A prime example of why I tend to avoid *nix
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So my boss was off last week, spending some time vacationing with his grandkids. Before he left, one of the tasks he gave me was to set up some new collaboration software. The catch: it needed to be set up on our lone *nix box (it runs something like CentOS
5.66.2). I knew I'd have to be careful because this box hosts our static public facing websites. Any downtime on that box means our web presence is hurt.No big deal, I figured, the instructions for the software are pretty clear. So I putty into the box and start poking around to check the requirements.
- ☑ MySQL 5 or higher OR SQLite 3 or higher. Looks like the box has both.
- ☐ PHP 5.3 or higher. Umm … whoops. No PHP. Looks like the boss forgot that the sites on here run with Python, not PHP.
Ok, so I've got to install PHP before I can install the new software. No big deal, right? Well, since I'm not a big *nix guy, I figured I'd run
man
real quick to get a review of the commands on the box:-bash: man: command not found
This is going to be a long project.
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Sounds like a minimal install of CentOS. The minimal install includes nothing. Literally.
yum install man
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CentOS? Hmm…
sudo yum install php
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IIRC the minimal install doesn't even include sudo.
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Oh... Good luck?
webtatic repos to the rescue
they also have PHP54 (install instructions included in that link!
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You need to log in as root to install sudo, because then sudo isn't required.
So let it be whooshed, so let it be done. - abarker
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IIRC the minimal install doesn't even include sudo.
Well, python and a few other things are already on there, so I'm betting that
sudo
has been added if it isn't in the minimal install.sudo yum install php
Success! Have a like!
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You need to log in as root to install sudo, because then sudo isn't required.
Shouldn't be too hard.
root
is the only login we have for that box.
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Shouldn't be too hard. root is the only login we have for that box.
Also typical for CentOS, in my experience.
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Don't need pesky things like permissions getting the way of getting things done.
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Don't need pesky things like permissions getting the way of getting things done.
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Root as the only login is OK, if the only reason you ever log in is to do maintenance.
Of course, if root is also the user account that all the daemons are set up to run in as well, then you need at least five of those Picard facepalm mosaics.
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Not sure about for CentOS, but I know the Debian-based distributions generally create service accounts as part of the service in question's install process.
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Yeah, getting into Debian-based servers is far easier. CentOS is simply a rebadged Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and Red Hat makes a good amount of their money by doing support and consulting. It's not in their best financial interests to build an easy-to-use operating system .
I used to be a CentOS guy until I finally tried out Ubuntu Server. It's typically like 32498uyrq0wei8qy0dfw times easier to manage.
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the Debian-based distributions generally create service accounts as part of the service in question's install process.
The Debian-based distributions generally do an excellent job of getting as close to It Just Works right after installation as possible.
That's why I run Debian
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CentOS is simply a rebadged Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and Red Hat makes a good amount of their money by doing support and consulting. It's not in their best financial interests to build an easy-to-use operating system .
We use CentOS (some ridiculously old version, natch) where I work (for two more weeks). I don't know how bad it is to maintain, since that's not my job, but a non-minimal installation seems pretty sane to regular users.
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Uh, pretty 99.9% sure that the CentOS 5.x package version of PHP is not 5.3.x. You might want to double check that (and then search for the Remi repository to get the higher level version of PHP if necessary, though you might run into MySQL dependency hell if you need php-mysql)
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I waved a post to a new topic: In which mott555 is flagged
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The people have spoken.
Well, except @kuro who's just causing trouble.
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To add insult to injury, i shall now also like @mott555's whooshing post
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I'm pretty sure I now have the most whoosh badges again
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Trying to be legitimately helpful is a barrier to avoiding whoosh badgers.
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That happened to me the other day when I accidentally overwrote $PATH. ls, man, git... all not found.
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TRWTF is having a critical part of a business running on a unmaintained server. What this have to do with *nix IDK.
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TRWTF is having a critical part of a business running on a unmaintained server.
Who said it wasn't maintained?
Let me put it this way: The box is generally "maintained" by outside vendors. It was spun up at the request of the last vendor that redesigned our corporate websites[1]. We rely on them to "maintain" the server, but it is ours.
[1] I should probably write a new Sidebar on that one.
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Running an EOLed OS is not maintenance.
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Running an EOLed OS is not maintenance.
If you're referencing the version of CentOS, I just checked and the version I referenced in the OP is incorrect. It's actually 6.2. Does that make it any better?
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Actually even 5.6 is still supported, albeit in maintenance-only mode, until 2017. (6.2 is supported in "full updates" mode.)
Unlike certain other supposedly "long-term support" distributions, RHEL/CentOS actually is pretty long-term. RHEL is potentially even longer term than CentOS, and "extended lifecycle support" for RHEL 4 is ongoing until 2017 and for RHEL 5 until 2020.
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@Eldelshell said:
Running an EOLed OS is not maintenance.
If you're referencing the version of CentOS, ...Edit:
even 5.6 is still supported, albeit in maintenance-only mode
If I read their page right, that applies to 5.x, so we're not quite EOL'd yet.
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Yeah well, this only means that they won't break shit up and only patch critical stuff. So instead of going from PHP 5.3 to 5.4, for example, they'll give 5.3.1 (if it's available). Believe me, I had to suffer this a few days ago. They had to build PHP from source to make it work.
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I'm not a big *nix guy
is
@abarker said:A prime example of why I tend to avoid *nix
Pretty much summarizes it all.In the other news: a guy leading an anti-door advocacy campaign after having deliberately jammed his penis in one of them.
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They had to build PHP from source to make it work.
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Believe me, I had to suffer this a few days ago. They had to build PHP from source to make it work.
Which kinda defeats the purpose of having a long-term-support, mammoth-shit-stable distribution in the first place. One easy make install turns any distro into Slackware.
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Which kinda defeats the purpose of having a long-term-support, mammoth-shit-stable distribution in the first place. One easy make install turns any distro into Slackware.
*snorts* I had to deal with building
bash
(yes, bash) from source on an AIX box once, because there was no decent interactive shell on that box.
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*snorts* I had to deal with building
bash
(yes, bash) from source on an AIX box once, because there was no decent interactive shell on that box.I once built
make
from source because the system I was on only had a very broken dependency manager. Bootstrapping the base of a toolchain is a deeply annoying experience. (Once the toolchain works at all you can much more easily assemble something better.)
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snorts I had to deal with building bash (yes, bash) from source on an AIX box once, because there was no decent interactive shell on that box.
I once built make from source because the system I was on only had a very broken dependency manager. Bootstrapping the base of a toolchain is a deeply annoying experience. (Once the toolchain works at all you can much more easily assemble something better.)
This is starting to sound like an old geezer competition. "When I was young, I had to walk to school. It was 15 miles through 5 foot snow drifts!" "Yeah, but did you have to go uphill both ways‽"
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Which kinda defeats the purpose of having a long-term-support, mammoth-shit-stable distribution in the first place. One easy make install turns any distro into Slackware.
The purpose of long-term stable distributions is so that you can keep running the same thing for a long time without changes, but still get security updates. If you want actual software upgrades, that's what the next version is for.
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Bootstrapping the base of a toolchain is a deeply annoying experience. (Once the toolchain works at all you can much more easily assemble something better.)
Confirming -- it's one of the reasons why cross toolchains are such a pain in the rump, and also why GCC has such a messy compilation process.
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snorts I had to deal with building bash (yes, bash) from source on an AIX box once,
I once built make from source because the system I was on only had a very broken dependency manager.
I once read these stories about idiot Linux users and their shitty OS and then pointed and laughed at them!
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I once read these stories about idiot Linux users and their shitty OS and then pointed and laughed at them!
Filed under: billing blakeyrat for an AIX license in 3...2....1
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* TwelveBaud installs the Interix subsystem on his Windows Server box.
* TwelveBaud breaks out into song:
♫ Any program you can run, I can run better, ♬
♫ I can run any program better than you! ♬
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I once built GCC to build Linux to run Linux... Back in 97' I think.