Linux distro for new server?

Linux distro for new server?

[Randy Brukardt]

This is mostly off-topic, but as it will be used to compile and run Ada 
programs, it's not *completely* off-topic, and I know people here have 
valuable insight.

I'm about to start replacing the machine that runs the www.ada-auth.org 
website and serves as our DMZ for the network here. (It's approaching 12 
years old and can be underpowered at times, especially when searching the 
RM.)

The hardware arrived today (it's been in town for almost two weeks, but the 
carrier didn't deliver it until now with weather and holiday excuses - 
grumble), and I need to decide what Linux distribution to install on it. The 
standard advice here has been Debian, but that's really emphasizing Ada 
development. I hopefully will not be doing much development on this machine 
(but that is not the same as none).

One thing I definitely want to avoid is a setup that loads up lots of 
unncessary software (Ubuntu does that, for instance). As a server, it should 
have almost nothing on it beyond the stuff it is running or needs to 
function.

The primary uses for the machine are going to be:

(1) Run the existing mail filter and web server software. This is all Ada 
software which I should be able to recompile for this machine (but it has to 
be possible to do that).
(2) Run firewall and proxy software for our network. (I'll need to find 
Linux versions of these, given how much Linux is used for servers, it must 
exist.)
(3) GNAT, to recompile the existing software for the machine. I expect 
development on the machine to be kept to a minimum. The software is 
virtually all Ada 95 code (with a few Ada 2005 features tossed in), there is 
nothing bleeding edge because it all was created with Janus/Ada.
(4) Network tools and a browser for network troubleshooting. (I assume these 
are givens on any modern OS, but I figured I better mention them.)

It's possible that I will look at virtualization at some point in the 
future, but I don't think it will buy much for right now, as all of the 
softtware coexists just fine (my personal opinion on that is that software 
that needs to be run it a virtual machine because it conflicts with 
everything else is junk - like most software that needs an SQL database, 
apparently). So being a good base for virtual machines would be a useful 
bonus, but not important now.

Thoughts on which distribution to install would be welcome, especially from 
Dmitry (who apparently uses several of them).

                                  Randy.

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Jeffrey Carter]

On 01/02/2013 05:42 PM, Randy Brukardt wrote:
>
> One thing I definitely want to avoid is a setup that loads up lots of
> unncessary software (Ubuntu does that, for instance). As a server, it should
> have almost nothing on it beyond the stuff it is running or needs to
> function.

I'm totally not qualified to answer your question, but we run Debian stable 
servers at work.

FWIW, there is a server version of Ubuntu:

http://www.ubuntu.com/business/server

-- 
Jeff Carter
"My brain hurts!"
Monty Python's Flying Circus
21

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Maciej Sobczak]

W dniu czwartek, 3 stycznia 2013 01:42:13 UTC+1 użytkownik Randy Brukardt napisał:

> This is mostly off-topic, but as it will be used to compile and run Ada 
> programs, it's not *completely* off-topic,

I have good experiences with minimal (clean) Debian installation plus individually pulled packages, but only those that are actually needed.
I believe that any clean installation of whatever Linux distro would work fine, but what makes Debian standing out is a set of Ada-oriented packages that are well maintained and consistent (thanks to Ludovic & co.).

If you already have an administrator that has his own personal preferences, I would let him decide (especially if there are many machines involved, which brings subjects like infrastructure monitoring, etc.), as this always guarantees higher motivation and work satisfaction - but if such issues are out of picture, then I would go for the consistency of a minimal Debian system.

My alternative choice would be a FreeBSD machine, but the risk of solving software configuration issues on your own would have to be taken under consideration - that is, the operating system itself is close to perfect, but due to smaller user base the user-level software around it might be less consistent than what you can get in Debian.

-- 
Maciej Sobczak * http://www.msobczak.com * http://www.inspirel.com

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Tero Koskinen]

On Wed, 02 Jan 2013 22:50:47 -0700
Jeffrey Carter <spam.jrcarter.not@spam.not.acm.org> wrote:

> On 01/02/2013 05:42 PM, Randy Brukardt wrote:
> >
> > One thing I definitely want to avoid is a setup that loads up lots of
> > unncessary software (Ubuntu does that, for instance). As a server, it should
> > have almost nothing on it beyond the stuff it is running or needs to
> > function.
> 
> I'm totally not qualified to answer your question, but we run Debian stable 
> servers at work.

Another vote for Debian stable (meaning 6.0.x currently). I have a few
virtual servers (mostly for hobby purposes) running Debian stable and
I haven't had any bad problems with them.

I should note that Debian stable comes with gcc/gnat 4.4 by default and
version 4.4 does not support Ada 20xx well (Ada 95 support is ok).

Other options besides Debian are Ubuntu and Fedora. Both Ubuntu and
Fedora have shorter release cycles than Debian and also more up-to-date
software (Fedora 17 has gnat 4.7, Ubuntu 12.10 has gnat 4.6). On the other
hand, they also drop support for older releases faster. In practice, this
means you need to update Fedora or Ubuntu distribution once a year or so
(unless you run Long-Term-Support version[1]).

I probably would not use Fedora as server, since it has habit of doing
big software updates even inside one release. This means that your
software might break if you run 'yum update' and API/ABI of some
updated package changes.

You should also decide whether you want 32-bit or 64-bit version.
In most cases it doesn't matter, but some software might run only
on 32-bit or 64-bit system. My variant of Not-Claw-Sockets[2]
is one such piece ;). It (barely) works only on 64-bit systems.

-- 
Tero Koskinen - http://iki.fi/tero.koskinen/
[1] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/LTS
[2] https://bitbucket.org/tkoskine/not-claw-sockets-linux-x86
    (x86 is misleading, I ended up doing x86_64 version, but
     did not change the repository name.)

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Georg Bauhaus]

On 03.01.13 16:42, Tero Koskinen wrote:
> Ubuntu 12.10 has gnat 4.6


But GNAT on Ubuntu could be in better shape.
Bugfixing and integrating starts in Debian, but results
do not seem to arrive in Ubuntu soon. Ubuntu does not
actively support the Ada component of GCC, IIRC.

(This becomes apparent as seemingly minor symptoms,
such as incorrect links between Info's DIR file and
GNAT's manuals: you'll have to correct the former
in order to navigate to the docs.)

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Pascal Obry]

+1 for GNU/Debian.

-- 
  Pascal Obry /  Magny Les Hameaux (78)

  The best way to travel is by means of imagination

  http://v2p.fr.eu.org
  http://www.obry.net

  gpg --keyserver keys.gnupg.net --recv-key F949BD3B

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Georg Bauhaus]

On 03.01.13 01:42, Randy Brukardt wrote:

Some impressions from more or less recent server setups:

> (1) Run the existing mail filter and web server software. This is all Ada
> software which I should be able to recompile for this machine (but it has to
> be possible to do that).

SuSE Linux ES (Novell): Ada support is likely not what you want (basically
unsupported).
Convenient system setup requires a graphical environment, or else knowledge
of Suse-only tools like zypper, plus RPM, and then some.
But some software, notably for Ada, is just not part of enterprise edition,
only in OpenSUSE or on the openSUSE Build System, if someone has managed to
compile it.

Building our in-house notification program (Ada) required that I used a
non-system GNAT plus sources (of AWS, basically) for compiling a standalone
executable to run on the servers.

Ubuntu LTS: Only slightly ahead of Debian "stable" in terms of version
numbers (GCC 4.6), but not in terms of quality and integration as regards
Ada support, I'd say.
The number of weekly fixes and updates is not as overwhelming as is for the
desktop Ubuntu systems. Two arguments in favor of the LTS version.

> (2) Run firewall and proxy software for our network. (I'll need to find
> Linux versions of these, given how much Linux is used for servers, it must
> exist.)

In a normal GNU/Linux, there is just one: Netfilter. A simple tool
for controlling the tables based firewall is ufw(1),

SELinux may be of interest.

> (3) GNAT, to recompile the existing software for the machine. I expect
> development on the machine to be kept to a minimum. The software is
> virtually all Ada 95 code (with a few Ada 2005 features tossed in), there is
> nothing bleeding edge because it all was created with Janus/Ada.

Needless to say, GNAT/ObjectAda/... all mention Redhat ES (or equivalent),
so I guess they are in good shape on these systems; the Debian Ada
environment is convenient, rich, and conservative (GCC 4.4) if using "stable".
I found Ludovic's description of a [s]chrooted "testing" environment
most helpful whenever some bits from the bleeding edge were needed
(that would have been GCC 4.6).

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Randy Brukardt]

"Tero Koskinen" <tero.koskinen@iki.fi> wrote in message 
news:20130103174200.bcf9c1584b18c0225c153789@iki.fi...
...
> Other options besides Debian are Ubuntu and Fedora. Both Ubuntu and
> Fedora have shorter release cycles than Debian and also more up-to-date
> software (Fedora 17 has gnat 4.7, Ubuntu 12.10 has gnat 4.6). On the other
> hand, they also drop support for older releases faster. In practice, this
> means you need to update Fedora or Ubuntu distribution once a year or so
> (unless you run Long-Term-Support version[1]).

I have a Ubuntu laptop; the constantly changing interface has forced me to 
the latest LTS version. I hardly could find anything in this latest version 
(literally everything had moved), and for a machine that only gets used a 
few times a year (mostly for ARG meetings) that was getting intolerable. At 
least now I won't have to do that again for several years.

That experience soured me enough on Ubuntu that I wasn't particularly 
interested in using it on a server. For a server, hardly anything should 
change for long periods; pretty much the only thing required ought to be 
security updates, other updates ought to be optional. But no one seems to 
work that way anymore. (That's one reason I haven't been in much of a hurry 
to retire my old W2K server...it's essentially the last Windows version 
before it was overrun by cruft. But of course the security deficiencies are 
a concern.)

It sounds like Fedora changes too often for my taste. (Do they have an 
equivalent of the LTS of Ubuntu?). And it sounds like Debian stable is just 
too old relative to GNAT (I do use some Ada 2005 features in my code, no 
interfaces though.) None of which looks too promising.

                                  Randy.

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Brian Drummond]

On Thu, 03 Jan 2013 16:39:06 -0600, Randy Brukardt wrote:

> "Tero Koskinen" <tero.koskinen@iki.fi> wrote in message
> news:20130103174200.bcf9c1584b18c0225c153789@iki.fi...
> 
> It sounds like Fedora changes too often for my taste. (Do they have an
> equivalent of the LTS of Ubuntu?). And it sounds like Debian stable is
> just too old relative to GNAT (I do use some Ada 2005 features in my
> code, no interfaces though.) None of which looks too promising.

It's not difficult to use a newer Gnat on top of Debian, if that is your 
only objection. I don't know what the formal objections to updating Gnat 
(and its immediate dependencies) to "testing", perhaps Ludovic can say.

But I have built gcc4.7.2 from source and not seen any glitches (beyond 
having to set paths so it can find libraries) and I believe Adacore Libre  
Gnat would work too. Building from source might not be recommended for a 
server though!

- Brian

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Ludovic Brenta]

Randy Brukardt writes on comp.lang.ada:
> It sounds like Fedora changes too often for my taste. (Do they have an
> equivalent of the LTS of Ubuntu?).

Yes, Red Hat Enterprise Linux; 7 years of paid support for each major
release, but no GNAT included in it.

> And it sounds like Debian stable is just too old relative to GNAT (I
> do use some Ada 2005 features in my code, no interfaces though.) None
> of which looks too promising.

GCC 4.4 does support many Ada 2005 features; it has the Containers for
example.

In case you really need GCC 4.6, you'll be happy to learn that Debian 7
"Wheezy" has been frozen for months and is very close to becoming
stable; only critical bug fixes are allowed at this point, so the API
and ABI are really "stable" already.  In fact, at this point in time I
recommend you install that and in a couple months time you'll find that
the upgrade to the real "stable" will be minimal.

[Anecdote: last week I installed Wheezy on a 12-year-old Apple
"Clamshell" iBook with 320 Mb of RAM and a 366-mHz PowerPC 750CX
processor; works like a charm].

-- 
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Bill Findlay]

On 04/01/2013 02:15, in article 87zk0ppubz.fsf@ludovic-brenta.org, "Ludovic
Brenta" <ludovic@ludovic-brenta.org> wrote:

> Randy Brukardt writes on comp.lang.ada:
>> It sounds like Fedora changes too often for my taste. (Do they have an
>> equivalent of the LTS of Ubuntu?).
> 
> Yes, Red Hat Enterprise Linux; 7 years of paid support for each major
> release, but no GNAT included in it.
> 
>> And it sounds like Debian stable is just too old relative to GNAT (I
>> do use some Ada 2005 features in my code, no interfaces though.) None
>> of which looks too promising.
> 
> GCC 4.4 does support many Ada 2005 features; it has the Containers for
> example.
> 
> In case you really need GCC 4.6, you'll be happy to learn that Debian 7
> "Wheezy" has been frozen for months and is very close to becoming
> stable; only critical bug fixes are allowed at this point, so the API
> and ABI are really "stable" already.  In fact, at this point in time I
> recommend you install that and in a couple months time you'll find that
> the upgrade to the real "stable" will be minimal.
> 
> [Anecdote: last week I installed Wheezy on a 12-year-old Apple
> "Clamshell" iBook with 320 Mb of RAM and a 366-mHz PowerPC 750CX
> processor; works like a charm].

Does that include a PowerPC 750 GNAT 4.6?

-- 
Bill Findlay
with blueyonder.co.uk;
use  surname & forename;

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Ludovic Brenta]

Ludovic Brenta writes:
> In case you really need GCC 4.6, you'll be happy to learn that Debian
> 7 "Wheezy" has been frozen for months and is very close to becoming
> stable; only critical bug fixes are allowed at this point, so the API
> and ABI are really "stable" already.  In fact, at this point in time I
> recommend you install that and in a couple months time you'll find
> that the upgrade to the real "stable" will be minimal.

Forgot the URL: http://www.debian.org/devel/debian-installer/index.html

There is no separate installer for "desktop" as opposed to "server"
machines; the same installer works for everything from a Raspberry Pi to
a z10 mainframe, with laptops old and new in between.  This installer
does not require the machine to even have a keyboard, let alone a
graphical display; it is quite content with a network or serial
connection.

I've used this installer at least a dozen times in the past 12 years.
Every single time I was astounded by the quality of the engineering and
the amount of detail that went into this program, especially considering
that this program normally runs only once on a given machine :)

Just three examples:

Back in 2006 I installed Debian 4 "Etch", several months before it
became "stable", on an already old Sun Enterprise 250 server (2x
UltraSPARC II processors, 512 MB RAM) with no keyboard or display; I
connected a laptop to the serial line, connected the Ethernet to my hub,
placed the net-installer CD-ROM in the drive and off I went.  The
biggest problem was a 10-minute research on how to go into the firmware
using the serial line and tell the machine to boot from CD-ROM.  After
that, the install and next reboot were a breeze.

Mid-2012, on my latest laptop, the installer for Debian 6 "Squeeze"
warned that choosing XFS as the filesystem for the root partition
requires the LILO bootloader as opposed to the default GRUB2.  After a
painless installation of the base system, I promptly switched the
selection of packages from "stable" to "testing", replicated the list of
packages installed on my old laptop to the new one, and installed the
rest of my packages.  Then I scp'd my home directory from the old
laptop, restored /etc from the monotone database I keep it in, and was
productive within a couple of hours, all told.

Last week, on the old iBook I just mentioned, the Debian 7 "Wheezy"
installer warned me that that kind of machine required a special
partition, at least 880 kB in size, with the name Apple_Bootstrap.

This kind of detail makes me enthusiastic about Debian, even after 12
years of continuous use, so excuse me if I sound biased :)

Hope this helps.

-- 
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Ludovic Brenta]

Bill Findlay writes:
> Does that include a PowerPC 750 GNAT 4.6?

Yes, it does, though I didn't install it; this machine is for my son,
who is younger than the machine, to play Wesnoth on :) but I can ssh to
this machine even while he plays, of course, so I could conceivably
compile Ada programs on it :)

-- 
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Bill Findlay]

On 04/01/2013 02:51, in article 87lic9psnb.fsf@ludovic-brenta.org, "Ludovic
Brenta" <ludovic@ludovic-brenta.org> wrote:

> Bill Findlay writes:
>> Does that include a PowerPC 750 GNAT 4.6?
> 
> Yes, it does, though I didn't install it; this machine is for my son,
> who is younger than the machine, to play Wesnoth on :) but I can ssh to
> this machine even while he plays, of course, so I could conceivably
> compile Ada programs on it :)

Thanks.

-- 
Bill Findlay
with blueyonder.co.uk;
use  surname & forename;

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[montezf]

Now is a good time to take a step back and really look at what you can do here.  I'm firmly in the one task per server camp.  How about taking a second look at entertaining running a virtual environment.  Which one you choose doesn't really matter as long as it is something that you can be comfortable with.

You could go with something like Vyatta as the firewall vm, or m0n0wall, IPCop or any of the other various distributions suited for this purpose.  Even a UTM like Endian, SmoothWall or Untangle could work.  

Hopefully you aren't using the web front end as your dev machine.  So I dunno if it really matters which distribution you go with.  But if you had to have an answer, I would say Ubuntu Server would probably get my vote.  Debian stable is nice, but unless you're going to put a lot into your toolchain to make sure you can recover from an incident or disaster, Ubuntu Server will probably get you back up and running with slightly less of a headache.

Your server is getting long in the tooth but still operational.  If you think a virtual environment is inevitable then you should look at moving there now.  Once you get something implemented, it'll be difficult or impossible to decouple them.  As a thought, you could setup your virtual infrastructure and P2V your existing server and have it running on your new hardware as a virtual while you kinda get your feet wet the the VM stuff and get the replacement environment built out.

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[J-P. Rosen]

Le 03/01/2013 23:39, Randy Brukardt a �crit :
> And it sounds like Debian stable is just 
> too old relative to GNAT (I do use some Ada 2005 features in my code, no 
> interfaces though.)
Just don't install the GNAT that comes with it, and install the latest
GPL version from AdaCore.

(I often have several - sometimes up to 5 or 6 - versions of Gnat on my
machine, there is no problem in using ACT Gnat on Debian)

-- 
J-P. Rosen
Adalog
2 rue du Docteur Lombard, 92441 Issy-les-Moulineaux CEDEX
Tel: +33 1 45 29 21 52, Fax: +33 1 45 29 25 00
http://www.adalog.fr

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Stephen Leake]

Brian Drummond <brian@shapes.demon.co.uk> writes:

> On Thu, 03 Jan 2013 16:39:06 -0600, Randy Brukardt wrote:
>
>> "Tero Koskinen" <tero.koskinen@iki.fi> wrote in message
>> news:20130103174200.bcf9c1584b18c0225c153789@iki.fi...
>> 
>> It sounds like Fedora changes too often for my taste. (Do they have an
>> equivalent of the LTS of Ubuntu?). And it sounds like Debian stable is
>> just too old relative to GNAT (I do use some Ada 2005 features in my
>> code, no interfaces though.) None of which looks too promising.
>
> It's not difficult to use a newer Gnat on top of Debian, if that is your 
> only objection. I don't know what the formal objections to updating Gnat 
> (and its immediate dependencies) to "testing", perhaps Ludovic can say.
>
> But I have built gcc4.7.2 from source and not seen any glitches (beyond 
> having to set paths so it can find libraries) and I believe Adacore Libre  
> Gnat would work too. Building from source might not be recommended for a 
> server though!

You can also install the GNAT GPL packages from
http://libre.adacore.com.

The downside of doing that is it is not integrated well with the rest of
the Debian packages. But since your software is all Ada, that should not
be a problem.

-- 
-- Stephe

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Stephen Leake]

"Randy Brukardt" <randy@rrsoftware.com> writes:

> For a server, hardly anything should 
> change for long periods; pretty much the only thing required ought to be 
> security updates, other updates ought to be optional. But no one seems to 
> work that way anymore. 

Debian does; they make security only releases to the current stable.

> And it sounds like Debian stable is just 
> too old relative to GNAT (I do use some Ada 2005 features in my code, no 
> interfaces though.) 

Install GNAT GPL-<pick a year> from http://libre.adacore.com on Debian.
That would be my first choice.

Red Hat seems to be prefered at my work (NASA), and it is the Linux OS
officially supported by AdaCore. Red Hat provides constant updates on
the machines I use; I'm not clear if they have a "security only" policy.

You might be able to talk AdaCore into giving you the academic
discount on paid support, since you are working for the ARG.

-- 
-- Stephe

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Simon Clubley]

On 2013-01-04, Stephen Leake <stephen_leake@stephe-leake.org> wrote:
>
> Red Hat seems to be prefered at my work (NASA), and it is the Linux OS
> officially supported by AdaCore. Red Hat provides constant updates on
> the machines I use; I'm not clear if they have a "security only" policy.
>

If you want RHEL, but are happy with a self-support approach, there is
always CentOS or Scientific Linux, which are RHEL rebuilds.

I use Scientific Linux to run some secondary servers at work as well as
in client roles both at home and work. (Still at SL 5.x however, so I
don't have any experience of the latest SL 6.x series yet).

I choose SL a number of years ago because I preferred the more formal
support system in place for it when compared to CentOS. SL also supplied
updates for a wider range of versions than CentOS did at the time (but
I don't know if that's still true or not).

Simon.

-- 
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Microsoft: Bringing you 1980s technology to a 21st century world

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Mart van de Wege]

Pascal Obry <pascal@obry.net> writes:

> +1 for GNU/Debian.

I'm adding my voice for Debian here. I've run it on a laptop of some
kind for about 10 years now, and it always performed well.

My current system carries a full development environment with lots of
libraries for three languages (Perl, Ada, and Common Lisp), all of them
right from the repository. I've used this to do sysadmin-related
development and hobby stuff for all the time I've had Debian installed.

The Debian maintainers really deliver good work; Ludovic especially
maintains a great Ada environment. And as he has pointed out, the
current 'unstable' is in the process of being deployed as 'stable' so
just use his URLs to install, and upgrade to stable when the freeze and
release are done.

Mart
-- 
"We will need a longer wall when the revolution comes."
    --- AJS, quoting an uncertain source.

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Randy Brukardt]

Thanks. And thanks to everyone else that has replied. I'll think about this 
over the weekend and make decisions on Monday.

                     Randy.

"Ludovic Brenta" <ludovic@ludovic-brenta.org> wrote in message 
news:87pq1lpsv5.fsf@ludovic-brenta.org...
> Ludovic Brenta writes:
>> In case you really need GCC 4.6, you'll be happy to learn that Debian
>> 7 "Wheezy" has been frozen for months and is very close to becoming
>> stable; only critical bug fixes are allowed at this point, so the API
>> and ABI are really "stable" already.  In fact, at this point in time I
>> recommend you install that and in a couple months time you'll find
>> that the upgrade to the real "stable" will be minimal.
>
> Forgot the URL: http://www.debian.org/devel/debian-installer/index.html
>
> There is no separate installer for "desktop" as opposed to "server"
> machines; the same installer works for everything from a Raspberry Pi to
> a z10 mainframe, with laptops old and new in between.  This installer
> does not require the machine to even have a keyboard, let alone a
> graphical display; it is quite content with a network or serial
> connection.
>
> I've used this installer at least a dozen times in the past 12 years.
> Every single time I was astounded by the quality of the engineering and
> the amount of detail that went into this program, especially considering
> that this program normally runs only once on a given machine :)
>
> Just three examples:
>
> Back in 2006 I installed Debian 4 "Etch", several months before it
> became "stable", on an already old Sun Enterprise 250 server (2x
> UltraSPARC II processors, 512 MB RAM) with no keyboard or display; I
> connected a laptop to the serial line, connected the Ethernet to my hub,
> placed the net-installer CD-ROM in the drive and off I went.  The
> biggest problem was a 10-minute research on how to go into the firmware
> using the serial line and tell the machine to boot from CD-ROM.  After
> that, the install and next reboot were a breeze.
>
> Mid-2012, on my latest laptop, the installer for Debian 6 "Squeeze"
> warned that choosing XFS as the filesystem for the root partition
> requires the LILO bootloader as opposed to the default GRUB2.  After a
> painless installation of the base system, I promptly switched the
> selection of packages from "stable" to "testing", replicated the list of
> packages installed on my old laptop to the new one, and installed the
> rest of my packages.  Then I scp'd my home directory from the old
> laptop, restored /etc from the monotone database I keep it in, and was
> productive within a couple of hours, all told.
>
> Last week, on the old iBook I just mentioned, the Debian 7 "Wheezy"
> installer warned me that that kind of machine required a special
> partition, at least 880 kB in size, with the name Apple_Bootstrap.
>
> This kind of detail makes me enthusiastic about Debian, even after 12
> years of continuous use, so excuse me if I sound biased :)
>
> Hope this helps.
>
> -- 
> Ludovic Brenta. 

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Randy Brukardt]

<montezf@gmail.com> wrote in message 
news:e855aa0e-39cd-4af9-a6be-483f247380bd@googlegroups.com...
...
>Hopefully you aren't using the web front end as your dev machine.

I'm going to use it to compile the already-existing Ada software for it, 
because I don't have another Linux machine with sufficient power (my laptop 
is ssslllooowwww). That's "development" only to the extent that I have to 
change stuff to eliminate the inevitable Windows/Linux differences. The 
actual development will continue on my primary development machine (still 
Windows XP, using Janus/Ada of course -- gotta eat your own dog food).

(I actually considered creating a Janus/Ada version of Linux -- especially 
as I get requests for it periodically -- which would be relatively easily 
done out of various parts previously built here [the old SCO Unix compiler 
and various other Unix-based projects means that I have most of what would 
be needed in existence, but it all would have to ported to the latest 
compiler and runtime] -- but that really wouldn't save anything as I'd have 
to write Linux versions of socket libraries and the like. There, it's easier 
to use the GNAT ones [at least, I hope that will be the case].)

I don't think that such limited use will cause any serious security 
problems, and I'm purposely leaving it uncomfortable to use that machine 
that way (it's in a corner with a cheap keyboard and screen) to keep any 
temptation to a minimum.

                                         Randy.

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Dirk Heinrichs]

Ludovic Brenta wrote:

> There is no separate installer for "desktop" as opposed to "server"
> machines; the same installer works for everything from a Raspberry Pi to
> a z10 mainframe, with laptops old and new in between.  This installer
> does not require the machine to even have a keyboard, let alone a
> graphical display; it is quite content with a network or serial
> connection.
> 
> I've used this installer at least a dozen times in the past 12 years.
> Every single time I was astounded by the quality of the engineering and
> the amount of detail that went into this program, especially considering
> that this program normally runs only once on a given machine :)
> 
> Just three examples:
>
> [...]

Let me add another one :)

It was just yesterday that I used it as a rescue system for my Guruplug, 
which all of a sudden stopped booting inside initramfs, leaving me with 
nothing but the "(initramfs)" prompt. So I've put it's kernel and initrd 
onto a microsd card, booted from it, mounted my filesystems, entered chroot 
and recreated the initrd. That was all done over serial line attached to the 
plugs JTAG port. Now it's up and running fine again.

Bye...

	Dirk
-- 
Dirk Heinrichs <dirk.heinrichs@altum.de>
Tel: +49 (0)2471 209385 | Mobil: +49 (0)176 34473913
GPG Public Key C2E467BB | Jabber: dirk.heinrichs@altum.de

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Jeffrey Carter]

On 01/04/2013 09:59 PM, Randy Brukardt wrote:
>
> (I actually considered creating a Janus/Ada version of Linux -- especially
> as I get requests for it periodically -- which would be relatively easily
> done out of various parts previously built here

That would be great. Who would think that an Ada OS "would be relatively easily 
done"? Then, of course, you'd use it for your server.

(I realize you meant to say "a Janus/Ada version FOR Linux", which would also be 
good, but I couldn't resist.)

-- 
Jeff Carter
"It's all right, Taggart. Just a man and a horse being hung out there."
Blazing Saddles
34

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Ludovic Brenta]

Maciej Sobczak writes on comp.lang.ada:
> My alternative choice would be a FreeBSD machine, but the risk of
> solving software configuration issues on your own would have to be
> taken under consideration - that is, the operating system itself is
> close to perfect, but due to smaller user base the user-level software
> around it might be less consistent than what you can get in Debian.

Ah but there's also Debian GNU/kFreeBSD :)

http://www.debian.org/ports/kfreebsd-gnu/index.en.html

complete with Ada toolchain, of course)!

-- 
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Maciej Sobczak]

W dniu poniedziałek, 7 stycznia 2013 00:19:12 UTC+1 użytkownik Ludovic Brenta napisał:

> > My alternative choice would be a FreeBSD machine,

> Ah but there's also Debian GNU/kFreeBSD :)

Which, from the point of view of finding help and support, is neither Debian nor FreeBSD. If something breaks and I get lost, who's going to help me?

On the other hand, this might be worth trying anyway.

-- 
Maciej Sobczak * http://www.msobczak.com * http://www.inspirel.com

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Ludovic Brenta]

Maciej Sobczak writes on comp.lang.ada:
> W dniu poniedziałek, 7 stycznia 2013 00:19:12 UTC+1 użytkownik Ludovic Brenta napisał:
>
>>> My alternative choice would be a FreeBSD machine,
>
>> Ah but there's also Debian GNU/kFreeBSD :)
>
> Which, from the point of view of finding help and support, is neither
> Debian nor FreeBSD. If something breaks and I get lost, who's going to
> help me?

Why, the developers themselves, of course.  They are reachable on the
dedicated mailing list, at http://lists.debian.org/debian-bsd.

If I had time, I'd certainly experiment with the support for ZFS and
FreeBSD jails that this port of Debian supports.

> On the other hand, this might be worth trying anyway.

Yes.

When Linux stopped booting on my 2001-vintage IBM ThinkPad T22 (probably
due to RAM or chipset problems), I revived this machine by installing
Debian GNU/kFreeBSD on it; that kernel did boot and made the machine
usable for another year -- its third life, so so speak, after Windows
and Debian GNU/Linux.  This machine finally died and is still in my
basement, as a source for spare parts :)

-- 
Ludovic Brenta.

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Randy Brukardt]

"Jeffrey Carter" <spam.jrcarter.not@spam.not.acm.org> wrote in message 
news:kc9k0k$85i$1@dont-email.me...
> On 01/04/2013 09:59 PM, Randy Brukardt wrote:
>>
>> (I actually considered creating a Janus/Ada version of Linux --  
>> especially
>> as I get requests for it periodically -- which would be relatively easily
>> done out of various parts previously built here
>
> That would be great. Who would think that an Ada OS "would be relatively 
> easily done"? Then, of course, you'd use it for your server.

I had the outline of such an OS *way* back in the day (when I was still a 
graduate student). It supported a file system and threading (would need to 
add sockets to that). The main problem that I see today is that it would be 
difficult to get device drivers (back then, I just rolled my own, they were 
easy enough to do with the floppy controllers of the CP/M days, and serial 
lines meant just programming a UART). Using device drivers for Linux would 
help, but then you'd have dragged in all of the problems of interfacing, so 
I'm not sure that you'd gain much in the end.

> (I realize you meant to say "a Janus/Ada version FOR Linux", which would 
> also be good, but I couldn't resist.)

Don't blame you for trying... :-)

I don't seem to have enough time to finish the things I've promised these 
days, so taking on new projects is virtually impossible. No matter how 
interesting...(an Ada OS for the Raspberry PI, perhaps?)

                                 Randy.

Re: Linux distro for new server?

[Björn Persson]

Ludovic Brenta wrote:
> Randy Brukardt writes on comp.lang.ada:
> > It sounds like Fedora changes too often for my taste. (Do they have an
> > equivalent of the LTS of Ubuntu?).  
> 
> Yes, Red Hat Enterprise Linux; 7 years of paid support for each major
> release, but no GNAT included in it.

CentOS 6 does include GNAT though (GCC 4.4.6). If you add the EPEL
repository we have some Ada libraries there, but not a lot yet.

Björn Persson