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[Syllable] The free desktop and server operating system family

Graham
26-Aug-2010
[2076x3]
I run all of the above on Ubuntu server .. no probs
ie. those are the apps I currently run on Ubuntu server
oh .. and OpenSSH server
Kaj
26-Aug-2010
[2079]
Sure, but they didn't come out of the box. So why is it difficult 
to accept the same for Syllable?
Graham
26-Aug-2010
[2080x4]
I didn't say out of the box .. I said without my having to recompile.
I just use apt-get and install
or aptitude
sorry .. and dropbox for backup
Kaj
26-Aug-2010
[2084]
Well, I've been working on that all year. As I said before, we're 
not in Nirvana yet. The latest Server 0.4 was prepared to be a platform 
for third-party package managers. I've been running binaries from 
three other package managers in addition to our own, but this is 
a difficult topic, so they're not ready for release yet
Graham
26-Aug-2010
[2085x2]
You perceive me as difficult .. but I'm a windows guy forced to struggle 
along with linux :(
so I want as easy as possible
Kaj
26-Aug-2010
[2087x2]
In the meantime, Server is its own system, usable for what is is
what it is
Graham
26-Aug-2010
[2089]
should call it Que Sera server :)
Kaj
26-Aug-2010
[2090]
As I've tried to make clear, Syllable is targeted at people who want 
to use open source and Linux but in an easier way. But this is a 
huge and ambitious task, and we are as far as we are. If you want 
more, you have two options: helping or waiting
Graham
26-Aug-2010
[2091x2]
Ok, I'm just letting you know at which point I'd be interested ...
The thing about Ubuntu is .. not that it's any better or worse than 
anything else, but I can google a problem and always find an answer
Kaj
26-Aug-2010
[2093]
OK. Anyway, if you have all your apps without problems on Ubuntu, 
I suppose there is no problem
Graham
26-Aug-2010
[2094x2]
Yep, I've got three ubuntu servers running 24/7
and I've setup ubuntu to run HylaFAX servers for a number of people 
too
Kaj
26-Aug-2010
[2096]
Please note that David asked me for elevator pitches. In an elevator 
pitch, one usually sheds light on what a project can do, not what 
it cannot do
Graham
26-Aug-2010
[2097]
Server is among the leanest and easiest general-purpose Linux distros.
Kaj
26-Aug-2010
[2098]
Also, we're not very interested in generically replacing other systems. 
Syllable's goal is to create new systems with their own personality 
and strengths
Graham
26-Aug-2010
[2099x2]
So, what exactly are people using it for if not one of the things 
I need?
Do you have case histories?
Kaj
26-Aug-2010
[2101]
We're running it on our servers, desktops and laptops
Graham
26-Aug-2010
[2102x2]
as web server?
and ?
Kaj
26-Aug-2010
[2104]
Yes. On our personal machines, we're doing development and office-type 
work. On our servers, we're running AltME and Cheyenne with supporting 
servers such as OpenSSH and FTP. We also have BitTorrents running 
to support Syllable downloads
Graham
26-Aug-2010
[2105]
sftp ?
Kaj
26-Aug-2010
[2106]
That should work, as it's included in OpenSSH, but I haven't tried 
it yet. People are FTPing their websites to us from REBOL on Windows 
and Mac, so no SFTP there, and the data will be public, anyway
ddharing
27-Aug-2010
[2107x3]
Kaj, I have looked closely at your website, but I wanted to see if 
I could get some additional insight from the man himself.
We're in the process of moving our REBOL-based ASCADA software from 
Windows to Linux. We already have a successful deployment at DHL 
using CentOS. I want to standardize on industrial PCs such as the 
Advantech UNO1170E running a lightweight Linux and our software. 
I'm evaluating Syllable Server even though it is only at 0.4 because 
it is console-based and REBOL friendly out of the box.
My Linux admin skills are not great . I spent several days of off-an-on 
attempts to get Syllable Server running. Now that I'm past the worst 
part of the learning curve, it's pretty easy. I just did another 
install on an Aspire One Netbook in about 15-20 minutes. I'm using 
Puppy LInux on a USB stick to partition and format the drive, run 
Grub and edit the text files.
ddharing
28-Aug-2010
[2110x2]
I have a looming project with Glad where this can be deployed. I'll 
be doing some extended load testing next week to see how our services 
run and verify the server's stability. These days a lot of software 
gets used for years and never makes it to 1.0. I'm running REBOL 
scripts, sqlite and Cheyenne. We'll also be using another third-part 
y so library for PLC communications.


Kaj, do you feel confident in Syllable Server's present state to 
run this kind of workload. I'm just looking for a personal opinion, 
of course. The ultimate decision and responsibility is mine. From 
the customer's perspective, our product is an embedded system running 
a custom version of Linux.
Kaj, I see that you've included Oracle's BerkeleyDB, but not the 
less corporate sqlite. Was there a specific reason for that choice?
Kaj
28-Aug-2010
[2112x14]
Yes, BerkeleyDB was one of the oldest and most popular open source 
databases before Oracle acquired it. Many open source packages require 
it. We would rather have kept it out of the base system, but one 
such package is in the Syllable Server base system; I believe IPRoute
We're using SQLite in our own Syllable Desktop web browser, though, 
so it's even ported to Desktop and it would be easy to use our build 
system to compile it on Server
Your goals are quite suited to Syllable
Although both Desktop and Server are designed as general-purpose 
systems, we're obviously about thirty thousand software packages 
behind on the likes of Debian. On Server, because it's a Linux, we 
can install many of those packages from third-party package managers, 
but then we can't guarantee their stability because they're not integrated 
with Syllable
Much of the integration of Syllable comes from my build system. I 
always meant it to be able to build varieties, of which we now have 
two major ones: Desktop and Server
Server is not yet very suitable for people such as Graham, who have 
lists of requirements that vary a lot from year to year because they 
want to cherry-pick it from the entire open source pool. But if you 
have a well defined set of software choices, and especially if you 
would like to package that up appliance style for customers, Syllable 
is a good base to do that on
If you're interested enough, I'm available to produce a customised 
package of Syllable
Are there any open source packages you need besides SQLite?
I'm not sure what your workload is, but we have been running a small 
website provider on Server for two years now, without any system-related 
problems
Server 0.3 was meant to enable that and 0.4 was meant to mature that 
functionality. We did improve security during that time, and improvements 
such as those were rolled into 0.4
Security could still be improved, but we are running the Try REBOL 
site on it to test it, which allows the public to run almost any 
REBOL expression, and although many tried, we haven't had any breaches 
yet :-)
http://tryrebol.esperconsultancy.nl/
Server 0.4 uses the latest stable Linux kernel instead of the bleeding 
edge one, so that should also help stability
Syllable should run very well on hardware such as the Advantech