Hi, I am writing up a document on setting up mosix on Debian GNU/Linux. I'm attaching a .txt of the document I've produced so far. The html version is available at http://www.infofin.com/~gandalf/doc/mosix-debian/mosix-debian.html Send me feedback, and let me know if you find the document useful. viral -- http://www.infofin.com/~gandalf Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way, The time is gone, the song is over, thought I'd something more to say.
Mosix on Debian GNU/Linux mini-HOWTO
Viral Shah <viral@debian.org>
Sun, 19 Aug 2001 19:32:16 +0530
This document describes the setting up of a Mosix cluster using Debian
GNU/Linux.
______________________________________________________________________
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
1.1 New Versions of this Document
1.2 Standard Disclaimer
1.3 Copyright Information
2. Downloading and Installing mosix.
2.1 Get the packages from the 'testing' distribution.
3. Compiling a mosix kernel
4. Configuring mosix defaults
5. Configuring system services
6. Other services for a mosix cluster.
7. Have fun
______________________________________________________________________
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The most current version of this document will be available at
http://www.infofin.com/~gandalf/docs/mosix-debian.
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Use the information in this document at your own risk. There is a good
chance that using the information in this document, you might severely
damage your system and/or lose data. But you know all that, now, don't
you ? ;-)
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This document is copyrighted (C) 2001 Viral Shah and distributed under
the following terms:
This document may be reproduced and distributed in whole or in part,
in any medium physical or electronic, as long as this copyright notice
is retained on all copies. Commercial redistribution is allowed and
encouraged; however, the author would like to be notified of any such
distributions.
All translations, derivative works, or aggregate works incorporating
this document must be covered under this copyright notice. That is,
you may not produce a derivative work from this document and impose
additional restrictions on its distribution. Exceptions to these rules
may be granted under certain conditions; please contact the author of
this document for details.
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It is assumed that the reader has used Debian GNU/Linux for some time
and is familiar with the system, in general. It is also assumed that
the target machines are already setup, and running a recent version of
Debian GNU/Linux.
The aim of this document is to allow a user to quickly setup a small
to medium sized mosix cluster, and does not attempt to provide a
solution for every situation.
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The current 'stable' distribution doesn't include mosix and related
software. Hence you will have to modify /etc/apt/sources.list and add
the following line for getting the packages from the testing
distribution.
deb http://http.us.debian.org/debian testing main
Now run
apt-get update
to update the lists. The following mosix related software is available
on Debian:
+o mosix -- The binaries for using mosix.
+o kernel-patch-mosix -- The kernel patch for mosix.
+o mps -- mps and mtop for a mosix cluster.
+o mosixview -- Graphical interface to mosctl.
+o update-cluster -- Cluster configuration tool for mosix.map.
APT takes care of dependencies and versions. The packages can be
downloaded and installed with
apt-get install mosix kernel-patch-mosix mps mosixview update-cluster
If you install update-cluster, the mosix package will detect so, and
run a debconf script that will allow you to generate
/etc/mosix/mosix.map. (Currently, this will only do simple
configurations, and the complex topologies will have to be created by
hand.) Note, in Debian, the configuration files are placed in
/etc/mosix and not in /etc.
update-cluster is a new tool, which aims to keep information about the
cluster, which can be used by various other packages to generate their
config files.
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Make sure you have the package kernel-package installed. On a Debian
system, make-kpkg is used to compile a kernel. Get the current linux
kernel, and cd into its top-level directory. Then, the running the
script /usr/src/kernel-patches/i386/apply/mosix will make sure that
the kernel version is correct, and that everything is alright, before
applying the patch.
Once the patch is applied, run make menuconfig to configure the
kernel, and then compile it with
fakeroot make-kpkg -rev=mosix.1.0 kernel_image
This will produce a .deb package of your custom compiled mosix kernel,
which can then be installed with
dpkg -i kernel-image-*.deb
Copy this new kernel deb to every machine in the cluster and install
it along with the rest of the packages. Reboot, and you will have a
mosix system running !
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The mosix package provides a file /etc/default/mosix which can be
configured for certain defaults. For example, setting MOSIX_NODE=yes
is required (and is the default) for mosix to be initialised upon
bootup. You can also initialise mosix by hand with
/etc/init.d/mosix start.
The other things that can be currently configured are the default node
policy using the variables MIGRATE and BLOCK. Setting MIGRATE=yes
allows local processes to migrate to remote nodes by default.
Similarly, BLOCK=no will allow remote processes to migrate to the
local node, by default. MFS can be disabled with MFS=no.
Finer grained per-process control is being worked upon right now.
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Mosix on Debian systems doesn't configure the system services yet.
Hence, one has to patch /etc/inittab, /etc/inetd.conf, and other
services such as ssh etc. by hand, so that they don't migrate to other
nodes. This is currently not done, as it can be potentially dangerous,
when other packages override the changes or install newer versions of
configuration files. A good policy can be to set the policy to 'don't
migrate' by default unless the user specifically asks for it.
The README that comes along with mosix explains these issues quite
well.
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Its generally a good idea to have NFS configured, unless you're using
MFS. The debian packages nfs-kernel-server and nfs-user-server
provide the NFS packages.
Its also a good idea to have an arp server in a mosix network. The
debian package arpd can be used to setup an ARP server.
Mosix works very well with diskless workstations, and the debian
package diskless provides an easy and convenient way to install
diskless clients.
http://www.infofin.com/~gandalf/articles/diskless_debian.txt and the
README.Debian in the diskless package are a good starting point to
start setting up diskless Debian clients.
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I hope this document was useful to you in some way. If it was, drop me
a mail at viral@debian.org and exchange a couple of lines with me. It
will make me feel happy for having been useful. :-)
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