IRC chat logs for #ltsp on irc.libera.chat (webchat)


Channel log from 24 September 2015   (all times are UTC)

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02:09
<dgroos>
Systems are working well :) Used clonezilla to clone the ‘golden image’ of my ltsp-pnp server and burn it to a new HD/PC and it worked great; not too much work to make that system work.
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02:15
<dgroos>
Tomorrow is a ‘test’ for my students on astronomy unit and I’d like them to be able to use a discussion web page where students have been building their own knowledge. Yet, I don’t want them to be able to use anything else on the internet.
02:16
Sooo… is there a way to make it so that they can’t access the web? That is, an easy way to Un-NAT the server w/out messing up other stuff?
02:17
I figure I can put the file in a shared location on the server and people can access the file via a browser. Should be slick…
02:24
<maldridge>
dgroos: so to be sure, you have a static page that requires no outside resources, and you want to host it locally and not nat for a while?
02:28
<dgroos>
exactly. Hosting would be just having the file on a shared location on the server.
02:29
It would still be best if the server itself had internet access…
02:42
Also, I’m assuming that a person could sit at their client, type in the ip of the server and the absolute path to the “whole web page” html file downloaded on to the server like this: file://192.168.67.1/home/me/Desktop/ I guess that’s untested, too…
02:43
oops, I mean file://192.168.67.1/home/me/Desktop/webpage.html
02:54
<maldridge>
yeah, that could work
02:54
you'd basically want to shut off ip forwarding
02:54
that would be the cheap way to kick clients offline
02:56
<dgroos>
very cool. How do I do that?
02:57
—shut off ip forwarding?
02:58
<maldridge>
sysctl -w net.ipv4.ip_forward=0
02:58
that would disable forwarding until the next reboot, and then the server would have internet, but wouldn't forwards client connections out
02:59
<dgroos>
Is that something that would interfere with Network Manager settings?
03:00
or, is that like you were talking about the last time, a setting that is stored in the RAM but not on the file system (thus the current conf setting would be returned upon reboot)?
03:05
BTW, I’ve got SmartBoard software working on 14.04 so my teacher computer can now use the attached smartboard.
03:12
<maldridge>
cool, smartboards were super buggy the last time I played with them, glad to hear they've improved
03:13
<dgroos>
Working great so far.
03:13
<maldridge>
that toggles a setting in the kernel, and is only toggled for the current running kernel. A reboot will reload the normal config from disk
03:14
<dgroos>
OK, thanks! I’ll test it tomorrow.
03:17
<maldridge>
np
03:17
you can replace the 0 with a 1 to restore normal operation
03:18
<dgroos>
Oh cool. Thanks.
03:26
Yeah, it was tough to install with its use of certificates but got it after *awhile*
03:27
maldridge Have a good eve and thanks again.
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15:47
<Donkey_>
i'm looking for a way to move a client entirely to virtual workstations
15:48
i would like to be able to host those workstations on a SAN and use pxe boot to get an ip address and access the virtual workstations
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15:55
<quinox>
I'm not sure what you mean with virtual workstation
15:56
<Donkey_>
a virtual machine on a san that can be utilized over the network
15:56
<quinox>
I think LTSP does what you want - there's the FAT client setup
15:56
depending on how you look at it thin clients can also be a solution
15:57
<Donkey_>
i'm thinking so, but what i have in my head may not work in reality
15:58
<quinox>
at my workplace we use a fat client setup, all machines are without harddrives and boot from the network and run everything locally
15:58
the home folder comes directly from the main server, so you can sit anywhere and resume your work
15:58
when a PC dies we throw it out, buy new hardware, hook it up to the network and voilá
15:58
<Donkey_>
yeah thats basically what i want
15:59
diskless terminals that boot to linux vms on a san
15:59
<quinox>
thin client setup, the LTSP default, also does that
15:59
but there the clients are simply display units, the processes run server-side
16:00
you can also mix the two, have some slower hardware run in thin client setup, and more beefier machines run in fat client mode
16:01
then LTSP might be a good solution
16:01
<Donkey_>
yeah of all the research i've done this seems to be closest to what i want
16:02
so i just need a better idea of what sort of config i'm looking at
16:02
i have a Synology RS2416
16:02
<quinox>
http://wiki.ltsp.org/wiki/Concepts#How_LTSP_Works
16:02
<Donkey_>
which can host the workstations
16:03
<quinox>
okay
16:03
looks nice
16:03
<Donkey_>
but the particulars of getting the terminals to boot to the right machine are a bit complicated
16:04
<quinox>
LTSP is very flexible
16:05
You can start with the default installation, a linux host that runs TFTP to load the initial linux kernel + the filesystem + the home folders
16:05
you could "cheat" by mounting the Synology on that linux host
16:06
then the clients talk to the linux host, and the linux host talks to the Synology
16:06
<vagrantc>
Donkey_: what do you mean by "virtal workstations" and "vms" ?
16:07
Donkey_: do you actually need a virtualized environment for some reason? fat clients don't typically default to any sort of virtualization
16:07
<Donkey_>
If i set up a pxe server that binds particular IPs to the client MAC, would it be possible to load a particular virtual machine based on that
16:08
<vagrantc>
it's possible, but the question is why to make sure we're speaking about the same things...
16:08
<Donkey_>
the client i'm working with has very particular settings that need to be in place for each user, and they're all different
16:09
using a virtual workstation gives them that ability while minimizing points of failure
16:09
<vagrantc>
i guess you could use the kiosk plugin to run the virtual machine software fullscreen. heh. :)
16:10
<quinox>
you mean you literally want to run VirtualBox?
16:10
<Donkey_>
no
16:11
i want to load the entire linux workstation from pxe boot
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16:11
<Donkey_>
let me make a diagram to make it more clear
16:12
<vagrantc>
LTSP clients all load the same OS image, effectively.
16:13
there are options to tweak settings at boot, or run different things
16:13
but if those settings are per-user, fat clients might be able to meet your requirements without having to do full virtualization
16:14
Donkey_: but it's still unclear to me if we mean the same thing when you and i say "virtualization"
16:15
<Donkey_>
this is why i will make a diagram
16:17
<vagrantc>
you can boot an abitrary number of images over the network, but that's not really the point of LTSP ... the point of LTSP is to manage a single image that supports many network booted clients.
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16:17
<vagrantc>
you could use LTSP and configure it to boot a different image for every client, but that's requires a lot more maintenance overhead
16:18
<quinox>
depending on what needs to be different it can also be solved by a script running at boot-time
16:20
we install everything anybody needs into the same image, it doesn't matter if there are program on it that aren't used by certain people
16:20
<Donkey_>
yeah
16:21
<quinox>
if you can give some specifics you might get more tuned answers instead of what's generally possible :-)
16:21* quinox goes AFK to catch a dinner now
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16:24
<vagrantc>
exactly
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16:27
<Donkey_>
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4b0trmrq6KEU1hueVQ5elNPbDQ/view?usp=sharing
16:33
<alkisg>
Donkey_: will user A require a completely different installation than user B? Or they both can have the same programs installed, and each one would use only the programs he wants?
16:34
vagrantc: I tried a jessie + ltsp-pnp installation, it went pretty well but it had issues with overlayfs and I had to manually download the newer ltsp-update-image and initramfs/hooks/ltsp. Are there plans to do a backport for jessie?
16:35
<Donkey_>
User A will need a completely different installation.
16:35
there are things that cannot be shared inbetween the users
16:36
<alkisg>
Usually ltsp works by having the same root file system for all users, and of course having a different /home/username for each user
16:36
But you can have as many installations as you want. We call them "chroots" or "images" here.
16:36
<Donkey_>
If you think of them more like groups that would probably be more accurate; group a will need to load VM A environment etc
16:37
<alkisg>
Cloning the initial chroot is as easy as cp -a /opt/ltsp/i386 /opt/ltsp/donkey
16:37
Gotcha, you can call them chroots from now on in order for us #ltsp'ers to understand you better.
16:38
<Donkey_>
ok
16:38
<alkisg>
And you can specify by mac which pc will load which chroot
16:38
<Donkey_>
brilliant
16:39
<alkisg>
You can maintain the chroots either with ltsp-chroot + console, which is the normal method, or with virtualbox if you don't like the console much.
16:40
<Donkey_>
the console should be fine i think. now with this configuration, it is still possible to separate everyone's home drive etc correct?
16:40
<alkisg>
Sure
16:40
<Donkey_>
ok
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16:43
<Donkey_>
this has been helpful
16:43
thank you
16:46
<alkisg>
You're welcome
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16:53
<vagrantc>
alkisg: jessie doesn't have overlayfs ... ?
16:54
<alkisg>
vagrantc: it doesn't have a newer kernel? /me wonders how fnctl installed it then...
16:55
<vagrantc>
alkisg: there are newer kernels in backports
16:55
<alkisg>
I remember the 686-pae variant, but not the version
16:55
<vagrantc>
alkisg: overlayfs wasn't mainlined until 3.18 ... jessie has 3.16
16:55
<alkisg>
Hmm... I definately saw the problem "module overlay not found", and the newer ltsp-update-image fixed it
16:55
and the newer hooks/ltsp as well, for the client side
16:55
<vagrantc>
ah.
16:56
it still tries to blindly load it
16:56
i think the newer code is more elegant
16:56
<alkisg>
Also, I had problems uninstalling cryptsetup and nfs-kernel-server
16:56
<vagrantc>
i'll put some time into backports once i get a new LTSP upload in... :)
16:57
<alkisg>
I had to uninstall ltsp-server-standalone and use ltsp-server instead
16:57
Maybe those could be recommends: and not depends: ?
16:57
(I used NBD)
16:57
<vagrantc>
the whole point of ltsp-server-standalone is to depend on all the defaults used
16:58
if you want recommends, use ltsp-server :P
16:58
<alkisg>
Why "depend" and not "recommend"?
16:58
E.g. you did put | dnsmasq there, didn't you?
16:58
<vagrantc>
because you can end up with a broken install.
16:58
if it were just recommends, there'd be no point in having -standalone
16:58
<alkisg>
The root file system can be provided with nfs, nbd or aoe
16:58
It would make sense to me to depend or recommend any one of them
16:59
<vagrantc>
hence, two packages.
16:59
<alkisg>
I thought the ltsp-server package provides only a few of the requirements, not all of them
16:59
<vagrantc>
NBD is required for NBD swap, which is a required feature, which would mean that NBD always gets installed and NFS doesn't get installed.
16:59
alkisg: correct.
17:00
<alkisg>
Well, it doesn't make much sense to me, but I won't argue more, it's easy to make do as it is
17:00
Although cryptsetup makes the initramfs larger
17:01* alkisg used ENCRYPT_SWAP=False to disable it because he didn't want to use ltsp-client-core instead of ltsp-client
17:01
<vagrantc>
basically, ltsp-server* predate recommends actually being viable
17:01
when recommends were essentially ignored...
17:01
<alkisg>
It's easy to write "--install-recommends" in our how-to's now...
17:02
<vagrantc>
if you really don't want package x, y or z installed, install ltsp-server. if you don't mind having an extra dependency or two, install ltsp-server-standalone.
17:02
the big problem with recommends is upgrades ... they can result in recommends not being satisfied.
17:03
<alkisg>
If they're not satisfied, and they're Depends:, ...the setup is screwed :)
17:03
Or am I misunderstanding this?
17:03
<vagrantc>
exactly, which means it isn't a hidden upgrade problem.
17:04
granted, unless we fix overlay FS support with NFS ... this will soon become a moot point.
17:04
<alkisg>
Well if NFS is no longer available and it's Depends:, the user can do nothing, while if it's Recommends:, they can switch to NBD
17:04
Hehe true
17:05
Also ltsp-pnp is used more these days, it might make sense to have common instructions in both debian and ubuntu
17:05
<vagrantc>
but "switch to NBD" requires manual configuration
17:05
<alkisg>
Hopefully that could easily be arranged with ltsp-config <something>
17:06* vagrantc would rather see bug reports that the setup is completely broken than people quietly switch to some other boot method while the default remains broken
17:06
<alkisg>
If NFS was broken, I'm sure it would be reported outside of the LTSP camp...
17:06
<vagrantc>
i'm also targetting a stable release, not something that's likely to change regularly.
17:06
<alkisg>
But LTSP users would be able to continue working while they waited for the problem to be resolved
17:07
Anyway, those are small plus + minuses, not worth talking over them too much
17:07
<vagrantc>
and they still could, but not using ltsp-server-standalone
17:07
<alkisg>
For me, the idea is "if ltsp supports nfs, nbd or aoe, it should depend on either one of them"
17:07
But np I'm ok with ltsp-server
17:08
About cryptsetup, I'd prefer it if it was Recommends:, as it makes the initramfs larger,
17:08
but ok with that as well, np
17:09
<vagrantc>
i think there may be problems with the use of cryptsetup as well
17:09
that needs some work
17:10
though i've never been confortable with remote swap being unencrypted
17:10
<alkisg>
LDM_DIRECTX is worse :)
17:10* vagrantc never really liked that either
17:10
<alkisg>
Well, old clients are unusuable without it... so it's either insecure or nothing in some cases
17:11* vagrantc nods
17:11
<alkisg>
Another small issue I saw is systemd complaining about "setting up network devices", and waiting there for several seconds before continuing and booting successfully
17:11
<vagrantc>
which is why i didn't walk away when people introduced it :)
17:11
<alkisg>
I checked and "eth0 manual" was correctly inserted in /etc/network/interfaces
17:11
So while network-manager respects that, something in systemd still complains and causes a lag with it
17:12
<vagrantc>
hrm.
17:12
<alkisg>
Maybe we should generate an override service for the network
17:12
Have you noticed that one?
17:12
<vagrantc>
most of the clients i've tested with boot in ~15-30 seconds, and i don't even see boot messages
17:13
maybe they would boot in 10-20 seconds if we fixed that :)
17:13
<alkisg>
Haha
17:17
vagrantc: about this one: https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=730587
17:18
I'm planning to write an init-ltsp.d script to chmod -x gnome-keyring-daemon if it's a broken version
17:18
I don't have any better workarounds
17:18
And I don't see any feedback from upstream
17:18
(ah, chmod -x only if the user is using sshfs, i.e. nothing for /home in fstab...)
17:19
I do have 65000+ temp files for each one of my users here... :-/
17:19
<vagrantc>
alkisg: chmod -x fixes the issue?
17:20
<alkisg>
Well, it completely prevents the keyring daemon from running
17:20
<vagrantc>
oh, you prevent it from starting at all ... got it
17:20
<alkisg>
So some parts are not working at all,
17:20
e.g. seahorse, which manages the user keyrings
17:20
It wouldn't work anyway, now at least it launches and only shows a few of the things there, like available ssh keys...
17:21
My problem is that the user is not notified that ltsp has a hack for a serious bug, because it has no real workaround or solution (other than swithing to nfs)
17:26
cyberorg: do you have this file in opensuse? /lib/systemd/system/ifup@.service - if so, could you pastebin it?
17:27
Or if someone has access to a fedora installation with systemd.... ^
17:32
It seems to be debian-specific, so I'll put that in the Debian dir, not in Common
17:33
http://paste.debian.net/313247
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18:08
<Icedmang>
Hello, I haven't been on IRC for a number of years, but here I am. I have a question about whether LTSP (currently installed on my Ubuntu 14.04 server) can build a windows client that a thin-client can boot? I've tried googling but its an ugly swamp to wade through
18:11
<vagrantc>
you can use xfreerdp or rdesktop to connect to a windows RDP server
18:11
there's also some support for RDP in LDM, though i haven't experimented with it much
18:13
<Icedmang>
I assume you are also suggesting I need to have a Windows RDP server installed as a VM on my server?
18:14
(assuming I don't want to run a separate Windows RDP Server)
18:55
<vagrantc>
Icedmang: not really understanding what you mean, then.
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19:26
<gehidore>
well that was fun
19:26
teach me to update core without updating aur packages... that I depend on ...
19:26
woops, wrong channel sorry
19:57
<vagrantc>
you've just outed yourself as an archlinux user, eh? :)
20:01
<gehidore>
always
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20:49
<work_alkisg>
Icedmang: you can run windows VMs over ltsp as well, you don't strictly need a windows server
20:49
But windows is not designed for network booting, that's why you need linux at the bottom
20:50
It can boot over iscsi, but that would require a different virtual disk for each client
20:50
plus some manual configuration...
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