[gentoo-dev] 2005.0: x86 test-stages and minimal test-livecd ready

On Thu, 2005-01-13 at 20:06 -0800, M. Edward Borasky wrote:

> On Thu, 2005-01-13 at 21:44 +0100, Benjamin Judas wrote:

> > Hi folks,
> >
> > The releng-team has the first test-set of stages and a minimal-installcd
> > for x86 ready.
> >
> > The stages were built completely against 2.6-headers and the livecd
> > itself is based on these stages. The livecd uses
> > gentoo-dev-sources-2.6.10-r4.
> >
> > There is some minor bug on the livecd (bootsplash doesn't start). We are
> > aware of it.
> >
> > I created two metabugs for the tests. Bug 77881 is for bugs with the
> > test-installcds, bug 77885 is for the test stages.
> >
> > The installcd and stages should hit the mirrors soon and will be in the
> > experimental branch. The datestamp of this first test-release is
> > 20050110.
> >
> > Regards

>
> I don't have a "real" machine available to test this with, but I do have
> a Windows partition running VMWare 4.5. Do you know any reason why
> Gentoo wouldn't work as a VMWare guest OS? I had it running once at the
> 1.4 level, but decided to dual-boot the system and give up on VMWare.
>
>
> --
> gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list
>

Gentoo runs well in VMware, and I personally use it along with allot of
other devs for testing certain things.

--
Brad Cowan <bcowan@gentoo.org>
Developer,
Gentoo Linux http://dev.gentoo.org/~bcowan

Public Key: http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?...rch=0xB1F16A56
Key fingerprint = C408 75B9 E68D 26E2 EAAE 20CF 4D5E 293D B1F1 6A56


--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list

On Thu, Jan 13, 2005 at 11:23:17PM -0500, Brad Cowan wrote:

> Gentoo runs well in VMware, and I personally use it along with allot of
> other devs for testing certain things.

While still being the new kid on the block qemu also runs pretty well -
with multiple possible guest archs ...
A (gentoo-based) SystemRescueCD booted quite well in it ...

Yours,
--
Björn Michaelsen
pub 1024D/C9E5A256 2003-01-21 Björn Michaelsen <bmichaelsen@gmx.de>
Key fingerprint = D649 8C78 1CB1 23CF 5CCF CA1A C1B5 BBEC C9E5 A256

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.6 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFB51NswbW77MnlolYRAnYCAJ98CG26vel7tXBb3zQHtJ zESqVEqQCgvi0u
MRHskdJeVTbSpPb9MnmOI2o=
=8mQp
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

>

> Gentoo runs well in VMware, and I personally use it along with allot of
> other devs for testing certain things.

Gentoo does run well in vmware, but things aren't perfect. I have several
vmware GSX and ESX boxes which regularly have 2-10 gentoo instances
running and notice a few issues that the workstation users might not
be seeing:

- The 2.6.x based releases have a horrible impact on server performance.
Interrupts go up from 200/s to 3,000/s and context switches increase from
2-4K/s to 30K+. After install, if you use a 2.4.x kernel and switch HZ to
~30, things return to normal.

- GSX and ESX support a greater range of hardware drivers, in particular,
the vmxnet nic driver which isn't detected in 2004.3.

- vmware tools isn't in portage yet, at least last I checked. This mightnot
be a big deal for those managing 1 vm, but can be quite painful if you
have dozens.

There a few other issues, but I haven't tested enough to comment on them
yet.

I have started creating my own "stage 3 vm's" which represent the 2004.3
release media compiled to stage3 and then shut down. New vm's are
simply cloned from here, have their identity updated, and run.

I'm not sure if it would ever make sense for people to make stage3 vm's
availabile to others to simplify installs. It is nice to have everything
already done for you, and to avoid the performance hit from the initial cd
kernel.

Regards,
Matt

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.6 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQBB59/mcHel9xqG6+QRAgrBAJ9h+A6nXmG1wj+Bra1a3HyxEw4kAQCgj 3ES
E5vJFEUtIYUjrt94HQTuKEc=
=FMK5
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

On Fri, 2005-01-14 at 07:05 -0800, Matthew Marlowe wrote:

> - The 2.6.x based releases have a horrible impact on server performance.
> Interrupts go up from 200/s to 3,000/s and context switches increase from
> 2-4K/s to 30K+. After install, if you use a 2.4.x kernel and switch HZ to
> ~30, things return to normal.

Is this a 2.6-based problem or do you think it is specific to our kernel
configurations? Would you be willing to test out a new minimal LiveCD
in this environment, let's say with preempt enabled and some other
possible speed improvements.

> - GSX and ESX support a greater range of hardware drivers, in particular,
> the vmxnet nic driver which isn't detected in 2004.3.

Show me where I can get it, and I'll include it.

> - vmware tools isn't in portage yet, at least last I checked. This mightnot
> be a big deal for those managing 1 vm, but can be quite painful if you
> have dozens.

Show me where I can get it, and I'll add it to portage. I couldn't find
a download on their site.

--
Chris Gianelloni
Release Engineering - Operational/QA Manager
Games - Developer
Gentoo Linux

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.0 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQBB5+z/kT4lNIS36YERAgozAJ9U5e1wGyFoH5KWvdIaHrVdA/K18QCglrlR
G3L7s6J4SbJeUckDGazYX+0=
=kc+/
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

On Friday 14 January 2005 17:02, Chris Gianelloni wrote:

> On Fri, 2005-01-14 at 07:05 -0800, Matthew Marlowe wrote:

> > - vmware tools isn't in portage yet, at least last I checked. This might
> > not be a big deal for those managing 1 vm, but can be quite painful if
> > you have dozens.

>
> Show me where I can get it, and I'll add it to portage. I couldn't find
> a download on their site.

If you have a Linux virtual server and you click VM/Install VMware Tools a
virtual CD is "inserted" in the virtual CDROM-player. After mounting this CD
you see a file vmware-linux-tools.tar.gz. If you don't have VMware available
you can tell me how you want the 6.4MB-file and I will make sure you get it
(unless you want me to send it with smoke signals) ;-)

--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list

On Friday 14 January 2005 08:02 am, Chris Gianelloni wrote:

> On Fri, 2005-01-14 at 07:05 -0800, Matthew Marlowe wrote:

> > - The 2.6.x based releases have a horrible impact on server performance.
> > Interrupts go up from 200/s to 3,000/s and context switches increase from
> > 2-4K/s to 30K+. After install, if you use a 2.4.x kernel and switch HZ
> > to ~30, things return to normal.

>
> Is this a 2.6-based problem or do you think it is specific to our kernel
> configurations? Would you be willing to test out a new minimal LiveCD
> in this environment, let's say with preempt enabled and some other
> possible speed improvements.
>

I'm not sure how much of the issue is gentoo 2.6 kernel specific vs generic
2.6. At the very least, I know that 2.6 has HZ set to 1000 by default which
isn't very scaleable. Also, some vmware kernel modules, especially for ESX,
will not compile under 2.6.x (unless someone has patches I haven't found).

> > - GSX and ESX support a greater range of hardware drivers, in particular,
> > the vmxnet nic driver which isn't detected in 2004.3.

>
> Show me where I can get it, and I'll include it.
>

It's part of vmware tools. The module source is usually in one of the
subdirectories of /usr/lib/vmware-tools.

> > - vmware tools isn't in portage yet, at least last I checked. This might
> > not be a big deal for those managing 1 vm, but can be quite painful if
> > you have dozens.

>
> Show me where I can get it, and I'll add it to portage. I couldn't find
> a download on their site.

It is part of every vmware install. I'm not sure about the licensing. We can
always force users to manually put the tar ball in distfiles, like I believe
we do with the vmware workstation downloads. Most of my ESX/GSX installs
share a nfs mounted distfiles so that would work fine for me too.

I do see some issues with various versions of vmware requiring different
releases of vmware-tools. ESX 2.1 might require different from GSX which
might require different from workstation 5 beta?

Regards,
Matt

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.6 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQBB6BHDcHel9xqG6+QRAuK5AJsEoA6L0m8X2j22f60X6h ZxGToGEACfa3Qg
Bx2Mj1IY14G/zKqHJZxAn+M=
=ZyFS
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

Am Donnerstag, den 13.01.2005, 20:06 -0800 schrieb M. Edward Borasky:

> On Thu, 2005-01-13 at 21:44 +0100, Benjamin Judas wrote:

> > Hi folks,
> >
> > The releng-team has the first test-set of stages and a minimal-installcd
> > for x86 ready.
> >
> > The stages were built completely against 2.6-headers and the livecd
> > itself is based on these stages. The livecd uses
> > gentoo-dev-sources-2.6.10-r4.
> >
> > There is some minor bug on the livecd (bootsplash doesn't start). We are
> > aware of it.
> >
> > I created two metabugs for the tests. Bug 77881 is for bugs with the
> > test-installcds, bug 77885 is for the test stages.
> >
> > The installcd and stages should hit the mirrors soon and will be in the
> > experimental branch. The datestamp of this first test-release is
> > 20050110.
> >
> > Regards

>
> I don't have a "real" machine available to test this with, but I do have
> a Windows partition running VMWare 4.5. Do you know any reason why
> Gentoo wouldn't work as a VMWare guest OS? I had it running once at the
> 1.4 level, but decided to dual-boot the system and give up on VMWare.
>
>
> --
> gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list
>

Seems to be a problem on your side :)

I pulled up a complete installation in vmware with lvm (testing lvm was
the main reason) and some small apps.

regards
--

Benjamin Judas

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Gentoo-developer http://dev.gentoo.org/~beejay
Giessen, Germany http://www.gentoo.org

GPG-Key : 0xC31DEDD8
Key-Fingerprint : 4E65 AAFE 785B 61D8 E4D9 1671 E017 87B7 C31D EDD8
Jabber : beejay@im.gentoo.org



-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.0 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQBB572H4BeHt8Md7dgRAqofAJ4y3xNDCjxvg3E9WwtHpw 6nz7/ElgCdG6qR
T2G3uFeBfbGC6BacybXhg7o=
=VD67
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

On Thu, 2005-01-13 at 20:06 -0800, M. Edward Borasky wrote:

> On Thu, 2005-01-13 at 21:44 +0100, Benjamin Judas wrote:

> > Hi folks,
> >
> > The releng-team has the first test-set of stages and a minimal-installcd
> > for x86 ready.
> >
> > The stages were built completely against 2.6-headers and the livecd
> > itself is based on these stages. The livecd uses
> > gentoo-dev-sources-2.6.10-r4.
> >
> > There is some minor bug on the livecd (bootsplash doesn't start). We are
> > aware of it.
> >
> > I created two metabugs for the tests. Bug 77881 is for bugs with the
> > test-installcds, bug 77885 is for the test stages.
> >
> > The installcd and stages should hit the mirrors soon and will be in the
> > experimental branch. The datestamp of this first test-release is
> > 20050110.
> >
> > Regards

>
> I don't have a "real" machine available to test this with, but I do have
> a Windows partition running VMWare 4.5. Do you know any reason why
> Gentoo wouldn't work as a VMWare guest OS? I had it running once at the
> 1.4 level, but decided to dual-boot the system and give up on VMWare.

I have a stage1 install in progress in a VMWare 4.5.2 virtual machine.
This is only my second stage1 install, so please be gentle with me. :)
So far, there have been only two minor snags:

1. I burned the .iso to a CD-RW with K3B, which reproducibly failed to
verify the result. I verified the MD5 sum another way, and the CD turned
out to be OK. I've filed a bug against K3B.

2. When you first start up "scripts/bootstrap.sh", it complains about
the 2005.0 profile and tells you not to use it. Would it be too much to
ask if you modified the script so it would exit and allow you to change
the symbolic link in "/etc", rather than continuing and giving you the
same error? CTL-C isn't always your friend. :)




--
gentoo-dev@gentoo.org mailing list