[Sh-X] Shaman-X progress report on 29 Aug 2003

[Dominique Chabord]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: Dominique Chabord

Sent: Friday, August 29, 2003 12:24 PM
Subject: Shaman-X progress report on 29 Aug 2003


Hello everybody,

Bonjour à tous,

Here is some news about the project

1) Technical: WDX V0.4 is now available at
http://downloads.shaman-x.org/wdx04.tar !
David updated the code so it now includes all modifications and updates
previously made to Old Autopilot product. Welldone. The updated version has
been running for three days without any fault. A new version has been
wrapped up, V0.4 and published on the web. V0.4 also includes WDX-030823-2,
WDX-030823-3 and WDX-030823-11 change requests from the To-DO list
(http://downloads.shaman-x.org/To-do-list.pdf).
Thank you David !

2) WDX documentation
I reflected minor changes of V0.4 in both presentation slides and user's
guide: you find them at the same URL.

I have published a new document
http://downloads.shaman-x.org/lamp-shx-design.pdf . It explains how we
intend to use WDX to integrate high havailabity solutions for applications
based on DRBD, MySQL, php and Apache. I tried to make it easy to follow, and
I'm waiting your comments.

3)WDX integration project with DRBD
Reminder: DRBD (http://www.linbit.com) is a network mirroring software.
I uploaded  http://downloads.shaman-x.org/drbd-wdx-spec.pdf which describes
all cases such an integrated solution must manage. It is an RFC (request for
comments), so please do comment.
I posted in DRBD note file
(https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/drbd-devel) and we have a
useful discussion about functionalities and administration of this solution
with Lars Marowski-Brée who is the technical leader for Suse-AG clustering
and Lars Ellenberg who is a development manager for DRBD project.
I plan to propose a design for the solution by the end of next week, if I
have enough time to finalize something.

4) Apple new project opportunity
I contacted Apple about a port of WDX to MacOS X,
They are very enthousiastic about it. After this first exchange, they will
have a look at the Linux version of the product and make some decisions. I
will follow up this opportunity next week and may be make some try this
weekend since I'll have access to Arlette's MacOS X 10.1 machine.

5) About another Shaman-X hypothetical product, called DummyDoctor-DDX
project. (Laurent Laffont)
DDX is a simulation evironment for testing and validating WDX missions and
some training on a standalone PC before the mission is transfered to
production environment. (get SPD from the web site)
Laurent suggests to use VMWare software or Bochs software which both emulate
several PCs on a single machine. If we could build several virtual PCs with
a -line interface linux, each one running WDX software, we might have a
wonderful DDX solution for limited effort.
VMWare is a commercial product. I would prefer Bochs which is  free software
if it works as well.
David, maybe you could test a full group on your single machine ! I tried
and installed Bochs (pronounce box), but I failed because of dependancies.
It needed to upgrade all my OS  and then conflicted in many ways. I gave up.
Remember, it is not because I could not achieve it that it is difficult for
you. I tried an older version, but then my virtual pc made kernel panics !
(Fortunatly, it did not affect the true machine !)



This is all for today,
Thank you for everybody's contribution
ciao
Dominique