m23

m23 halfBaked 0.5.7 is ready

2015-05-14
I have not followed (as announced and assumed) the release plan strictly. The new m23 version is called halfBaked 0.5.7 because it contains functions of the planned releases 0.5.6 and 0.5.8. All planned features of 0.5.6 are included. There are the usual bugfixes and some new functions that are listed in the table below. You can find a complete list of the changes in the Changelog.
  • Debian Etch: Since this release the m23 server is based on the current stable Debian release named Etch.
  • 7-Zip compression for the OS: 7-Zip compresses much better than the well known bzip2. The operating system on the m23 server installation CD is now compressed with 7-Zip. That saves approx. 30 MB.
  • Integration of package sources: Downloaded package sources can be integrated into the m23 server installation CD to be available after server installation.
  • Package builder: The integrated package builder is a comfortable tool to create Debian packages directly from the m23 webinterface. These packages can be installed on the m23 clients like any other package and can contain single files or complete file directory trees.
  • Installation of a package selection together with the OS: You can choose a package selection that will be installed automatically in the distribution selection dialog.
  • Sorting of clients: The clients in the webinterface can be sorted ascending and descending by client status, client name, installation date and change date.
  • Extended hardware detection database: The hardware detection software now uses the advanced hardware database from pciids.sourceforge.net to improve the detection rate.
  • Overview of multiple hardware of the same type: CPUs with more cores, multiprocessor systems, multiple installed graphiccards, networkcards or soundcards are now shown in the webinterface. Earlier versions of m23 showed only the first occuring hardware component of a type.
  • Improved printer support: Printers are detected if attached to the clients and the printer detection option is selected in the webinterface. The detection of newly attached and removed printers is now repeated on every client start. Clients permit access to attached printers for all clients in the network by default. The printer icon in the webinterface allows changing of permission rights and viewing of status messages for all printers.
  • Server status page: On this new page all relevant informations (free diskspace, installation type, operating sytstem etc.) about the m23 server are listed. This information block can be copied and pasted directly into the forum. And now I hope that you will use this opportunity, so I have not to ask the same basic questions again and again ;-)
  • Warning dialogs: The new waring dialogs are shown in the webinterface if you m23 server is in a critical state. This is for example if your server has a dynamic IP or no free space is available in the root partition.

You can find hints for the installation via CD, Debian packages or in a virtual machine or the upgrade of your m23 server in the Installation guide.

The server installation CD is available here and the files for the virtual machines VirtualBox and VMPlayer are here.

Have fun!
m23-testarea-mini

"m23/Test area" started

2015-05-14
"m23/Test area" is the new plattform for testing m23 functions before their integration into upcomming versions. I will publish files that should be tested by you all on a newly created web site. This may be e.g. new ISO images, changed PHP files or virtual machines. There may be a seperation of m23 into a stable and an experimental development tree, if m23/Test area is accepted well. This would be good for system adminitrators who need a stable m23 basis for work and for an unhindered development. I need your help to make it realisable. Testing is a complex and time consuming business that I can't do alone, because of lack of time and limited hardware variety. It can only be done, if enough of you are testing and are reporting bugs in the forum. Please write me a mail if you know that you can spend some time for testing in the future. The test area starts with two ISO images:
  • m23server_0.5.6-preview-etch.iso: This is a preview of the upcoming m23 release with current packages and Debian Etch as OS.
  • m23server_0.5.5-mini-VirtualBox-freeze.iso: VirtualBox 1.4.0 and SVN versions are freezing when booting this ISO earlier or later.
Have fun!
m23-update

Support for Debian Etch, KDE and fix for the client boot CD

2015-05-14
The update to patch level 100136 contains some changes and corrections. Debian Etch and the included KDE are now supported, as well as the client boot CD should work again.

A well known KDE error in the login manager KDM emerged in Debian Etch again. Passwords could not be entered because keystrokes were not interpreted. A login into the client was not possible in the end. New code in m23 that can configure old and new KDM versions fixes this behaviour.

The migration to a new parted version lead to an additional error that hit the client boot CD. The boot drive was locked while booting from the boot CD. m23hwscanner (the m23 client's hardware scanner) was not able to scan the harddrives because the parted library threw error messages then. This corrupted the hardware information file that was sent to the m23 server because the error messages were embedded. As a result no harddrives and no hardware information was visible in the m23 webinterface. I've patched m23hwscanner to write the gathered hardware information directly to the output file and not to redirect the output of m23hwscanner to this file. Now the parted error messages are only shown on the display and not tranferred to the server any more.

Have fun!
m23

Tester for m23 wanted!

2015-05-14
m23 is a very complex software distribution sytem based on Debian on the server side, that can install Debian, Ubuntu and Kubuntu clients with different desktop environments or as server without graphical user interface.m23 consists of many different OpenSource components and self written code. The server contains e.g. MySQL, Apache and PHP. Most of the code is written in PHP. There are embedded parts of BASH code and a few C code.

Job description

Your job would be to test new m23 versions on different clients (real or in virtual machine doesn't matter) with different combinations of installed software and hardware. I need detailed bug reports if you find errors (and I think you will find some ;-)). I get bug reports like "it doesn't work", but this is not very helpfully. I need bug reports detailed like "When I install a client with configuration "foo", I get the error message "bar". But this only happens, if I use "xyz"."

What do you need?

  • A computer where you can install the m23 software distribution system.
  • Some clients (real or virtual machine)
  • Time to test ;-)
  • English or German skills to write the bug reports.

Contact

If you like, you can contact me via IM:
  • ICQ: 109585783
  • Jabber: dodgerm23@jabber.org
Otherwise please use the contact information on the project page.
m23

Last turn of "wish-an-m23-function"

2015-05-14
You have time till 30th of April to add your last wishes for m23 halfBaked 0.6.0. Please enter your wishes in the destined forum.

Have fun!
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