Re: [Gnumed-devel] Re: Live Media
On Freitag 13 Februar 2009, Andreas Tille wrote:
> On Fri, 13 Feb 2009, Sebastian Hilbert wrote:
> >
> > frontend:
> > openSUSE: private beta openSUSE studio (unclear when they will open it)
> > Debian: I am not aware of any
>
> Just guessing from the title: It is intended to be a frontend GUI to
> create a live medium? I would always prefer scripts to make the process
> reproducible. If it is a frontend to create scripts it might be
> interesting.
>
It is a frontend to kiwi. I am pretty sure it will create scripts for kiwi but
those might not be accessible. I prefer scripts as well. It does not really
matter. I believe it sets up the enviroment and then calls kiwi. That is what
they say in the video. It could potentially set up the environment for
live-helper and call it then.
> > non-standard repositories
> > openSUSE: all packages in openSUSE buildservice can be included
> > Debian: a custom sources list for apt needs to be carefully crafted
>
> ???
> I've thought metapackages basically solve this problem.
>
It is not a problem of the packages or the dependencies itself. If I want to
add a repository such as experimental or any other repository I need to
fiddle with one sources.list for the chroot stage , one for the build stage
and so forth. It is a usability thing. Not an issue right now since I have
figured it out. Those files need to be preseeded. That means I have to supply
them rather than telling live-helper on the command line that I want gnumed
from reppository foo. Don't worry about it.
> > custom files
> > openSUSE: can be added via webinterface
> > Debian: can be manually supplied in target directories, it is kind of
> > hard for me to track when changes need to happen
>
> What kind of changes?
The webpage keeps track of the files such as custom files in home directories,
custom configuration files etc. In live -helper I always need to navigate the
directory tree for the supplied files. It is just a question of usability.
>
> > sharing
> > openSUSE: supposedly available via their servers
> > Debian: needs to be hosted by us
>
> Might be subject for discussion.
In the lon run there might be an option to supply a Debian-med live CD. Here
is what needs to be done to make this happen.
1.) Have a repository such as svn for custom files
2.) write scripts that copy those files (sources.lst, wallpaper, user info,
documentation, boot splash) into the live-helper environment
This is possible I just lack the shell scripting skills.
>
> > Here are some things I would like to see covered from the GNUmed
> > perspective.
> >
> > 1.) ease of use when simply updating the package list such as a new
> > GNUmed release
>
> Isn't this just be done by simple rebuild of the ISO?
Yes. I meant something along the lines of a watch file that would detect a new
version of a debian med package and roll new images.
>
> > 2.) point and click switching between USB, CD, network media
>
> Sounds like an interesting feature.
It is not that hard I believe. one calls live-helper with the corresponding
option but this involves more wrapper scripting. I believe not all options
for the config files are available through the command line. So if you wnat
to change the bootsplash you would need to edit the config files. those are
generated and the changes will be lost unless you scripts the changes via
patch or something.
It can be done. It is just a lot more work (at least once). If you use a
webinterface those options are stored and the middleware takes care of
changes of the underlying tools. Sure we could implement this middleware.
I am quite happy with the current state but I don't think I can invest the
time into learning how to script the above and track changes to the backend
live-helper. This could be a job for a community member.
--
Sebastian Hilbert
Leipzig / Germany
[www.gnumed.de] -> PGP welcome, HTML ->/dev/null
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