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kikinovak
n00b
n00b


Joined: 25 Aug 2002
Posts: 55
Location: Montpezat (South France)

PostPosted: Sun Oct 12, 2014 2:37 pm    Post subject: Gentoo for production deployment? Reply with quote

Hi,

I'm running a small IT company (http://www.microlinux.fr) based 100 % on Linux and FOSS in South France. I'm relying on Linux exclusively since around 2001, I've run most major and many minor distributions over the years... and taking a peek in this forum, I even ran Gentoo back in 2002.

Currently I'm mostly relying on my own blend of Slackware (http://www.microlinux.fr/slackware/) on both servers and desktops (http://www.microlinux.fr/mled.php). My custom spin consist mostly on a bunch of additional packages that I build locally and then upload to a public repository. I also package configurations, which makes my stuff easy to deploy in schools, public computer rooms and the likes.

I have something in mind, and I'd like to ask the Gentoo gurus in this forum about how feasible this seems. Here's what I need on a daily basis:

* LAN server (Samba, NIS, LDAP, etc.)
* public server (Apache, Postfix, ...)
* standard KDE-based desktop
* lightweight Xfce-based desktop for old hardware

Can I do the following thing with Gentoo?

* build everything on one big workstation in my office (in a series of VM's)
* upload binaries for various repos (server, desktop-kde, desktop-xfce)
* configure client machines so that they only use what's in the binary repos

Other detail: I usually go for the most stable version of each software. For example, I jump from LibreOffice 4.1.6 to 4.2.5, and then I wait for the last point release to upgrade to 4.3.whatever. Same thing with KDE, where I like to upgrade from 4.10.5 to 4.11.5, and so on. Is something like this possible with Gentoo?

Cheers from the flooded South of France,

Niki [/list]
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steveL
Watchman
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Joined: 13 Sep 2006
Posts: 5153
Location: The Peanut Gallery

PostPosted: Sun Oct 12, 2014 3:29 pm    Post subject: Re: Gentoo for production deployment? Reply with quote

kikinovak wrote:
Can I do the following thing with Gentoo?

* build everything on one big workstation in my office (in a series of VM's)
* upload binaries for various repos (server, desktop-kde, desktop-xfce)
* configure client machines so that they only use what's in the binary repos

Yes that's all possible via a binhost; though for the last part you'd need to provide a portage tree that only has in it what's in the binhost repo dirs, for smoothest operation. You'd likely end up wanting to provide profiles as well, which can be part of running an overlay.

Using FEATURES="buildpkg" (lower down on same page) on your main machine for rollback, gets you started on the first part.
Quote:
Other detail: I usually go for the most stable version of each software. For example, I jump from LibreOffice 4.1.6 to 4.2.5, and then I wait for the last point release to upgrade to 4.3.whatever. Same thing with KDE, where I like to upgrade from 4.10.5 to 4.11.5, and so on. Is something like this possible with Gentoo?

Sure. It's even easier when you're providing the tree, in terms of client usage.

You'd simply build what you wanted, using a PORTAGE_CONFIGROOT as well as ROOT, and you can mask or unmask to your heart's content, with full separation. Some of those settings would be what you want to push as profile content.

I'd recommend using git, or some other distributed vcs, for the configuration directories.

HTH,
steveL.
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