[CoLoCo] Webmin???

[Kevin Fries]

On Wed, 2008-04-02 at 13:16 -0700, Neal McBurnett wrote:
> On Wed, Apr 02, 2008 at 01:46:52PM -0600, Kevin Fries wrote:
> > ahh nuts, here we go again.
> > 
> > Linux is supposed to be about choice, but the Ubuntu distro is more and
> > more showing that its just not industrial strength.  ebox does not have
> > the industry wide support that webmin has.  Funny thing is that I often
> > use webmin only for firewall configuration.  And, ebox does not appear
> > to support shorewall, or any other standard firewall configuration
> > utility.
> 
> With webmin, I think the issue is complicated by underlying approaches
> of different distros.

The webmin team has always been sensitive to this.  The solution is to
work within that community, and keep tools uniform.  One of the well
deserved knocks that the Windows/Mac community lumps on Linux is that
their is too many distros.  While I don't think the number of distros is
a problem, as long as the basic infrastructure and management tools
remain consistent.  Sometimes Linux does a good job of that (take
openssl or openldap as examples... everyone just uses or extends a
common library), this situation is an example of where Linux does this
very poorly.  Rather than working with Webmin to fix whatever your
issues are, you are working on a different tool, making you less
consistent with RedHat, CentOS, etc (for the record, this is my key
dislike of Suse and Yast).

Don't get me wrong, I would love to see a better tool than Webmin come
along.  But, eBox is too proprietary to their own way, without enough
3rd party support.  Its is also too simplistic for advanced
configuration.

Personally, I get the simplistic controls on desktops, but not on
servers.  I think that is why I am getting so upset with Ubuntu lately.
The stuff I love on the desktop, is driving me nuts on the server.
Servers need not be setup by amateurs, and therefore the level of hand
holding is too Microsof-ish or Apple-ish for my taste.  I expect the
interface to be a little more raw and basic on a server.  Take a look at
power tools as an analogy... the ones built for Joe public do not allow
for the level of granular control that tools built for professionals
have.  The Ubuntu community is trying to do for the server, what it did
for the desktop, and at least in my opinion, its a dangerous thing.
Servers in the home are probably quite easily set up with a basic
script, and then even eBox is over kill.  Servers built for business,
need that extended level of granular control.  I love the Ubuntu desktop
because of its smart defaults... I guess I am getting upset with the
server stuff because I feel the Ubuntu community is restricting my level
of control.  Again, love it on the desktop, frustrated with it on the
server.

> An advantage of the debian/ubuntu packaging system is unusually smooth
> upgrades, due in part to the standards on how the packages deal with
> configuration files in the debian policy and deb-conf programs.
> RPM/yum is far less mature in this area, last I heard.

The biggest difference I have noticed between the two is DPKG's abaility
to interact with the user.  RPM/Yum is very little more than a
standardized tgz file with some minimal scripting built in.  I know the
problem that is being talked about and can give you an example.  When
you install MySQL server, it will stop and request an admin password
from the end user.  In my opinion, Synaptic does a poor job of
supporting this also, but it does handle it.  Yum will not.  So no root
password is set.

In synaptic, the install will appear to stall.  Open the details, and
you will get a terminal where you can respond to the prompts.  Of course
if you did this from a terminal with apt-get, it would use ncurses to
prompt you.  The question is how would you handle this in webmin.  The
default behavior in webmin is to pipe the output inside <pre> tags.  So,
it is not giving you this terminal.  This can leave packages installed
but not configured.

Debian based systems also uses this same mechanism to reconfigure
packages (dpkg-reconfigure, update-alternatives, etc).  My argument is
not with the problem, but the solution.  Webmin has kinda become a
standard by default.  So accept that, and work with the software install
package to handle package reconfiguration.  Don't abandon what everyone
already knows and go in a different direction.  Keeping to the same web
based admin tool as other distros, allows transfer of knowledge between
distros to be faster, and allows Linux to grow at a faster pace.

> If a package like webmin changes config files in such a way that it
> breaks upgrades, it doesn't surprise me that the package isn't
> supported.  That doesn't mean the package can't be fixed, though I
> guess it is hard.  I don't know the details, but please help if you
> can.

That is a bogus argument.  Not even Debian is trying to claim that one.
Webmin was supported up until Etch, and the guy that was maintaining it
did not want to do it any longer.  The argument was, "if somebody really
wants this, resubmit it and you can then manage it... I'm done".  But
the Debian community (a distro I still use quite a bit, and love) tend
to be the hard core of the Linux community, the "ssh in and use vi you
sissy" kind of admins.  For the most part, that is the type of admin I
am, but I also need to deal with "Windows mostly, Linux occasionally"
subs under me, and so Webmin is a god-send.  As such, it is not as
surprising to me that nobody picked up the banner over there.  Ubuntu is
much more concerned with user interface issues, so I am surprised it was
not picked up on this side.

It does not wrongly configure any package I have ever seen, and I use it
allot.  What it will do is not configure a package because of the
reasons I showed above.  Again, work with the standard tool to fix the
problem, don't do in a different direction.

-- 
Kevin Fries
Senior Linux Engineer
Computer and Communications Technology, Inc
A Division of Japan Communications Inc.