Re: Installing Guix on Linode: a how-to

[Christopher Lemmer Webber <cwebber@dustycloud.org>]

I'd be totally supportive of it being put in the cookbook... I don't
have time to do it myself right now, though...

Gary Johnson writes:

> Can someone add this tutorial to the Guix Cookbook? I've been wondering
> about how to do this for some time now, and it would be great to have it
> saved somewhere obvious like that for future reference.
>
> Thanks,
>   Gary
>
> Christopher Lemmer Webber <cwebber@dustycloud.org> writes:
>
>> Hi!  I finally got Guix running on Linode!  I'm excited about it!
>> Here's the process (thanks to jackhill on freenode for helping me figure
>> out all the stuff involving the bootloader!).  It's very bullet-point'y,
>> but here's the steps I took:
>>
>>  - Start with a Debian (or whatever) server.  Be sure to add your ssh
>>    key for easy login.  We'll be using the default distro as a way to
>>    bootstrap Guix.
>>  - Power it down.
>>  - In the Disks/Configurations tab, resize the Debian disk to be
>>    smaller, maybe 30GB or something.
>>  - "Add a disk", with the following:
>>    - Label: "Guix"
>>    - Filesystem: ext4
>>    - Set it to the remaining size
>>  - Next to the "configuration" that comes with the default image,
>>    press "..." and select "Edit", then on that menu add to
>>    /dev/sdc the "Guix" label
>>  - Now "Add a Configuration", with the following:
>>    - Label: Guix
>>    - VM Mode: Paravirtualization (the default?? don't know if this matters)
>>    - Kernel: Grub 2 (it's at the bottom!  This step is *IMPORTANT*)
>>    - Block device assignment:
>>      - /dev/sda: Guix
>>      - /dev/sdb: swap
>>    - Root device: /dev/sda
>>    - Turn off all the filesystem/boot helpers
>>  - Now power it back up, picking the Debian configuration
>>  - Once it's booted up, ssh root@<your-server-ip-here>
>>  - Run the "install guix form binary installer" steps:
>>    - $ sudo apt-get install gpg
>>    - $ wget https://sv.gnu.org/people/viewgpg.php?user_id=15145 -qO - | gpg --import -
>>    - $ wget https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/guix.git/plain/etc/guix-install.sh
>>    - $ chmod +x guix-install.sh
>>    - $ ./guix-install.sh
>>  - $ guix pull
>>
>>  - Now it's time to write out a config for the server.  The key stuff is
>>    below, save as guix-config.scm:
>>
>> #+BEGIN_SRC scheme
>> (use-modules (gnu)
>>              (guix modules))
>> (use-service-modules networking
>>                      ssh)
>> (use-package-modules admin
>>                      certs
>>                      package-management
>>                      ssh
>>                      tls)
>>
>> (operating-system
>>   (host-name "my-server")
>>   (timezone "America/New_York")
>>   (locale "en_US.UTF-8")
>>   ;; This goofy code will generate the grub.cfg
>>   ;; without installing the grub bootloader on disk.
>>   (bootloader (bootloader-configuration
>>                (bootloader
>>                 (bootloader
>>                  (inherit grub-bootloader)
>>                  (installer #~(const #t))))))
>>   (file-systems (cons (file-system
>>                         (device "/dev/sda")
>>                         (mount-point "/")
>>                         (type "ext4"))
>>                       %base-file-systems))
>>
>>   (initrd-modules (cons "virtio_scsi"    ; Needed to find the disk
>>                         %base-initrd-modules))
>>
>>   (users (cons (user-account
>>                 (name "janedoe")
>>                 (group "users")
>>                 ;; Adding the account to the "wheel" group
>>                 ;; makes it a sudoer.
>>                 (supplementary-groups '("wheel"))
>>                 (home-directory "/home/janedoe"))
>>                %base-user-accounts))
>>
>>   (packages (cons* nss-certs            ;for HTTPS access
>>                    openssh-sans-x
>>                    %base-packages))
>>
>>   (services (cons* 
>>              (service dhcp-client-service-type)
>>              (service openssh-service-type
>>                       (openssh-configuration
>>                        (openssh openssh-sans-x)
>>                        (password-authentication? #f)
>>                        (authorized-keys
>>                         `(("janedoe" ,(local-file "janedoe_rsa.pub"))
>>                           ;; Is this a good idea?  Well if you don't add it
>>                           ;; you have to manually set your user's password
>>                           ;; via the glish console...
>>                           ("root" ,(local-file "janedoe_rsa.pub"))))))
>>              %base-services)))
>> #+END_SRC
>>
>>  - Replace the following fields in the above configuration:
>>    - (host-name "my-server")     ; replace with your server name
>>    - (name "janedoe")            ; replace with your username
>>    - ("janedoe" ,(local-file "janedoe_rsa.pub")) ; here too
>>    - Note the same above for root, which I don't feel great about, but
>>      otherwise you'll need to log in via the linode "glish" console to
>>      log in as root and set the user's initial password before you can
>>      start using sudo (is there another way around this?)
>>
>>  - Save your ssh public key (~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub) as
>>    <your-username-here>_rsa.pub or whatever in the same directory
>>
>>  - Mount the guix drive:
>>      $ mkdir /mnt/guix
>>      $ mount /dev/sdc /mnt/guix
>>
>>  - Due to the way we set things up above, we don't install Grub
>>    completely, just our grub configuration file.  So we need to copy
>>    over some of the other Grub stuff that's already there:
>>      $ mkdir -p /mnt/guix/boot/grub
>>      $ cp -r /boot/grub/* /mnt/guix/boot/grub/
>>
>>  - Now initialize the Guix installation:
>>      $ guix system init guix-config.scm /mnt/guix
>>
>>  - Ok, power it down!
>>  - Now from the linode console, select boot and select "Guix"
>>
>>  - Once it boots, you should be able to log in via ssh!  (The server
>>    config will have changed though.)
>>
>>  - Be sure to set your password and root's password.
>>
>>  - Horray!  At this point you can shut down the server, delete the
>>    Debian disk, and resize the Guix to the rest of the size.
>>    Congratulations!
>>
>> BTW, if you save it as a disk image right at this point, you'll have an
>> easy time spinning up new Guix images!
>>
>> Let me know if this guide helps you!