Linux

Well, here it is Friday night. I’m preparing for a trip in a week or so to India and Singapore for 2 weeks. Got some priority projects to get good statuses on. The new work keeps me going most days and evenings. I noticed I had not posted anything here in some days so its time to scratch and sniff again and find some virtual travel spots. Excuse the rather lame wandering here; but its what I’m made of.

Anomie’s Journey

Anomie is a sociological term from back when. I like its meaning overall. It bridges a few gaps. I always felt that sociologists were kinda funny kids on the block back when I did anthropology. We used to joke that they were “almost enlightened”. But psychologists were unworthy. I still feel that way for some reason. Perhaps because they always felt that they had some magic answers and they only did the observation for an hour a week. After all, anthropologists study behaviors for years and often admit to still not knowing nearly enough. This is human and cultural behavior folks. How can you sum up another culture in an hour a week?

Sincerely Moving Away from Center

I find myself these days getting some kind of wanderlust. I drift off sometimes to find a reality that I once had. Advancing years? I still feel in command of my senses (for the most part). No, I think its some mental wanderlust. I still connect to Alexander Supertramp and still see that magical bus and wonder at his life and places. Darn that Sean Penn anyways. He had to do that movie. He left me scarred.

Now I am moving off the center beam. I remember when I went into my wild. For me, it was those days of wandering deserts, mountains, hills. I could have stayed there for those years and more. Anthropology was such a mistress folks. Demanding, sometimes demented; but always very possessive and needing more.

And I miss it sometimes very much and other times even more. But I miss it in a way of not wanting to go back. I like what I have now; in fact would say I love it. But its the secret life of my own conscience that drags me around its hurricane force winds.

Linux on the Corners of the World

Back to my travel to Chennai. I like India folks. I told a colleague that India and Linux are a lot alike. Both seem unfinished, promising, rich, and tapestried. They both have potential and like most human conditions some flaws. Software is never finished and my feeling about India is its not finished either. And that’s a wondrous thing. Its mold is still be shaped and I think the people know it. So off I go soon.

Wish me well and safe travels. I wonder why Dave and his Offbeat Guides guys won’t invite me. I’m a good traveler guys. I like adventure. Gimme a try. I want to be a Offbeat travel guy. I’m going to Singapore and India soon. I have 3 days of a weekend to go poke around in dusty corners.

This weekend was a quiet one for me. At work on Friday, I had reached the end of the tether running Windows. XP Professional decided it was unhappy and I had been unhappy for awhile being away from “The Linux”. I had gotten more that way of late with moving to a position of openly evangelizing Linux solutions. I should be eating the dog food. So, instead of merely buying another laptop drive, I installed the Brown Distribution over the XP drive. Its always a liberating feeling when I make a basic change. I just feel more real, more in control, more “there” with Linux. its a better thing. Now I’ll enjoy this until I see the new Ubuntu come out and then I’ll consider whether I update or not. Truth be told, things are working very well for me now. Since the company uses Exchange, I just use OWA for calendaring only and use Thunderbird for email.

My phone, a Motorola Q9 global, still does what I want. Its the hub of my own collaboration approaches and lets me keep updated with email, calendaring, tasks and I don’t interface all that much with exchange.

I do have a infrequent need to access specific programs like Visio so I have a native Server 2008 box all pimped out looking like Vista for those rare times.

You can live in a Windows-centric world and use other tools. Its not hard to get there.

When VMware announced that ESXi would be downloadable for free, I knew that I’d be able to find a good source to do a so-called unsupported install onto a whitebox. Its tricky though. The installer just will not see any ole network interface card or hard disk drives. I’ll skip all the failures and get on with what I did to make things work on a lowly home whitebox. It is lowly compared to what we used to run ESX on at Visa; but still its a decent system. Here are the specs and data on the system:

1. ECS GeForce 6100SM-M2 Socket AM2 Motherboard (RETAIL) GeForce6100SM-M2 (V1.0A)
2. Socket AM2 NVIDIA GeForce 6100 Chipset
3. NVIDIA nForce 405 Chipset
4. SATA RAID 0/1
5. NVIDIA GeForce 6100 Video Onboard

My particular system has 4g of memory but I could go farther with it as it all the way up to 16gb of memory and it has a dual core AMD64 6000+ CPU in it.

Note that most of the list above will not work with ESXi. Well, the memory and CPU will and perhaps that’s the most important. Here is what I had to add to make it work though:

• Promise SATA300 TX4
• 2 x 500gb Seagate SATA 3.0 Drives
• 1 crummy but reliable E100 Network card

So I assembled all this into the system, booted the ESXi installer ISO image and off it went. It found the Promise SATA controller, gave me a choice of drives to install to. The install went fine but of course the Marvel Yukon gig ethernet card is not found. Hence, the E100 card above that I have a few of. When done, I got the warning from the ESXi install that I had no “persistent memory”. So I configured two disks worth of 900gb of usable storage space.Promise SATA300 TX4. The other nice thing about this promise controller is that I still have two more SATA ports left with nothing on them and plenty of space in the case I chose.

So what to do with this you may ask? Well, its a home experiment and I already had the system. Just had to add the Promise controller which cost about $70.00. Its baremetal so things are different than VMWare Server at a few levels. Its faster, cleaner, and more dedicated which is fine for me. it also has a very constrained HCL that VMWare openly promotes; but as you can see it is possible to do ESXi on a comfortable; yet minimal system at home.

The next step is to run the VMware converter which talks to ESXi directly and “port” a few VMWare workstation images I have to the server. I could also just do installs of new guests if I wanted; but I have a few different ones.

If you decide to go play in the fields of ESXi, read the vm-help website for tips and tricks to get you through the experience. You too can have a whitebox running a baremetal hypervisor!

Final Steps

Why you may ask would I do this? Mess around with temporal and spatial things like virtualization. This leads me to my last area. My position has changed dramatically at the company. I am know working as a product evangelist and technologist/product manager for our evolving and emerging solutions which includes our Linux portfolio. I am expected to participate in wide-ranging technology discussions with partners, assess new technologies (like virtualization) and then promote their use in the company ecology. I’m very excited about this move because I think I’m good at this. I’ve been around Linux for about 12 years now in a few settings. I’ve managed deployments, built custom distributions, managed large PS engagements. I also feel that I understand its place and what it offers as a compelling alternative in a few settings to more standardized solutions. Call me a disruptive solutions specialist if you will

Things never stay the same and when they change, they really change. Change is good and I believe our minds and spirits and bodies thrive with it. If we just stay the status quo, we never feel the challenge.

I’ve been playing around with two cool virtualization technologies. One is on my almost brand spanking new Windows Server 2008 box. This box is a AMD64 dual core 6000+ with 6g of memory. It runs most stuff very robustly and VMware Server and/or Hyper-V are no exception. Unfortunately, on Ubuntu 7.10 AMD64 I can no longer seem to get the Console Monitor to work no matter what I try; so I moved things off that box. Now I have VMware Workstation installed on a Server 2003 box and my 2008 Workstation (uhm Server). Truth be told, Server 2008 is an excellent workstation OS. It flat outflies Vista 64 which I have one of as well. Now I just use the Vista box to serve up my new HP printer software.

I found a few interesting newbie things with Hyper-V which took me a bit to deal with. Ubuntu 7.10 no matter what just won’t install and its been reported a few times. I installed Ubuntu 8.04 server and it works fine but you have to assign a legacy network card and you also have to “associate the real card” with the virtual card or at least I did to make networking work. Then you can just reboot the VM and networking/dhcp comes right up. Hyper-V is pretty cool though once you learn its little tricks and traps. I can see why VMware is threatened. It does some stuff and I’m just starting. Bundling it with an Operating System is smart. Damned smart Microsoft. Good one! That makes VMWare have to give things away like ESXi.

On to VMware Server. As I noted, something is just wrong with Server on Ubuntu 7.10 and I don’t know what. Server Console won’t work but I can RDP and ssh to the guests. What’s up with that? VMware Server seems to be a back step since it does all kinds of weird stuff with web and console. Forget about it!

I could probably just stabilize on Hyper-V but I have been a VMWare customer for years and I want it to work. VMware Workstation is still plenty nice but I think VirtualBox threatens it with its transparent or seamless modes for guest applications. I have not tried VirtualBox on Ubuntu yet; but I may do that at work. Truth is, it appears that VirtualBox is a great personal virtualization thing but I cannot serve up images. Since I am involved with building out a support lab that is all virtual for work; I need to serve up the guests.

I also wonder what’s next for VMWare? They seem to be giving away stuff now and Hyper-V is plenty cool and its something for VMware to worry over. Gnaw that bone VMWare guys. You need some competition! It gives the rest of us new toys and tools to test out.

Its the weekend so perhaps its blog-time. Seems that I only write these days on the weekends. I started writing some stuff last night about a slashdot story on Linux and where it would be in 3 years; but I stopped. I’ve been using Linux one way or another for about 10 years now. At home, work, selling it, preselling it, managing it, deploying it. The last year or so I’ve moved off center from it. I worked at Visa and only touched Linux things and now I’m more involved at a few levels since I seem to be moving to a place where I’ll be some kind of Product Manager for our Linux line of appliances. That’s to be defined still I guess. But after reading the comments and the article, I’m unsure where the whole thing is going and perhaps that’s part of the mystique and why the desktop environments replicate but really don’t innovate. I cannot find where Linux will be and my questions are:

• Will Linux on the desktop ever truly arrive for the masses? People point at Dell selling Linux as though this is the first time it happened. Here’s a bit of news for ya. In 2001, Dell was packaging 4 different forms of Linux on desktop machines and laptops. Linuxcare Labs certified that hardware for Dell back then and I managed the technical relationship with Dell back then.
• Will KDE and Gnome ever see it will be better to come together? Perhaps there is one integrating platform between the two camps. We also need to evolve applications in general. Applications are organisms. They require feeding and watering and they need to take a dump every so often. Dumps mean learning for developers I think.

I went to the show at Moscone this year. We need something else and I suggest that its SCALE in Los Angeles. Linuxworld has lost whatever vision and participation it once had. Drop the feeble attempts guys. You’ve lost the thread of what the show is. Somehow its some next generation data center show. You’ve lost the consciousness and evolution of things. The show is not a show-case of Linux and it does not capture a meeting place between Linux and users (corporate, personal, company). its some bastardization of open source and show with a dash of feeble representation by dwindling attendees and exhibitors.

For me personally, I love Linux and what it is and does. I’ve just moved beyond using it on the desktop and have gone backwards unfortunately. Perhaps this habilis has gotten lazy and wants something simple. The idea for me is the tool. The tool must deliver and give function. If I have to run one thing to launch another thing which in turn is virtual and I do that to take care of default tools, I have questions. Like Why. Why am I doing things this way and am I doing the best job at tool using?

I ended up moving some stuff around here and took a database backup which was missing this blogpost. Scribefire kept it in the editing window so I am reposting it. The thoughts still run true on the whole Linuxworld Expo experience…

I visited Linuxworld Expo for the day yesterday. It was yet again different and a few folks commented on the overall size reduction of the exhibition floor. Gone were Novell, no Redhat (again), no Sun, no groups of others. At this point it could move back to San Jose for size reasons much like it moved out of San Jose back in 2001 or so for size reasons.

The show is sad and it seems to be like an anxious shadow casting about furtively for its master image. It just don’t know what it wants to be. Am I data center show focusing on Linux or a Linux show focusing on data center? There was a huge trailer with the next generation data center in it but there were not enough visitors to keep the show floor busy.

At the other end of the spectrum, thanks to the folks at SCALE for making 7x a Westin LAX Hotel event again! The accomodations, staff, location make the Westin a great conference location. I will be attending next February 20-22 for sure! The difference is the difference. SCALE is enjoyable, rewarding, and fun. There is the mix of big enterprise and individual contributor there. I like the spread of papers that one can listen to and enjoying a beverage at the hotel of the event each evening.

I’ll probably drop to one Linux show each year now and it won’t be LWE in SF. I cannot afford OSCON. SCALE remains my show of choice especially after seeing this last Linuxworld. I commented to Doc that it was like someone washed the show in very hot water and it shrunk.

So true; so sadly true.

Its getting to be that time of the year again. People are booking rooms in San Francisco, packing up suitcases, perhaps traveling at the behest of their company. They’re seeking out news of the Penguin in the wonnerful city by the Bay. They may travel long or short distance and if they’re exhibitors their feet will ache, time may crawl by, and other booths start looking interesting.

I’ve done my fair share of booth duties and doing a trade show is always interesting. You meet people that want to know what you do or just want to know what you are giving away. I think the doodads used to be better and more fun. I remember all kinds of interesting little things and big. When I worked at Linuxcare we gave away cars! And bug suckers. Big and small. Linuxcare knew how to package up show things. Perhaps the strangest and best was the “poster”. This was the so-called Simply Supported Poster with the “palm girl” holding a Redhat box on it. I remember handing them out to everyone that morning in North Carolina and then we got the cease and desist request. Redhat was not happy. And it was their show.

But it was too late. Everyone had seen it and wanted it. I handed out copies to friends at Suse and a few guys I knew in the support pit at Redhat.

The shows have paled in some regards and IDG seems to be able to do a massively mediocre job at promoting something as fun as Linux. Lets be clear and certain here. Linux is fun. Its fun because its not done yet and the people and companies and pundits that go know its not done. Trade shows must be unfinished too to gain acceptance. You cannot hustle off the .orgs to some other place, city, or floor. Big mistake and IDG gets another bad mark.

Yet still I will go. Why? Well this year I am meeting someone for a business meeting. I’m a SE Manager but I touch many things at Celestix. I get to play with lots of things in the course of a day. And I’m going to meet up with some friends, see other friends, hopefully see the oldtimers from those other halycon days.

Then we’ll wander for lunch and maybe a beer at the Thirsty Bear. That’s just what ya do. So if you are at the show, I’m there with ya. I show up for only a day this year on Wednesday. It will be fun and mediocre. But that’s the declining nature of the whole thing. Linux is changing and since its not done; no one knows what it will change into. I have some questions around evolution of it all. I’m unsure what it all means any longer and perhaps no one really knows and they’re along for the ride as well. That’s okay. It all works for me. I use it the way I want to use it and it works for me.

Linuxworld Expo in SF is just around the corner. Its time to go to the show for my requisite one day and see who’s left that I know that goes. Last year was the last time I arranged a lunch for some of the folks. I just got an idea that the time had come to leave that behind. This year I go on Wednesday and meet up with some potential business partners for work stuff. We may build an appliance prototype with some of them. That should be interesting.

But Linuxworld Expo itself is not so interesting any longer. Its become something that I don’t really recognize any longer and I prefer the community spirit of the SCALE shows down in Los Angeles. But they are the expo’s and they have this memory of the older shows from the Linuxcare days.

So, here I go for a day to do a bit of business and perhaps some fun. We’ll see. I will probably post a one-day review of the show from my vantage point. I’ve moved far away from the mainstream of Linux sometimes it seems. But I think the show may be fun. At least for a day.

I am reading a article with Mark Shuttleworth of Ubuntu about criticism regarding the release of Ubuntu Hardy Heron. I’ve thought about this for awhile after using 8.04 and being somewhat dismayed with how difficult it actually was to get Firefox 2 working with plugins after doing a Hardy Heron install. The plugin architecture appears to be all different and I got numerous “failed to load plugin xxyy; missing file” when I attempted to actually use a web browser that would work with the vast number of my plugins. I did solve that actually but it created a few other questions in my vast universe of thought regarding exactly where Linux is heading these days. Perhaps its a good time to come up with these since Linuxworld Expo is around the corner as well. Its not like the IDG show will yield appreciable insight into where Linux is going. Mark says that Gnome would benefit from QT integration and that the 6 month release cycle works even with a few issues. I have more basic questions about it like:

Where is it all going? What is the roadmap, the plan, the goal? To what end does Linux itself plotting? I don’t honestly get it anymore. Kernel releases come out slower but they seem higher in quality yet they often break things that integrate like VMware. Where do we wish to see the value? What is the innovation point? Does a failure to actually update things mean a failure to innovate? Should there be a “bleeding edge” of Ubuntu much like Sid on Debian for those of us that want to play at a dangerous level?

What timeline are we discussing for true innovation? I just don’t see the path any longer nor do I see my place on the path. I’ve grown a bit reticent about updating perfectly good Ubuntu 7.10 installations because I don’t see the big change. What does it get me in terms of the underlying form and function? I could probably use a new kernel for some things but why?

What are the visible trends that Linux is answering? Is it desktop? Server, Embedded? I don’t see the trend any longer. I see gnome and KDE doing things but there is not a path to the light.

For us tool users, we will always use the tool with the best fit whether it innovates or just updates. But we also may want a playground which can be stressed a bit. I’m going to Linuxworld to meet up with some people I know and don’t know. But I don’t expect a set of answers. Ubuntu Linux in some ways seems stalled on a set of features that really don’t innovate but just update. Perhaps I should just go back to Sid.

I’ve blogged a few times about my habilis habits. A habilis (like homo habilis) is a tool-user. The originals lived some million years ago give or take a flaked-stone tool and were the earliest known hominid to make tools. A tool is either a subtractive or additive process. If you are making a flaked-stone projectile point, perhaps you reduce raw material to a workable state. Tools can also be an additive process. May be that a projectile point is both actually since you add some kind of delivery agent to it. But that’s what we basically do I think to this day with the tools we choose to use or not. Some tools we adopt to make something easier and when we learn it perhaps we move on or keep it or adopt a new tool. I have a hypothesis that tools exhibit their maker’s beliefs in many distinct areas. If we can identify a certain structure to what is called flaked-stone morphology perhaps we could even identify a specific tool maker.

Now lets hop in my archeological and anthropological time machine and jog to the present. I’m at a customer site over in Plano, Texas which has given me a brand new appreication of “man the tool user”. The customer site is a larger entity which does some interesting things around tubes and transistors and even calculators. I’m in learning mode so I sit quietly and watch the master tool users exhibit. I ask a question or two about a specific tool and how to reduce it or add to it. These guys are interesting and encapsulate my judgements on computers as a whole. They use the right tool for the job. If the tool requires open source technologies, they roll out Linux solutions or place open source tools on Windows systems. This is completely possible and I do it myself. If they need Solaris they use it. Windows too. Many people maintain multiple desktops that they VNC or RDP to. Both of these tools are enablers. They enable you to reach out to other systems, make use of them. But lets not forget the ultimate enabler. Secure Shell has to be the grand daddy of enablers. With SSH you can rule. You can adopt, change, move, copy, delete, merge, split. Its cousins SCP and SFTP make it a three sided coin.

Now I have met the ultimate habilis enablers. They reach and encompass all the tools and they embody my beliefs that I’ve blogged a few times. Its all about the tools, Luke. You must use the tools. Computers and OS’es are no different. Linux, Sun, Windows, and their tools all make a composite whole. I told a Microsoft guy I am working with today that view and he vigorously agreed.

So in the end, I am sitting in the cave entrance painting my blog. Recording the rush of antelope and the sunrises and strange bursts of color. I am traversing a desert scape and knowing where the best plants lie. I am the enabler; the ultimate enabler and my canvas is the world. I can use tools that make me better and I can adopt and adapt. Is that not the mark of successful beings? Evolution has a way of separating wheat from chaff.

I get the feeling from these days in Texas that we must all become habilis and not ever have the view that just because its “this not that” its better or others that choose something else is worse. The paint I choose makes me more productive these days.

What do you choose to be more productive? As a side note, I would be seriously remiss if I did not mention that the fox came out with its latest yesterday or today. Way to go Mozilla team. You guys do good stuff and you have my thanks.