[gentoo-dev] System management - Portage management

[gentoo-dev] System management - Portage management

[jboyens]

I'm seriously considering using Gentoo for my office, but I need to
figure out some ideas on how to get the 8 boxes to "sync-up". I need
the applications to be the same. Versions, apps installed, features,
etc. Pretty much I want 8 boxes exactly the same with some minor
config changes. We mount our /home off of an NFS mount, so that gives
us concurrent settings and the like. Any suggestions on how to keep
the packages updated and the same?

Thanks,
-- 
JR Boyens
jboyens@iastate.edu
---------------------------------------------
Speak softly and carry a +6 two-handed sword.
---------------------------------------------

Re: [gentoo-dev] System management - Portage management

[gentoo-user]

On 22 Feb 2002 jboyens@fooninja.org wrote:

> I'm seriously considering using Gentoo for my office, but I need to
> figure out some ideas on how to get the 8 boxes to "sync-up". I need
> the applications to be the same. Versions, apps installed, features,
> etc. Pretty much I want 8 boxes exactly the same with some minor
> config changes. We mount our /home off of an NFS mount, so that gives
> us concurrent settings and the like. Any suggestions on how to keep
> the packages updated and the same?
>

Appoint one of the machines as "master" and have it do updates (I advise
you to do that manually for safety). Then someway copy the files of your
"master" system to all the slaves. You can write some script for doing the
updating. Basically rsync could do most of the job. It doesn't delete old
files though, but

find / -xdev >filelist

on the master and

find / -xdev >slavelist

on the slaves and than a compare

cat filelist slavelist |sort |uniq -u >filestodelete

and a final

rm `cat filestodelete`

if you are sure (on the slaves of course)

Good luck

Paul

-- 
  ___
 /~~~\  | Paul de Vrieze
| O-O | | Student of information management and technology
|  _  | | Mail: Paul@devrieze.net
 \___/  | Homepage: http://www.devrieze.net

Re: [gentoo-dev] System management - Portage management

[M Butcher]

Seems like you should be able to do something clever by comparing a file list 
of <master>:/var/db/pkg to <slave>:/var/db/pkg. You'd still have to (or "be 
able to") manage different config files for each, but this would help keep 
applications, versions, features, etc. the same.

Matt

On Friday 22 February 2002 08:28 am, you wrote:
> On 22 Feb 2002 jboyens@fooninja.org wrote:
> > I'm seriously considering using Gentoo for my office, but I need to
> > figure out some ideas on how to get the 8 boxes to "sync-up". I need
> > the applications to be the same. Versions, apps installed, features,
> > etc. Pretty much I want 8 boxes exactly the same with some minor
> > config changes. We mount our /home off of an NFS mount, so that gives
> > us concurrent settings and the like. Any suggestions on how to keep
> > the packages updated and the same?
>
> Appoint one of the machines as "master" and have it do updates (I advise
> you to do that manually for safety). Then someway copy the files of your
> "master" system to all the slaves. You can write some script for doing the
> updating. Basically rsync could do most of the job. It doesn't delete old
> files though, but
>
> find / -xdev >filelist
>
> on the master and
>
> find / -xdev >slavelist
>
> on the slaves and than a compare
>
> cat filelist slavelist |sort |uniq -u >filestodelete
>
> and a final
>
> rm `cat filestodelete`
>
> if you are sure (on the slaves of course)
>
> Good luck
>
> Paul

Re: [gentoo-dev] System management - Portage management

[George Shapovalov]

Sounds like a single LAN and a small office. You might want to consider 
putting your /usr on the same file-server where you keep your /home. 
Then you need to only update the server and propagate changes in /etc to the 
clients (which you will need to check anyway if you are to install it all 
separately). On the other hand if your changer are really lockal (such as 
user settings, going under /home) you might end up mounting all your 
important stuff (/bin /etc /lib and /sbin) off that nfs server and only 
leaving /var /root /boot and /mnt local (of course /proc and /dev are local 
as well). With some tweaking yopu might even do diskless workstations, but 
that would be to much work for too little benefit, since you have them all 
functioning now. 
There are definitely pros and cons of doing things this way, and it is really 
up to you to chose what is best in your case.

George



On Thursday 21 February 2002 22:36, you wrote:
> I'm seriously considering using Gentoo for my office, but I need to
> figure out some ideas on how to get the 8 boxes to "sync-up". I need
> the applications to be the same. Versions, apps installed, features,
> etc. Pretty much I want 8 boxes exactly the same with some minor
> config changes. We mount our /home off of an NFS mount, so that gives
> us concurrent settings and the like. Any suggestions on how to keep
> the packages updated and the same?
>
> Thanks,