Because I want to get to a place where running ansible and loading content can
be managed through an admin gui, I have started thinking about a command
server, a sort of callable job queue.
I want to give certain admin users the ability to launch commands which run as
root and may be long-running. Such commands should survive a restart and it
should be possible to monitor progress.
I am leaning towards the following approach:
1. A command server based on ZeroMQ implemented as a systemd service which is
always running as root.
2. Input to the command server is through a unix domain socket which is owned
by root and rw only for anyone in a group whose members are apache and probably
xsce-admin.
3. The command server uses sqlite for persistent storage owned by root and rw
by owner. Probably the schema distinguishes between command requests and jobs.
4. A php or python script invoked by an ajax call from the admin gui invokes a
command on the command server. The gui would be user/password protected.
5. The command server parses the request and checks if it has already been
requested.
If the command is new:
6. The command server logs the command into persistent storage and immediately
returns a response with probably OK or Error depending.
7. It translates it into a shell command based on internal logic. It NEVER
simply executes a command it gets from the gui.
8. The command server forks a child which runs the appropriate command in
background, returns its pid, and terminates. The pid is put in persistent
storage.
If the command is a duplicate:
9. The command server verifies that the command is running and to the extent
possible its percent of completion and returns status to the caller.
10. There would also be status commands to return a list of current jobs or
status of an active job and perhaps jobs marked active that are not running.
11. If the command server crashes or the system is restarted, the command
server attempts to restart active jobs.
Possible commands are:
rsync-iiab-content – copy various iiab files to their destination in /library.
The source is a parameter, but not the destination to keep from copying malware
into /usr/bin, etc. Some attempt would also be made to verify the source to
prevent malicious content.
rsync-rachel-content – similar
rsynce-kiwix-content – the list could grow
runtag
runansible
reboot
Tim
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