[rhelv6-beta-list] My first experiences with RHEL6 beta

Tue Jun 15 02:37:44 UTC 2010

Bryan J. Smith wrote:
> John Summerfield <debian at herakles.homelinux.org> wrote:
>> First, I tried to install RHEL6 beta in a virtual machine
>> on Windows XP. My VM software of choice is Microsoft Virtual
>> PC ...
> 
> This is _very_important_ comment, as are VMware installs ...  ;)
> 

It's lost here. My installs of RHEL6 and Fedora12 on Windows XP 
Professional running Microsoft Virtual PC did not complete. They got to 
installing the last package, then set there using little resources for 
some days.

RHEL6 on Windows Virtual PC on Windows 7 faired no better.

I do run several Debian{stable,testing,Sid} systems on both.

My actual working test system is running in VirtualBox under RHEL-5 clone.

>> First, I did a text install. I was very surprised how many
>> pointless questions it asked, and how many sensible ones it
>> didn't ask. Like, "Do you wan swap?"
> 
> The Release Notes and Manuals cover the logic of the text v. graphical
> installs.  If you have preferences, please open a Bugzilla.  The merits
> will be discussed and, in many cases, were already, previously discussed.
> 

I expect to retire at the end of the year, and after over 40 years with 
computers I have to say my enthusiasm has waned.

I have dropped out of most of the mailing lists I've frequented, and 
find it difficult to pay much attention to those few I'm still on.

At Work, I hope to have systems set  up to require little detailed 
attention for some years, so Windows XP -. Windows 7, Windows Server 
2003 -> Windows Server 2008 R2 (or whatever), a nice new Linux server.

Since I won't be maintaining any of it, there's an argument in favour of 
an actual officially-supported distro, likely SLES11 or RHEL6.

> http://www.redhat.com/docs/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/6-Beta/html/Beta_Release_Notes/installer.html#id625818  
> 
> For text-only or headless systems, VNC is _highly_recommended_.  In
> fact, the installer is fairly good at offering VNC if it can't start
> the graphical installation.  This feature alone was very welcome by
> several people I know.  ;)

zBox-owners I expect.

> 
> http://www.redhat.com/docs/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/6-Beta/html/Installation_Guide/s1-guimode-textinterface-x86.html  
> 
>> it would have been really nice to have a working network
>> after installing.
> 
> See Virtual PC comment above.  ;)

As clarified above, this was Virtualbox.

Post-installation, I'm unhappy that it prefers to download

> 
> Red Hat _does_ have a certification agreement and cooperation
> relationship with Microsoft for Virtual PC.  However, many configurations
> may not be supported.  I know I've already run into many issues on
> NT 5.x (e.g., Windows XP) myself, with Virtual PC, that I do not run
> into on NT 6.x (e.g., Windows Vista, Windows 7).

Then my setup should have been tested by RH before the beta was 
released. Surely, current releases of Windows are the most important.

> 
> And those issues include running Windows under Virtual PC itself.  ;)

We could talk about Windows 7 Sound in Microsoft Virtual PC hosted on 
XP, but this is a Linux list!

> 
> Also know Networking is typically a major issue with Microsoft and
> VMware hypervisors.  I also find the more familiar people are with
> Windows, and using Windows for virtualization, the more things I have
> to teach them in how to setup their environment for Linux.

I could talk about VMWare too. I removed it just as fast as I could when 
I found it disables Fast User Switching.

> 
>> Speaking of vi, why is the whole of vim not installed?
> 
> vim-minimal v. vim-enhanced or vim-X11 (w/vim-common) -- the first 
> goes into /, the latters going into /usr.  This was discussed years
> ago, and the current logic is sound to most customers I speak with.
> 
> Also, installing (and bloating) the system off-the-bat with many
> things is not always the best move.  vim-minimal works, and doesn't
> bring in the much, much bigger lot of software.

I was surprised to find just how much more it did bring in, but then 
Linux sans Perl is fairly surprising too.

> 
>> Why, when I wanted to install more software, yum goes out to the
>> network and downloads stuff at 30kbytes/sec (my network can
>> do 1.5 mbytes/sec and better, the the speed problem's not at
>> my end) when it could load of my virtual DVD at 200
>> Mbytes/sec?
> 
> Then target the virtual DVD image as your YUM repository.  ;)

That should be done automatically. Last time I tried, probably with 
RHEL5, the DVD image seems unusable post install. I had a qhick look at 
the repo files and it didn't seem to have changed.

> 
>> A question that arose: When I booted, I added the boot
>> option "vga=813" That works with a lot of Linux kernels, but
>> not this one.
> 
> See your above comment ...
?

> 
> "My VM software of choice is Microsoft Virtual PC ..."
> 
> Repeat for VMware hypervisors as well.  ;)
> 
>> On prompting, I manged to choose one that was close, and
>> went on to install using a framebuffer console.
> 
> VNC works wonders here.  Again, I've had several customers now comment
> how the auto-offer of VNC really helps during installation, and easy
> setup post-installation.

VNC might work, but it's not how I want to use it.

> 
>> If a user specifies "vga=" something, it's a good clue that
>> they do not like the default behaviour. The default
>> behaviour might even not work, my boss insists on using a
>> nice Apple screen on his PC, and he cannot read the BIOS
>> console messages, and I could not use a Linux rescue disk on
>> it without replacing his screen.
> 
> Again ...
> 
> "My VM software of choice is Microsoft Virtual PC ..."

Rephrase that. VPC is my virtualisation software of choice, but it's not 
what I used.

> 
> Many of these things should be addressed as the Beta progresses.
> Integration with 3rd party, closed source hypervisors do not occur
> overnight.
> 
>> I find the text-mode timezone choice a real pain.
> 
> Will re-iterate the recommendation of a VNC installation.  It should
> be extremely easy to take advantage of, as it's running in a Windows
> host virtual machine.  Just fire up the VNC client.  ;)
> 
>> And that's with Australia being near the top of the list. Some
>> software that uses the same basic technique uses "hot keys"
>> so users can scroll more quickly to their preferred choice.
>> "B" works well for Australia, it's near the end of the As,
>> and I expect Zimbabweans would really appreciate it.
>> Speaking of timezone preferences, when a user chooses
>> Australia/Perth, you can be pretty sure that their language
>> is English (en-AU and not en-US), that we spend dollars,
>> measure in metres (and notice the spelling, meters are for
>> measuring), we load A4 paper into the printer (except when
>> we use A3 or A5), that the 3/2/2001 is the third day of the
>> second month.
> 
> This would make a great Bugzilla entry for Anaconda!  Please do
> file for this enhancement!
> 
>   http://bugzilla.redhat.com  
> 
> Zoneinfo, Localization, etc... isn't addressed by the individual
> projects, but it's one area where Anaconda could offer some assistance.
> 
>> Speaking of timezone preferences, when a user chooses
>> Australia/Perth, you can be pretty sure that their language
>> is English (en-AU and not en-US), that we spend dollars,
>> measure in metres (and notice the spelling, meters are for
>> measuring), we load A4 paper into the printer (except when
>> we use A3 or A5), that the 3/2/2001 is the third day of the
>> second month.
>> It would be really nice of the Mozilla software,
>> OpenOffice.org and all the other software recognised that
>> without being told.
> 
> System-wide localization is one thing, and could be integrated.
> 
> Application details are another.  Although GNOME, KDE and some frameworks
> could be well integrated, paper size and other localizations may require
> far more logic -- and possibly still get things wrong.

Getting it right some times would be an enormous improvement over 
getting it wrong all the time. AFAIK nobody outside USA uses Letter paper.

> 
> I.e., the common ISO v. US paper debate is common across all regions.  ;)
> 
>> I have up on the first install and reinstalled, using the
>> GUI tool this time. I swear there were sensible choices
>> offered to me this time that were not offered with the
>> text-mode install. I got to modify the package selection, to
>> choose no swap. Oh, joy!
> 
> Again, the Release Notes and Manual covers these details.  The text
> mode is really for, to be honest, Kickstarts.  VNC is a nice option
> for text-only or headless boxen.

text-mode used to be quite a viable choice, and I sometimes used to 
simply to get the job done faster.

> 
>> Eventually, I found an icon on the panel that did the job.
>> Just started the network. I worked so easily that I wonder
>> why I had to install KDE and logon to make it work. A bare
>> server install is all very well, but lots of folk
>> (especially those using Z-boxes) will want to logon remotely
>> immediately. Without a desktop.
> 
> VNC is the best recourse.

I've been learning a little python3 recently. I've done a little with 
curses, and I can report that, on a Linux console, and in putty, and in 
ssh via xterm, that curses' mouse support works.

I used to use Turbo Pascal with TurboVision, and for many uses I still 
reckon that was the best interface going.

Those cases where the mouse doesn't work over ssh need some attention, 
and the a proper interactive install over ssh, using a mouse, would be 
possible, and I reckon the mainframe users would love it.

Installing graphical software of any kind on a mainframe is a huge wast 
of very expensive CPU cycles. Most of them would be very happy to omit X.

> 
> In an ideal world, there would be a text-GUI symbios.  But that
> takes additional efforts.  I've watched Red Hat over the years
> and understood why the text started to lag.
> 
> Again, the auto-offer of VNC really mitigates this, and allows
> developers to focus on one, detailed install, and one minimal.
> 
>> Oh, the desktop. 800x600 is entirely unsatisfactory.
> 
> Again, Virtual PC at work here, just like VMware (this has come
> up before).
> 
> Be sure to open up some Bugzilla reports or, better yet, leverage
> your CRM and/or IT accounts (if you have them) for feature requests.
> 
> 
> 

-- 

Cheers
John

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