about the base install

[Matt Zimmerman]

On Tue, Apr 12, 2005 at 12:11:23PM -0700, Marc MERLIN wrote:

> Mmmh, I see your point.  The problem is that the current base ubuntu
> install seemed fairly big anyway for a stripped down server install.
>
> How about a:
> ubuntu-base: libc/sysinit/coreutils/getty/sshd/ip-utils/vi-minimal and so forth
> just the base minimum. This should be around 50MB, maybe 100MB now?

We plan to address this for the next release (see the same PackageSelection
BOF page linked earlier) by dividing the existing base system into a minimal
base (more along the lines of a traditional Debian base), plus a task for
the additional packages that we add to an Ubuntu base install, rather than
expanding the Debian base system.

The guiding principle for the new minimal base would be "the minimum
necessary to install more software with apt".  This would lay the groundwork
for selecting between:

- A very minimal system
- A well-rounded generic server base
- Either of the above, plus specific packages

If you have specific feedback about the packages in the current base system,
I'm interested to hear it.

> after that:
> ubuntu-desktop / ubuntu-gnome / ubuntu-kde
> (note that ubuntu-desktop has basic user utils and X, but no desktop
> managers. That's if I want just X and twm/enlightenment/blackbox/whatever)

Our approach to GNOME vs. KDE is a bit different; Kubuntu is a proper Ubuntu
derivative, with its own set of parallel tasks.  Kubuntu's "desktop" is
separate and distinct from Ubuntu's "desktop".  It is possible to install
Kubuntu tasks on Ubuntu and vice versa.  In the same spirit as Ubuntu,
derivatives are under development based on alternative, lightweight desktop
environments (based on Xfce, Icewm, etc.).

> For the rest, I think the way RH does it isn't bad: 
> - ubuntu-extras (all common stuff people put on top of a stripped down
>   server: default mta/vim/emacs/mc/perl/python/ruby?/tcl?)

I feel pretty strongly that vim, perl and python belong in the base (the
"fat base", not the minimal one).  Of course, stripped-down perl and python
interpreters are required infrastructure on any Ubuntu system; I'm talking
about the full package.  I think the rest of these are probably
controversial in the context of a general-purpose package.

> - ubuntu-printing

Would be fairly straightforward, at least if we merge the "client-only" and
"client+server" use cases into one set of packages.

> - ubuntu-web (i.e. apache and all the mods/php/etc)

Another tricky one.  What about the PHP modules?  Many web servers don't use
PHP at all.  Is there much more in this category that can be considered
generic enough to be broadly applicable to web servers, besides Apache
itself?

> - ubuntu-devel (devel libs/includes/full compilers)

Which devel libs?  If only the C library, this is provided by the existing
build-essential metapackage.  If you want the set of development libraries
necessary to rebuild the system, that's quite a lot, and not generally
applicable to systems in a "development" role.

> - ubuntu-games

What criteria would be applied to choose which games?  We currently include
gnome-games in the desktop install, to provide the expected toys.  As I'm
sure you realize, there are a huge number of games in Ubuntu, of varying
quality, user interface, size and genre.

> > We'll be skirting this issue for the next release by removing postfix from
> > the base install (which will allow the admin to choose any MTA easily, or
> > have none at all).
> 
> Right.
> I'll just be removing ubuntu-base for now, which I guess isn't a huge deal
> I'm also not quite sure why ubuntu switched away from exim4 since debian put
> a lot of effort into the exim4 package due to the number of users (along
> with a nice debconf setup, and the option to have a self maintained
> exim4-config replacement, but I'm sure that's an FAQ and I don't want to
> start an MTA war :)

Our decision was based on the consideration that if we were going to "force"
an MTA on the user by default, it should be one which required a minimum of
privilege for its various components, and postfix follows that guideline
more closely than does exim.

exim4 is, quite explicitly, also a supported alternative on Ubuntu.

> I'd say that if you can only offer just a very small ubuntu-base/server
> install, you'd be there 90% of the way IMO (adding stuff on top is always
> easier)

That's very much part of the plan for the next cycle.

-- 
 - mdz