Hello list, I recently got directed here from ubuntu-devel-discuss with my pet-peeves on how i think Ubuntu Server is not really tailored for servers [anymore], the thread of which you can read up on here: https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel-discuss/2013-January/014163.html
I wrote about these issues in an earlier thread on this list too: https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-server/2011-April/thread.html Basically it boils down to quotes from the above shown threads; | "I like to be able to watch the [boot] process happen. [ .. ] I don't | care if my server looks pretty when it's booting. I do care that I | can see at what point in the boot process a catastrophic failure has | occurred." and; | "[ .. ] under no circumstance should a server blindly come up in a mode | in which it cannot display to a virtual console. Never. Ever. No Excuse." In fact, and i really, *really* don't mean to insult any one involved in ubuntu-server development, but i kind-of wonder if the people putting all this hard work in ubuntu-server are actually using ubuntu-server on a daily basis on more than one system like a lot of sysadmins like myself do. Me and my team manage roughly 200 servers running Ubuntu. We encounter situations where we have old CRT monitors, shady KVM-switches and crappy ILOM/ELOM/DRAC java implementations with which we have to manage our servers. Situations where (we/the customer) botched something up which makes the bootprocess fail, etc. Framebuffers, or rather 'special video modes', are somewhat unstable on server hardware and/or plain right incompatible with shady KVM implementations which are, unfortunately, commonly used in colocated environments. What i really want to know is 'why' all this is necessary on server installs ad what we / i can do to get a clearer view on what is actually going on during boot. The path Ubuntu Server followed from Ubuntu Desktop is to depend on framebuffers and upstart during boot and to switch off the GRUB menu by default. I'd like to propose the (re)introduction of a special '-server' kernel which has no framebuffers enabled? Some mechanism to tune GRUB into verbose, 80x24 text mode when installed on a Server setup? Implement 'tee(1)' functionality in Upstart perhaps? Is any of this discussable? With warm regards, -Sander. -- | 0 bottles of beer on the wall, 0 bottles of beer, you take 1 down, | pass it around, 4294967295 bottles of beer on the wall. | 4096R/20CC6CD2 - 6D40 1A20 B9AA 87D4 84C7 FBD6 F3A9 9442 20CC 6CD2 -- ubuntu-server mailing list [email protected] https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-server More info: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ServerTeam
