A small, secure, limited distro is a great idea, and I agree wholeheartedly
with your suggestions. Personally, I run OpenBSD which provides everything
for which you ask. However, generating another Linux distro isn't something
which the freeVSD team needs to be directing our limited resources towards
at this time. As previous messages in this thread have shown, there are all
sorts of distro's out there. Better to pick one of those that matches your
needs and use it as the base for your hosting server, rather then freeVSD
trying to impose a 'one-size fits all' distro. In time I would hope we can
begin approaching distributions to start including freeVSD, after all, it is
going to become the standard for providing virtual environments... ;-)
Recommending a Red Hat install to begin with simply provides a smaller
download requirement. While we are prinicipally aimed at ISPs, I would not
want us to exclude those who's bandwidth was more limited from experimenting
with freeVSD (If anyone can suggest a practical way to avoid downloading an
entire glibc for the sake of a minor patch, I'd love to hear it). I hope to
see freeVSD being used in a variety of possible applications, some are
discussed in the docs bundled with the package...
Perhaps we could compile a list of recommended distros on which to base
hosting servers? Suggestions? I suspect though that ISPs will, with tweaks
improvements and modifications, effectively be producing their own tailored
distro from whichever they choose to adopt...
Tim
> -----Original Message-----
> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Sent: 06 April 2001 10:11
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Subject: RE: PreBuilt Distro
>
>
> This sound great. However, I still see no reason why you should recommend
> a redhat install to begin with. It shouldn't be hard to have a 200 (Max)
> meg iso available for download that you would install this pre-built skels
> ontop of. Security would not be that big of an issue being as the base
> distro wouldn't even have programs that have ports open, no net apps.
> And, the only security concerns would be if a user of a VS broke out of
> the VS jail and had full access to the hosting server.
>
> Ryan
>
> On Fri, 6 Apr 2001, Tim Sellar wrote:
>
> > I have checked through this distro thread this morning but I am not sure
> > what people are wanting to achieve with a freeVSD distro. Presently, the
> > mechanism for generating a skel is not very sophisticated. It
> is intended to
> > allow a first-time installer to generate a working skel with the minimum
> > download required. That is the only reason we constantly
> recommend using a
> > full RedHat server installation.
> >
> > As you may have seen on the announce-list, we have gained the necessary
> > bandwidth allocation to start posting pre-built skels. To those
> who are not
> > bandwidth challenged (ISPs, the people freeVSD is developed for) these
> > should provide the preferred method of installation. Try it, it makes
> > installation a snap.
> >
> > With pre-built skels available the need to have a full server
> installation
> > is removed, you can strip your host server installation as far
> as you would
> > like. Indeed, you should be able to use a pre-built skel on a
> hosting server
> > using whatever your preferred distro might be. I would be very
> keen to hear
> > from people who have some success with this.
> >
> > The intention is to remove the need for everyone to reinvent a method of
> > getting MySQL/PHP etc into the skel. Just download a skel that includes
> > them. We are working to extend the applications presently
> offered (majordomo
> > and webalizer are coming soon) and intend to keep the skels we support
> > current with errata, bug/security fixes etc. (provided as
> .tar.gz patches -
> > not a repeat download).
> >
> > The question I have for the list now is, what do you want to see in the
> > skels? Do people want RedHat based skels? What applications are
> required?
> > What configurations?
> >
> > If people have produced their own skel which provides something
> unique or
> > fills a specific niche, let us know, and we can add it to the skels
> > collection.
> >
> > We are also putting the finishing touches to a mechanism for adding
> > pre-built packages to an existing skel. As we are still very
> RedHat based at
> > present this is taking the form of a vsd-rpm. This is
> essentially the RedHat
> > rpm rebuilt to include a couple of vsd-specific files. One of
> these files is
> > a script to integrate the package into each individual virtual server.
> >
> > For example, the vsd-rpm we are finishing at the moment is
> openldap. You can
> > use a new vsd-rpm command (just rpm --root really) to install
> the rpm into
> > an existing RH skel (files are not overwritten so virtual servers do not
> > need to be stopped). A new command vsd-linkvs then ripples through all
> > virtual servers establishing the necessary hard links to each
> virtual server
> > and copying the integration scripts. Now, comes the good bit.
> On reboot a
> > virtual server will check for any unexecuted integration script (from
> > rc.vsd) and run those which require execution. This completes the
> > installation of the package into the virtual server (changing
> the defaults
> > in ldap.conf to reflect the virtual servers name for example).
> And there you
> > go. As each virtual server is restarted the new application becomes
> > available, fully configured...
> >
> > It is hoped this will provide a mechanism whereby a standard skel can be
> > made available to which people may add/remove additional applications as
> > they wish.
> >
> > I think this provides a robust model for freeVSD to begin extending the
> > applications it provides. Any feedback would be greatly
> appreciated to let
> > us know if we are moving in the right direction...
> >
> > Tim
> >
> >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Dave Cost
> > > Sent: 06 April 2001 07:42
> > > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > > Subject: RE: PreBuilt Distro
> > >
> > >
> > > > > I just remembered the name it's http://www.rocklinux.org/
> > >
> > > > Hmm, might give it a look. However, it won't run on my
> > > systems, because I
> > > > compile everything from scratch, and only the programs I
> actually run.
> > >
> > > This is exactly what that distro is all about. You choose
> which packages,
> > > and it goes to the net, downloads their last versions and
> > > compiles.... with
> > > your intervention, of course.
> > >
> > >
> > > Dave
> >
> >
