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I love technology. I like using it, learning it, exploring it, and when money permits, buying it. For the longest time, that last thing is what kept me from really enjoying modern technology (and the fact that the last two computers before my new one experienced all kinds of untold, and told, misfortunes). Now, that I'm making some (yes, that was intentional) money, I'm able to partake in some of the newer technologies. This has allowed me to completely upgrade my home network to full gigabit (with the exception of 2 of the 3 older PC's), and opens up a wide range of possibilities – network storage and backup, video and audio streaming, and running at least one home server. This allows me experiment with several projects.
The first project, of course, is setting up virtual servers (currently only one, but I also want another appliance for a gallery of my personal artwork). The one I have running now is just a test server running the Turnkey Linux MediaWiki. Unfortunately, it's running an an AMD Athlon64 1.8GHz, with only 1GB of DDR 400 (PC 3200), and although I have plenty of CPU power, the amount of RAM I have to work with, keeping the balance between running the OS (which is currently Windows XP), and running the VM is kind of difficult. Now, with the new Antivirus I have on it (the old was Norton AV 8.0, which Symantec quit updating in Oct. '10) chewing more RAM, I don't have much memory left. So I am stuck with shrinking the VM RAM to less than 128MB, and I have seen a performance hit.
The computer I want to use, which is an older AMD MP 1.6GHz dual processor workstation (still running Windows 2000), itself, only has 1GB of DDR266 (PC 2100). I plan on running Linux on that box, but not until the other two 512MB sticks I ordered arrive (this thing uses registered ECC server RAM, very expensive stuff – also discontinued – but I managed to find a few sticks cheap). Once I get the sticks, though, I'm going to load Linux on it and load a VM, and do some more testing (my real goal is to build a new system dedicated to running several VM's, that is low power, and can stay on at least most of the day).
Well, the reason why I was a few days from continuing my previous post was that I spent the weekend messing around with the Turnkey server, and creating stuff in the Wiki. I now have a better grasp on how to work with a Wiki, and it really wasn't all that difficult. I at least know enough now to get started on my project. I still don't know all that much about PHP; although the FAQ [mediawiki.org] at MediaWiki's site helped with some guided instructions on modifying some of the PHP configuration files.
Once I know enough with the actual Wiki, I would love to start running one on the MI site (I have all kinds of ideas). But this is were Tim's help is going to have to come in: I have no idea where to start to have all the right stuff loaded into the proper areas of the server (he is the one who originally set this forum up). Down the road I'd like to integrate more new features into the entire site, and give it a nice upgrade, and then maybe I'll start using it more!
So, I'm just excited to start working with all this, and I think this is where I will end this discussion, as both posts have gotten quite lengthy. But I am willing to discuss more about all this. I haven't been this excited since I made my first page at SimpleNet [not who they are now, but the company they were before Yahoo bought them]!
I'll tell you, with virtual servers, I have a box dedicated to just doing that. Mostly right now, its just for testing purposes, but its worked out quite well. I'd love to understand the VM technology a bit better and I'd really like to get my hands on a copy of VMware, with enough time to actually sit down and USE IT. Right now, the box Im using as a VM host server is a custom built single quad core 3.2 Ghz AMD Phenom X4, 8 GB of RAM, 2 HDD's (primary 160 GB OS, secondary 1 TB, both Western Digital) with Windows Server 2008 using Hyper-V. Currently, I use the box to set up VM's for testing customer environments and various other tests, including documenting our installation process, which I have to admit, has been a savior. What I like about Hyper-V, from a production perspective vs VirtualBox is that if a VM is running and the server has to be rebooted, the VM's automatically come back up, they dont have to be restarted. I love VirtualBox and its quite useful, but for a production environment, the free version just doesnt cut it, as it shouldnt. Resources are so important with a VM though. Ive found that on my system, I can allocate up to 3 cores and 6 GB of RAM without any degradation to the host system.
If you wanted to get into a weekend project, Im thinking we could build a Linux box and load the necessary stuff to get a wiki server running. Been awhile since we went old school on a project like that and I think we could both benefit from something like that.
Im very interested in how you're envisioning the wiki to work with the site. Certainly we need to discuss this, but Im all ears. Ive been thinking about a site overhaul for awhile, but time hasnt really been on my side as of late.
Yeah, I'm seeing some potential for VM's running at home. I have some plans for stuff, but at the moment, I just don't have the resources. As I mentioned, I eventually want to build a system that is a small form factor (mini-ITX) and low power – something that I can run all day. I don't want to use my current box, not because of its power usage (it actually clocks down the CPU and GPU at idle), but because I didn't build that system for running servers and such off of – it's primarily a gaming/media PC, although I do use it for some content creation (Photoshop/3D/video editing). The idea of this box is for me to run VM's from, and when they aren't running, to be able to use it as an HTPC. Keep in mind, this is not a home server – that will be coming later.
The plan with this box is for me to be able to use and manage it remotely (through both LAN and Internet). To do this, I'll either be using RDP, a web browser [logmein.com], or a VPN [logmein.com]. I thought about running Linux, but found that there is no easy way, such as LogMeIn, to get into it from the Internet, so I think I'm just going to run Windows 7 Professional 64-bit on it. It's just going to make my life easier, simple as that. And, with some of my external hard drives attached, this will allow me access to all my data, no matter where I am at, which I'm going to like very much.
That box and everything related to it will all be for my purposes. Now, onto the question of running a Wiki on the site. I don't have all the details worked out yet, but it will be an MI Wiki, including things such as what we (Tim and I) do with, both on and off the site, history of the site, detailed 'about' info, maybe even archives and information about past page/site layouts. Yes, it will have some stuff already found on these forums, but presented in a more organized layout. My other thoughts with it though, are restricting anonymous user editing, but tying it in with forum members. More than likely users who are either Admins/Mods/Site Members will be the only ones allowed to edit the Wiki. Others, well, maybe certain areas. I'm wanting this to allow others (such as Steve, Danny, Jeremy, etc) to add info about any pages, info, or involvement in the MI site (past, present, or future), without us having to obtain the info and make, edit, and update HTML pages.
Well, those are my current ideas. Tim, feel free to absorb that info, and add/change/expand what you see fit, but this is kind of the base that I want to start with.
Tim, I think you basically said it here:
index.php?topic=166.0 [Memory Lane]
Some of that old stuff would be great to archive onto the Wiki, at least I think so.
First off, I'm posting this here, as my post really contains a little bit of everything found in this section, from Programming all the way down to Networking. I'm kind of excited about this project. If I wasn't busy with work so much, I'd really be excited. Also, before I start, I know some of the technology has been around for a few years, but it's new to me, so I'm just now learning, and I know I've got a way to go.
Ok, yesterday I was working on some documentation. For years, I've been working on this kind of documentation in standard word processors, and it has served my purpose well. But, I got to thinking, and I realized, with all the information I have, spread across many documents, it could be difficult to find information, and the images I have won't fit very well into the documents. Basically, I wanted all my documents to be “interactive”. Then, I got the idea, “why don't I just create a Wiki?”
Brilliant! Or so I thought. . .
I've never done anything with this Web 2.0 stuff. I lost my interest in web design long before the new stuff hit. Mainly because editing the HTML every time I wanted to update my page became very repetitive and boring, and I just moved on to other things. Well, I thought I would give this Wiki stuff a try. I've looked at in the past, and had an idea of what was involved, but until today, I didn't realize how much is involved. Well, I've learned two very important things within the last couple of hours today – I know very little on how to edit a Wiki, and I know squat about PHP.
I just wanted to get something locally up and running, so I could work with and learn how to edit a Wiki. I don't want to run this on a web server just yet, I wanna play with it first. Well, after some looking, I came across TurnKey Linux [turnkeylinux.org], which has a bunch of Linux based appliance services, one of them being a Wiki, powered by MediaWiki [mediawiki.org].
This is where the ball started rolling that prompted me to write this post. I've had VirtualBox [virtualbox.org] installed on this computer for awhile now, but haven't gotten around to really using it. Well, I created the TurnKey Linux CD, started up a VM, installed, and had a local Wiki up and running in less than 10 minutes. Good, something I can play with, and if I hose it, no biggie. So now, I just need to learn how to actually edit the Wiki, and start understanding some PHP code so I can make changes to the backend. I should also freshen up on my knowledge of HTML and CSS.
This got me thinking though, I really have not used VM's as much as I should, and too their full potential. I have three computers (soon to be four) sitting at home that do almost nothing now that I have my new gaming rig. It's about time I start putting them to use. I need to take one of those boxes, setup Linux, and start running some VM's. Because, I have some plans for the future – just some things I want to mess with. Before that, I need to go back and relearn Unix/Linux shell commands – I've gotten pretty rusty.
I'm going to end this part of the discussion here, as I need to get ready to head home, but I'm very excited about this post. As you can see, it already touches on web design, programming, software, and operating systems. I want to continue this later, with more discussion on software and web design, with talk about hardware and networking. This is why I believe this is the perfect topic to break in this new 'General Tech' board. I'd love to be able to get a nice discussion going about all this, especially with Tim, once he hops on.
Well, I've got a lot more to talk about, so I will return later.
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