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  • From: flux <flux AT sourcemage.org>
  • To: sm-discuss AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [SM-Discuss] ISO 0.10.0-test4 is released
  • Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2008 22:15:26 -0400

Arjan Bouter (abouter AT sourcemage.org) wrote [08.10.06 21:29]:
> I started updating netconf to make it write a valid /etc/network/interfaces
> file but on IRC i was told that was a waste of time as the smgl users can
> configure their networking manually.
>
> Shall I continue my work on netconf or does anyone know of an existing tool
> to
> replace it with?
>
> >
> > Imho, some default /etc/network/interfaces should be installed. Copy of
> > /usr/share/doc/ifupdown/examples/network-interfaces or just :
> > auto eth0
> > iface eth0 inet dhcp
>
> I agree, even if only as an example.
> Maybe add an example (commented out) for static networking.
>
> That should get 99% of the 1st time users online pretty quickly.

According to David Kowis (quote from IRC): "god damnit, man interfaces".
I agree with him, but I'm also not opposed to someone working on fixing
netconf to work with the new stuff. Having a tool people can use is fine
in my opinion, so long as it doesn't get in the way of people editing
things with a text editor. I present the analogy of sorcery: it has the
ncurses menu system as a UI, but you can also just hack up the sorcery
configs in a text editor quite easily. I don't think anyone is opposed
to having both options with sorcery, and I think as long as netconf is
done right (so that we really have _both_ options), no one will complain
if you do the extra work.

> Can we look for, or make an educated guess about, the spells needed during
> install? Like checking mounted filesystems, use of lvm and things like that?
> This way we keep the installation as small as possible while keeping the iso
> usable in pretty much every scenario.

This might be possible in the future, but doesn't even make sense right
now. Currently there are *no* optional spells, as we don't have the
infrastructure in place for dealing with optional installation material.
That's in development, but it probably won't be out for the first stable
that I produce, since right now getting a stable out the door to replace
the festering 0.9.6.3 is a little more pressing than getting one that
has everything we want it to. Since there are no optional spells,
detecting what the user would want installed wouldn't make sense because
they would still just be untarring one big system.tar.bz2 anyway.

In terms of the future though, I don't know if it would be a good idea
to autodetect like this, even if we could. It would mean that we are
pushing suggestions onto the SA based on the hardware seen at the time
of install, and what filesystems they have. What if they know they will
be plugging in an external harddrive later that they will need to
interface with? We can't detect that sort of thing, and installing only
the tools for the filesystems on their system would mean they wouldn't
be able to interface with the external disk until they cast those tools.
I think ultimately we should just provide the spells on the ISO and let
the SA determine everything. Eventually we may even want to make gcc an
"optional" spell for embedded systems (gasp!). This is for much later
though.

--
Justin "flux_control" Boffemmyer
Cauldron wizard and general mage
Source Mage GNU/Linux
http://www.sourcemage.org

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