Category:System Administration
From SOFTICE
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In order to use the laboratories developed in the context of this grant, you need your students to access Linux virtual machines. However, as we explained in various Publications, this doesn't entail that you have to switch your classroom workstations to Linux. The following documentation will describe how you can easily set up a Debian GNU Linux server to host your virtual machines and, even more interesting for institutions concerned with scalability issues, set up a easy to manage load balancing cluster made of recycled classroom PCs. Once this is done, students remotely access their virtual machines or your server / cluster from any platform using freely available tools (e.g. Xming, SSH client, PUTTY) which can even be loaded on a usb stick (e.g. SOFTICE students' remote access usb stick)
Solution #1: Using our courseware on a single Linux server
A - No server, need only OS labs
If you don't want your students to use a centralized Linux server, or if you want to work on these labs on your own as an independent learner, you can do so for the Operating Systems Labs. You need to take a look at our SOFTICE OS Labs Vmware Image which will allow you to work through the Operating Systems labs on your PC (Windows or Linux).
B - You already have a Linux server ready
You might already have a Linux server at your institution which would be sufficient to host your students' UML virtual machines as they work on the laboratories. The only think you need is to download the courseware itself, along with the virtual machines templates.
This can be achieved by downloading a single script for each laboratory set you're interested in. This script will then download from our server all necessary files and install them.
C - Setting up a basic Linux server
If you don't have already a Linux server on which to host your students' Virtual Machines, we can provide you with step-by-step instructions on how to set up your server. The guides below iuse the Debian Linux distribution because of its ubiquity and ease of use.
- How to install Debian
- For help on day to day sysadmin tasks, see day-to-day sysadmin
Once you are done with this step, you can start hosting virtual machines using User Mode Linux technology. The above softice-osc-install script will take care of setting up the UML tools but we also provide some optional documentation below for you to know how you can do it by hand;
Additionally, we also used Manage Large Networks (MLN) to create virtual networks made up of virtual nodes. We're using MLN to develop networking labs. Once again the softice-net-install will take care of installing this tool for you but here are the by-hand guidelines:
Solution #2: Installing your own off the shelf cluster from scratch
While a single Linux server can host all students VMs for a given class, it might soon become insufficient for large or multiple classes in parallel.
If you are interested in hosting your virtual machines on a load-balancing cluster, you will need to follow the above instructions to install Debian and the UML tools on a computer with two network cards. This machine will be the master node of your cluster and the only one which your students will connect to.
Behind this machine, a switch will connect several recycled classroom PCs to its second network interface. The Warewulf clustering toolkit will have to be installed on the master node and help you manage as many cluster node you can pack as easily as you would manage a single host.
Upon booting, the cluster nodes will be able to use the PXE protocol (configure PXE booting in their BIOS) to obtain their IP, their kernel, initial ram disk and root disk from the master node. These concepts are explained on the warewulf clustering toolkit documentation.
At this point, you have an easy to manage cluster which nodes are statelessly provisioned by a couple of warewulf daemons running on the master node. The next step consists in enabling load-balancing capabilities so that when your students connect to the master node, their connections will be dispatched on the cluster nodes to make best usage of the available hardware. Incoming SSH connections can be load-balanced by installing the ultra-monkey package.
- How to install LVS Linux Virtual Server configuration for our cluster
Before to lead you step by step in the installation and configuration of your system, have a look at hardware options to check out the hardware we've been using for the softice cluster.
Solution #3: Using the SOFTICE virtual appliance
Virtual appliances are becoming increasingly common in corporate settings. We are working on encapsulating in a VMware virtual image the features of the SOFTICE master node. What is the benefit for an instructor? It becomes trivial to set up a load-balancing cluster such as the one described in the previous section with little Linux system administration knowledge. Take a look at the SOFTICE Virtual Appliance page for more information.
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Articles in category "System Administration"
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