[BlueOnyx:14092] BlueOnyx 5107R/5108R YUM updates in testing repository

[Michael Stauber]

Hi all,

I just wanted to give you all an update on the state of the BlueOnyx
development.

As you all know, the work on the new GUI for BlueOnyx is an ongoing
effort. I've spent more than a year on it already and it's coming
together. Maybe two more months, give or take. End of February is a
definite "maybe" for a tentative release date of BlueOnyx 5207R and
5208R with the new GUI.

Now Christmas is around the corner and usually that means presents.
Well, lets see what we got here. No, it's not the new GUI yet.

However, there are a lot of new additions that were easily backported
and integrated into 5107R/5108R.

These updates just have been built and have been uploaded the
"BlueOnyx-Testing" YUM repository for 5107R and 5108R.

Now these updates do need some testing. That's why they are not in the
usual release YUM repository yet. So it might not be the best idea to
install them on a productive server. There are a few productive servers
that are already running these updates. Which has helped to find some
glitches and issues. If you want to help us to make this code more
mature, then please test it, too. And let us know if you find bugs.

How to enable the "BlueOnyx-Testing" YUM repository?

Just modify /etc/yum.repos.d/BlueOnyx.repo and set the switch for the
"BlueOnyx-Testing" YUM repository from "enabled=0" to "enabled=1".

Then run "yum clean all" and "yum update" to install roughly 475 updated
RPMs.

Once these updates have been installed, some cleanup needs to be done.
Either reboot the box, or run these commands:

/sbin/service cced.init restart
/sbin/service admserv restart
/sbin/service httpd restart

Log out of the GUI and back in. And you should be good to go.

Now what do you get with the new updates?

Feature list:
=============

- GUI now available in the following languages:
  - English
  - Danish
  - German
  - Japanese *
  - Spanish *
  - French *
  - Italian *
  - Portuguese *
   (*) Needs improvements by native speakers of these languages.

- Reseller Management
  "Server Administrators" can now have finely tuned permissions, so
  that you can grant access to various parts of the GUI. This includes
  new Capabilities such as "Virtual Site Management" and "Site DNS
  Management".

  If you grant a "Server Administrator" the ability "Virtual Site
  Management" and "Site DNS Management", he can create virtual sites
  and manage the DNS for them.

  You can also set a maximum disk quota, how many sites he may create
  and how many maximum users his sites may have in total. The server
  admin can then create sites as long as these limits are not exceeded.

  Likewise, the "Site Management" now shows who "owns" a site. That
  allows you to quickly see which "Server Administrator" owns a site.

  You can also assign already existing sites to a "Server Administrator"
  or can move them from one "Server Administrator" to another or back
  into possession of user "admin".

  If you suspend a "Server Administrator" that "owns" virtual sites,
  then all his virtual sites will be suspended as well. If you delete
  a "Server Administrator" account while he "owns" sites, then the sites
  and all their users will be deleted as well.

  Part of that functionality was created by Hisao Shibuya and Hideki
  Oride for BlueQuartz 5200R and other parts of that functionality was
  added or modified by me. In any case I want to thank our Japanese
  friends for sharing.

- Apache HTTP and HTTPS ports can now be changed to other ports than 80
  and 443. That is particularly useful in scenarios where you want to
  put something else in front of Apache. Like a Varnish cache, a
  forwarding proxy or a load balancer. The ports can now be changed
  under "Network Services" / "Web".

  Existing sites will be updated to use the new ports and new virtual
  sites will directly use the new ports on creation.

- New Module: base-istat. Again credit for that goes to Hisao Shibuya.
  This module allows to monitor some server statistics in real time.
  That is, if you have an iPhone or iPad with the "iStat" application.

- Bugfixes: Too many to list. Just a few highlights:
  - ServerAlias was lost when SSL was enabled/disabled. Fixed.
  - Various issues with SSL certificates fixed.
  - Backported various fixes that allow BlueOnyx to be run in Amazon's
    EC2 (on the official CentOS OS templates).

The full list of code changes, modifications and updates can be seen here:

http://devel.blueonyx.it/trac/changeset?new=1126%40%2F&old=981%40%2F

That's a pretty long list, so it'll take a moment to load.

Well, that's it in a nutshell. Please test these updates if you can and
let us know if you find any glitches or bugs.

Depending on the bug reports these updates will be released to the
normal YUM repository sometime next week.

-- 
With best regards

Michael Stauber