hobbit documentation and packaging projects
Hi, there
In the long run (before I died ;), I plan to migrate my bb system monitoring
environment to hobbit given its open-source license and availability of
cookit provides commercial support.
Following items that need to be done and I am willing to help on
Digitalize the hobbit compilation and packaging process for different Unixen. So we don't need keep answering how to compile hobbit on ??? platform issues.
Set up a hobbit wiki page/book (on mediawiki ?) I like mediawiki because there is a command line client in perl to automate the wikipage update.
Prepare the hobbit document in docbook format ? The docbook format is the final resting place of hobbit wiki. So we can generate pdf and rtf easily.
I have experience on above three tasks, just need to hear a few voices to tell me to jump on these tasks ;)
Seriouslly, please follow up this thead to let me know your comment. Should I spend the efforts on these tasks ? Are you willing to help etc...
T.J. Yang
On Tue, May 24, 2005 at 10:47:44AM -0500, T.J. Yang wrote:
Following items that need to be done and I am willing to help on
- Digitalize the hobbit compilation and packaging process for different Unixen. So we don't need keep answering how to compile hobbit on ??? platform issues.
I may be biased, but I don't think there's been that many "silly" questions about how to build Hobbit. Most of the cases that have been real issues have been due to my failure to write truly portable code, and they have been dealt with by fixing the code.
The few things that have been truly platform-specific - like the HP-UX compiler bug that was brought up yesterday - is something that should be documented.
Building "shrink-wrap" packages of Hobbit is something that I do for my personal use (it's just the easiest way to install it on many systems). And for the not-quite-so-experienced admin out there I think they are really useful to get something up and running quickly and get off to a good start with using Hobbit, instead of struggling for a couple of days with the fine details of configure, make etc. So there are Linux based packages in deb- and rpm-format. I know there are NetBSD packages of Hobbit available, and I wouldn't be surprised if someone was working on putting it into the FreeBSD "ports" collection. But I also think that most of the die-hard sysadmins here actually prefer to build from source :-)
Set up a hobbit wiki page/book (on mediawiki ?) I like mediawiki because there is a command line client in perl to automate the wikipage update.
Prepare the hobbit document in docbook format ? The docbook format is the final resting place of hobbit wiki. So we can generate pdf and rtf easily.
I know there was/is a Wiki for BB. If you feel it would be useful for Hobbit, go ahead - it's not a format I use very much. Probably just me being old-fashioned - e-mail and newsgroups are my preferred communication methods.
Seriouslly, please follow up this thead to let me know your comment. Should I spend the efforts on these tasks ? Are you willing to help etc...
I really appreciate your willingness to undertake some work on Hobbit, especially with documentation which most programmers really try to avoid. I do write documentation, but I may be an exception - it's simply because when the documentation exists, I get more time to do the interesting stuff (code) since I don't have to spend so much time answering questions.
But before you embark on this, ask yourself: What problem will I solve by doing this ? Setting up a Wiki is fine - but only if it gets used. For that to happen, there must be stuff there that people want to read. So what's missing today - is it the "beginners guide to monitoring your network" ? Or a "How to monitor your datacenter and survive" guide ? Or maybe a "Building graphs for your Boss" description?
I guess, what I'm trying to say is that you should narrow your focus
- at least to begin with. Then, when you have something going, you can broaden the scope.
Henrik
From: henrik at hswn.dk (Henrik Stoerner) Reply-To: hobbit at hswn.dk To: hobbit at hswn.dk Subject: Re: [hobbit] hobbit documentation and packaging projects Date: Tue, 24 May 2005 22:38:02 +0200
On Tue, May 24, 2005 at 10:47:44AM -0500, T.J. Yang wrote:
Following items that need to be done and I am willing to help on
- Digitalize the hobbit compilation and packaging process for different Unixen. So we don't need keep answering how to compile hobbit on ??? platform issues.
I may be biased, but I don't think there's been that many "silly" questions about how to build Hobbit. Most of the cases that have been real issues have been due to my failure to write truly portable code, and they have been dealt with by fixing the code.
There are not many silly questions because I was not on this email list ;) You alread answered one silly question regarding to hobbit/man has html version of manpage.
The few things that have been truly platform-specific - like the HP-UX compiler bug that was brought up yesterday - is something that should be documented.
Even it is fully documented, it is still need to be read and typed by my fat fingers. My goal is to autmoated the process as much as possible.
Building "shrink-wrap" packages of Hobbit is something that I do for my personal use (it's just the easiest way to install it on many systems). And for the not-quite-so-experienced admin out there I think they are really useful to get something up and running quickly and get off to a good start with using Hobbit, instead of struggling for a couple of days with the fine details of configure, make etc. So there are Linux based packages in deb- and rpm-format. I know there are NetBSD packages of Hobbit available, and I wouldn't be surprised if someone was working on putting it into the FreeBSD "ports" collection. But I also think that most of the die-hard sysadmins here actually prefer to build from source :-)
I am planning to deploy hobbit at work and we expect SMS(win32) type of application on our Unix environment. for that to happen we need to package server and client packges.
When this is done, the software,package build and package deployment process will be automated just like our other applications.
I will release the package sources if hobbit community is interested. anyone can build the hobbit package from source and customize it at your pleasure.
For example, "gmake hobbit-4.0.3-clean;gmake hobbit-4.0.3" will compile hobbit and its depended other software (ssl,ldap,pcre ...) and then generate a rpm on rhlinux,a pkgadd on solaris and a depot if run the above gmake command on hpux.
Set up a hobbit wiki page/book (on mediawiki ?) I like mediawiki because there is a command line client in perl to automate the wikipage update.
Prepare the hobbit document in docbook format ? The docbook format is the final resting place of hobbit wiki. So we can generate pdf and rtf easily.
I know there was/is a Wiki for BB. If you feel it would be useful for Hobbit, go ahead - it's not a format I use very much. Probably just me being old-fashioned - e-mail and newsgroups are my preferred communication methods.
Seriouslly, please follow up this thead to let me know your comment. Should I spend the efforts on these tasks ? Are you willing to help etc...
I really appreciate your willingness to undertake some work on Hobbit, especially with documentation which most programmers really try to avoid. I do write documentation, but I may be an exception - it's simply because when the documentation exists, I get more time to do the interesting stuff (code) since I don't have to spend so much time answering questions.
I really appreciate your willingness to underake the work to make bb open-source and alive again ;) Better yet, you fix the BB's performance and other issues.
For that I am willing to pick up the missing parts of work haven't done yet.
But before you embark on this, ask yourself: What problem will I solve by doing this ? Setting up a Wiki is fine - but only if it gets used. For that to happen, there must be stuff there that people want to read. So what's missing today - is it the "beginners guide to monitoring your network" ? Or a "How to monitor your datacenter and survive" guide ? Or maybe a "Building graphs for your Boss" description?
Build it and they will come.
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/System_Monitoring_with_Hobbit
Pardon the dust, it is created today and still fresh.
I guess, what I'm trying to say is that you should narrow your focus
- at least to begin with. Then, when you have something going, you can broaden the scope.
Thanks for advice, I am taking notes.
tj
Henrik
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I really appreciate your willingness to undertake some work on Hobbit, especially with documentation which most programmers really try to avoid. I do write documentation, but I may be an exception - it's simply because when the documentation exists, I get more time to do the interesting stuff (code) since I don't have to spend so much time answering questions.
I don't like to answer question also so I would rather put my efforts on documentation and packaging to do it right.
But before you embark on this, ask yourself: What problem will I solve by doing this ? Setting up a Wiki is fine - but only if it gets used. For that to happen, there must be stuff there that people want to read. So what's missing today - is it the "beginners guide to monitoring your network" ? Or a "How to monitor your datacenter and survive" guide ? Or maybe a "Building graphs for your Boss" description?
I guess, what I'm trying to say is that you should narrow your focus
- at least to begin with. Then, when you have something going, you can broaden the scope.
I hope you are not disappointed about this http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/System_Monitoring_with_Hobbit
Looks like I am using top-down approach on this document to cover the big area of this subject. In the hope that other can work on the area documentation of they are interested in.
Can you comment on the 4.0.4 road map here, since you are the real code developer. http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Sytem_Monitoring_with_Hobbit/Developer_Guide#De...
I printed out most of your *.c *.h and Makefiles today. I had a brief look to gain some understanding.
I also try to compile hobbitclient-0.3.tgz on linux and solars, but looks like the Makefile generated by ./configure is messed up at this line. Looks like 0.3 really reflect hobbitclient's age. But it is also good that I can participate hobbitclient at its early age.
Problem in Makefile of hobbitclient-0.3 <snip> hobbitc: hobbitc.o conf_load.o conf_parse.o report.o osdep.o $(CC) -o $@ $(LIBS) $> <snip>
Error logs
gmake
cc -o hobbitc cc: no input files gmake: *** [hobbitc] Error 1
cat /etc/redhat-release
Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS release 3 (Taroon Update 1)
participants (2)
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henrik＠hswn.dk
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tj_yang＠hotmail.com