What are the differences between Version 4 and Version 5 RightImages?

RightLink Support

One of the key differences between v4 and v5 RightImages is that v5 (and later) RightImages install a RightLink agent on the instance that allows RightScale to more efficiently communicate with the instance.   A RightLink-enabled RightImage is also required in order to run Chef recipes on an instance.  Other software tools like Puppet can be installed and configured on v4 or v5 RightImages.

SSH Access (Linux only)

v4 RightImages
For instances launched with v4 RightImages, the EC2 SSH Key is used to establish SSH (shell) access to the instance.  When you launch an EC2 instance, you must select an EC2 SSH Key that will be used to establish a secure client-server connection with the instance.  Therefore, if you want to SSH into the instance from inside the RightScale Dashboard, you must use an SSH Key for which the private key material is available and not missing.  The private key material in only sent once when the SSH Key is created.  So if you're using an EC2 SSH Key that you created outside the RightScale platform, you will need to manually copy the private key material in the Dashboard for the matching key.

v5 RightImages
For instances launched with v5 RightImages, RightScale's Managed SSH feature will be used to establish SSH (shell) access to the instance. You can either use the unique SSH Key that RightScale generates for each user or upload your own SSH Key.  You will still need to select an EC2 SSH Key in order to launch the instance, however since it's no longer used to establish an SSH console session from the RightScale Dashboard, even if the EC2 SSH Key has missing private key material, you will still be able to SSH into the instance. 

Execution of Scripts

The execution of RightScripts is supported on Servers that are launched with v4 or v5 RightImages.  However, the manner in which those scripts are run on a Server differs depending on whether it's a v4 or v5 and later RightImage.

v4 RightImages
For Servers that are launched with v4 RightImages (e.g. RightImage CentOS_5.2_i386_v4.2.5), RightScale uses the EC2 SSH Key in order to SSH into an instance over port 22 and run the script(s).  Therefore, it's important that RightScale has the private key material for the Server's assigned EC2 SSH Key, otherwise RightScale will not be able to establish a secure client-server connection in order to run the specified RightScripts on the Server.  In order to successfully launch a Server in EC2 using a v4 RightImage where the specified boot scripts can be run on the Server, the following cloud resources must be configured properly:

• EC2 SSH Key (with private key material) - RightScale must provide the matching private key material in order to establish a client-server connection to the instance.
• EC2 Security Group - One of the EC2 Security Groups that the instance is launched with must have port 22 open to -any- TCP/IP address. 

If you launch a Server with an EC2 SSH Key for which RightScale does not have the private key material stored in the RightScale database, the Server will become "stranded in booting" because RightScale will be unable to complete the boot process and run the specified Boot Scripts. 

Note: Even though the launched Server is stranded in booting you will continue to be charged by AWS for hourly usage of that instance.

v5 RightImages
For Servers launched with v5 RightImages, bi-directional communication is used between the RightLink agent on the Server and RightScale's core site for coordinating the execution of scripts on a Server.  Instead of using the EC2 SSH Key to SSH into an instance over port 22 and run the script (as with v4 RightImages), a RightLink agent is installed on the instance and is used for communicating with the RightScale platform over a secure connection. 

Summary

• Supports all functionality of v4 RightImages and also includes many bug fixes
• Removal of 15 minute limit for Operational Scripts.  With v4 RightImages, a script would automatically timeout if it required more than 15 minutes to complete the task.
• Faster Execution of Operational Scripts
• Managed SSH
• Chef Support
• Use of Tags for Automation via API.  One of the ways RightScale uses tags with v5 RightImages is to automatically connect application servers with load balancers running HAProxy.  Instead of relying on correctly defined DNS settings and A Records to make the necessary connections (as in v4 RightImages), each server is simply tagged as an "application" server or "load balancer" so that when an application server boots up, it will automatically connect to the correct load balancing pool based on its tags.