[Web4lib] blue sky thinking

Thu Jul 27 12:09:39 EDT 2006

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On Jul 27, 2006, at 10:25 AM, Karen Coyle wrote:

> Keith D. Engwall wrote:
>> Aside from having a good firewall to sit behind, what is the  
>> biggest reason against doing this in-house?
>>
>> We just put together an Ubuntu linux server for about $600 with 1  
>> GB of RAM and 400 GB of storage space.
>>
>>
> Having heard many statements/arguments for using open source  
> software, about a year ago I decided to do the experiment myself. I  
> meant to keep notes about how long things took me, what problems I  
> ran into, etc. but it was so frustrating that I just couldn't  
> immortalize it in a fixed form. But it went something like this:
>
> 1) Get operating system and burn to disk. Since I was starting with  
> a blank slate, I had to find a copy of the OS and get it onto a CD  
> so I could install it. The particular application I was aiming at  
> wanted that to be Debian. This was easy, maybe a half hour (note: I  
> read the install documentation before downloading most software).

There are many who would say you picked the "wrong Linux Distro" to  
start but I applaud your efforts to stick with it. To this well  
seasoned Debian user the installer is not particularly "friendly".

http://www.arouse.net/despair-linux/debian.jpg

I guess that's fair.

This comes up a lot in flamewars -- anyone that prefers the command  
line to an ultra-shiny OS-X-ripoff-GUI is "elitist".  That's simply  
not the case.  Those people ("we") started using computers when there  
weren't shiny GUIs for Linux and we got used to the command line.   
Since we have several years of experience using the command line to  
do our work, we continue to do this and continue to recommend it to  
others.  For us, it's faster, better, and cheaper and we want to  
share that Goodness with you! (I'm using the command line as an  
example... you can apply the same logic to emacs/LaTeX vs.  
OpenOffice, GMail vs. Mutt, Linux vs. Windows, etc.)

>
> 2) Insert disk and boot up. Answer install questions. Here I got  
> stuck for an entire afternoon, believe it or not. First, there were  
> lots of questions to which I did not know the answer, so I was back  
> to my other machine to read more documentation. Then there was one  
> menu that absolutely stumped me -- not because I didn't know the  
> answer, but because I didn't know how to make an "x" appear before  
> my choices. I moved the cursor (tab tab tab) to the right spot and  
> typed "x" - nothing. I typed "a" "b" -- basically I went through  
> the entire keyboard - nothing. Added "ctrl" before them - nothing.  
> Shift - nothing. I looked at the online documentation. It just said  
> "select the ones you wish to install." Nothing on how to select.  
> The next day I tried again, and only by accident did I hit the  
> space bar - BINGO. So I wasted 4 hours because nowhere did it say  
> that the way to select an item in a menu is to use the space bar.  
> OK. I got over that.

That is also a fair evaluation of Debian's "Installer".

>
> 3) I now had a basic OS installed, but in order to run my app I  
> would need things like MySQL, Apache, etc. I would need "packages."  
> I have some experience with Red Hat (until they abandoned all of us  
> desktop users), with Suse, and with something else that I don't  
> remember now. Each has its own way to install software. I was on  
> the phone to a friend who is quite well versed in Unix, so he  
> offered to help me go through the package process. The first thing  
> he told me to do was type "dselect". De-select? To get things? No,  
> it means something like debian select, and you go through menus to  
> get to a huge list of possible software packages to select and  
> install. All I can remember about this is hours spent going through  
> lists, selecting something I needed, only to get a screen saying  
> something about dependencies, but no explanation of what I should  
> DO about them. Many many hours. Eventually, I had stuff installed,  
> but no idea if any of it would work. I didn't write it down, but  
> this took days -- days because I would occasionally install the  
> wrong thing and then want to uninstall it, or I'd go to install  
> something and it would ask me questions I couldn't answer. In the  
> end, the thing that always frustrates me about Unix is that I don't  
> know WHERE my installed software is. There's a logic to it all, I'm  
> sure, but I've yet to find a clear explanation.

I am REALLY surprised that the advice you got complicated your life  
thusly. DSelect is okay (for me) on the rare occasion that an  
upstream software simply won't work. For Apache/MySQL etc apt-get  
would have been "my" pick.

"sudo apt-get install {package-name}" would have done ALL of this for  
you and automated the entire extremely frustrating experience into a  
marvel.

Debian's packaging policy (I am picking Debian because I have used it  
for a while) is very strict about where files are installed. More on  
the QA procedures below

http://www.debian.org/doc/developers-reference/ch-developer-duties

>
> 4) Now I installed the app I wanted to run, although it then needed  
> some changes to things like Apache, etc., to work properly. I spent  
> another day or so doing all of this. In the end, I actually was  
> able to start my app. But at that point I had run out of steam, and  
> the machine has been turned off since then. Maybe I'll spend my  
> summer actually getting the app up and running as a functioning  
> system. Then again, maybe not.

Unfortunately here also you are right. System Administration tends to  
be a full time job. It is tedious, fascinating, challenging and  
boring all at the same time. I feel like we have veered sufficiently  
OT though. :-) I just try to make sure Debian doesn't continue to be  
represented in unflattering ways. :-)

IMHO if you had picked apt-get to install your packages, you probably  
would have spent all that energy with the custom configuration. I  
digress...

regards,
./fxk
===============
Francis Kayiwa
Library Systems Team
4-180, MC 234
T: +1.312.996.2716
W: http://www.uic.edu/~kayiwa
Key: http://tigger.uic.edu/~kayiwa/kayiwa.gpg

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