Discussion of Fedora Server use-cases

[Jim Perrin]

On 10/28/2013 04:13 PM, Michael R. Davis wrote:
> Fedora Server Folks,
>  
> I think the group needs to focus on making things easier for 100% RPM
> Installs.  RPM is the package manager for Fedora so applications SHOULD
> be deployable with 100% RPM-based installs and NOT require another
> system to get them running or configure them (e.g. chef, puppet, CFengine).

This is already the ideal case for most things. Very few require things
like this to configure a functional default. Katello and foreman are the
only two that come to mind offhand.

There's a difference between initial install and config
maintenance/management though.

>  
> Here's a short list of things that I would like and would be rather easy
> to implement.
>  
>  - Any daemon can be started and running with a "-on" package (e.g.
> httpd-on) just a wrapper with chkconfig on + service start
>  - /etc/fstab.d/ capability

Could you provide an example of why this might be useful? Do you
programmatically change mount points enough for this?

>  - Moving /etc/yum.repos.d/*.repo files from fedora-release to an
> independent package that can optionally not be installed in the
> kickstart. THIS IS A BIG SECURITY PET PEEVE OF MINE. 

Could you elaborate a bit on this one as well please?

>>>    * Database server (both free and commercial).
>>> s/commercial/proprietary/ I guess ?
>  
> We really need to fix the Oracle instant client mess.  SpaceWalk tried
> but why can't Fedora make a really great wrapper RPM so that it just
> works.  I'm sure most of you will say why can't Oracle just make good
> RPMs.  I have my own wrapper but why make it so hard. Same with
> Perl-DBD-Oracle. This is a political effort more than technical.  But,
> these are the kinds of things, I think, this group needs to work on.  I
> am not proposing that Fedora host Oracle RPMs (wrong license) but work
> with Oracle to fix it for everyone in one place and just make it easy.


I've not found oracle overly willing to help in most aspects. In most
cases they've been condescending and arrogant.

>>>  * Simplify management and deployment.[1]
>  
> Bottom line I think Fedora should provide the running building block or
> even full running applications like TurnKey Linux with a nice default
> configuration.  e.g. I need a running webserver "yum install httpd-on". 
> I need a running database "yum install postgresql-server-on".
>  
> So, a web application spec simply requires: postgresql-server-on
> httpd-on and done!

Would there be an equivalent -off for folks who wish to manually tinker
prior to enabling? If so, what would be the behavior if someone were to
'yum install httpd-on httpd-off' ?

I'm not convinced that yum should be in the business of
enabling/disabling services like this.



-- 
Jim Perrin
The CentOS Project | http://www.centos.org
twitter: @BitIntegrity | GPG Key: FA09AD77