[Neurodebian-devel] fresh wheezy-based NeuroDebian VM images (todo or not todo)?

[Yaroslav Halchenko]

On Thu, 10 Jan 2013, Yury V. Zaytsev wrote:
> > the tandem of a base VM image(s) + provisioning via puppet/chef is quite
> > useful for many scenarios e.g. (if we divert from all webfarms) 
> > [...]
> But of course! You're talking to a guy that is configuring single
> instances with Puppet in master-less mode, so I don't need convincing. 

;-) shame on me then -- I am just using etckeeper... I have used
cfengine2 extensively for a previous cluster I was administering, then
when we were setting up our new one - refused to learn puppet or chef
(they also lacked seamless ability to introduce patching of configs
instead of complete copies) so tried cfengine3 but it drove me nuts (may
be now it is better/stable).  So I am yet to come into puppeteers.

> However, if your box is already set up, then you do have puppet / chef
> already working, if not, then include provisioning of puppet / cloning
> of manifests in the kickstart / preseed or what have you...

the question here is not about "your box" but rather about a complete
environment (of which you have multitude, in contrast to a single box)
where you want to test/deploy/share

> > Moreover -- sharing... vagrant .box is a bit more than .ova -- it might
> > contain already additional provisioning and setup  (e.g. ports
> > forwarding etc), making it all nice.
> Meh... Who would run boxes created by some guy on the interwebs on their
> infra...

and that is where veewee comes into play -- to not use stock vagrant
ubuntu image, nor some random image from http://www.vagrantbox.es/ but
some trustworthy, created from scratch with complete provisioning
information, neurodebian-wheezy-amd64.box ;-)

> there, but otherwise stuff like port-forwarding is just not needed.

not for everyone indeed, but e.g. would be handy for running a complete
ipython notebook server ;-)

> I
> can't think of a scenario where this would be useful for NeuroDebian or
> NEST virtual machines.

NeuroDebian:
- testing (testkraut) of complete environments even beyound Debian
  (where we could debootstrap + schroot to achieve comparable setups).
- delivering (Neuro)Debian to those struggling (there were already
  people seeking vagrant boxes with complete scientific python stack)
- once again -- rolling out complete environments given a concise
  provisioning information (for scientific purposes ;) )
and I bet we could come up with more

NEST: close to NeuroDebian ones ;)

> > so altogether -- is it groundbreaking invention?  NO.  But it is a quite
> > well done integration of existing technologies to address a variety  of
> > usage schemes.
> Okay, in the end it doesn't matter... Maybe I just got to hate the old
> logo too much (if you remember what it looked like).

I was successful at forgetting it if I ever saw it ;)

> > yeah -- it should... although so far I have tried only to use it via
> > vagrant, but that is what it was distined for originally  -- pure
> > .ova's.

> That would be great, but anyways, another thing that is bothering me is
> the live media issue. I need to get back to your old e-mail and refresh
> my memory...

yeah -- live media is not directly covered by veewee ... in that it
doesn't have examples but I guess it should be doable with a few
additional scriptlets ;)

> I remember you mentioned some Debian-base solution for that.

yes -- http://live.debian.net/

> Last time I
> looked at it, Ubuntu had some pretty decent mastering kit, but still it
> was so much work that repacking released images looked like the way to
> go if I didn't want to spend all my life on that.

live-build is fully automated but indeed it would be nice to avoid
needing different specifications for VM and live media.

> > as long as you stay in Ruby gem/rvmuniverse -- it might be tollerable
> Meh again :-)
yeah -- doesn't fit me either
-- 
Yaroslav O. Halchenko
Postdoctoral Fellow,   Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences
Dartmouth College, 419 Moore Hall, Hinman Box 6207, Hanover, NH 03755
Phone: +1 (603) 646-9834                       Fax: +1 (603) 646-1419
WWW:   http://www.linkedin.com/in/yarik