Re: GuixSD on commodity hosting platforms, hoster: IN-Berlin

[ng0 <contact.ng0@cryptolab.net>]

On 17-02-14 10:24:57, Ludovic Courtès wrote:
> Leo Famulari <leo@famulari.name> skribis:
> 
> > On Thu, Feb 09, 2017 at 06:36:09PM +0000, ng0 wrote:
> >> today I had a short message exchange with the hoster "IN-Berlin"[0], a
> >> non-commercial group predating the widespread access of internet in
> >> Germany.
> >> 
> >> It turns out that it could be as simple as providing them with the raw
> >> disk image, so I will give it a try soon.
> >
> > A few months ago I had a brief discussion with a representative of
> > <https://serveraptor.com> about offering GuixSD there.
> >
> > They said that could accept a bootable ISO or qcow2 image.
> >
> > So, we could give them the 0.12.0 GuixSD installer image, after
> > converting it to the qcow2 format.
> >
> > I used the following command to convert the installer to qcow2:
> >
> > $ xz -d guixsd-usb-install-0.12.0.x86_64-linux.xz \
> > && qemu-img convert -O qcow2 guixsd-usb-install-0.12.0.x86_64-linux \
> > guixsd-usb-install-0.12.0.x86_64-linux.qcow2
> >
> > The results are available at
> > <https://famulari.name/a2249a95c83f60bc75efe89b6fe4f01d/>.
> >
> > I'd like for someone to try this conversion themself and verify that it
> > creates the same qcow2 file.
> 
> The image itself is most likely not bit-reproducible, if that’s what you
> mean (non-reproducible packages, uncontrolled file system layout, etc.)
> 
> > If it does, then we can ask Serveraptor to make it available for testing
> > on their platform.
> 
> That would be great!
> 
> For these use cases, I wonder if it makes sense to provide the
> installation image.  Wouldn’t it be more convenient if we provided, say,
> the “bare-bones” image or a variant thereof?  That way, as a user, you
> could directly use it as-is, or just run ‘reconfigure’ in it.
> 
> Thanks,
> Ludo’.
> 

I'd include an openssh aswell, but for IN-Berlin this is what I'll be
using in March, a variant of the barebones image.
I think in their special case even the installer would work, but with
the bare-bones there's already "something".
Maybe once it works I give "just the installer" a try on a second VM.

-- 
ng0 -- https://www.inventati.org/patternsinthechaos/