Has anyone heard of the Transname Patch for Linux? I downloaded it and am testing it now, and it seems to work very well! There is a version against kernel 2.0.25 on my WWW site that you can have.
Transnames promises to greatly simplify management of cluster workstations and large networks by allowing you to mount the root partion of your server as the root '/' partition of diskless or dataless clients! Sharable files are shared, and a suffix is added to the ones that should differ from machine to machine, which indicates to the kernel which version of a file it should let programs see. It does this by adding a filename translation feature to the Linux virtual filesystem layer that is selectable with a set of 'make menuconfig' or 'make xconfig' compile-time options in the filesystems section. The translation is active under directories owned by group 'adm' (configurable). Any filename in a directory of group 'adm' can be given a suffix consisting of a tagtype=tagname pair, and each machine using that filesystem will perform a name translation where it will only see the base filename meant for itself. If you have, say: /etc/init.d/rc3.d#ktype=client# /etc/init.d/rc3.d#ktype=server# ...and /etc & /etc/init.d are group 'adm', then the bootscripts on machines with kernels compiled with ktype=server will see the server setups, and ones with ktype=client will see the client setups! The README can explain Transnames better than I can, and you can find it through my page, near the top. I am running a DX4/120 40Mb with a kernel booting from the HD as a server, and on an ethernet I have another machine, a DX33 12Mb, booting from a floppy with ktype=server. The floppy I made using the nfsroot.txt instructions from linux/Docu... It boots using bootp; and the server has the bootp service in my xinetd.conf. The /etc/fstab#host=cherryflower# file mounts the server's /usr and /home partions, and a small 80Mb /aux drive in the client machine. I am able to run programs on either machine, sending their DISPLAYs to the X server on the rootfileserver. A thing we may try: At a local ISP (Internet Arena, inetarena.com), it may become possible to do sysadmin stuff from a workstation downstairs, (allowing the proprietor to keep an eye on his place while he gets some work done so he doesn't have to stay so late doing it after hours.) ...which normally runs Win95, by booting it as a diskless client from a floppy. It will mount the root partition of the Linux box upstairs, configured with the no_root_squash option to allow full access. I am unsure about swap partition shareing between win95 and Linux; perhaps the nfs-swap patch may be the answer here. CAVEATS: I could not get the /tmp directory structure to function the way they show it in their docs; instead, I placed /tmp dirs directly under my / for each machine: /tmp#ktype=server# /tmp#host=cherryflower# There is an option called 'failsafe'. It is meant to make it so that you can create a symlink to the server's version of a suffixed file, so that you can boot your un-transname-patched kernel and still have it find the files. With transname on, that symlink (file or tree) will appear to be a normal file or tree!!! If you 'rm -r' the tree it points to, it will suddenly become a symlink again. So, don't do that. I accidently rm -r'd my log directory, after discovering that both machines can use the same logfiles. (and should) The original patch applies almost cleanly to 2.0.25. There was one .rej which can be easily hand-fixed. Since CVS makes it so easy to do, I've uploaded a patch against 2.0.25 to my website. The patch includes the README under the Documantation directory, and two sample configuration files; the ones I'm using on my two computers here at home. :-) Let me know if you try this; an in-the-list discussion would be WELCOME! -- Karl M. Hegbloom <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> http://www.teleport.com/~karlheg (K0D) AYG-GE01 Portland, OR, USA :) Proudly running Linux 2.0.25 transname and Debian GNU public software! -- This message was distributed manually by [EMAIL PROTECTED] after the list initially failed to distribute it.