diff --git a/functions-common b/functions-common
index 5284056..c096664 100644
--- a/functions-common
+++ b/functions-common
@@ -466,6 +466,13 @@
     [[ "$(uname -m)" == "$1" ]]
 }
 
+# Quick check for a rackspace host; n.b. rackspace provided images
+# have these Xen tools installed but a custom image may not.
+function is_rackspace {
+    [ -f /usr/bin/xenstore-ls ] && \
+        sudo /usr/bin/xenstore-ls vm-data | grep -q "Rackspace"
+}
+
 # Determine if current distribution is a Fedora-based distribution
 # (Fedora, RHEL, CentOS, etc).
 # is_fedora