Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>]

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Comments inline below.  I'll go ahead and untag the ones that were agreed on.

On Thursday, September 25, 2014 3:00:48 PM Andy Kurth wrote:
> > I'd like to bump these issues to 2.5.  I think they will delay us too much
> > in getting a release out.  Please reply if there are any you really think
> > should be in 2.4.  On Friday, I'd like to bump to 2.5 any of them that no
> > one replies about keeping in 2.4.
> 
> I agree we need to complete 2.4 and several issues can be untagged
> from 2.4.  I know I mentioned changing the tags to 2.5 in my previous
> email.  However, looking though the ones you brought up made me
> realize that rather than simply upping the version tag, we should
> reevaluate each issue.  If you look at the history of a few of the
> issues, the tag changed from 2.2 to 2.3 to 2.4, and now possibly 2.5.
> This kick-the-can method of release management isn't working too well.
> For the issues don't make it into 2.4 we still deem beneficial, I
> think it would be better to just untag the issues' "Fix Version" until
> the release.  After the release, we can go through every issue and
> devise a thoughtful and realistic roadmap.  What does everyone think?

I like this idea.

> My individual issue votes and comments inline below:
> > VCL-66 - Reservations for newly created images may be assigned to
> > management nodes or computers on which the image can't run
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-66
> 
> +1 (close, won't fix)
> I created this one and sure went crazy with the description.  Although
> this would be an improvement, the complexities outweigh its value.  It
> would only benefit deployments with multiple management nodes and was
> really only intended to resolve an issue where certain images could
> only run in certain places.  This problem this issue described can be
> avoided with proper mapping.
> 
> > VCL-178 - enable checkuser flag for per reservation instead of image only
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-178
> 
> -1 (keep in 2.4)
> This is one that was created in 2009 and got bumped all the way from
> the 2.2 release.  The backend code has supported this feature since
> 2010.  This would be pretty useful.  How much time would it take to
> implement this?

The easy part is adding a checkbox for reservations that says not to do user 
login checks.  The hard part is determining who sees the checkbox (i.e. 
permissions).  How do we determine who gets to see this functionality?  Is it 
a global permission?  Is it something that is image specific?  Is it image 
specific but also tied to a user permission?

> > VCL-216 - seat licensing - user group based SW licensing
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-216
> 
> +1 (untag from 2.4, lack of time)
> This would be a very useful feature but would only benefit a narrow
> range of images.
> 
> > VCL-290 - user managed image scripts
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-290
> 
> +1 (close, duplicate)
> The description needs more detail.  From what was given, it sounds
> like this is describing concepts that the configuration management
> feature would cover.
> 
> > VCL-296 - option for VM placement to minimize VM hosts or to spread load
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-296
> 
> +1 (untag from 2.4, lack of time)
> This needs a fair amount of discussion.  It would be good if the scope
> of this issue is broadened to cover VM scheduling optimization for
> performance and power saving.  I have some ideas regarding this.
> Whoever decides to work on this, please start a thread on the dev
> list.
> 
> > VCL-343 - image capture process summary for end-user
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-343
> 
> +?
> The description needs more detail.  What details?  In an email?  On
> the website?  What details are not communicated which would be useful?
>  This may be a pretty trivial change and could possibly be included.

Nothing is communicated about the image capture process other than 
completed/failed via email, for users that have email working.  It would be 
great to keep reservations in the state of being captured on the Reservations 
page with a link where "Pending" normally is that pops up a window showing 
information about where things are in the capture process.

> > VCL-369 - Tools to search the privilege tree
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-369
> 
> +1 (untag from 2.4, lack of time)
> Although extremely needed, this involves the privilege tree and I can
> see how it could consume a bit of time.
> 
> > VCL-372 - allocate a new computer to blockComputers if one is put in
> > maintenance, vmhostinuse, or hpc
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-372
> 
> +1 (untag from 2.4)
> I'm tempted to vote -1 for this one because this seems like a pretty
> trivial change.  However, every time I touch blockrequest.pm I'm
> reminded it needs some cleanup.  Regardless, this issue only affects a
> fairly rare case and isn't very critical.
> 
> > VCL-448 - allow access to edit computers without needing access to edit a
> > schedule
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-448
> 
> +1 (untag from 2.4, more discussion needed)
> The whole "schedule is a resource" design should be discussed.  I
> agree with the intention of this issue, but think it may be bandaging
> the underlying architecture which could be improved.  Whoever works on
> this, please start a thread on the dev list first.
> 
> > VCL-449 - add max concurrent reservations per affiliation
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-449
> 
> +1 (untag from 2.4, lack of time)
> It doesn't seem like this issue alone would take too much time to
> implement.  However, there is currently no way of managing
> affiliations via the website.  Without this, it would be pretty
> useless for most.
> 
> > VCL-525 - explain how to install non autoprovisioned connect methods
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-525
> 
> +?
> The description needs more detail.  Is this referring to text that
> needs to be displayed on the website where connect methods are
> configured?

Connect methods can be flagged as "autoprovisioned" or not.  If 
autoprovisioned, it is assumed either all images using some OS will have the 
connect method available (i.e. RDP on Windows), or vcld will be able to 
provision the method if it is not already there.  If not autoprovisioned, it 
is the responsibility of the image creator to install the connect method.  It 
would be useful for connect methods that are not autoprovisioned to have some 
text somewhere associated with the connect method that explains to an image 
creator how to install that connect method (i.e. To install xRDP, you need to 
install x, y, z packages and modify j, k, l configuration files).

> > VCL-526 - add section to site to manage connect methods
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-526
> 
> -1 (or replace with a new issue)
> How much time will this take?  We added the connect methods feature in
> 2.3 without a way to manage them other than directly modifying the
> database.  Not good.  If adding a feature to the website takes too
> much time we could add something to "vcld -setup" for 2.4.  I'm not
> voting +1 for the release without some way to manage this.

Again, this is a permissions issue.  Who gets to see and manage each connect 
method?  It would also require creating a new section of the site for managing 
it.  It may work to make them a new resource.

> > VCL-561 - Image inventory
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-561
> 
> +1 (untag from 2.4, lack of time)
> Some code is complete to retrieve software information from Windows
> images but nothing to store it in the database or present it via the
> website.  This will be a very useful feature but there is a lot of
> work to do.
> 
> > VCL-566 - Separate image type from OS in database
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-566
> 
> +1 (untag from 2.4)
> This is a huge undertaking and should be a top priority after 2.4.
> The code I'm working on to replace update-vcl.sql should make the
> transition easier.
> 
> > VCL-577 - Cloud Broker tool for VCL
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-577
> 
> +?
> This was submitted by Karuna Joshi.  We need to reach out to her and
> make sure she is involved in this discussion.  If she is interested
> and willing to assist, we should make an effort to include this in
> 2.4.  If she is interested but it is not feasible timewise to include
> it in 2.4, it should be top priority after the release.  We need to
> encourage these contributions.

This is more something that uses VCL instead of something that is part of VCL.  
So, I don't see a need for it being included in a release.  However, if it 
were, Karuna would need to step up as a committer to maintain it, in which 
case, she should be contacted.

> > VCL-591 - Image copy/push for distributed management nodes
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-591
> 
> +1 (untag from 2.4, lack of time)
> Although useful, this would be a lot of work.  There are higher priorities.
> 
> > VCL-645 - store/update fingerprint info for machines for end-user
> > reservations https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-645
> 
> +1 (untag from 2.4)
> Not a high priority.  It apparently came from a single end user request at
> NCSU.
> > VCL-689 - Configuration Management
> > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-689
> 
> +1 (untag from 2.4)
> This is a hugely ambitious feature nowhere near complete.
> 
> -Andy
> 
> > Josh
> > 
> > On Monday, September 22, 2014 1:55:21 PM Andy Kurth wrote:
> >> I'd like to start discussing and planning the VCL 2.4 release.  This is a
> >> good opportunity to review and improve several aspects of the project
> >> including our testing and release procedures, documentation, and the
> >> roadmap.  I will be best to create separate threads for the various
> >> topics.  This thread is devoted to the progress of development work which
> >> remains to be done.  Separate threads will be created to discuss
> >> documentation, etc.
> >> 
> >> Please use this thread to detail everything you are working on or plan to
> >> work on related to VCL 2.4.  If the technical details of any particular
> >> issue needs to be discussed further, start a dedicated thread.
> >> 
> >> Here is a link to the open 2.4 issues:
> >> https://issues.apache.org/jira/issues/?filter=12329339
> >> 
> >> And to all of the 2.4 issues:
> >> https://issues.apache.org/jira/issues/?filter=12329344
> >> 
> >> Some of the open issues can be closed.  I will be going through and
> >> updating the ones I have worked on this week.
> >> 
> >> I have added a "fix version" 2.4 tag to all of the issues which were only
> >> tagged 2.3.3, and these are included in this filter.  We should probably
> >> delete 2.3.3 from Jira.  I have also added a 2.5 version to Jira.  There
> >> will be a few issues we will decide to shelve for 2.4.  These can be
> >> untagged 2.4 and tagged 2.5.  Please DO NOT untag any issues from 2.4
> >> without first asking the dev list!
> >> 
> >> There are a few significant issues I plan to work on over the next few
> >> weeks:
> >> 
> >> * Database changes for VCL 2.4 (
> >> https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-764)
> >> I will be working on a Perl script which reads vcl.sql and either imports
> >> the schema into a new database for new installs or compares the file to
> >> an
> >> existing database's schema and executes 'alter' statements.  This will
> >> eliminate the need for the unwieldy update-vcl.sql file.
> >> 
> >> * Allow dynamic private IP addresses, remove /etc/hosts requirement (
> >> https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-767)
> >> There is still some work to do to remove the reliance on /etc/hosts being
> >> populated on each management node.  The code is still using the hostname
> >> for SSH commands.  This needs to be changed.  It is required in order to
> >> properly test the Openstack module.  For this issue, we need an upgrade
> >> path since this is a significant change would could significantly break
> >> things.  When an upgrade to 2.4 is performed, each management node will
> >> need to check every computer mapped to it and make sure the private IP
> >> address the hostname resolves to matches the database.  The database
> >> should
> >> be updated if the private IP address is missing or incorrect.  This
> >> functionality may be included in the script to update the schema, making
> >> it
> >> a more general install/upgrade script.
> >> 
> >> * Improve user connection checking and how firewall is locked down (
> >> https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-753)
> >> This is also a significant change and needs a lot of testing.  The code
> >> to
> >> use the connectlog table is mostly complete but I have not committed it
> >> yet.
> >> 
> >> * Add support for 64-bit cygwin (
> >> https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-783)
> >> This is a pretty easy one.  The Windows module was designed to funnel
> >> everything which would be affected by 32 vs 64-bit versions through
> >> is_64_bit and get_system32_path so the changes will be minor.  The
> >> cygwin-sshd-config.sh and update_cygwin.cmd scripts also need an update.
> >> 
> >> As always, your thoughts and comments are welcome.
> >> 
> >> Thank You,
> >> Andy
> > 
> > - --
> > - -------------------------------
> > Josh Thompson
> > VCL Developer
> > North Carolina State University
> > 
> > my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu
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Josh Thompson
VCL Developer
North Carolina State University

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Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>]

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Norma,

To unsubscribe, send a blank email to dev-unsubscribe@vcl.apache.org from the 
email address you used to subscribe to the list.

The unsubscribe link for all ASF lists is in the headers of the email.

Josh

On Friday, October 31, 2014 6:22:57 AM Norma P Estrella wrote:
> Remove me please
> 
> Norma P. Estrella, xoxo
> Sent from my iPhone
> 
> On Oct 31, 2014, at 6:14 AM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu> wrote:
> > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> > Hash: SHA1
> > 
> > I'd like to either close VCL-710 (Allow an admin to permanently delete an
> > image) as Won't Fix, or bump it to a later release.  The ability to delete
> > VMware image files has been added to the setup part of vcld.  I imagine
> > adding other types of image files wouldn't be too difficult.  There is
> > currently no way for the frontend to trigger something like this on the
> > backend.  So, it would require enough design and development that I don't
> > think it is a good idea to try to get it in 2.4.
> > 
> > Josh
> > 
> > On Tuesday, October 21, 2014 4:26:46 PM Aaron Peeler wrote:
> >> VCL-170 is completed on the backend and in the database sql files. So
> >> it can be marked fixed.
> >> Aaron
> >> 
> >> On Tue, Oct 21, 2014 at 3:26 PM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>
> > 
> > wrote:
> >>> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> >>> Hash: SHA1
> >>> 
> >>> What's the status of the backend development on the following issues?
> >>> 
> >>> VCL-170 - option to power off blades after reservation - new reload
> >>> module
> >>> Computers can be configured to have their Predictive Loading Module set
> >>> to
> >>> "Unload Post reservation" now.  So, I think the frontend work on this is
> >>> done.
> >>> 
> >>> VCL-174 - NAT - support for sites that have small IP address ranges
> >>> Frontend work for this is mostly done.  I just need to add something to
> >>> the
> >>> parts of the site where computers and management nodes are managed to be
> >>> able to set them as NAT hosts or not.
> >>> 
> >>> VCL-253 - Allow users to specify RDP port
> >>> Users can specify an alternate port for RDP under User Preferences now.
> >>> It
> >>> only overrides when a connect method has "remote desktop" or "rdp" in
> >>> the
> >>> name and is using tcp port 3389 as the port.
> >>> 
> >>> VCL-568 - refresh current reservations page 15 minutes after a
> >>> reservation
> >>> becomes available
> >>> At some point, the plan here was to key off of an entry in the
> >>> computerloadlog being added once a node was deployed and ready for user
> >>> connection.  That gave the frontend a time from which to start counting
> >>> down to later be able to refresh the page in case of reservation
> >>> timeout.
> >>> However, there doesn't appear to be an entry being inserted in
> >>> computerloadlog right after the reservation becomes ready.  There also
> >>> needs to be a similar entry for when the user first clicks the Connect
> >>> button.
> >>> 
> >>> VCL-571 - EC2 API provisioning module
> >>> Has any work been done on incorporating this contribution?  I'm not sure
> >>> what changes would need to be done of the frontend for it.
> >>> 
> >>> VCL-584 - Extend features of Server loads
> >>> Are the two items left in this issue finished in the backend?
> >>> Andy - I haven't been able to reproduce the problem you saw that you
> >>> listed in your comment on this issue.  I did modify things so that
> >>> request.forimaging does not get updated for checkpoints.
> >>> 
> >>> Josh
> >>> 
> >>> On Friday, October 17, 2014 6:45:33 PM Andy Kurth wrote:
> >>>> I was hoping this thread would generate more discussion and help
> >>>> facilitate
> >>>> completing the VCL 2.4 release.  Thank you Josh for providing your
> >>>> updates
> >>>> and comments.  Is anyone else working on anything related to 2.4?  If
> >>>> so,
> >>>> please share.
> >>>> 
> >>>> I have an update on the development issues I have been working on
> >>>> below.
> >>>> Before getting into that, there are some more general topics which need
> >>>> to
> >>>> be managed.
> >>>> 
> >>>> 1) Testing.  We don't have any sort of documented test plan, test
> >>>> cases,
> >>>> a
> >>>> checklist, nothing...  We don't have adequate instructions regarding
> >>>> how
> >>>> to
> >>>> set up a test environment based off of the code from trunk or a release
> >>>> artifact.  We don't have any information what what and how to test.
> >>>> These
> >>>> is critically needed.  Is anyone willing to help to work out and
> >>>> document
> >>>> these processes?  There is a lot of helpful information available on
> >>>> other
> >>>> ASF project sites.  Here's a good example:
> >>>> https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/CLOUDSTACK/CloudStack+4.0+t
> >>>> es
> >>>> t+p rocedure
> >>>> 
> >>>> Please take a look at this page.  The first paragraph applies to all
> >>>> ASF
> >>>> projects and is something that everyone needs to understand.
> >>>> (Quoted from cloudstack's site)
> >>>> 
> >>>>> For an apache project, a VOTE on a release candidate is a very
> >>>>> important
> >>>>> process.  By voting (particularly for PPMC members and committers),
> >>>>> you
> >>>>> are
> >>>>> saying to the world that "yes, I have download, verified and tested
> >>>>> using
> >>>>> the project's procedure for testing".  Your +1, 0 or -1 vote is an
> >>>>> indication of the success of the steps listed.
> >>>> 
> >>>> In the past when a vote for a VCL release was started, there was a
> >>>> flurry
> >>>> of +1's from people who had not communicated on the dev list about
> >>>> anything
> >>>> having to do with the release.  I could be wrong, but I'm guessing some
> >>>> people who voted +1 did not test the release artifact in any way.  Not
> >>>> having any documentation on how one would do this leads me to this
> >>>> conclusion.
> >>>> 
> >>>> Documenting how to set up a test environment needs to be done ASAP and
> >>>> can
> >>>> be done concurrently with the remaining code development.  Is anyone
> >>>> willing to take a stab at starting this?  I'd be happy to help, but
> >>>> really
> >>>> want to focus on finishing up the development items I'm working on.
> >>>> 
> >>>> 2) Documentation.  With every release comes a spike in interest. 
> >>>> People
> >>>> are interested in what has been fixed/improved and what new features
> >>>> have
> >>>> been added.  They then look at the accompanying documentation.  It
> >>>> would
> >>>> be
> >>>> a shame if someone got a bad impression and became frustrated due to
> >>>> poor
> >>>> documentation.  There are new features with this release and things
> >>>> have
> >>>> been dramatically reorganized on the VCL website portal.  We need to
> >>>> make
> >>>> sure documentation is adequate and anything which refers to things that
> >>>> have changed gets updated.  I'm not suggesting that we need to rework
> >>>> all
> >>>> of the existing documentation or fill in all of the holes, but there is
> >>>> obviously work that needs to be done prior to the release.  Is anyone
> >>>> willing to manage this?
> >>>> 
> >>>> Update on the issues I have been working on, I hope to have these done
> >>>> next
> >>>> week:
> >>>> 
> >>>> VCL-764: Database changes for VCL 2.4
> >>>> The tricky parts are done.  I have code which parses a reference .sql
> >>>> file
> >>>> (the 2.4 schema in this case), retrieves the current schema definition
> >>>> information from the database, and can compare the two.  It then sorts
> >>>> out
> >>>> all of the operations that need to be done and then can make the
> >>>> changes
> >>>> to
> >>>> update the current database.  I'm thinking for this release the
> >>>> instructions for installing the database for a fresh install can remain
> >>>> the
> >>>> same, although the script could automate some additional steps in the
> >>>> future.  Upgrades can use the new script and execute it from an
> >>>> existing
> >>>> management node.  I added some other features to the script which made
> >>>> development and testing easier.  It can download the schema for any of
> >>>> the
> >>>> previous releases, create a temporary test database, and then upgrade
> >>>> the
> >>>> test database with the reference (2.4) schema.  The script will have a
> >>>> menu
> >>>> system based off of how "vcld -setup" works.  I need to finish
> >>>> implementing
> >>>> this and polish it up.
> >>>> 
> >>>> VCL-685: VMware improvements for VCL 2.4
> >>>> I didn't plan on spending much more time on the VMware code but there
> >>>> were
> >>>> some problems which needed to be addressed.  We have been seeing a lot
> >>>> of
> >>>> problems lately with our old ESXi 4.1 hosts.  The code was modified to
> >>>> make
> >>>> it more resilient and for some problems, self healing.  See the commit
> >>>> comments for the details.
> >>>> 
> >>>> VCL-767: Allow dynamic private IP addresses, remove /etc/hosts
> >>>> requirement
> >>>> This needs to be finished.  I spoke to Young Oh today, partially
> >>>> regarding
> >>>> this.  The code changes shouldn't take too much time.  I have already
> >>>> written a "vcld -setup" option which gathers all of the computers
> >>>> controlled by a management node, checks the private IP address each
> >>>> computer's hostname resolves to, and verifies/updates the private IP
> >>>> address in the computers table.  I just need to update all the places
> >>>> still
> >>>> using the hostname to SSH into the computers.
> >>>> 
> >>>> VCL-753: Improve user connection checking and how firewall is locked
> >>>> down
> >>>> I'm thinking this issue should be bumped for the sake of time and
> >>>> quality.
> >>>> It will provide a much more secure way of handling how the firewall is
> >>>> locked down, but is also very complicated and could introduce problems
> >>>> until all the bugs are worked out.  The current code which this will
> >>>> replace is stable.  Untag from 2.4?  Everyone agree?
> >>>> 
> >>>> VCL-783: Add support for 64-bit cygwin
> >>>> Again, this should be quick.
> >>>> 
> >>>> 
> >>>> I did not include the previous quoted messages in this reply since they
> >>>> were pruned in some replies based on what the reply was referring to. 
> >>>> As
> >>>> a
> >>>> result, they would have been incomplete without some manual reassembly.
> >>>> Here's a link to the entire thread for reference:
> >>>> http://vcl.markmail.org/thread/jwcwymumnxxpd5ns
> >>>> 
> >>>> Thank You,
> >>>> Andy
> >>> 
> >>> - --
> >>> - -------------------------------
> >>> Josh Thompson
> >>> VCL Developer
> >>> North Carolina State University
> >>> 
> >>> my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu
> >>> 
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> > - --
> > - -------------------------------
> > Josh Thompson
> > VCL Developer
> > North Carolina State University
> > 
> > my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu
> > 
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- -- 
- -------------------------------
Josh Thompson
VCL Developer
North Carolina State University

my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu

All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)

iEYEARECAAYFAlRTkyMACgkQV/LQcNdtPQOKGwCeOiTPvu67rsWKXPa/FhtLugdZ
7CoAn0Uz6Zaz/YiDyNOSCDWrP0oSBAJE
=pecQ
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Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Aaron Peeler <aa...@ncsu.edu>]

I vote to bump this issue out to the next release.

We still need a broader method for purging all types of deleted
images.  Building something in the front-end to trigger vcld to clean
up, would delay the 2.4 release even more.

Aaron

On Fri, Oct 31, 2014 at 9:14 AM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu> wrote:
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> I'd like to either close VCL-710 (Allow an admin to permanently delete an
> image) as Won't Fix, or bump it to a later release.  The ability to delete
> VMware image files has been added to the setup part of vcld.  I imagine adding
> other types of image files wouldn't be too difficult.  There is currently no
> way for the frontend to trigger something like this on the backend.  So, it
> would require enough design and development that I don't think it is a good
> idea to try to get it in 2.4.
>
> Josh
>
> On Tuesday, October 21, 2014 4:26:46 PM Aaron Peeler wrote:
>> VCL-170 is completed on the backend and in the database sql files. So
>> it can be marked fixed.
>> Aaron
>>
>> On Tue, Oct 21, 2014 at 3:26 PM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>
> wrote:
>> > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>> > Hash: SHA1
>> >
>> > What's the status of the backend development on the following issues?
>> >
>> > VCL-170 - option to power off blades after reservation - new reload module
>> > Computers can be configured to have their Predictive Loading Module set to
>> > "Unload Post reservation" now.  So, I think the frontend work on this is
>> > done.
>> >
>> > VCL-174 - NAT - support for sites that have small IP address ranges
>> > Frontend work for this is mostly done.  I just need to add something to
>> > the
>> > parts of the site where computers and management nodes are managed to be
>> > able to set them as NAT hosts or not.
>> >
>> > VCL-253 - Allow users to specify RDP port
>> > Users can specify an alternate port for RDP under User Preferences now.
>> > It
>> > only overrides when a connect method has "remote desktop" or "rdp" in the
>> > name and is using tcp port 3389 as the port.
>> >
>> > VCL-568 - refresh current reservations page 15 minutes after a reservation
>> > becomes available
>> > At some point, the plan here was to key off of an entry in the
>> > computerloadlog being added once a node was deployed and ready for user
>> > connection.  That gave the frontend a time from which to start counting
>> > down to later be able to refresh the page in case of reservation timeout.
>> >  However, there doesn't appear to be an entry being inserted in
>> > computerloadlog right after the reservation becomes ready.  There also
>> > needs to be a similar entry for when the user first clicks the Connect
>> > button.
>> >
>> > VCL-571 - EC2 API provisioning module
>> > Has any work been done on incorporating this contribution?  I'm not sure
>> > what changes would need to be done of the frontend for it.
>> >
>> > VCL-584 - Extend features of Server loads
>> > Are the two items left in this issue finished in the backend?
>> > Andy - I haven't been able to reproduce the problem you saw that you
>> > listed in your comment on this issue.  I did modify things so that
>> > request.forimaging does not get updated for checkpoints.
>> >
>> > Josh
>> >
>> > On Friday, October 17, 2014 6:45:33 PM Andy Kurth wrote:
>> >> I was hoping this thread would generate more discussion and help
>> >> facilitate
>> >> completing the VCL 2.4 release.  Thank you Josh for providing your
>> >> updates
>> >> and comments.  Is anyone else working on anything related to 2.4?  If so,
>> >> please share.
>> >>
>> >> I have an update on the development issues I have been working on below.
>> >> Before getting into that, there are some more general topics which need
>> >> to
>> >> be managed.
>> >>
>> >> 1) Testing.  We don't have any sort of documented test plan, test cases,
>> >> a
>> >> checklist, nothing...  We don't have adequate instructions regarding how
>> >> to
>> >> set up a test environment based off of the code from trunk or a release
>> >> artifact.  We don't have any information what what and how to test.
>> >> These
>> >> is critically needed.  Is anyone willing to help to work out and document
>> >> these processes?  There is a lot of helpful information available on
>> >> other
>> >> ASF project sites.  Here's a good example:
>> >> https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/CLOUDSTACK/CloudStack+4.0+tes
>> >> t+p rocedure
>> >>
>> >> Please take a look at this page.  The first paragraph applies to all ASF
>> >> projects and is something that everyone needs to understand.
>> >> (Quoted from cloudstack's site)
>> >>
>> >> > For an apache project, a VOTE on a release candidate is a very
>> >> > important
>> >> > process.  By voting (particularly for PPMC members and committers), you
>> >> > are
>> >> > saying to the world that "yes, I have download, verified and tested
>> >> > using
>> >> > the project's procedure for testing".  Your +1, 0 or -1 vote is an
>> >> > indication of the success of the steps listed.
>> >>
>> >> In the past when a vote for a VCL release was started, there was a flurry
>> >> of +1's from people who had not communicated on the dev list about
>> >> anything
>> >> having to do with the release.  I could be wrong, but I'm guessing some
>> >> people who voted +1 did not test the release artifact in any way.  Not
>> >> having any documentation on how one would do this leads me to this
>> >> conclusion.
>> >>
>> >> Documenting how to set up a test environment needs to be done ASAP and
>> >> can
>> >> be done concurrently with the remaining code development.  Is anyone
>> >> willing to take a stab at starting this?  I'd be happy to help, but
>> >> really
>> >> want to focus on finishing up the development items I'm working on.
>> >>
>> >> 2) Documentation.  With every release comes a spike in interest.  People
>> >> are interested in what has been fixed/improved and what new features have
>> >> been added.  They then look at the accompanying documentation.  It would
>> >> be
>> >> a shame if someone got a bad impression and became frustrated due to poor
>> >> documentation.  There are new features with this release and things have
>> >> been dramatically reorganized on the VCL website portal.  We need to make
>> >> sure documentation is adequate and anything which refers to things that
>> >> have changed gets updated.  I'm not suggesting that we need to rework all
>> >> of the existing documentation or fill in all of the holes, but there is
>> >> obviously work that needs to be done prior to the release.  Is anyone
>> >> willing to manage this?
>> >>
>> >> Update on the issues I have been working on, I hope to have these done
>> >> next
>> >> week:
>> >>
>> >> VCL-764: Database changes for VCL 2.4
>> >> The tricky parts are done.  I have code which parses a reference .sql
>> >> file
>> >> (the 2.4 schema in this case), retrieves the current schema definition
>> >> information from the database, and can compare the two.  It then sorts
>> >> out
>> >> all of the operations that need to be done and then can make the changes
>> >> to
>> >> update the current database.  I'm thinking for this release the
>> >> instructions for installing the database for a fresh install can remain
>> >> the
>> >> same, although the script could automate some additional steps in the
>> >> future.  Upgrades can use the new script and execute it from an existing
>> >> management node.  I added some other features to the script which made
>> >> development and testing easier.  It can download the schema for any of
>> >> the
>> >> previous releases, create a temporary test database, and then upgrade the
>> >> test database with the reference (2.4) schema.  The script will have a
>> >> menu
>> >> system based off of how "vcld -setup" works.  I need to finish
>> >> implementing
>> >> this and polish it up.
>> >>
>> >> VCL-685: VMware improvements for VCL 2.4
>> >> I didn't plan on spending much more time on the VMware code but there
>> >> were
>> >> some problems which needed to be addressed.  We have been seeing a lot of
>> >> problems lately with our old ESXi 4.1 hosts.  The code was modified to
>> >> make
>> >> it more resilient and for some problems, self healing.  See the commit
>> >> comments for the details.
>> >>
>> >> VCL-767: Allow dynamic private IP addresses, remove /etc/hosts
>> >> requirement
>> >> This needs to be finished.  I spoke to Young Oh today, partially
>> >> regarding
>> >> this.  The code changes shouldn't take too much time.  I have already
>> >> written a "vcld -setup" option which gathers all of the computers
>> >> controlled by a management node, checks the private IP address each
>> >> computer's hostname resolves to, and verifies/updates the private IP
>> >> address in the computers table.  I just need to update all the places
>> >> still
>> >> using the hostname to SSH into the computers.
>> >>
>> >> VCL-753: Improve user connection checking and how firewall is locked down
>> >> I'm thinking this issue should be bumped for the sake of time and
>> >> quality.
>> >> It will provide a much more secure way of handling how the firewall is
>> >> locked down, but is also very complicated and could introduce problems
>> >> until all the bugs are worked out.  The current code which this will
>> >> replace is stable.  Untag from 2.4?  Everyone agree?
>> >>
>> >> VCL-783: Add support for 64-bit cygwin
>> >> Again, this should be quick.
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> I did not include the previous quoted messages in this reply since they
>> >> were pruned in some replies based on what the reply was referring to.  As
>> >> a
>> >> result, they would have been incomplete without some manual reassembly.
>> >> Here's a link to the entire thread for reference:
>> >> http://vcl.markmail.org/thread/jwcwymumnxxpd5ns
>> >>
>> >> Thank You,
>> >> Andy
>> >
>> > - --
>> > - -------------------------------
>> > Josh Thompson
>> > VCL Developer
>> > North Carolina State University
>> >
>> > my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu
>> >
>> > All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
>> > are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
>> > Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.
>> > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
>> > Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)
>> >
>> > iEYEARECAAYFAlRGs08ACgkQV/LQcNdtPQPXUQCggCE0e4mN5r1z56QIRWp7QZAo
>> > uiIAn2hCX7aTwCnbO94j+3ORqDZwWYlp
>> > =EIkC
>> > -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
> - --
> - -------------------------------
> Josh Thompson
> VCL Developer
> North Carolina State University
>
> my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu
>
> All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
> are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
> Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
> Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)
>
> iEYEARECAAYFAlRTizYACgkQV/LQcNdtPQPNpQCeKNg38EIKXB6xIiqlCyeDmfcr
> ZGgAnAjQMqcUlQ/3yWMPT9Ev3yzzqMj+
> =Mtur
> -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
>



-- 
Aaron Peeler
Program Manager
Virtual Computing Lab
NC State University

All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.

Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Norma P Estrella <no...@yahoo.com.INVALID>]

Remove me please

Norma P. Estrella, xoxo
Sent from my iPhone

On Oct 31, 2014, at 6:14 AM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu> wrote:

> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
> 
> I'd like to either close VCL-710 (Allow an admin to permanently delete an 
> image) as Won't Fix, or bump it to a later release.  The ability to delete 
> VMware image files has been added to the setup part of vcld.  I imagine adding 
> other types of image files wouldn't be too difficult.  There is currently no 
> way for the frontend to trigger something like this on the backend.  So, it 
> would require enough design and development that I don't think it is a good 
> idea to try to get it in 2.4.
> 
> Josh
> 
> On Tuesday, October 21, 2014 4:26:46 PM Aaron Peeler wrote:
>> VCL-170 is completed on the backend and in the database sql files. So
>> it can be marked fixed.
>> Aaron
>> 
>> On Tue, Oct 21, 2014 at 3:26 PM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>
> wrote:
>>> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>>> Hash: SHA1
>>> 
>>> What's the status of the backend development on the following issues?
>>> 
>>> VCL-170 - option to power off blades after reservation - new reload module
>>> Computers can be configured to have their Predictive Loading Module set to
>>> "Unload Post reservation" now.  So, I think the frontend work on this is
>>> done.
>>> 
>>> VCL-174 - NAT - support for sites that have small IP address ranges
>>> Frontend work for this is mostly done.  I just need to add something to
>>> the
>>> parts of the site where computers and management nodes are managed to be
>>> able to set them as NAT hosts or not.
>>> 
>>> VCL-253 - Allow users to specify RDP port
>>> Users can specify an alternate port for RDP under User Preferences now. 
>>> It
>>> only overrides when a connect method has "remote desktop" or "rdp" in the
>>> name and is using tcp port 3389 as the port.
>>> 
>>> VCL-568 - refresh current reservations page 15 minutes after a reservation
>>> becomes available
>>> At some point, the plan here was to key off of an entry in the
>>> computerloadlog being added once a node was deployed and ready for user
>>> connection.  That gave the frontend a time from which to start counting
>>> down to later be able to refresh the page in case of reservation timeout.
>>> However, there doesn't appear to be an entry being inserted in
>>> computerloadlog right after the reservation becomes ready.  There also
>>> needs to be a similar entry for when the user first clicks the Connect
>>> button.
>>> 
>>> VCL-571 - EC2 API provisioning module
>>> Has any work been done on incorporating this contribution?  I'm not sure
>>> what changes would need to be done of the frontend for it.
>>> 
>>> VCL-584 - Extend features of Server loads
>>> Are the two items left in this issue finished in the backend?
>>> Andy - I haven't been able to reproduce the problem you saw that you
>>> listed in your comment on this issue.  I did modify things so that
>>> request.forimaging does not get updated for checkpoints.
>>> 
>>> Josh
>>> 
>>> On Friday, October 17, 2014 6:45:33 PM Andy Kurth wrote:
>>>> I was hoping this thread would generate more discussion and help
>>>> facilitate
>>>> completing the VCL 2.4 release.  Thank you Josh for providing your
>>>> updates
>>>> and comments.  Is anyone else working on anything related to 2.4?  If so,
>>>> please share.
>>>> 
>>>> I have an update on the development issues I have been working on below.
>>>> Before getting into that, there are some more general topics which need
>>>> to
>>>> be managed.
>>>> 
>>>> 1) Testing.  We don't have any sort of documented test plan, test cases,
>>>> a
>>>> checklist, nothing...  We don't have adequate instructions regarding how
>>>> to
>>>> set up a test environment based off of the code from trunk or a release
>>>> artifact.  We don't have any information what what and how to test. 
>>>> These
>>>> is critically needed.  Is anyone willing to help to work out and document
>>>> these processes?  There is a lot of helpful information available on
>>>> other
>>>> ASF project sites.  Here's a good example:
>>>> https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/CLOUDSTACK/CloudStack+4.0+tes
>>>> t+p rocedure
>>>> 
>>>> Please take a look at this page.  The first paragraph applies to all ASF
>>>> projects and is something that everyone needs to understand.
>>>> (Quoted from cloudstack's site)
>>>> 
>>>>> For an apache project, a VOTE on a release candidate is a very
>>>>> important
>>>>> process.  By voting (particularly for PPMC members and committers), you
>>>>> are
>>>>> saying to the world that "yes, I have download, verified and tested
>>>>> using
>>>>> the project's procedure for testing".  Your +1, 0 or -1 vote is an
>>>>> indication of the success of the steps listed.
>>>> 
>>>> In the past when a vote for a VCL release was started, there was a flurry
>>>> of +1's from people who had not communicated on the dev list about
>>>> anything
>>>> having to do with the release.  I could be wrong, but I'm guessing some
>>>> people who voted +1 did not test the release artifact in any way.  Not
>>>> having any documentation on how one would do this leads me to this
>>>> conclusion.
>>>> 
>>>> Documenting how to set up a test environment needs to be done ASAP and
>>>> can
>>>> be done concurrently with the remaining code development.  Is anyone
>>>> willing to take a stab at starting this?  I'd be happy to help, but
>>>> really
>>>> want to focus on finishing up the development items I'm working on.
>>>> 
>>>> 2) Documentation.  With every release comes a spike in interest.  People
>>>> are interested in what has been fixed/improved and what new features have
>>>> been added.  They then look at the accompanying documentation.  It would
>>>> be
>>>> a shame if someone got a bad impression and became frustrated due to poor
>>>> documentation.  There are new features with this release and things have
>>>> been dramatically reorganized on the VCL website portal.  We need to make
>>>> sure documentation is adequate and anything which refers to things that
>>>> have changed gets updated.  I'm not suggesting that we need to rework all
>>>> of the existing documentation or fill in all of the holes, but there is
>>>> obviously work that needs to be done prior to the release.  Is anyone
>>>> willing to manage this?
>>>> 
>>>> Update on the issues I have been working on, I hope to have these done
>>>> next
>>>> week:
>>>> 
>>>> VCL-764: Database changes for VCL 2.4
>>>> The tricky parts are done.  I have code which parses a reference .sql
>>>> file
>>>> (the 2.4 schema in this case), retrieves the current schema definition
>>>> information from the database, and can compare the two.  It then sorts
>>>> out
>>>> all of the operations that need to be done and then can make the changes
>>>> to
>>>> update the current database.  I'm thinking for this release the
>>>> instructions for installing the database for a fresh install can remain
>>>> the
>>>> same, although the script could automate some additional steps in the
>>>> future.  Upgrades can use the new script and execute it from an existing
>>>> management node.  I added some other features to the script which made
>>>> development and testing easier.  It can download the schema for any of
>>>> the
>>>> previous releases, create a temporary test database, and then upgrade the
>>>> test database with the reference (2.4) schema.  The script will have a
>>>> menu
>>>> system based off of how "vcld -setup" works.  I need to finish
>>>> implementing
>>>> this and polish it up.
>>>> 
>>>> VCL-685: VMware improvements for VCL 2.4
>>>> I didn't plan on spending much more time on the VMware code but there
>>>> were
>>>> some problems which needed to be addressed.  We have been seeing a lot of
>>>> problems lately with our old ESXi 4.1 hosts.  The code was modified to
>>>> make
>>>> it more resilient and for some problems, self healing.  See the commit
>>>> comments for the details.
>>>> 
>>>> VCL-767: Allow dynamic private IP addresses, remove /etc/hosts
>>>> requirement
>>>> This needs to be finished.  I spoke to Young Oh today, partially
>>>> regarding
>>>> this.  The code changes shouldn't take too much time.  I have already
>>>> written a "vcld -setup" option which gathers all of the computers
>>>> controlled by a management node, checks the private IP address each
>>>> computer's hostname resolves to, and verifies/updates the private IP
>>>> address in the computers table.  I just need to update all the places
>>>> still
>>>> using the hostname to SSH into the computers.
>>>> 
>>>> VCL-753: Improve user connection checking and how firewall is locked down
>>>> I'm thinking this issue should be bumped for the sake of time and
>>>> quality.
>>>> It will provide a much more secure way of handling how the firewall is
>>>> locked down, but is also very complicated and could introduce problems
>>>> until all the bugs are worked out.  The current code which this will
>>>> replace is stable.  Untag from 2.4?  Everyone agree?
>>>> 
>>>> VCL-783: Add support for 64-bit cygwin
>>>> Again, this should be quick.
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> I did not include the previous quoted messages in this reply since they
>>>> were pruned in some replies based on what the reply was referring to.  As
>>>> a
>>>> result, they would have been incomplete without some manual reassembly.
>>>> Here's a link to the entire thread for reference:
>>>> http://vcl.markmail.org/thread/jwcwymumnxxpd5ns
>>>> 
>>>> Thank You,
>>>> Andy
>>> 
>>> - --
>>> - -------------------------------
>>> Josh Thompson
>>> VCL Developer
>>> North Carolina State University
>>> 
>>> my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu
>>> 
>>> All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
>>> are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
>>> Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.
>>> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
>>> Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)
>>> 
>>> iEYEARECAAYFAlRGs08ACgkQV/LQcNdtPQPXUQCggCE0e4mN5r1z56QIRWp7QZAo
>>> uiIAn2hCX7aTwCnbO94j+3ORqDZwWYlp
>>> =EIkC
>>> -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
> - -- 
> - -------------------------------
> Josh Thompson
> VCL Developer
> North Carolina State University
> 
> my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu
> 
> All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
> are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
> Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
> Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)
> 
> iEYEARECAAYFAlRTizYACgkQV/LQcNdtPQPNpQCeKNg38EIKXB6xIiqlCyeDmfcr
> ZGgAnAjQMqcUlQ/3yWMPT9Ev3yzzqMj+
> =Mtur
> -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
> 

Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Aaron Peeler <aa...@ncsu.edu>]

VCL-308 is being tested now.

It's been few days allowed for comments, I'll go ahead and move the
others to a later release.

Aaron

On Thu, Nov 20, 2014 at 9:53 AM, Aaron Peeler <aa...@ncsu.edu> wrote:
> Shouldn't take much for VCL-308, I'll look into it.
>
> Aaron
>
>
> On Thu, Nov 20, 2014 at 9:17 AM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu> wrote:
>> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>> Hash: SHA1
>>
>> These mostly seem backend related.  I'm okay with bumping them to another
>> release in the interest of time so that we can get 2.4 out.
>>
>> Would it take much on the backend to do something simple for VCL-308?  I don't
>> think it would take much on the frontend, and this can be rather confusing to
>> users when a reservation seems to be stuck for 30 minutes while an image gets
>> transferred.  So, if it would be fairly simple, we may want to go ahead and do
>> that one.
>>
>> Josh
>>
>> On Wednesday, November 19, 2014 10:05:50 AM Aaron Peeler wrote:
>>> There are still 51 jira issues tagged for the upcoming release. I
>>> suggest the following be either closed or pushed out to a later
>>> release. Please confirm if these should be pushed out:
>>>
>>> VCL-579 provision ESXi as an end-user env
>>>
>>> VCL-572 Automatically install updates when an image is loaded
>>>
>>> VCL-416 Fix the default user profile when capturing an image
>>>
>>> VCL-465 Add support for computers with a single NIC
>>>
>>> VCL-678 Reduce unnecessary output written to vcld.log
>>>
>>> VCL-718 Add optional automatic execution of sdelete.exe to reduce vmdk size
>>>
>>> VCL-308 Computer load log does not account for images that have to be
>>> transferred to another management node
>>>
>>> Others? Also if ones that have been completed or are still in
>>> progress, please closed or updated.
>>>
>>> Aaron
>>>
>>> On Fri, Oct 31, 2014 at 9:24 AM, Mark Gardner <mk...@vt.edu> wrote:
>>> > On Fri, Oct 31, 2014 at 9:14 AM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>
>>> >
>>> > wrote:
>>> >> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>>> >> Hash: SHA1
>>> >>
>>> >> I'd like to either close VCL-710 (Allow an admin to permanently delete an
>>> >> image) as Won't Fix, or bump it to a later release.  The ability to
>>> >> delete
>>> >> VMware image files has been added to the setup part of vcld.  I imagine
>>> >> adding
>>> >> other types of image files wouldn't be too difficult.  There is currently
>>> >> no
>>> >> way for the frontend to trigger something like this on the backend.  So,
>>> >> it
>>> >> would require enough design and development that I don't think it is a
>>> >> good
>>> >> idea to try to get it in 2.4.
>>> >
>>> > +1 for postpone
>>> > . D
>>> > on't know about won't fix
>>> > as I have not had the need.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > Mark
>>> > --
>>> > Mark Gardner
>>> > --
>> - --
>> - -------------------------------
>> Josh Thompson
>> VCL Developer
>> North Carolina State University
>>
>> my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu
>>
>> All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
>> are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
>> Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.
>> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
>> Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)
>>
>> iEYEARECAAYFAlRt+A0ACgkQV/LQcNdtPQNA5wCdEl0fEjuus3BTRpZOGKswZTF8
>> TjYAmgM91RSKu4RI7ZTAyLBRfNTaCxSX
>> =scLM
>> -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Aaron Peeler
> Program Manager
> Virtual Computing Lab
> NC State University
>
> All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
> are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
> Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.



-- 
Aaron Peeler
Program Manager
Virtual Computing Lab
NC State University

All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.

Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Aaron Peeler <aa...@ncsu.edu>]

Shouldn't take much for VCL-308, I'll look into it.

Aaron


On Thu, Nov 20, 2014 at 9:17 AM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu> wrote:
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> These mostly seem backend related.  I'm okay with bumping them to another
> release in the interest of time so that we can get 2.4 out.
>
> Would it take much on the backend to do something simple for VCL-308?  I don't
> think it would take much on the frontend, and this can be rather confusing to
> users when a reservation seems to be stuck for 30 minutes while an image gets
> transferred.  So, if it would be fairly simple, we may want to go ahead and do
> that one.
>
> Josh
>
> On Wednesday, November 19, 2014 10:05:50 AM Aaron Peeler wrote:
>> There are still 51 jira issues tagged for the upcoming release. I
>> suggest the following be either closed or pushed out to a later
>> release. Please confirm if these should be pushed out:
>>
>> VCL-579 provision ESXi as an end-user env
>>
>> VCL-572 Automatically install updates when an image is loaded
>>
>> VCL-416 Fix the default user profile when capturing an image
>>
>> VCL-465 Add support for computers with a single NIC
>>
>> VCL-678 Reduce unnecessary output written to vcld.log
>>
>> VCL-718 Add optional automatic execution of sdelete.exe to reduce vmdk size
>>
>> VCL-308 Computer load log does not account for images that have to be
>> transferred to another management node
>>
>> Others? Also if ones that have been completed or are still in
>> progress, please closed or updated.
>>
>> Aaron
>>
>> On Fri, Oct 31, 2014 at 9:24 AM, Mark Gardner <mk...@vt.edu> wrote:
>> > On Fri, Oct 31, 2014 at 9:14 AM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>
>> >
>> > wrote:
>> >> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>> >> Hash: SHA1
>> >>
>> >> I'd like to either close VCL-710 (Allow an admin to permanently delete an
>> >> image) as Won't Fix, or bump it to a later release.  The ability to
>> >> delete
>> >> VMware image files has been added to the setup part of vcld.  I imagine
>> >> adding
>> >> other types of image files wouldn't be too difficult.  There is currently
>> >> no
>> >> way for the frontend to trigger something like this on the backend.  So,
>> >> it
>> >> would require enough design and development that I don't think it is a
>> >> good
>> >> idea to try to get it in 2.4.
>> >
>> > +1 for postpone
>> > . D
>> > on't know about won't fix
>> > as I have not had the need.
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > Mark
>> > --
>> > Mark Gardner
>> > --
> - --
> - -------------------------------
> Josh Thompson
> VCL Developer
> North Carolina State University
>
> my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu
>
> All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
> are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
> Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
> Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)
>
> iEYEARECAAYFAlRt+A0ACgkQV/LQcNdtPQNA5wCdEl0fEjuus3BTRpZOGKswZTF8
> TjYAmgM91RSKu4RI7ZTAyLBRfNTaCxSX
> =scLM
> -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
>



-- 
Aaron Peeler
Program Manager
Virtual Computing Lab
NC State University

All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.

Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

These mostly seem backend related.  I'm okay with bumping them to another 
release in the interest of time so that we can get 2.4 out.

Would it take much on the backend to do something simple for VCL-308?  I don't 
think it would take much on the frontend, and this can be rather confusing to 
users when a reservation seems to be stuck for 30 minutes while an image gets 
transferred.  So, if it would be fairly simple, we may want to go ahead and do 
that one.

Josh

On Wednesday, November 19, 2014 10:05:50 AM Aaron Peeler wrote:
> There are still 51 jira issues tagged for the upcoming release. I
> suggest the following be either closed or pushed out to a later
> release. Please confirm if these should be pushed out:
> 
> VCL-579 provision ESXi as an end-user env
> 
> VCL-572 Automatically install updates when an image is loaded
> 
> VCL-416 Fix the default user profile when capturing an image
> 
> VCL-465 Add support for computers with a single NIC
> 
> VCL-678 Reduce unnecessary output written to vcld.log
> 
> VCL-718 Add optional automatic execution of sdelete.exe to reduce vmdk size
> 
> VCL-308 Computer load log does not account for images that have to be
> transferred to another management node
> 
> Others? Also if ones that have been completed or are still in
> progress, please closed or updated.
> 
> Aaron
> 
> On Fri, Oct 31, 2014 at 9:24 AM, Mark Gardner <mk...@vt.edu> wrote:
> > On Fri, Oct 31, 2014 at 9:14 AM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>
> > 
> > wrote:
> >> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> >> Hash: SHA1
> >> 
> >> I'd like to either close VCL-710 (Allow an admin to permanently delete an
> >> image) as Won't Fix, or bump it to a later release.  The ability to
> >> delete
> >> VMware image files has been added to the setup part of vcld.  I imagine
> >> adding
> >> other types of image files wouldn't be too difficult.  There is currently
> >> no
> >> way for the frontend to trigger something like this on the backend.  So,
> >> it
> >> would require enough design and development that I don't think it is a
> >> good
> >> idea to try to get it in 2.4.
> > 
> > +1 for postpone
> > . D
> > on't know about won't fix
> > as I have not had the need.
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > Mark
> > --
> > Mark Gardner
> > --
- -- 
- -------------------------------
Josh Thompson
VCL Developer
North Carolina State University

my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu

All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)

iEYEARECAAYFAlRt+A0ACgkQV/LQcNdtPQNA5wCdEl0fEjuus3BTRpZOGKswZTF8
TjYAmgM91RSKu4RI7ZTAyLBRfNTaCxSX
=scLM
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Aaron Peeler <aa...@ncsu.edu>]

There are still 51 jira issues tagged for the upcoming release. I
suggest the following be either closed or pushed out to a later
release. Please confirm if these should be pushed out:

VCL-579 provision ESXi as an end-user env

VCL-572 Automatically install updates when an image is loaded

VCL-416 Fix the default user profile when capturing an image

VCL-465 Add support for computers with a single NIC

VCL-678 Reduce unnecessary output written to vcld.log

VCL-718 Add optional automatic execution of sdelete.exe to reduce vmdk size

VCL-308 Computer load log does not account for images that have to be
transferred to another management node

Others? Also if ones that have been completed or are still in
progress, please closed or updated.

Aaron

On Fri, Oct 31, 2014 at 9:24 AM, Mark Gardner <mk...@vt.edu> wrote:
> On Fri, Oct 31, 2014 at 9:14 AM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>
> wrote:
>
>> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>> Hash: SHA1
>>
>> I'd like to either close VCL-710 (Allow an admin to permanently delete an
>> image) as Won't Fix, or bump it to a later release.  The ability to delete
>> VMware image files has been added to the setup part of vcld.  I imagine
>> adding
>> other types of image files wouldn't be too difficult.  There is currently
>> no
>> way for the frontend to trigger something like this on the backend.  So, it
>> would require enough design and development that I don't think it is a good
>> idea to try to get it in 2.4.
>>
>
>
> +1 for postpone
> . D
> on't know about won't fix
> as I have not had the need.
>
>
>
> Mark
> --
> Mark Gardner
> --



-- 
Aaron Peeler
Program Manager
Virtual Computing Lab
NC State University

All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.

Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Mark Gardner <mk...@vt.edu>]

On Fri, Oct 31, 2014 at 9:14 AM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>
wrote:

> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> I'd like to either close VCL-710 (Allow an admin to permanently delete an
> image) as Won't Fix, or bump it to a later release.  The ability to delete
> VMware image files has been added to the setup part of vcld.  I imagine
> adding
> other types of image files wouldn't be too difficult.  There is currently
> no
> way for the frontend to trigger something like this on the backend.  So, it
> would require enough design and development that I don't think it is a good
> idea to try to get it in 2.4.
>

​
+1 for postpone
​. D
on't know about won't fix
​ as I have not had the need.​

​

​Mark
-- 
Mark Gardner
--

Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

I'd like to either close VCL-710 (Allow an admin to permanently delete an 
image) as Won't Fix, or bump it to a later release.  The ability to delete 
VMware image files has been added to the setup part of vcld.  I imagine adding 
other types of image files wouldn't be too difficult.  There is currently no 
way for the frontend to trigger something like this on the backend.  So, it 
would require enough design and development that I don't think it is a good 
idea to try to get it in 2.4.

Josh

On Tuesday, October 21, 2014 4:26:46 PM Aaron Peeler wrote:
> VCL-170 is completed on the backend and in the database sql files. So
> it can be marked fixed.
> Aaron
> 
> On Tue, Oct 21, 2014 at 3:26 PM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu> 
wrote:
> > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> > Hash: SHA1
> > 
> > What's the status of the backend development on the following issues?
> > 
> > VCL-170 - option to power off blades after reservation - new reload module
> > Computers can be configured to have their Predictive Loading Module set to
> > "Unload Post reservation" now.  So, I think the frontend work on this is
> > done.
> > 
> > VCL-174 - NAT - support for sites that have small IP address ranges
> > Frontend work for this is mostly done.  I just need to add something to
> > the
> > parts of the site where computers and management nodes are managed to be
> > able to set them as NAT hosts or not.
> > 
> > VCL-253 - Allow users to specify RDP port
> > Users can specify an alternate port for RDP under User Preferences now. 
> > It
> > only overrides when a connect method has "remote desktop" or "rdp" in the
> > name and is using tcp port 3389 as the port.
> > 
> > VCL-568 - refresh current reservations page 15 minutes after a reservation
> > becomes available
> > At some point, the plan here was to key off of an entry in the
> > computerloadlog being added once a node was deployed and ready for user
> > connection.  That gave the frontend a time from which to start counting
> > down to later be able to refresh the page in case of reservation timeout.
> >  However, there doesn't appear to be an entry being inserted in
> > computerloadlog right after the reservation becomes ready.  There also
> > needs to be a similar entry for when the user first clicks the Connect
> > button.
> > 
> > VCL-571 - EC2 API provisioning module
> > Has any work been done on incorporating this contribution?  I'm not sure
> > what changes would need to be done of the frontend for it.
> > 
> > VCL-584 - Extend features of Server loads
> > Are the two items left in this issue finished in the backend?
> > Andy - I haven't been able to reproduce the problem you saw that you
> > listed in your comment on this issue.  I did modify things so that
> > request.forimaging does not get updated for checkpoints.
> > 
> > Josh
> > 
> > On Friday, October 17, 2014 6:45:33 PM Andy Kurth wrote:
> >> I was hoping this thread would generate more discussion and help
> >> facilitate
> >> completing the VCL 2.4 release.  Thank you Josh for providing your
> >> updates
> >> and comments.  Is anyone else working on anything related to 2.4?  If so,
> >> please share.
> >> 
> >> I have an update on the development issues I have been working on below.
> >> Before getting into that, there are some more general topics which need
> >> to
> >> be managed.
> >> 
> >> 1) Testing.  We don't have any sort of documented test plan, test cases,
> >> a
> >> checklist, nothing...  We don't have adequate instructions regarding how
> >> to
> >> set up a test environment based off of the code from trunk or a release
> >> artifact.  We don't have any information what what and how to test. 
> >> These
> >> is critically needed.  Is anyone willing to help to work out and document
> >> these processes?  There is a lot of helpful information available on
> >> other
> >> ASF project sites.  Here's a good example:
> >> https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/CLOUDSTACK/CloudStack+4.0+tes
> >> t+p rocedure
> >> 
> >> Please take a look at this page.  The first paragraph applies to all ASF
> >> projects and is something that everyone needs to understand.
> >> (Quoted from cloudstack's site)
> >> 
> >> > For an apache project, a VOTE on a release candidate is a very
> >> > important
> >> > process.  By voting (particularly for PPMC members and committers), you
> >> > are
> >> > saying to the world that "yes, I have download, verified and tested
> >> > using
> >> > the project's procedure for testing".  Your +1, 0 or -1 vote is an
> >> > indication of the success of the steps listed.
> >> 
> >> In the past when a vote for a VCL release was started, there was a flurry
> >> of +1's from people who had not communicated on the dev list about
> >> anything
> >> having to do with the release.  I could be wrong, but I'm guessing some
> >> people who voted +1 did not test the release artifact in any way.  Not
> >> having any documentation on how one would do this leads me to this
> >> conclusion.
> >> 
> >> Documenting how to set up a test environment needs to be done ASAP and
> >> can
> >> be done concurrently with the remaining code development.  Is anyone
> >> willing to take a stab at starting this?  I'd be happy to help, but
> >> really
> >> want to focus on finishing up the development items I'm working on.
> >> 
> >> 2) Documentation.  With every release comes a spike in interest.  People
> >> are interested in what has been fixed/improved and what new features have
> >> been added.  They then look at the accompanying documentation.  It would
> >> be
> >> a shame if someone got a bad impression and became frustrated due to poor
> >> documentation.  There are new features with this release and things have
> >> been dramatically reorganized on the VCL website portal.  We need to make
> >> sure documentation is adequate and anything which refers to things that
> >> have changed gets updated.  I'm not suggesting that we need to rework all
> >> of the existing documentation or fill in all of the holes, but there is
> >> obviously work that needs to be done prior to the release.  Is anyone
> >> willing to manage this?
> >> 
> >> Update on the issues I have been working on, I hope to have these done
> >> next
> >> week:
> >> 
> >> VCL-764: Database changes for VCL 2.4
> >> The tricky parts are done.  I have code which parses a reference .sql
> >> file
> >> (the 2.4 schema in this case), retrieves the current schema definition
> >> information from the database, and can compare the two.  It then sorts
> >> out
> >> all of the operations that need to be done and then can make the changes
> >> to
> >> update the current database.  I'm thinking for this release the
> >> instructions for installing the database for a fresh install can remain
> >> the
> >> same, although the script could automate some additional steps in the
> >> future.  Upgrades can use the new script and execute it from an existing
> >> management node.  I added some other features to the script which made
> >> development and testing easier.  It can download the schema for any of
> >> the
> >> previous releases, create a temporary test database, and then upgrade the
> >> test database with the reference (2.4) schema.  The script will have a
> >> menu
> >> system based off of how "vcld -setup" works.  I need to finish
> >> implementing
> >> this and polish it up.
> >> 
> >> VCL-685: VMware improvements for VCL 2.4
> >> I didn't plan on spending much more time on the VMware code but there
> >> were
> >> some problems which needed to be addressed.  We have been seeing a lot of
> >> problems lately with our old ESXi 4.1 hosts.  The code was modified to
> >> make
> >> it more resilient and for some problems, self healing.  See the commit
> >> comments for the details.
> >> 
> >> VCL-767: Allow dynamic private IP addresses, remove /etc/hosts
> >> requirement
> >> This needs to be finished.  I spoke to Young Oh today, partially
> >> regarding
> >> this.  The code changes shouldn't take too much time.  I have already
> >> written a "vcld -setup" option which gathers all of the computers
> >> controlled by a management node, checks the private IP address each
> >> computer's hostname resolves to, and verifies/updates the private IP
> >> address in the computers table.  I just need to update all the places
> >> still
> >> using the hostname to SSH into the computers.
> >> 
> >> VCL-753: Improve user connection checking and how firewall is locked down
> >> I'm thinking this issue should be bumped for the sake of time and
> >> quality.
> >> It will provide a much more secure way of handling how the firewall is
> >> locked down, but is also very complicated and could introduce problems
> >> until all the bugs are worked out.  The current code which this will
> >> replace is stable.  Untag from 2.4?  Everyone agree?
> >> 
> >> VCL-783: Add support for 64-bit cygwin
> >> Again, this should be quick.
> >> 
> >> 
> >> I did not include the previous quoted messages in this reply since they
> >> were pruned in some replies based on what the reply was referring to.  As
> >> a
> >> result, they would have been incomplete without some manual reassembly.
> >> Here's a link to the entire thread for reference:
> >> http://vcl.markmail.org/thread/jwcwymumnxxpd5ns
> >> 
> >> Thank You,
> >> Andy
> > 
> > - --
> > - -------------------------------
> > Josh Thompson
> > VCL Developer
> > North Carolina State University
> > 
> > my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu
> > 
> > All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
> > are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
> > Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.
> > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
> > Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)
> > 
> > iEYEARECAAYFAlRGs08ACgkQV/LQcNdtPQPXUQCggCE0e4mN5r1z56QIRWp7QZAo
> > uiIAn2hCX7aTwCnbO94j+3ORqDZwWYlp
> > =EIkC
> > -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
- -- 
- -------------------------------
Josh Thompson
VCL Developer
North Carolina State University

my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu

All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)

iEYEARECAAYFAlRTizYACgkQV/LQcNdtPQPNpQCeKNg38EIKXB6xIiqlCyeDmfcr
ZGgAnAjQMqcUlQ/3yWMPT9Ev3yzzqMj+
=Mtur
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Aaron Peeler <aa...@ncsu.edu>]

VCL-170 is completed on the backend and in the database sql files. So
it can be marked fixed.
Aaron

On Tue, Oct 21, 2014 at 3:26 PM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu> wrote:
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> What's the status of the backend development on the following issues?
>
> VCL-170 - option to power off blades after reservation - new reload module
> Computers can be configured to have their Predictive Loading Module set to
> "Unload Post reservation" now.  So, I think the frontend work on this is done.
>
> VCL-174 - NAT - support for sites that have small IP address ranges
> Frontend work for this is mostly done.  I just need to add something to the
> parts of the site where computers and management nodes are managed to be able
> to set them as NAT hosts or not.
>
> VCL-253 - Allow users to specify RDP port
> Users can specify an alternate port for RDP under User Preferences now.  It
> only overrides when a connect method has "remote desktop" or "rdp" in the name
> and is using tcp port 3389 as the port.
>
> VCL-568 - refresh current reservations page 15 minutes after a reservation
> becomes available
> At some point, the plan here was to key off of an entry in the computerloadlog
> being added once a node was deployed and ready for user connection.  That gave
> the frontend a time from which to start counting down to later be able to
> refresh the page in case of reservation timeout.  However, there doesn't
> appear to be an entry being inserted in computerloadlog right after the
> reservation becomes ready.  There also needs to be a similar entry for when
> the user first clicks the Connect button.
>
> VCL-571 - EC2 API provisioning module
> Has any work been done on incorporating this contribution?  I'm not sure what
> changes would need to be done of the frontend for it.
>
> VCL-584 - Extend features of Server loads
> Are the two items left in this issue finished in the backend?
> Andy - I haven't been able to reproduce the problem you saw that you listed in
> your comment on this issue.  I did modify things so that request.forimaging
> does not get updated for checkpoints.
>
> Josh
>
> On Friday, October 17, 2014 6:45:33 PM Andy Kurth wrote:
>> I was hoping this thread would generate more discussion and help facilitate
>> completing the VCL 2.4 release.  Thank you Josh for providing your updates
>> and comments.  Is anyone else working on anything related to 2.4?  If so,
>> please share.
>>
>> I have an update on the development issues I have been working on below.
>> Before getting into that, there are some more general topics which need to
>> be managed.
>>
>> 1) Testing.  We don't have any sort of documented test plan, test cases, a
>> checklist, nothing...  We don't have adequate instructions regarding how to
>> set up a test environment based off of the code from trunk or a release
>> artifact.  We don't have any information what what and how to test.  These
>> is critically needed.  Is anyone willing to help to work out and document
>> these processes?  There is a lot of helpful information available on other
>> ASF project sites.  Here's a good example:
>> https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/CLOUDSTACK/CloudStack+4.0+test+p
>> rocedure
>>
>> Please take a look at this page.  The first paragraph applies to all ASF
>> projects and is something that everyone needs to understand.
>> (Quoted from cloudstack's site)
>>
>> > For an apache project, a VOTE on a release candidate is a very important
>> > process.  By voting (particularly for PPMC members and committers), you
>> > are
>> > saying to the world that "yes, I have download, verified and tested using
>> > the project's procedure for testing".  Your +1, 0 or -1 vote is an
>> > indication of the success of the steps listed.
>>
>> In the past when a vote for a VCL release was started, there was a flurry
>> of +1's from people who had not communicated on the dev list about anything
>> having to do with the release.  I could be wrong, but I'm guessing some
>> people who voted +1 did not test the release artifact in any way.  Not
>> having any documentation on how one would do this leads me to this
>> conclusion.
>>
>> Documenting how to set up a test environment needs to be done ASAP and can
>> be done concurrently with the remaining code development.  Is anyone
>> willing to take a stab at starting this?  I'd be happy to help, but really
>> want to focus on finishing up the development items I'm working on.
>>
>> 2) Documentation.  With every release comes a spike in interest.  People
>> are interested in what has been fixed/improved and what new features have
>> been added.  They then look at the accompanying documentation.  It would be
>> a shame if someone got a bad impression and became frustrated due to poor
>> documentation.  There are new features with this release and things have
>> been dramatically reorganized on the VCL website portal.  We need to make
>> sure documentation is adequate and anything which refers to things that
>> have changed gets updated.  I'm not suggesting that we need to rework all
>> of the existing documentation or fill in all of the holes, but there is
>> obviously work that needs to be done prior to the release.  Is anyone
>> willing to manage this?
>>
>> Update on the issues I have been working on, I hope to have these done next
>> week:
>>
>> VCL-764: Database changes for VCL 2.4
>> The tricky parts are done.  I have code which parses a reference .sql file
>> (the 2.4 schema in this case), retrieves the current schema definition
>> information from the database, and can compare the two.  It then sorts out
>> all of the operations that need to be done and then can make the changes to
>> update the current database.  I'm thinking for this release the
>> instructions for installing the database for a fresh install can remain the
>> same, although the script could automate some additional steps in the
>> future.  Upgrades can use the new script and execute it from an existing
>> management node.  I added some other features to the script which made
>> development and testing easier.  It can download the schema for any of the
>> previous releases, create a temporary test database, and then upgrade the
>> test database with the reference (2.4) schema.  The script will have a menu
>> system based off of how "vcld -setup" works.  I need to finish implementing
>> this and polish it up.
>>
>> VCL-685: VMware improvements for VCL 2.4
>> I didn't plan on spending much more time on the VMware code but there were
>> some problems which needed to be addressed.  We have been seeing a lot of
>> problems lately with our old ESXi 4.1 hosts.  The code was modified to make
>> it more resilient and for some problems, self healing.  See the commit
>> comments for the details.
>>
>> VCL-767: Allow dynamic private IP addresses, remove /etc/hosts requirement
>> This needs to be finished.  I spoke to Young Oh today, partially regarding
>> this.  The code changes shouldn't take too much time.  I have already
>> written a "vcld -setup" option which gathers all of the computers
>> controlled by a management node, checks the private IP address each
>> computer's hostname resolves to, and verifies/updates the private IP
>> address in the computers table.  I just need to update all the places still
>> using the hostname to SSH into the computers.
>>
>> VCL-753: Improve user connection checking and how firewall is locked down
>> I'm thinking this issue should be bumped for the sake of time and quality.
>> It will provide a much more secure way of handling how the firewall is
>> locked down, but is also very complicated and could introduce problems
>> until all the bugs are worked out.  The current code which this will
>> replace is stable.  Untag from 2.4?  Everyone agree?
>>
>> VCL-783: Add support for 64-bit cygwin
>> Again, this should be quick.
>>
>>
>> I did not include the previous quoted messages in this reply since they
>> were pruned in some replies based on what the reply was referring to.  As a
>> result, they would have been incomplete without some manual reassembly.
>> Here's a link to the entire thread for reference:
>> http://vcl.markmail.org/thread/jwcwymumnxxpd5ns
>>
>> Thank You,
>> Andy
> - --
> - -------------------------------
> Josh Thompson
> VCL Developer
> North Carolina State University
>
> my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu
>
> All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
> are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
> Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
> Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)
>
> iEYEARECAAYFAlRGs08ACgkQV/LQcNdtPQPXUQCggCE0e4mN5r1z56QIRWp7QZAo
> uiIAn2hCX7aTwCnbO94j+3ORqDZwWYlp
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>



-- 
Aaron Peeler
Program Manager
Virtual Computing Lab
NC State University

All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
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Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

What's the status of the backend development on the following issues?

VCL-170 - option to power off blades after reservation - new reload module
Computers can be configured to have their Predictive Loading Module set to 
"Unload Post reservation" now.  So, I think the frontend work on this is done.

VCL-174 - NAT - support for sites that have small IP address ranges
Frontend work for this is mostly done.  I just need to add something to the 
parts of the site where computers and management nodes are managed to be able 
to set them as NAT hosts or not.

VCL-253 - Allow users to specify RDP port
Users can specify an alternate port for RDP under User Preferences now.  It 
only overrides when a connect method has "remote desktop" or "rdp" in the name 
and is using tcp port 3389 as the port.

VCL-568 - refresh current reservations page 15 minutes after a reservation 
becomes available
At some point, the plan here was to key off of an entry in the computerloadlog 
being added once a node was deployed and ready for user connection.  That gave 
the frontend a time from which to start counting down to later be able to 
refresh the page in case of reservation timeout.  However, there doesn't 
appear to be an entry being inserted in computerloadlog right after the 
reservation becomes ready.  There also needs to be a similar entry for when 
the user first clicks the Connect button.

VCL-571 - EC2 API provisioning module
Has any work been done on incorporating this contribution?  I'm not sure what 
changes would need to be done of the frontend for it.

VCL-584 - Extend features of Server loads
Are the two items left in this issue finished in the backend?
Andy - I haven't been able to reproduce the problem you saw that you listed in 
your comment on this issue.  I did modify things so that request.forimaging 
does not get updated for checkpoints.

Josh

On Friday, October 17, 2014 6:45:33 PM Andy Kurth wrote:
> I was hoping this thread would generate more discussion and help facilitate
> completing the VCL 2.4 release.  Thank you Josh for providing your updates
> and comments.  Is anyone else working on anything related to 2.4?  If so,
> please share.
> 
> I have an update on the development issues I have been working on below.
> Before getting into that, there are some more general topics which need to
> be managed.
> 
> 1) Testing.  We don't have any sort of documented test plan, test cases, a
> checklist, nothing...  We don't have adequate instructions regarding how to
> set up a test environment based off of the code from trunk or a release
> artifact.  We don't have any information what what and how to test.  These
> is critically needed.  Is anyone willing to help to work out and document
> these processes?  There is a lot of helpful information available on other
> ASF project sites.  Here's a good example:
> https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/CLOUDSTACK/CloudStack+4.0+test+p
> rocedure
> 
> Please take a look at this page.  The first paragraph applies to all ASF
> projects and is something that everyone needs to understand.
> (Quoted from cloudstack's site)
> 
> > For an apache project, a VOTE on a release candidate is a very important
> > process.  By voting (particularly for PPMC members and committers), you
> > are
> > saying to the world that "yes, I have download, verified and tested using
> > the project's procedure for testing".  Your +1, 0 or -1 vote is an
> > indication of the success of the steps listed.
> 
> In the past when a vote for a VCL release was started, there was a flurry
> of +1's from people who had not communicated on the dev list about anything
> having to do with the release.  I could be wrong, but I'm guessing some
> people who voted +1 did not test the release artifact in any way.  Not
> having any documentation on how one would do this leads me to this
> conclusion.
> 
> Documenting how to set up a test environment needs to be done ASAP and can
> be done concurrently with the remaining code development.  Is anyone
> willing to take a stab at starting this?  I'd be happy to help, but really
> want to focus on finishing up the development items I'm working on.
> 
> 2) Documentation.  With every release comes a spike in interest.  People
> are interested in what has been fixed/improved and what new features have
> been added.  They then look at the accompanying documentation.  It would be
> a shame if someone got a bad impression and became frustrated due to poor
> documentation.  There are new features with this release and things have
> been dramatically reorganized on the VCL website portal.  We need to make
> sure documentation is adequate and anything which refers to things that
> have changed gets updated.  I'm not suggesting that we need to rework all
> of the existing documentation or fill in all of the holes, but there is
> obviously work that needs to be done prior to the release.  Is anyone
> willing to manage this?
> 
> Update on the issues I have been working on, I hope to have these done next
> week:
> 
> VCL-764: Database changes for VCL 2.4
> The tricky parts are done.  I have code which parses a reference .sql file
> (the 2.4 schema in this case), retrieves the current schema definition
> information from the database, and can compare the two.  It then sorts out
> all of the operations that need to be done and then can make the changes to
> update the current database.  I'm thinking for this release the
> instructions for installing the database for a fresh install can remain the
> same, although the script could automate some additional steps in the
> future.  Upgrades can use the new script and execute it from an existing
> management node.  I added some other features to the script which made
> development and testing easier.  It can download the schema for any of the
> previous releases, create a temporary test database, and then upgrade the
> test database with the reference (2.4) schema.  The script will have a menu
> system based off of how "vcld -setup" works.  I need to finish implementing
> this and polish it up.
> 
> VCL-685: VMware improvements for VCL 2.4
> I didn't plan on spending much more time on the VMware code but there were
> some problems which needed to be addressed.  We have been seeing a lot of
> problems lately with our old ESXi 4.1 hosts.  The code was modified to make
> it more resilient and for some problems, self healing.  See the commit
> comments for the details.
> 
> VCL-767: Allow dynamic private IP addresses, remove /etc/hosts requirement
> This needs to be finished.  I spoke to Young Oh today, partially regarding
> this.  The code changes shouldn't take too much time.  I have already
> written a "vcld -setup" option which gathers all of the computers
> controlled by a management node, checks the private IP address each
> computer's hostname resolves to, and verifies/updates the private IP
> address in the computers table.  I just need to update all the places still
> using the hostname to SSH into the computers.
> 
> VCL-753: Improve user connection checking and how firewall is locked down
> I'm thinking this issue should be bumped for the sake of time and quality.
> It will provide a much more secure way of handling how the firewall is
> locked down, but is also very complicated and could introduce problems
> until all the bugs are worked out.  The current code which this will
> replace is stable.  Untag from 2.4?  Everyone agree?
> 
> VCL-783: Add support for 64-bit cygwin
> Again, this should be quick.
> 
> 
> I did not include the previous quoted messages in this reply since they
> were pruned in some replies based on what the reply was referring to.  As a
> result, they would have been incomplete without some manual reassembly.
> Here's a link to the entire thread for reference:
> http://vcl.markmail.org/thread/jwcwymumnxxpd5ns
> 
> Thank You,
> Andy
- -- 
- -------------------------------
Josh Thompson
VCL Developer
North Carolina State University

my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu

All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
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-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Andy - thanks for the update.  More inline...

On Friday, October 17, 2014 6:45:33 PM Andy Kurth wrote:
> I was hoping this thread would generate more discussion and help facilitate
> completing the VCL 2.4 release.  Thank you Josh for providing your updates
> and comments.  Is anyone else working on anything related to 2.4?  If so,
> please share.
> 
> I have an update on the development issues I have been working on below.
> Before getting into that, there are some more general topics which need to
> be managed.
> 
> 1) Testing.  We don't have any sort of documented test plan, test cases, a
> checklist, nothing...  We don't have adequate instructions regarding how to
> set up a test environment based off of the code from trunk or a release
> artifact.  We don't have any information what what and how to test.  These
> is critically needed.  Is anyone willing to help to work out and document
> these processes?  There is a lot of helpful information available on other
> ASF project sites.  Here's a good example:
> https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/CLOUDSTACK/CloudStack+4.0+test+p
> rocedure
> 
> Please take a look at this page.  The first paragraph applies to all ASF
> projects and is something that everyone needs to understand.
> (Quoted from cloudstack's site)
> 
> > For an apache project, a VOTE on a release candidate is a very important
> > process.  By voting (particularly for PPMC members and committers), you
> > are
> > saying to the world that "yes, I have download, verified and tested using
> > the project's procedure for testing".  Your +1, 0 or -1 vote is an
> > indication of the success of the steps listed.
> 
> In the past when a vote for a VCL release was started, there was a flurry
> of +1's from people who had not communicated on the dev list about anything
> having to do with the release.  I could be wrong, but I'm guessing some
> people who voted +1 did not test the release artifact in any way.  Not
> having any documentation on how one would do this leads me to this
> conclusion.
> 
> Documenting how to set up a test environment needs to be done ASAP and can
> be done concurrently with the remaining code development.  Is anyone
> willing to take a stab at starting this?  I'd be happy to help, but really
> want to focus on finishing up the development items I'm working on.

+1 on having documentation for how to set up a test environment.  Like Andy, 
I'm trying to get through a number of remaining issues on the frontend.  So, 
it would be great if someone would be willing to step up and take a stab at 
this.  Those of use that have been around longer would certainly be willing to 
help polish it up.

> 2) Documentation.  With every release comes a spike in interest.  People
> are interested in what has been fixed/improved and what new features have
> been added.  They then look at the accompanying documentation.  It would be
> a shame if someone got a bad impression and became frustrated due to poor
> documentation.  There are new features with this release and things have
> been dramatically reorganized on the VCL website portal.  We need to make
> sure documentation is adequate and anything which refers to things that
> have changed gets updated.  I'm not suggesting that we need to rework all
> of the existing documentation or fill in all of the holes, but there is
> obviously work that needs to be done prior to the release.  Is anyone
> willing to manage this?

This is a great point.

> Update on the issues I have been working on, I hope to have these done next
> week:
> 
> VCL-764: Database changes for VCL 2.4
> The tricky parts are done.  I have code which parses a reference .sql file
> (the 2.4 schema in this case), retrieves the current schema definition
> information from the database, and can compare the two.  It then sorts out
> all of the operations that need to be done and then can make the changes to
> update the current database.  I'm thinking for this release the
> instructions for installing the database for a fresh install can remain the
> same, although the script could automate some additional steps in the
> future.  Upgrades can use the new script and execute it from an existing
> management node.  I added some other features to the script which made
> development and testing easier.  It can download the schema for any of the
> previous releases, create a temporary test database, and then upgrade the
> test database with the reference (2.4) schema.  The script will have a menu
> system based off of how "vcld -setup" works.  I need to finish implementing
> this and polish it up.
> 
> VCL-685: VMware improvements for VCL 2.4
> I didn't plan on spending much more time on the VMware code but there were
> some problems which needed to be addressed.  We have been seeing a lot of
> problems lately with our old ESXi 4.1 hosts.  The code was modified to make
> it more resilient and for some problems, self healing.  See the commit
> comments for the details.
> 
> VCL-767: Allow dynamic private IP addresses, remove /etc/hosts requirement
> This needs to be finished.  I spoke to Young Oh today, partially regarding
> this.  The code changes shouldn't take too much time.  I have already
> written a "vcld -setup" option which gathers all of the computers
> controlled by a management node, checks the private IP address each
> computer's hostname resolves to, and verifies/updates the private IP
> address in the computers table.  I just need to update all the places still
> using the hostname to SSH into the computers.
> 
> VCL-753: Improve user connection checking and how firewall is locked down
> I'm thinking this issue should be bumped for the sake of time and quality.
> It will provide a much more secure way of handling how the firewall is
> locked down, but is also very complicated and could introduce problems
> until all the bugs are worked out.  The current code which this will
> replace is stable.  Untag from 2.4?  Everyone agree?

I'd really like to see this get added in.  However, I think we're to the point 
that trimming anything we can to get a release out is a good idea.  So, I'm 
okay for it to be untagged for 2.4.  For the following release, it would be 
great to just pick a few key issues to focus on instead of the large number 
we've done for this one.

Josh

> VCL-783: Add support for 64-bit cygwin
> Again, this should be quick.
> 
> 
> I did not include the previous quoted messages in this reply since they
> were pruned in some replies based on what the reply was referring to.  As a
> result, they would have been incomplete without some manual reassembly.
> Here's a link to the entire thread for reference:
> http://vcl.markmail.org/thread/jwcwymumnxxpd5ns
> 
> Thank You,
> Andy
- -- 
- -------------------------------
Josh Thompson
VCL Developer
North Carolina State University

my GPG/PGP key can be found at pgp.mit.edu

All electronic mail messages in connection with State business which
are sent to or received by this account are subject to the NC Public
Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux)

iEYEARECAAYFAlRFD58ACgkQV/LQcNdtPQP16ACdFMcVsjO5hJR2xIMzs1Lf4FHH
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=I3dN
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Andy Kurth <an...@ncsu.edu>]

I was hoping this thread would generate more discussion and help facilitate
completing the VCL 2.4 release.  Thank you Josh for providing your updates
and comments.  Is anyone else working on anything related to 2.4?  If so,
please share.

I have an update on the development issues I have been working on below.
Before getting into that, there are some more general topics which need to
be managed.

1) Testing.  We don't have any sort of documented test plan, test cases, a
checklist, nothing...  We don't have adequate instructions regarding how to
set up a test environment based off of the code from trunk or a release
artifact.  We don't have any information what what and how to test.  These
is critically needed.  Is anyone willing to help to work out and document
these processes?  There is a lot of helpful information available on other
ASF project sites.  Here's a good example:
https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/CLOUDSTACK/CloudStack+4.0+test+procedure

Please take a look at this page.  The first paragraph applies to all ASF
projects and is something that everyone needs to understand.
(Quoted from cloudstack's site)

> For an apache project, a VOTE on a release candidate is a very important
> process.  By voting (particularly for PPMC members and committers), you are
> saying to the world that "yes, I have download, verified and tested using
> the project's procedure for testing".  Your +1, 0 or -1 vote is an
> indication of the success of the steps listed.


In the past when a vote for a VCL release was started, there was a flurry
of +1's from people who had not communicated on the dev list about anything
having to do with the release.  I could be wrong, but I'm guessing some
people who voted +1 did not test the release artifact in any way.  Not
having any documentation on how one would do this leads me to this
conclusion.

Documenting how to set up a test environment needs to be done ASAP and can
be done concurrently with the remaining code development.  Is anyone
willing to take a stab at starting this?  I'd be happy to help, but really
want to focus on finishing up the development items I'm working on.

2) Documentation.  With every release comes a spike in interest.  People
are interested in what has been fixed/improved and what new features have
been added.  They then look at the accompanying documentation.  It would be
a shame if someone got a bad impression and became frustrated due to poor
documentation.  There are new features with this release and things have
been dramatically reorganized on the VCL website portal.  We need to make
sure documentation is adequate and anything which refers to things that
have changed gets updated.  I'm not suggesting that we need to rework all
of the existing documentation or fill in all of the holes, but there is
obviously work that needs to be done prior to the release.  Is anyone
willing to manage this?

Update on the issues I have been working on, I hope to have these done next
week:

VCL-764: Database changes for VCL 2.4
The tricky parts are done.  I have code which parses a reference .sql file
(the 2.4 schema in this case), retrieves the current schema definition
information from the database, and can compare the two.  It then sorts out
all of the operations that need to be done and then can make the changes to
update the current database.  I'm thinking for this release the
instructions for installing the database for a fresh install can remain the
same, although the script could automate some additional steps in the
future.  Upgrades can use the new script and execute it from an existing
management node.  I added some other features to the script which made
development and testing easier.  It can download the schema for any of the
previous releases, create a temporary test database, and then upgrade the
test database with the reference (2.4) schema.  The script will have a menu
system based off of how "vcld -setup" works.  I need to finish implementing
this and polish it up.

VCL-685: VMware improvements for VCL 2.4
I didn't plan on spending much more time on the VMware code but there were
some problems which needed to be addressed.  We have been seeing a lot of
problems lately with our old ESXi 4.1 hosts.  The code was modified to make
it more resilient and for some problems, self healing.  See the commit
comments for the details.

VCL-767: Allow dynamic private IP addresses, remove /etc/hosts requirement
This needs to be finished.  I spoke to Young Oh today, partially regarding
this.  The code changes shouldn't take too much time.  I have already
written a "vcld -setup" option which gathers all of the computers
controlled by a management node, checks the private IP address each
computer's hostname resolves to, and verifies/updates the private IP
address in the computers table.  I just need to update all the places still
using the hostname to SSH into the computers.

VCL-753: Improve user connection checking and how firewall is locked down
I'm thinking this issue should be bumped for the sake of time and quality.
It will provide a much more secure way of handling how the firewall is
locked down, but is also very complicated and could introduce problems
until all the bugs are worked out.  The current code which this will
replace is stable.  Untag from 2.4?  Everyone agree?

VCL-783: Add support for 64-bit cygwin
Again, this should be quick.


I did not include the previous quoted messages in this reply since they
were pruned in some replies based on what the reply was referring to.  As a
result, they would have been incomplete without some manual reassembly.
Here's a link to the entire thread for reference:
http://vcl.markmail.org/thread/jwcwymumnxxpd5ns

Thank You,
Andy

Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Andy Kurth <an...@ncsu.edu>]

On Wed, Oct 1, 2014 at 4:01 PM, Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>
wrote:
>
>
> > > > > VCL-526 - add section to site to manage connect methods
> > > > > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-526
> > > >
> > > > -1 (or replace with a new issue)
> > > > How much time will this take?  We added the connect methods feature
> in
> > > > 2.3 without a way to manage them other than directly modifying the
> > > > database.  Not good.  If adding a feature to the website takes too
> > > > much time we could add something to "vcld -setup" for 2.4.  I'm not
> > > > voting +1 for the release without some way to manage this.
> > >
> > > Again, this is a permissions issue.  Who gets to see and manage each
> > > connect
> > > method?  It would also require creating a new section of the site for
> > > managing
> > > it.  It may work to make them a new resource.
> >
> > So, add to "vcld -setup"?  This wouldn't be too difficult and would only
> be
> > available to admins with access to a management node.
>
> I think this eventually needs to be in the frontend, but having it in the
> backend for 2.4 would allow things to be managed and would handle the
> permissions issue.  However, it seems like a lot to add to "vcld -setup".
> Are
> you thinking to be able to add and remove connect methods, edit the
> connecttext and ports for them, and control their mappings?
>

It wouldn't be too much work.  The code would be similar to the mechanism
already in 'vcld -setup' to configure Windows KMS and MAC activation.

I did not think of editing connecttext.  We don't currently have any
multi-line editing functionality.  This would require a little bit of
work.  A quick way to do this may be:

-Read the text field from the database, or begin with a stock template if
adding a new connect method
-Create a temp file populated with the text
-Call system() to launch vi or the default editor and open the temp file
-User edits text and saves the temp file
-Read the updated text file
-Validate the data
-Update the database



>
> > > > VCL-577 - Cloud Broker tool for VCL
> > > >
> > > > > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-577
> > > >
> > > > +?
> > > > This was submitted by Karuna Joshi.  We need to reach out to her and
> > > > make sure she is involved in this discussion.  If she is interested
> > > > and willing to assist, we should make an effort to include this in
> > > > 2.4.  If she is interested but it is not feasible timewise to include
> > > > it in 2.4, it should be top priority after the release.  We need to
> > > > encourage these contributions.
> > >
> > > This is more something that uses VCL instead of something that is part
> of
> > > VCL.
> > > So, I don't see a need for it being included in a release.  However,
> if it
> > > were, Karuna would need to step up as a committer to maintain it, in
> which
> > > case, she should be contacted.
> >
> > I don't necessarily see it as needing to be included, but the issue
> > includes a patch file to the VCL code and there was a fair amount of
> > communication in the issue comments.  The responsibility of testing it
> and
> > getting it into the release rests on her.  We have been bitten in the
> past
> > by removing a module someone contributed who was not active in the
> > community at the time.  Although this is not the same situation, we need
> to
> > be completely transparent and be sure to not surprise anyone.  I'll send
> > her a direct message.  If she doesn't respond or is not able to prepare
> it
> > for the release within our time constraints then we shelve it.
>
> Unless I missed something, the patch doesn't actually modify any of the
> existing code but just adds files that use the API and can reside anywhere
> on
> the webserver.  She did add one table and a view to the database though.
> It
> is a good idea to reach out to her.  I'm interested to see if she wants to
> continue to maintain this.
>

I have corresponded with Karuna directly.  She is aware of this
discussion.  I have asked her to respond to this thread.


Regards,
Andy

Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Josh Thompson <jo...@ncsu.edu>]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Comments inline - I'll add the comments to the JIRA issues as well.

On Wednesday, October 01, 2014 12:59:11 PM Andy Kurth wrote:
> Thanks for the feedback.  One request when anyone untags an issue, please
> add a comment with the corresponding discussion from this thread or a link
> to this thread.  This will make it easier to evaluate the issues later on.
> 
> > > > VCL-178 - enable checkuser flag for per reservation instead of image
> > only
> > 
> > > > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-178
> > > 
> > > -1 (keep in 2.4)
> > > This is one that was created in 2009 and got bumped all the way from
> > > the 2.2 release.  The backend code has supported this feature since
> > > 2010.  This would be pretty useful.  How much time would it take to
> > > implement this?
> > 
> > The easy part is adding a checkbox for reservations that says not to do
> > user
> > login checks.  The hard part is determining who sees the checkbox (i.e.
> > permissions).  How do we determine who gets to see this functionality?  Is
> > it
> > a global permission?  Is it something that is image specific?  Is it image
> > specific but also tied to a user permission?
> 
> Though not ideal, what about doing something similar to the special
> "Specify End Time" group?  If we want to do something more elaborate in the
> future such as adding a new privilege, it should be relatively easy to
> transition by granting the single special group the new privilege.

That would work and wouldn't be too difficult.

> > > > VCL-526 - add section to site to manage connect methods
> > > > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-526
> > > 
> > > -1 (or replace with a new issue)
> > > How much time will this take?  We added the connect methods feature in
> > > 2.3 without a way to manage them other than directly modifying the
> > > database.  Not good.  If adding a feature to the website takes too
> > > much time we could add something to "vcld -setup" for 2.4.  I'm not
> > > voting +1 for the release without some way to manage this.
> > 
> > Again, this is a permissions issue.  Who gets to see and manage each
> > connect
> > method?  It would also require creating a new section of the site for
> > managing
> > it.  It may work to make them a new resource.
> 
> So, add to "vcld -setup"?  This wouldn't be too difficult and would only be
> available to admins with access to a management node.

I think this eventually needs to be in the frontend, but having it in the 
backend for 2.4 would allow things to be managed and would handle the 
permissions issue.  However, it seems like a lot to add to "vcld -setup".  Are 
you thinking to be able to add and remove connect methods, edit the 
connecttext and ports for them, and control their mappings?

> > > VCL-577 - Cloud Broker tool for VCL
> > > 
> > > > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-577
> > > 
> > > +?
> > > This was submitted by Karuna Joshi.  We need to reach out to her and
> > > make sure she is involved in this discussion.  If she is interested
> > > and willing to assist, we should make an effort to include this in
> > > 2.4.  If she is interested but it is not feasible timewise to include
> > > it in 2.4, it should be top priority after the release.  We need to
> > > encourage these contributions.
> > 
> > This is more something that uses VCL instead of something that is part of
> > VCL.
> > So, I don't see a need for it being included in a release.  However, if it
> > were, Karuna would need to step up as a committer to maintain it, in which
> > case, she should be contacted.
> 
> I don't necessarily see it as needing to be included, but the issue
> includes a patch file to the VCL code and there was a fair amount of
> communication in the issue comments.  The responsibility of testing it and
> getting it into the release rests on her.  We have been bitten in the past
> by removing a module someone contributed who was not active in the
> community at the time.  Although this is not the same situation, we need to
> be completely transparent and be sure to not surprise anyone.  I'll send
> her a direct message.  If she doesn't respond or is not able to prepare it
> for the release within our time constraints then we shelve it.

Unless I missed something, the patch doesn't actually modify any of the 
existing code but just adds files that use the API and can reside anywhere on 
the webserver.  She did add one table and a view to the database though.  It 
is a good idea to reach out to her.  I'm interested to see if she wants to 
continue to maintain this.

Josh
- -- 
- -------------------------------
Josh Thompson
VCL Developer
North Carolina State University

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Re: VCL 2.4 - development status

[Andy Kurth <an...@ncsu.edu>]

Thanks for the feedback.  One request when anyone untags an issue, please
add a comment with the corresponding discussion from this thread or a link
to this thread.  This will make it easier to evaluate the issues later on.


> > > VCL-178 - enable checkuser flag for per reservation instead of image
> only
> > > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-178
> >
> > -1 (keep in 2.4)
> > This is one that was created in 2009 and got bumped all the way from
> > the 2.2 release.  The backend code has supported this feature since
> > 2010.  This would be pretty useful.  How much time would it take to
> > implement this?
>
> The easy part is adding a checkbox for reservations that says not to do
> user
> login checks.  The hard part is determining who sees the checkbox (i.e.
> permissions).  How do we determine who gets to see this functionality?  Is
> it
> a global permission?  Is it something that is image specific?  Is it image
> specific but also tied to a user permission?


Though not ideal, what about doing something similar to the special
"Specify End Time" group?  If we want to do something more elaborate in the
future such as adding a new privilege, it should be relatively easy to
transition by granting the single special group the new privilege.


> > > VCL-343 - image capture process summary for end-user
> > > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-343
> >
> > +?
> > The description needs more detail.  What details?  In an email?  On
> > the website?  What details are not communicated which would be useful?
> >  This may be a pretty trivial change and could possibly be included.
>
> Nothing is communicated about the image capture process other than
> completed/failed via email, for users that have email working.  It would be
> great to keep reservations in the state of being captured on the
> Reservations
> page with a link where "Pending" normally is that pops up a window showing
> information about where things are in the capture process.
>

+1 (untag, lack of time)
That makes sense.  I changed the description of the issue to this and
untagged it.


> >
> > > VCL-525 - explain how to install non autoprovisioned connect methods
> > > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-525
> >
> > +?
> > The description needs more detail.  Is this referring to text that
> > needs to be displayed on the website where connect methods are
> > configured?
>
> Connect methods can be flagged as "autoprovisioned" or not.  If
> autoprovisioned, it is assumed either all images using some OS will have
> the
> connect method available (i.e. RDP on Windows), or vcld will be able to
> provision the method if it is not already there.  If not autoprovisioned,
> it
> is the responsibility of the image creator to install the connect method.
> It
> would be useful for connect methods that are not autoprovisioned to have
> some
> text somewhere associated with the connect method that explains to an image
> creator how to install that connect method (i.e. To install xRDP, you need
> to
> install x, y, z packages and modify j, k, l configuration files).
>

+1 (untag, lack of time)
Thanks for the clarification.  I'd like to revisit the
connectmethodmap.autoprovisioned flag and how different connect methods
show up as (1) being a valid method a user sees on the Connect page and (2)
to image administrators as being an option to enable for an image.  It may
be best to use separate columns or a separate mapping table for each use.


> > > VCL-526 - add section to site to manage connect methods
> > > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-526
> >
> > -1 (or replace with a new issue)
> > How much time will this take?  We added the connect methods feature in
> > 2.3 without a way to manage them other than directly modifying the
> > database.  Not good.  If adding a feature to the website takes too
> > much time we could add something to "vcld -setup" for 2.4.  I'm not
> > voting +1 for the release without some way to manage this.
>
> Again, this is a permissions issue.  Who gets to see and manage each
> connect
> method?  It would also require creating a new section of the site for
> managing
> it.  It may work to make them a new resource.
>

So, add to "vcld -setup"?  This wouldn't be too difficult and would only be
available to admins with access to a management node.


> > VCL-577 - Cloud Broker tool for VCL
> > > https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/VCL-577
> >
> > +?
> > This was submitted by Karuna Joshi.  We need to reach out to her and
> > make sure she is involved in this discussion.  If she is interested
> > and willing to assist, we should make an effort to include this in
> > 2.4.  If she is interested but it is not feasible timewise to include
> > it in 2.4, it should be top priority after the release.  We need to
> > encourage these contributions.
>
This is more something that uses VCL instead of something that is part of
> VCL.
> So, I don't see a need for it being included in a release.  However, if it
> were, Karuna would need to step up as a committer to maintain it, in which
> case, she should be contacted.


I don't necessarily see it as needing to be included, but the issue
includes a patch file to the VCL code and there was a fair amount of
communication in the issue comments.  The responsibility of testing it and
getting it into the release rests on her.  We have been bitten in the past
by removing a module someone contributed who was not active in the
community at the time.  Although this is not the same situation, we need to
be completely transparent and be sure to not surprise anyone.  I'll send
her a direct message.  If she doesn't respond or is not able to prepare it
for the release within our time constraints then we shelve it.

Thanks,
Andy