I am in the
process of documenting some of the OSS software that we use in our school. As part of the process I am creating some generic VMs that could be used as Turnkey servers. The turnkey solutions will be based on on ubuntu server. These VMs would run in openVZ, KVM and virtualBox. There would also be supporting wikis for the solutions.
The turnkey solutions I will be working on are as follows.
Squid/Dansguardian - document the process of installing Squid and Dansguardian for content filtering. This would be supported by a turnkey virtual server that would simpify the process of integrating squid with Active Directory etc.
Limesurvey - Limesurvey is a great survey tool that is used extensively by our school for collecting information from staff, learners and parents.
Moodle - release versions of moodle with some key modules installed including any publically available MIS modules for Facility/Eportal and Sims.
Monitoring solution - looking to implement either Zenoss or Zabbix. Any other suggestions on this.
Any feedback appreciated.
Tim
Sounds good to me. I am doing similar for Sogo.
There is an issue that needs to be adressed. With Sogo, the standard build is Centos/Postgresql/Cyrus
to which we have added Clam and Spamassasin.
The issue is that
I think sticking with Sogo's standard rather than trying to migrate to ubuntu would be sensible.
Doing a VirtualBox build is a sensible way forward.
Do we want to attempt to standardise the presentation of instructions?
Brian Lockwood
I used to have our Linux systems based on RHEL and ran Centos. So I remember enough about using it to provide VMs based on Centos as well. Although I think is does now install fine on debian based distros.
Are Clam and Spamassassin used for supporting Sogo?
Yes thats right.
Brian Lockwood
If you are going to use Squid / DansGuardian then you also need to document the policies / procedures the school uses for adding items to the whitelist / black list and where you get any blocklists from.
-- In general, my opinions, based on my experience and not a reflection on my employer or any other groups I am associated with *unless explicitly mentioned*.
Thanks for the advice re policies. Squid/Dansguardian,ISA, Websense etc are tools for helping implement the polices in your orgainsiation. For some schools squid maybe enough, as they may use whitelists for allowed sites and all other sites are banned etc. I am thinking that we will need to put a BIG disclaimer on to remind people that that this a tool to support the internet usage policy in your school, not a onesize fits all implementation :)
The turnkey will also integrate tools such as Sarge to help with viewing log files on usage etc. The other part of the turnkey will be to ease integration with AD/Samba (if required)
In terms of updating blacklists/block lists sounds like a good idea to document the sources. Also look to automate updating these lists and provide relevant feedback via standard logs.
looks in danger of being mission drift to me because ..
Whilst it is certain that sets of procedures and policies are needed and a template policy would be useful, schools vary immensely in what drives their internet access policy.
A Turnkey solution to the technical set up of squid and Dan's Guardian can be the same from school to school. Policies and procedures almost certainly won't be.
That being said, maybe you would like to set up an Open Source set of turnkey procedures and policies that people could use regardless of the Internet solution they use.
We look forward to your contribution.
Brian Lockwood
In relation to documenting the build of the turnkey systems I am proposing to use MediaWiki to document the process. Any views on this?
I am going write a build system in python that will use an ncurses style interface to automate installing required applications, updates etc. Inititially the build systm will be to support Debian based distros, but I would like to also support RedHat based distros as well.
I am chosing Python as I have wanted to create a pyton project for ages and this will allow me to do a pyhton project at work. I am going to either
Urwidor
Dialogto help with dialogues/ncurses . Any advice on python and ncurses/urwid/Dialog or should I be looking at a different language toolset for this?
The turnkey solution will be ship fully installed, but fine tuning of configs for the end user will also be done via the python build system.
My aim is to be able to insall and build the system using my android phone and an ssh connection.