Call for testing: jobs-admin

[Jacob Peddicord]

On Tue, Aug 10, 2010 at 11:36 PM, Steven <stenten at gmail.com> wrote:
> I don't mean to sound stupid, but what exactly *is* jobs-admin, and what
> does it do? What's a job/service? Is it the same as a process (i.e. those
> shown when running 'top')?

Perhaps I should have explained it more in my first message: this is,
essentially, a replacement for services-admin from older Ubuntu
releases. Jobs (or services, we use the terms interchangeably) are
system processes that run in the background, keeping your computer
going. They also control what starts up when the system boots. Example
jobs: ufw (firewall), ttys (recovery terminals), cups (printing
services), and crash reporting via apport.

You can see many jobs in top; most will run as root. These are the
same thing as services you'd start via the command-line using `sudo
/etc/init.d/myservice start`, `sudo start myservice`, or `sudo service
myservice start` (the syntax has changed over the releases).

> I'd love to help test it, but I'd also like to know what it's supposed to do
> so I can know if it's working or not :). Some initial test cases would also
> be nice, but not necessary (playing around is just as much fun when testing
> software). Thanks!

Here are some things to try that could be useful in real-world situations:

* You want to turn off Bluetooth services on your computer to speed up
boot, since you have no Bluetooth devices: uncheck Bluetooth.
* You have installed openssh and want to change the port without
finding the config file where it is located. Find "OpenSSH server" in
the list and change the port on the right.
* You want to use PulseAudio as a system service instead of inside a
desktop session to prevent it from being killed. Find PulseAudio,
check System mode, hit Apply, then restart the service.
* You've found a bug with a system service and want to report it:
select the service, then go to Edit > Report Service Problem.

There are many, many more things that can be tested. This utility is
mainly targeted at system administrators and enthusiasts that want to
tweak their system. Behind it all is jobservice, a powerful framework
that helps manage these jobs on your system. jobservice can be used by
other applications to perform certain tasks automatically. By using
jobs-admin you'll be testing jobservice so we can make it more robust
for other applications.

In short: while there are some test cases you can perform, the real
power behind it can be tested by simply messing around. Pay close
attention to what you change, however, to make sure you won't regret
anything. On a default system, you won't be able to change things to
the point where your system won't boot. This doesn't prevent you from
breaking networking, printing, or other useful services, though. :)

-- 
Jacob Peddicord
http://jacob.peddicord.net/
https://launchpad.net/~jpeddicord