Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[inode0]

On Tue, Jan 8, 2013 at 2:15 PM, Kevin Fenzi  wrote:
> Greetings.
>
> I've whipped up the early ideas of a way to replace (most) spins with
> something that is more generic and useful. I have signed up for a
> fudcon session to brainstorm on this idea and see if it can be beaten
> into a plan/schedule/feature, or if it's not going to work for whatever
> reason.
>
> I have a very brainstormy/draft wiki page outlining the idea at:
> https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Fedora_formulas
>
> The short version:
>
> Setup a infrastructure/framework around a collection of ansible
> playbooks to allow our users to simply download a formula for what they
> want to do and have a curated setup made for them using Fedora
> packages.
>
> Want a electionics lab setup? download. review. answer some
> questions. click.
> Want a LAMP stack? download. review. answer some questions. click.
> Want a openstack demo cluster? ditto.
> Want a graphics designer workstation? ditto.
>
> Note that this assumes you have already installed Fedora, it's a post
> install setup. This would mean that we should continue to do spins for
> various desktops as people may way to install their desktop as a base
> before adding on formulas.

Looking at the distribution of even the desktop spins it jumps out at
me that only the KDE spin seems to exceed 100 downloads while we
distribute all of them in the thousands via pressed multi-desktop
media which we also make available to users for download or transfer
to USB as a group. This "indirect" distribution of desktop spins is
likely close to two orders of magnitude larger than the direct
download distribution. From a marketing perspective I think the
multi-desktop media form of distribution achieves the desired ends
even in the absence of pushing individual desktop spins to all the
mirrors.

Which makes me wonder if we should consider having a pre-desktop base
with formulas for the desktops as well? Even if the answer to that is
no I can imagine lots of potential uses for which the existence of a
desktop isn't necessary or even desirable.

John
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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Ian Malone]

On 12 January 2013 17:02, Kevin Kofler  wrote:
> Ian Malone wrote:
>> KDE favourites:
>> For a spin (or formula) it makes sense that the favourites should
>> reflect the spin (or formula) focus. The kickstart updates this
>> through /etc/skel/.kde/share/config/kickoffrc and
>> /etc/rc.d/init.d/livesys (on the live sytem the installer is a
>> favourite, so these two are slightly different).
>
> You can write KDE defaults to /etc/kde (which ships empty by default, we put
> distrowide defaults into /usr/share/kde-settings/kde-
> profile/default/share/config/ instead). IIRC, I already pointed this out to
> one of you when they asked about tweaking KDE settings.
>

That's what's done at the moment. Thought I'd bring it up as I wasn't
sure it was the approved (wasn't me, maybe was a private email) or
best solution and also, if we did use a formula instead, this is one
of the things we'd want to do through ansible. My understanding is it
that it's trivial, but I could be wrong.

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Ian Malone]

On 12 January 2013 19:07, Kevin Fenzi  wrote:
> On Fri, 11 Jan 2013 13:01:03 +
> Ian Malone  wrote:
>

>> KDE favourites:
>> For a spin (or formula) it makes sense that the favourites should
>> reflect the spin (or formula) focus. The kickstart updates this
>> through /etc/skel/.kde/share/config/kickoffrc and
>> /etc/rc.d/init.d/livesys (on the live sytem the installer is a
>> favourite, so these two are slightly different).
>
> favourites are like 'what app runs to handle uri's' and such?
>

More simple than that, the KDE menu's first tab has a number of
programmes as favourites, a bit like the Gnome3 sidebar.

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Kevin Fenzi]

On Fri, 11 Jan 2013 13:01:03 +
Ian Malone  wrote:

> Of course in trying to do that what we were really trying to do was
> amend the defaults users would get on the installed system. Some of
> this we were able to achieve through /etc/skel files, but that's a
> non-scaling and fragile solution as already mentioned. Some was
> originally attempted by modifying firstboot modules (a no-no that is
> not in the approved spin).
> 
> Since we had planned to try and find better solutions with the spins
> and engineering teams once the release was out and since ansible
> sounds like it can provide some of them (and since the F18 release is
> now final - congratulations to everyone who worked hard through
> /that/), here are the Music-creation/Jam spin quirks for a case study:
> 
> KDE favourites:
> For a spin (or formula) it makes sense that the favourites should
> reflect the spin (or formula) focus. The kickstart updates this
> through /etc/skel/.kde/share/config/kickoffrc and
> /etc/rc.d/init.d/livesys (on the live sytem the installer is a
> favourite, so these two are slightly different).

favourites are like 'what app runs to handle uri's' and such?
 
> Audio group permissions:
> Needed for Jack real-time, usermod commands are added to
> /etc/rc.d/init.d/livesys so in the live system the liveuser is in
> 'jackuser' and 'audio'. We can't push this in the installed system at
> the moment. (This is one of the parts that had been done with the
> firstboot modules, piggybacking on the add-to-administrator group
> function. Additionally to modifying files it shouldn't, that simple
> approach is also not very compatible with translations.)

Yeah, a user running a formula could have this done to their user I
would think, as long as we don't have guidelines preventing it. 
 
> Desktop themeing:
> Related to KDE favourites above, though of less functional importance.
> Again this is currently handled by having a package for the spin
> themes which owns an /etc/skel file that allows us to set the default
> themes (KDE desktop theme and splash). This is not really a problem
> that desktop spins have (since by definition they have their own
> independent themes), but for other spins or formulae being able to
> tweak the default look slightly gives some sense of individual
> identity for the spin itself and also a degree of user-hinting about
> the environment they're using.

Sure, that could be an optional thing too... 
'do you want the themes from ...'
 
> From my brief skim of the Formula proposal it looks like it can do all
> of these. If you can also do a headless/non-interactive setup
> targetted at liveuser then presumably it could just be run by the
> kickstart during creation of a livecd/dvd (i.e. so things are already
> set up in the disk image, you'd then have to run it again during the
> actual install, but I think it would be an advantage to not have to do
> this every time you start a live image without persistent storage).

Yeah, how it would interact with live creation/install is something to
hash out. 

kevin


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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Kevin Kofler]

Ian Malone wrote:
> KDE favourites:
> For a spin (or formula) it makes sense that the favourites should
> reflect the spin (or formula) focus. The kickstart updates this
> through /etc/skel/.kde/share/config/kickoffrc and
> /etc/rc.d/init.d/livesys (on the live sytem the installer is a
> favourite, so these two are slightly different).

You can write KDE defaults to /etc/kde (which ships empty by default, we put 
distrowide defaults into /usr/share/kde-settings/kde-
profile/default/share/config/ instead). IIRC, I already pointed this out to 
one of you when they asked about tweaking KDE settings.

> Desktop themeing:
> Related to KDE favourites above, though of less functional importance.
> Again this is currently handled by having a package for the spin
> themes which owns an /etc/skel file that allows us to set the default
> themes (KDE desktop theme and splash). This is not really a problem
> that desktop spins have (since by definition they have their own
> independent themes), but for other spins or formulae being able to
> tweak the default look slightly gives some sense of individual
> identity for the spin itself and also a degree of user-hinting about
> the environment they're using.

Likewise, this should be doable through /etc/kde.

Kevin Kofler

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Ian Malone]

On 10 January 2013 23:51, Kevin Kofler  wrote:
> Brendan Jones wrote:
>> The main problem we have with kickstarts at the moment is that there is
>> no way (according to current packaging guidelines) to alter files owned
>> by other packages.
>
> This is just plain impossible anyway (except for config files in /etc), no
> matter what you do (i.e. not just with kickstarts). The next update of the
> package legitimately owning the file will destroy any changes made to the
> file (except if it was marked %config(noreplace), but files outside of /etc
> must not be marked %config nor %config(noreplace) according to our packaging
> guidelines).
>

Of course in trying to do that what we were really trying to do was
amend the defaults users would get on the installed system. Some of
this we were able to achieve through /etc/skel files, but that's a
non-scaling and fragile solution as already mentioned. Some was
originally attempted by modifying firstboot modules (a no-no that is
not in the approved spin).

Since we had planned to try and find better solutions with the spins
and engineering teams once the release was out and since ansible
sounds like it can provide some of them (and since the F18 release is
now final - congratulations to everyone who worked hard through
/that/), here are the Music-creation/Jam spin quirks for a case study:

KDE favourites:
For a spin (or formula) it makes sense that the favourites should
reflect the spin (or formula) focus. The kickstart updates this
through /etc/skel/.kde/share/config/kickoffrc and
/etc/rc.d/init.d/livesys (on the live sytem the installer is a
favourite, so these two are slightly different).

Audio group permissions:
Needed for Jack real-time, usermod commands are added to
/etc/rc.d/init.d/livesys so in the live system the liveuser is in
'jackuser' and 'audio'. We can't push this in the installed system at
the moment. (This is one of the parts that had been done with the
firstboot modules, piggybacking on the add-to-administrator group
function. Additionally to modifying files it shouldn't, that simple
approach is also not very compatible with translations.)

Desktop themeing:
Related to KDE favourites above, though of less functional importance.
Again this is currently handled by having a package for the spin
themes which owns an /etc/skel file that allows us to set the default
themes (KDE desktop theme and splash). This is not really a problem
that desktop spins have (since by definition they have their own
independent themes), but for other spins or formulae being able to
tweak the default look slightly gives some sense of individual
identity for the spin itself and also a degree of user-hinting about
the environment they're using.

From my brief skim of the Formula proposal it looks like it can do all
of these. If you can also do a headless/non-interactive setup
targetted at liveuser then presumably it could just be run by the
kickstart during creation of a livecd/dvd (i.e. so things are already
set up in the disk image, you'd then have to run it again during the
actual install, but I think it would be an advantage to not have to do
this every time you start a live image without persistent storage).

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Kevin Kofler]

Brendan Jones wrote:
> The main problem we have with kickstarts at the moment is that there is
> no way (according to current packaging guidelines) to alter files owned
> by other packages.

This is just plain impossible anyway (except for config files in /etc), no 
matter what you do (i.e. not just with kickstarts). The next update of the 
package legitimately owning the file will destroy any changes made to the 
file (except if it was marked %config(noreplace), but files outside of /etc 
must not be marked %config nor %config(noreplace) according to our packaging 
guidelines).

Kevin Kofler

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Pete Travis]

On Jan 9, 2013 12:32 PM, "Nathanael D. Noblet"  wrote:
>
> On 01/09/2013 12:26 PM, Seth Vidal wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, 9 Jan 2013, Kevin Fenzi wrote:
>>

 One of the big questions to answer is distribution. I can see good
 arguments on the one hand distributing formulas via RPM and on the
 other having an official Git repository for them.
>>>
>>>
>>> Yep. I am torn here too. rpms get us a lot, but are also inflexable in
>>> other ways. :)
>>>
>>
>> Let me make an argument against rpms here.
>>
>> Ansible doesn't require anything on the local system to run a playbook.
>>
>> That's one of its virtues.
>>
>> For a user if we just use a git repo then the user doesn't have to
>> modify their system in order to use the tools to change their system.
>>
>> There is a certain amount of elegance in that not to mention just not
>> being annoying.
>
>
> It also allows a user to take a recipe, fork, modify, improve etc and
test it without necessarily knowing anything about rpm... or being a
packager in the packager group etc. Having a fedora account etc...
>
>
> --
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> t 403.875.4613
>
> --
I really like this idea.  A curated, task oriented system helps
inexperienced users get it right and advanced users work more efficiently.
The concept is highly marketable. Properly maintained, we could save scores
of users from the scourge of outdated, inaccurate, or potentially harmful
procedurals that a broad Google search might dig up.

With that in mind, I have to disagree with the comments above. Presenting
this as a playground for inexperienced users negates the benefit of
curation and compounds the very problems I think it should solve. Not that
the functionality shouldn't be there, of course, but the presentation
should stress quality over extensibility.

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Seth Vidal]

On Wed, 9 Jan 2013, Bill Nottingham wrote:


Seth Vidal (skvi...@fedoraproject.org) said:

One of the big questions to answer is distribution. I can see good
arguments on the one hand distributing formulas via RPM and on the
other having an official Git repository for them.


Yep. I am torn here too. rpms get us a lot, but are also inflexable in
other ways. :)


Let me make an argument against rpms here.

Ansible doesn't require anything on the local system to run a playbook.

That's one of its virtues.

For a user if we just use a git repo then the user doesn't have to
modify their system in order to use the tools to change their
system.

There is a certain amount of elegance in that not to mention just
not being annoying.


Well, if we're allowing this to be for end-users as opposed to just
managed infrastructure, it would require *something* to be on the local
end-user's system, depending on how the playbook is written. (For example,
if it uses the 'command' or 'shell' features) That can be mitigated by
having requirements on the playbooks that we accept into this repository,
of course.



1. you don't want to use command/shell modules much - mainly b/c they are 
not idempotent and get run every time barring the presence of the 
creates=option



2. you are correct that if you are using something not commonly on 
systems in a command or shell module you're in trouble. However, you can 
pull those in an early step in the playbook w/o controversy. Playbooks 
don't execute in random order. They are in a strict, obvious order.


does that help?
-sv


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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Bill Nottingham]

Seth Vidal (skvi...@fedoraproject.org) said: 
> >>One of the big questions to answer is distribution. I can see good
> >>arguments on the one hand distributing formulas via RPM and on the
> >>other having an official Git repository for them.
> >
> >Yep. I am torn here too. rpms get us a lot, but are also inflexable in
> >other ways. :)
> 
> Let me make an argument against rpms here.
> 
> Ansible doesn't require anything on the local system to run a playbook.
> 
> That's one of its virtues.
> 
> For a user if we just use a git repo then the user doesn't have to
> modify their system in order to use the tools to change their
> system.
> 
> There is a certain amount of elegance in that not to mention just
> not being annoying.

Well, if we're allowing this to be for end-users as opposed to just
managed infrastructure, it would require *something* to be on the local
end-user's system, depending on how the playbook is written. (For example,
if it uses the 'command' or 'shell' features) That can be mitigated by
having requirements on the playbooks that we accept into this repository,
of course.

Bill
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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Kevin Fenzi]

On Wed, 09 Jan 2013 13:50:31 +0100
Brendan Jones  wrote:

> On 01/09/2013 01:27 PM, Ian Malone wrote:
> > On 9 January 2013 12:23, Ian Malone  wrote:
> >
> >
> >> Down-sides, there'd no longer be a live-cd/dvd as a 'demo' system.
> >> You could only try out the formula on an installed system. It
> >> looks though like people are already suggesting overlaying a
> >> formula somehow to create traditional live images (presumably
> >> still with the advantages of being able to tweak configuration).

Yeah, there would be another step, but in this step you could gain some
interactivity and more features. 

ie: 

live spin case: 
- download spin
- burn/transfer to media
- boot and use

formula case: 
- download whatever desktop the user likes. 
- burn/transfer to media
- boot
- run formula frontend, click 'fedora jams' 
- answer some questions, get offered some tutorials or other info. 
- use

So, there are more steps (downside), but you get to offer them a better
experience (at least potentially). 

> > P.S. that downside also may translate to more difficult testing and
> > development. With spin development I've been able to make a live cd
> > and then run it live or run it live/install it within a VM. With a
> > formula you have to have an already-installed image in a VM and then
> > make the formula available for install within it. (Advantage though,
> > compiling a formula *must* be quicker than rebuilding a live image.)

Sure, you can make a stock vm and clone it each time for testing too. 

Also, btrfs/lvm snapshots might help. 

> Agreed to both your downsides. The goal of the spin was to have as
> much configured 'out of the box' in a live environment firstly then
> as the installed user.
> 
> I can't see this as being a replacement but perhaps it could be used
> in this context as well (post install).

Yeah, it was pointed out to me that there are still some other spins
use cases that I am not sure we can replace here. Namely: 

- Security lab - one of the uses is to boot ro on a possibly
  compromised machine and inspect it. You don't want a real install for
  that. 

- Other spins - Some people might be (does anyone know if they do?)
  using live media in labs where they don't want to touch the installs
  on the machines, but use just one for a class or session. ie, boot 15
  machines up with design-suite, do a class on gimp, pull them and
  reboot machines in whatever else they had on them. 

kevin


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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Nathanael D. Noblet]

On 01/09/2013 12:26 PM, Seth Vidal wrote:




On Wed, 9 Jan 2013, Kevin Fenzi wrote:



One of the big questions to answer is distribution. I can see good
arguments on the one hand distributing formulas via RPM and on the
other having an official Git repository for them.


Yep. I am torn here too. rpms get us a lot, but are also inflexable in
other ways. :)



Let me make an argument against rpms here.

Ansible doesn't require anything on the local system to run a playbook.

That's one of its virtues.

For a user if we just use a git repo then the user doesn't have to
modify their system in order to use the tools to change their system.

There is a certain amount of elegance in that not to mention just not
being annoying.


It also allows a user to take a recipe, fork, modify, improve etc and 
test it without necessarily knowing anything about rpm... or being a 
packager in the packager group etc. Having a fedora account etc...



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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Seth Vidal]

On Wed, 9 Jan 2013, Kevin Fenzi wrote:



One of the big questions to answer is distribution. I can see good
arguments on the one hand distributing formulas via RPM and on the
other having an official Git repository for them.


Yep. I am torn here too. rpms get us a lot, but are also inflexable in
other ways. :)



Let me make an argument against rpms here.

Ansible doesn't require anything on the local system to run a playbook.

That's one of its virtues.

For a user if we just use a git repo then the user doesn't have to 
modify their system in order to use the tools to change their system.


There is a certain amount of elegance in that not to mention just not 
being annoying.


-sv

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Kevin Fenzi]

On Wed, 9 Jan 2013 08:59:35 -0500
john.flor...@dart.biz wrote:

> > From: Kevin Fenzi 
> > Thats not to say perhaps we couldn't think of a clever way to
> > somehow generate images based on them, but it would probibly take
> > some way to take an existing machine and make a live image from it.
> > Not sure how easy that is to do. 
> 
> I think that's quite straightforward, if desired.  You merely run 
> ansible/puppet/whatever in the post install of a kickstart used with 
> livecd-creator.  The UI for such a thing would merely create the
> dynamic content to be included within the kickstart and subsequently
> run livecd-creator.

Could work. That would still be more hassle for current spin consumers
if they really need a read only bootable media. On the other hand they
would be able to make their own easier... 

kevin


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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Kevin Fenzi]

On Wed, 9 Jan 2013 09:18:55 -0500
Matthew Miller  wrote:

> On Tue, Jan 08, 2013 at 01:15:29PM -0700, Kevin Fenzi wrote:
> > Setup a infrastructure/framework around a collection of ansible
> > playbooks to allow our users to simply download a formula for what
> > they want to do and have a curated setup made for them using Fedora
> > packages. 
> 
> I think this is great work, and fills a big gap in Fedora as it is.

Cool. Hopefully enough folks find it interesting to work on. :) 

> > Note that this assumes you have already installed Fedora, it's a
> > post install setup. This would mean that we should continue to do
> > spins for various desktops as people may way to install their
> > desktop as a base before adding on formulas.
> 
> Presumably not just desktops, given your examples of openstack.
> 
> I'd also like to "works in kickstart postinstall" as a basic feature.
> That means a non-interactive mode.

Yeah, I am on the fence about that. I guess we could say "there's
interactive support, but you can run --noninteractive and get some kind
of default/no optional features" ?

Something to hash out for sure. 

> 
> One of the big questions to answer is distribution. I can see good
> arguments on the one hand distributing formulas via RPM and on the
> other having an official Git repository for them.

Yep. I am torn here too. rpms get us a lot, but are also inflexable in
other ways. :) 

kevin




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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Michael Scherer]

Le mercredi 09 janvier 2013 à 09:24 -0500, Matthew Miller a écrit :
> On Wed, Jan 09, 2013 at 07:36:06AM +, "Jóhann B. Guðmundsson" wrote:
> > >I'm not sure I understand the question, actually. Can you elaborate?
> > So you want us in the QA community to go through basically a copy
> > concept of puppets/chefs and QA any "Formula" that has been
> > submitted there?
> 
> I didn't say what I want; I asked a question.
> 
> Formulas would need rules akin to the RPM packaging guidelines and review
> process. QA would certainly be an important part of that, although it
> doesn't necessarily need to place more demand on the existing QE team.

Or we could ask to people who use it to do the Q/A.

> > There are several checks that happen when a spin gets created whilst
> > this idea we would have to download each "formula" and test it.
> 
> There's absolutely no reason that some rudimentarly testing of formulas
> couldn't happen automatically.

Since that's yaml, having a schema based on kwalify would be a first
test :
http://www.kuwata-lab.com/kwalify/


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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Matthew Miller]

On Wed, Jan 09, 2013 at 08:20:58AM +, "Jóhann B. Guðmundsson" wrote:
> From that response I gather it is something user setup/install after
> installing Fedora basically you seem to be then just duplicating and
> or trying to come up with a better app installer then already exists
> is that the case?

It's not a "better app installer". It's a complementary function. The
installer puts software onto your system. A formula configures it in the way
you want for a function you want.


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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Matthew Miller]

On Wed, Jan 09, 2013 at 07:36:06AM +, "Jóhann B. Guðmundsson" wrote:
> >I'm not sure I understand the question, actually. Can you elaborate?
> So you want us in the QA community to go through basically a copy
> concept of puppets/chefs and QA any "Formula" that has been
> submitted there?

I didn't say what I want; I asked a question.

Formulas would need rules akin to the RPM packaging guidelines and review
process. QA would certainly be an important part of that, although it
doesn't necessarily need to place more demand on the existing QE team.


> There are several checks that happen when a spin gets created whilst
> this idea we would have to download each "formula" and test it.

There's absolutely no reason that some rudimentarly testing of formulas
couldn't happen automatically.

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Matthew Miller]

On Wed, Jan 09, 2013 at 05:15:02AM +0100, Brendan Jones wrote:
> >no way (according to current packaging guidelines) to alter files owned
> >by other packages. In the future we might like to choose different
> >pulseaudio modules to load, ALSA config based on hardware etc. I don't
> This is probably not a good example as we could drop such config
> files in /etc/skel

That depends on those files getting copied into newly-created users' home
directories, which is not really ideal.

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Matthew Miller]

On Tue, Jan 08, 2013 at 01:15:29PM -0700, Kevin Fenzi wrote:
> Setup a infrastructure/framework around a collection of ansible
> playbooks to allow our users to simply download a formula for what they
> want to do and have a curated setup made for them using Fedora
> packages. 

I think this is great work, and fills a big gap in Fedora as it is.

> Note that this assumes you have already installed Fedora, it's a post
> install setup. This would mean that we should continue to do spins for
> various desktops as people may way to install their desktop as a base
> before adding on formulas.

Presumably not just desktops, given your examples of openstack.

I'd also like to "works in kickstart postinstall" as a basic feature. That
means a non-interactive mode.

One of the big questions to answer is distribution. I can see good arguments
on the one hand distributing formulas via RPM and on the other having an
official Git repository for them.


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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[John . Florian]

> From: Kevin Fenzi 
> Thats not to say perhaps we couldn't think of a clever way to somehow
> generate images based on them, but it would probibly take some way to
> take an existing machine and make a live image from it. Not sure how
> easy that is to do. 

I think that's quite straightforward, if desired.  You merely run 
ansible/puppet/whatever in the post install of a kickstart used with 
livecd-creator.  The UI for such a thing would merely create the dynamic 
content to be included within the kickstart and subsequently run 
livecd-creator.
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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Brendan Jones]

On 01/09/2013 01:27 PM, Ian Malone wrote:

On 9 January 2013 12:23, Ian Malone  wrote:



Down-sides, there'd no longer be a live-cd/dvd as a 'demo' system. You
could only try out the formula on an installed system. It looks though
like people are already suggesting overlaying a formula somehow to
create traditional live images (presumably still with the advantages
of being able to tweak configuration).



P.S. that downside also may translate to more difficult testing and
development. With spin development I've been able to make a live cd
and then run it live or run it live/install it within a VM. With a
formula you have to have an already-installed image in a VM and then
make the formula available for install within it. (Advantage though,
compiling a formula *must* be quicker than rebuilding a live image.)

Agreed to both your downsides. The goal of the spin was to have as much 
configured 'out of the box' in a live environment firstly then as the 
installed user.


I can't see this as being a replacement but perhaps it could be used in 
this context as well (post install).

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Ian Malone]

On 9 January 2013 12:23, Ian Malone  wrote:


> Down-sides, there'd no longer be a live-cd/dvd as a 'demo' system. You
> could only try out the formula on an installed system. It looks though
> like people are already suggesting overlaying a formula somehow to
> create traditional live images (presumably still with the advantages
> of being able to tweak configuration).
>

P.S. that downside also may translate to more difficult testing and
development. With spin development I've been able to make a live cd
and then run it live or run it live/install it within a VM. With a
formula you have to have an already-installed image in a VM and then
make the formula available for install within it. (Advantage though,
compiling a formula *must* be quicker than rebuilding a live image.)

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Ian Malone]

On 9 January 2013 04:10, Brendan Jones  wrote:
> On 01/08/2013 09:15 PM, Kevin Fenzi wrote:
>>
>> Greetings.
>>
>> I've whipped up the early ideas of a way to replace (most) spins with
>> something that is more generic and useful. I have signed up for a
>> fudcon session to brainstorm on this idea and see if it can be beaten
>> into a plan/schedule/feature, or if it's not going to work for whatever
>> reason.
>>
>> I have a very brainstormy/draft wiki page outlining the idea at:
>> https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Fedora_formulas
>>
>> The short version:
>>
>> Setup a infrastructure/framework around a collection of ansible
>> playbooks to allow our users to simply download a formula for what they
>> want to do and have a curated setup made for them using Fedora
>> packages.
>>

> Coming from the Fedora Audio spin here's a few things that we would like to
> achieve that we can (mostly) from a kickstart:
>
>  - add default groups for the liveuser and logged in user
>  - add extra kernel boot parameters (threadirqs)
>  - custom desktop themes, favourites, and desktop settings (turning off
> desktop effects for example)
>  - default autostart apps
>
> The main problem we have with kickstarts at the moment is that there is no
> way (according to current packaging guidelines) to alter files owned by
> other packages. In the future we might like to choose different pulseaudio
> modules to load, ALSA config based on hardware etc. I don't see how this
> solution could do this if it were RPM based. If is based as some kind of
> overlay that alters files owned by other packages post install then there
> needs to be an obvious indication that this has occurred. I'd expect that
> whoever writes such a "formula" would have to get sign off from the owner of
> the package whose files it modifies.
>

Thanks, I was planning to reply from the Fedora Jam/Audio spin point
of view. Looking at Kevin's page this might actually be a way to do
some of the configuration work we were trying to do with the spin:

"Advantages / selling points
"Better than groups of packages, because you can change config files,
set things to start on boot, etc.
"Allows for interactive querying the user for what they want "

Down-sides, there'd no longer be a live-cd/dvd as a 'demo' system. You
could only try out the formula on an installed system. It looks though
like people are already suggesting overlaying a formula somehow to
create traditional live images (presumably still with the advantages
of being able to tweak configuration).

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Jóhann B. Guðmundsson]

On 01/09/2013 04:34 AM, Kevin Fenzi wrote:

On Tue, 8 Jan 2013 19:18:36 -0500
Matthew Miller  wrote:


On Tue, Jan 08, 2013 at 11:17:35PM +, "Jóhann B. Guðmundsson"
wrote:

On 01/08/2013 08:15 PM, Kevin Fenzi wrote:

So, what do folks think? Workable? Crazy? Crazy enough to work?

And we are supposed to QA this how?

Like any software?

I'm not sure I understand the question, actually. Can you elaborate?

I'd welcome any QA thoughts/feedback. I think we would probibly have to
have guidelines at least somewhat worked out before we could figure out
how to test things.

We could do something like what we do for packages, ie, a testing
collection and promotion to stable only happens with positive tester
feedback.

We could try and build into the process some kind of automated
testing/tooling. (search for forbidden items, runs in a virt that list
all files changed and diffs of those for review, etc.

I think QA is definitely something to keep in mind when thinking about
the rest of the process...



In one response against this thread you say

"This is not exactly what I meant... this would be things you could 
run/install on any already installed Fedora. It would not have anything 
to do with creating live isos... it would be just extra things for 
existing installs. "


From that response I gather it is something user setup/install after 
installing Fedora basically you seem to be then just duplicating and or 
trying to come up with a better app installer then already exists is 
that the case?



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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Jóhann B. Guðmundsson]

On 01/09/2013 12:18 AM, Matthew Miller wrote:

On Tue, Jan 08, 2013 at 11:17:35PM +, "Jóhann B. Guðmundsson" wrote:

On 01/08/2013 08:15 PM, Kevin Fenzi wrote:

So, what do folks think? Workable? Crazy? Crazy enough to work?

And we are supposed to QA this how?

Like any software?

I'm not sure I understand the question, actually. Can you elaborate?




So you want us in the QA community to go through basically a copy 
concept of puppets/chefs and QA any "Formula" that has been submitted 
there?


There are several checks that happen when a spin gets created whilst 
this idea we would have to download each "formula" and test it.


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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Kevin Fenzi]

On Tue, 8 Jan 2013 19:18:36 -0500
Matthew Miller  wrote:

> On Tue, Jan 08, 2013 at 11:17:35PM +, "Jóhann B. Guðmundsson"
> wrote:
> > On 01/08/2013 08:15 PM, Kevin Fenzi wrote:
> > >So, what do folks think? Workable? Crazy? Crazy enough to work?
> > And we are supposed to QA this how?
> 
> Like any software? 
> 
> I'm not sure I understand the question, actually. Can you elaborate?

I'd welcome any QA thoughts/feedback. I think we would probibly have to
have guidelines at least somewhat worked out before we could figure out
how to test things. 

We could do something like what we do for packages, ie, a testing
collection and promotion to stable only happens with positive tester
feedback.

We could try and build into the process some kind of automated
testing/tooling. (search for forbidden items, runs in a virt that list
all files changed and diffs of those for review, etc. 

I think QA is definitely something to keep in mind when thinking about
the rest of the process... 

kevin


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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Kevin Fenzi]

On Tue, 8 Jan 2013 16:18:56 -0800
Mahrud S  wrote:

> I know that Slax Linux used to have this feature. You could just
> choose the modules that you want on the website and download a custom
> live iso with those packages! But that feature is disabled
> now, perhaps because they use a new module system now.

This is not exactly what I meant... this would be things you could
run/install on any already installed Fedora. It would not have anything
to do with creating live isos... it would be just extra things for
existing installs. 

Thats not to say perhaps we couldn't think of a clever way to somehow
generate images based on them, but it would probibly take some way to
take an existing machine and make a live image from it. Not sure how
easy that is to do. 

> Ah, here: http://old.slax.org/build.php
> I'm not sure whether that's just for show or if it still works though.
> 
> That's what you are thinking, right?

Not exactly, see above. 

kevin


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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Brendan Jones]

On 01/09/2013 05:10 AM, Brendan Jones wrote:

On 01/08/2013 09:15 PM, Kevin Fenzi wrote:

Greetings.

I've whipped up the early ideas of a way to replace (most) spins with
something that is more generic and useful. I have signed up for a
fudcon session to brainstorm on this idea and see if it can be beaten
into a plan/schedule/feature, or if it's not going to work for whatever
reason.

I have a very brainstormy/draft wiki page outlining the idea at:
https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Fedora_formulas

The short version:

Setup a infrastructure/framework around a collection of ansible
playbooks to allow our users to simply download a formula for what they
want to do and have a curated setup made for them using Fedora
packages.

Want a electionics lab setup? download. review. answer some
questions. click.
Want a LAMP stack? download. review. answer some questions. click.
Want a openstack demo cluster? ditto.
Want a graphics designer workstation? ditto.

Note that this assumes you have already installed Fedora, it's a post
install setup. This would mean that we should continue to do spins for
various desktops as people may way to install their desktop as a base
before adding on formulas.

Of course there's tons of details/questions to work out (many listed on
the wiki page, but I'm sure there are more details too).

So, what do folks think? Workable? Crazy? Crazy enough to work?
:)

kevin


Most spins don't do anything really special apart from install a default
set of packages. Maybe this is because of the limitations of kickstart,
I don't know.

Coming from the Fedora Audio spin here's a few things that we would like
to achieve that we can (mostly) from a kickstart:

  - add default groups for the liveuser and logged in user
  - add extra kernel boot parameters (threadirqs)
  - custom desktop themes, favourites, and desktop settings (turning off
desktop effects for example)
  - default autostart apps

The main problem we have with kickstarts at the moment is that there is
no way (according to current packaging guidelines) to alter files owned
by other packages. In the future we might like to choose different
pulseaudio modules to load, ALSA config based on hardware etc. I don't


This is probably not a good example as we could drop such config files 
in /etc/skel

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Brendan Jones]

On 01/08/2013 09:15 PM, Kevin Fenzi wrote:

Greetings.

I've whipped up the early ideas of a way to replace (most) spins with
something that is more generic and useful. I have signed up for a
fudcon session to brainstorm on this idea and see if it can be beaten
into a plan/schedule/feature, or if it's not going to work for whatever
reason.

I have a very brainstormy/draft wiki page outlining the idea at:
https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Fedora_formulas

The short version:

Setup a infrastructure/framework around a collection of ansible
playbooks to allow our users to simply download a formula for what they
want to do and have a curated setup made for them using Fedora
packages.

Want a electionics lab setup? download. review. answer some
questions. click.
Want a LAMP stack? download. review. answer some questions. click.
Want a openstack demo cluster? ditto.
Want a graphics designer workstation? ditto.

Note that this assumes you have already installed Fedora, it's a post
install setup. This would mean that we should continue to do spins for
various desktops as people may way to install their desktop as a base
before adding on formulas.

Of course there's tons of details/questions to work out (many listed on
the wiki page, but I'm sure there are more details too).

So, what do folks think? Workable? Crazy? Crazy enough to work?
:)

kevin

Most spins don't do anything really special apart from install a default 
set of packages. Maybe this is because of the limitations of kickstart, 
I don't know.


Coming from the Fedora Audio spin here's a few things that we would like 
to achieve that we can (mostly) from a kickstart:


 - add default groups for the liveuser and logged in user
 - add extra kernel boot parameters (threadirqs)
 - custom desktop themes, favourites, and desktop settings (turning off 
desktop effects for example)

 - default autostart apps

The main problem we have with kickstarts at the moment is that there is 
no way (according to current packaging guidelines) to alter files owned 
by other packages. In the future we might like to choose different 
pulseaudio modules to load, ALSA config based on hardware etc. I don't 
see how this solution could do this if it were RPM based. If is based as 
some kind of overlay that alters files owned by other packages post 
install then there needs to be an obvious indication that this has 
occurred. I'd expect that whoever writes such a "formula" would have to 
get sign off from the owner of the package whose files it modifies.


We are working around this by developing an application which the user 
has to run and is prompted to confirm such changes. Such a program could 
be configured to run once at startup I guess. This is a work in progress 
and not in production yet.


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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Mahrud S]

update: definitely works.
It's pretty neat to have a live usb with the exact programs that you like
ready in your pocket!
How can you create an iso on the fly that fast?!

On Tue, Jan 8, 2013 at 4:18 PM, Mahrud S  wrote:

> I know that Slax Linux used to have this feature. You could just choose
> the modules that you want on the website and download a custom live iso
> with those packages! But that feature is disabled now, perhaps
> because they use a new module system now.
>
> Ah, here: http://old.slax.org/build.php
> I'm not sure whether that's just for show or if it still works though.
>
> That's what you are thinking, right?
>
> On Tue, Jan 8, 2013 at 3:17 PM, "Jóhann B. Guðmundsson" <
> johan...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On 01/08/2013 08:15 PM, Kevin Fenzi wrote:
>>
>>> So, what do folks think? Workable? Crazy? Crazy enough to work?
>>>
>>
>> And we are supposed to QA this how?
>>
>> JBG
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>
>
>
>
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> Best wishes
> Mahrud 
>



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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Mahrud S]

I know that Slax Linux used to have this feature. You could just choose the
modules that you want on the website and download a custom live iso with
those packages! But that feature is disabled now, perhaps
because they use a new module system now.

Ah, here: http://old.slax.org/build.php
I'm not sure whether that's just for show or if it still works though.

That's what you are thinking, right?

On Tue, Jan 8, 2013 at 3:17 PM, "Jóhann B. Guðmundsson"
wrote:

> On 01/08/2013 08:15 PM, Kevin Fenzi wrote:
>
>> So, what do folks think? Workable? Crazy? Crazy enough to work?
>>
>
> And we are supposed to QA this how?
>
> JBG
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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Matthew Miller]

On Tue, Jan 08, 2013 at 11:17:35PM +, "Jóhann B. Guðmundsson" wrote:
> On 01/08/2013 08:15 PM, Kevin Fenzi wrote:
> >So, what do folks think? Workable? Crazy? Crazy enough to work?
> And we are supposed to QA this how?

Like any software? 

I'm not sure I understand the question, actually. Can you elaborate?


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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[Jóhann B. Guðmundsson]

On 01/08/2013 08:15 PM, Kevin Fenzi wrote:

So, what do folks think? Workable? Crazy? Crazy enough to work?


And we are supposed to QA this how?

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Re: Feedback wanted: Fedora Formulas

[John . Florian]

> From: Kevin Fenzi 
> 
> Greetings. 
> 
> I've whipped up the early ideas of a way to replace (most) spins with
> something that is more generic and useful. I have signed up for a
> fudcon session to brainstorm on this idea and see if it can be beaten
> into a plan/schedule/feature, or if it's not going to work for whatever
> reason. 
> 
> I have a very brainstormy/draft wiki page outlining the idea at: 
> https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Fedora_formulas
> 
> The short version: 
> 
> Setup a infrastructure/framework around a collection of ansible
> playbooks to allow our users to simply download a formula for what they
> want to do and have a curated setup made for them using Fedora
> packages. 
> 
> Want a electionics lab setup? download. review. answer some
> questions. click. 
> Want a LAMP stack? download. review. answer some questions. click. 
> Want a openstack demo cluster? ditto. 
> Want a graphics designer workstation? ditto.
> 
> Note that this assumes you have already installed Fedora, it's a post
> install setup. This would mean that we should continue to do spins for
> various desktops as people may way to install their desktop as a base
> before adding on formulas.
> 
> Of course there's tons of details/questions to work out (many listed on
> the wiki page, but I'm sure there are more details too). 
> 
> So, what do folks think? Workable? Crazy? Crazy enough to work?
> :) 
> 
> kevin


Doh!  I wish I was going to fudcon. I've yet to get to one and this would 
be right up my alley.  I'm doing something similar with puppet now where I 
boot a custom Live Fedora spin with stateless Linux features enabled and 
puppet makes each node conform to some predetermined role.  I've been 
wanting to get some time with ansible because puppet really isn't working 
very well for this.  My situation differs mostly in that I use this 
approach to maintain hundreds (working towards thousands) of 
appliance-like nodes.  Still, there is much in common once you go beyond 
just managing packages, but also their run-time state.  Do you aim to go 
that far, or stop just shy of that?

I don't think the concept is crazy at all -- I think it's terrific, but I 
also have no idea how attached the current spin maintainers are to their 
established methods.
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