the testing here.
Panel Improvements
We’ve improved Panel to make it easier to use, including making it clearer what volumes will be wiped upon re-imaging a server. We’ll also now prompt you to accept our new terms and GDPR friendly data processing agreement (if you haven’t already).
Rescue Environment
We’ve made updates to our rescue options. It is now possible to access gparted at the boot (PXE) prompt which will boot the machine into a graphical environment. You can read more about this here: https://docs.bytemark.co.uk/article/resizing-existing-discs/
Thanks for Reading!
If you haven’t tried Bytemark Cloud before, or haven’t checked it out in a few months, we’d encourage you to take a look. We offer a generous 7 day trial with no obligation to continue- so give us a try and let us know what you think!
