[BlueOnyx:07715] Re: BlueOnyx 5107R Beta available

[Chris Gebhardt - VIRTBIZ Internet]

Hi Chuck,
I've snipped quite a bit from the initial post and will just reply to 
those points that I feel especially qualified on.

Chuck Tetlow wrote:
> So I'm wondering if LVM is really needed, and worth the additional 
> complexity of accessing that data "off-box"??

First off, I should mention that I don't feel that LVM is really a 
necessary item for a BlueOnyx installation.  I would be just fine with 
going straight ext3.

LVM can, indeed, add a certain layer of complexity to a recovery 
process.  However, in most recoveries that I have been party to (and 
that's plenty, BTW) it has been sufficient to boot from CD into rescue 
mode and go from there.

With respect to attaching the hard drive to another system, it's really 
not that big an issue.  You just need to add the first step of changing 
the logical volume name, which is straight-forward enough.  After that, 
it's pretty trivial to get the drive spun up in another box.  We do that 
from time to time with BlueOnyx boxes, but also commonly with other 
boxes from the Fedora or RHEL family tree.  (We have around 1000 servers 
screaming away in the datacenter at this point, so our chances of system 
failure of some sort may be increased from the average BX user!)  At any 
rate, once you're familiar with the LVM commands, it's not that big an 
issue.

> And finally - do you think we'll ever get the option to opt out of LVM 
> in the ISO installation?

Simply my opinion, but I like the idea of continuing to make the install 
process as simple and hands-off as possible.  The fact that you can pop 
the CD in the drive, boot up, hit Enter and then the next piece of input 
you give is Enter to reboot to the new installation makes it very easy 
for any user to install.  That keeps in the spirit of "appliance".

Given the above, I wouldn't be a fan of adding another input point into 
the install process.  Maybe it's something that could be done before 
hitting "Enter" to start the install similar to if you wanted to run 
rescue mode you type "linux rescue" and then off to the races.  That way 
users who feel advanced enough to throw some switches have that ability, 
but it doesn't remove the appliance goal.   Keep in mind that anybody 
responsible for maintaining a (physical) BX server will go through the 
installer process.  A relatively minuscule percentage of all of those 
users would ever see the rescue process.

Bottom line: if it's easy to insert a way to opt for simple ext3 instead 
of LVM without creating another pause in the install process, then I 
don't see the harm.   But if it changes the standard install process, 
the trade-off becomes significantly less attractive.

Maybe it's a bit beyond the scope of your question, but I can't help 
myself... how come you're having to recover so much data from crashed 
boxes?  What happened to your backups?!  <ducks>

-- 
Chris Gebhardt
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