Date: Tue, 03 Jan 2012 20:50:59 -0600 From: Ron McDowell <rcm@fuzzwad.org> To: Lawrence Stewart <lstewart@freebsd.org> Cc: freebsd-sysinstall@freebsd.org, Marcel Moolenaar <marcel@xcllnt.net> Subject: Re: sysinstall as a post-install tool Message-ID: <4F03BE93.9040708@fuzzwad.org> In-Reply-To: <4F03AF24.70102@freebsd.org> References: <CAF6rxgnVAbRd-mrN%2BykDmXafPzQRJgaw9q=%2Bi%2BXqTzL26gWh5Q@mail.gmail.com> <F80CD5E2-0CC0-4872-9B25-72C4ABCC5F42@xcllnt.net> <4F03AF24.70102@freebsd.org>
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Lawrence Stewart wrote: > [switching to freebsd-sysinstall@ which I'm no subscribed to, please > keep me CC'ed] > > On 01/04/12 11:27, Marcel Moolenaar wrote: >> >> On Jan 3, 2012, at 3:33 PM, Eitan Adler wrote: >> >>> Hi, >>> >>> In the the recent sysinstall thread there seems to be general >>> agreement that >>> having a post-install configuration tool is a good thing. Until such a >>> tool is written I think it would be a good idea to use sysinstall for >>> this purpose. I am willing to do the work to restore sysinstall and >>> maintain it as a post-install tool until a new one is written. >> >> I though sade was created for that purpose, because sysinstall was too >> much tied to the installation process. If sysinstall comes back, sade >> definitely has to go: >> >> ------------------------------------------------------------------------ >> r161060 | netchild | 2006-08-07 16:35:49 -0700 (Mon, 07 Aug 2006) | 9 >> lines >> >> Say welcome to 'sade', the SysAdmins Disk Editor. It's the fdisk and >> disklabel part >> of sysinstall. So sysinstall may retire now, we have the important >> non-install part >> of it covered. >> >> ATM it doesn't understand GEOM stuff (like mirror, stripe, raid, >> ...), but patches >> to change this and to clean it up internally are more than welcome. >> >> Submitted by: mami@nyitolap.hu >> >> ------------------------------------------------------------------------ >> >> In general I think it's a bad idea to revive sysinstall. It doesn't >> function appropriately on most architectures that FreeBSD supports >> and it's definitely the opposite of what we've been working towards >> for at least the last 5 years. > > In the sysinstall removal thread, Ron (CC'ed) suggested he might be > interested in getting involved with writing a post installation config > script which leverages bsdinstall's sh code where possible, but is > separate and stand alone. Ron's extensive sysadmin background would be > very useful in developing such a tool, so it seems silly not to take > the offer and run with it to see where we end up. > > Ron, are you still interested in this project? What help and/or > support do you need to get things moving? > > Eitan, as discussed briefly on IRC, I suspect the amount of work > required to revive sysinstall and do all the hacking to make it do > what you suggest would be in the same ballpark as syncing up with Ron > and having a crack at a shell script based on a set of dialogs a la > bsdinstaller to achieve the same goal. > > I know you said you didn't want to write a new tool, so if getting > involved with the above doesn't take your fancy, perhaps just waiting > to see what comes of the effort to write said tool would be prudent. > > Cheers, > Lawrence I [Ron] just added myself to the sysinstall list. A comment about the "sade" mention above...sade performs a very small part of what sysinstall does and cannot be thought of as a replacement for sysinstall, just as a replacement for a small but vital part of it. I'm not sure if that's what the OP meant or not...but thought I'd throw it out there in case anyone did. Yes, I'm in the process of building up a box I can dedicate to this project...new HD arrived today. What I envision is a text based system administration suite that will [hopefully] do everything that the "Configure" option on the top level of the sysinstall menu does. I see it as being part of the base OS, such that once one has rebooted from HD after the install and logged in as root [or user+su], a menu can be brought up by entering "sysadmin" or such. Does "sysadmin" work for a name? I kinda like it. I plan on basically going through the sysinstall post-configuration menu: Distributions Install additional distribution sets Documentation installation Install FreeBSD Documentation set Packages Install pre-packaged software for FreeBSD Root Password Set the system manager's password Fdisk The disk Slice (PC-style partition) Editor Label The disk Label editor User Management Add user and group information Console Customize system console behavior Time Zone Set which time zone you're in Media Change the installation media type Mouse Configure your mouse Networking Configure additional network services Security Configure system security options Startup Configure system startup options TTYs Configure system ttys. Options View/Set various installation options HTML Docs Go to the HTML documentation menu (post-ins Load KLD Load a KLD from a floppy and as close as reasonable, stick to the same task flow. I plan on writing it against 10-current and look at back-porting to 9 after it's somewhat stable. One new, important, and not-so-difficult task will be: on exiting, check the sanity of /etc/rc.conf and complain if needed, but allow the user to override the safety-switch if foot-shooting is really requested. :) I'm a firm believer of not disallowing anything. -- Ron McDowell San Antonio TX
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