gmane.comp.lang.smalltalk.squeak.seaside

Bill Schwab | 12 Jul 17:47

Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

Hello all,

Is it reasonable to expect Squeak/Pharo with Seaside, and other tools to
perform as follows:

(1) Pharo image(s) run as service(s); the computer is (ab)used pretty
much as an appliance; technicians are told to plug in the network cable,
then turn on the box, and if all is well, it "just works".

(2) most (Smalltalk) configuration tasks happen via a Seaside interface.

(3) I realize that I can edit code through Seaside's halos, but I will
sometimes want to interact graphically with the Squeak image; it will be
doing other things beyond serving Seaside pages.  I envision (please
tell me if there are better ways) making a remote desktop (or similar)
connection to the server, stopping the offending service, and restarting
it as a desktop user to debug, save the changed image, exit, restart the
service, and log out.

Is this a SSH/VNC task, or is there a better way.  Some things I have
read appear to suggest that one can simply use VNC to attach to the
running Squeak service and a GUI instantly appears???  That seems too
slick to expect it to work.

Do things change if one replaces Linux with Windows?  I am trying to
escape, but it will take some time to complete the transfer.

Bill

Wilhelm K. Schwab, Ph.D.

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Lukas Renggli | 12 Jul 21:52

Re: Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

>  (1) Pharo image(s) run as service(s); the computer is (ab)used pretty
>  much as an appliance; technicians are told to plug in the network cable,
>  then turn on the box, and if all is well, it "just works".

That's already possible.

>  (2) most (Smalltalk) configuration tasks happen via a Seaside interface.

What configuration tasks? If these are not yet available an interface
could certainly be built. OmniBrowser and the XUL integration is also
a possibility here.

>  (3) I realize that I can edit code through Seaside's halos, but I will
>  sometimes want to interact graphically with the Squeak image; it will be
>  doing other things beyond serving Seaside pages.  I envision (please
>  tell me if there are better ways) making a remote desktop (or similar)
>  connection to the server, stopping the offending service, and restarting
>  it as a desktop user to debug, save the changed image, exit, restart the
>  service, and log out.

OmniBrowser.

>  Is this a SSH/VNC task, or is there a better way.  Some things I have
>  read appear to suggest that one can simply use VNC to attach to the
>  running Squeak service and a GUI instantly appears???  That seems too
>  slick to expect it to work.

RemoteFrameBuffer is perfect to do that. Like this you start you image
headless on the server, and use a VNC client to connect to the screen
from anywhere. I use that on all my servers.

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Norbert Hartl | 14 Jul 11:00

Re: Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

On Sat, 2008-07-12 at 21:52 +0200, Lukas Renggli wrote:
> >  (1) Pharo image(s) run as service(s); the computer is (ab)used pretty
> >  much as an appliance; technicians are told to plug in the network cable,
> >  then turn on the box, and if all is well, it "just works".
> 
> That's already possible.
> 
> >  (2) most (Smalltalk) configuration tasks happen via a Seaside interface.
> 
> What configuration tasks? If these are not yet available an interface
> could certainly be built. OmniBrowser and the XUL integration is also
> a possibility here.
> 
> >  (3) I realize that I can edit code through Seaside's halos, but I will
> >  sometimes want to interact graphically with the Squeak image; it will be
> >  doing other things beyond serving Seaside pages.  I envision (please
> >  tell me if there are better ways) making a remote desktop (or similar)
> >  connection to the server, stopping the offending service, and restarting
> >  it as a desktop user to debug, save the changed image, exit, restart the
> >  service, and log out.
> 
> OmniBrowser.
> 
> >  Is this a SSH/VNC task, or is there a better way.  Some things I have
> >  read appear to suggest that one can simply use VNC to attach to the
> >  running Squeak service and a GUI instantly appears???  That seems too
> >  slick to expect it to work.
> 
> RemoteFrameBuffer is perfect to do that. Like this you start you image
> headless on the server, and use a VNC client to connect to the screen

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Lukas Renggli | 14 Jul 11:20

Re: Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

>  > >  Is this a SSH/VNC task, or is there a better way.  Some things I have
>  > >  read appear to suggest that one can simply use VNC to attach to the
>  > >  running Squeak service and a GUI instantly appears???  That seems too
>  > >  slick to expect it to work.
>  >
>  > RemoteFrameBuffer is perfect to do that. Like this you start you image
>  > headless on the server, and use a VNC client to connect to the screen
>  > from anywhere. I use that on all my servers.
>  >
>
> Yes, me too. Do you think it would be possible to let the squeak browser
>  module do a vnc connection. That could be cool for some situations where
>  you just enter the https url of your admin site and connect from the
>  browser image to the production image. But I don't know if the squeak
>  module is able to connect on another port. Tunneling the vnc of port 80
>  would be some work and would destroy the benefit.

I don't understand what you mean? What is a module?

There is a web-based application (WAScreenshot) included with Seaside
that enables accessing the GUI of a headless image through the web. It
is a bit slow (it essentially just displays a screenshot) and not very
user-friendly (mouse clicks on the screenshot are forwarded to the
image) though.

If you use RemoteFrameBuffer (VNC) you are very likely tunneling
through an SSH connection anyway. I guess nobody wants to keep an
unencrypted VNC port open on their server.

Cheers,

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Norbert Hartl | 14 Jul 11:34

Re: Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

On Mon, 2008-07-14 at 11:20 +0200, Lukas Renggli wrote:
> >  > >  Is this a SSH/VNC task, or is there a better way.  Some things I have
> >  > >  read appear to suggest that one can simply use VNC to attach to the
> >  > >  running Squeak service and a GUI instantly appears???  That seems too
> >  > >  slick to expect it to work.
> >  >
> >  > RemoteFrameBuffer is perfect to do that. Like this you start you image
> >  > headless on the server, and use a VNC client to connect to the screen
> >  > from anywhere. I use that on all my servers.
> >  >
> >
> > Yes, me too. Do you think it would be possible to let the squeak browser
> >  module do a vnc connection. That could be cool for some situations where
> >  you just enter the https url of your admin site and connect from the
> >  browser image to the production image. But I don't know if the squeak
> >  module is able to connect on another port. Tunneling the vnc of port 80
> >  would be some work and would destroy the benefit.
> 
> I don't understand what you mean? What is a module?
> 
I don't know the name of the firefox extension to run a squeak vm inside
the browser. But I mean that.

> There is a web-based application (WAScreenshot) included with Seaside
> that enables accessing the GUI of a headless image through the web. It
> is a bit slow (it essentially just displays a screenshot) and not very
> user-friendly (mouse clicks on the screenshot are forwarded to the
> image) though.
> 
> If you use RemoteFrameBuffer (VNC) you are very likely tunneling

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Sebastian Sastre | 14 Jul 15:18

RE: Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

> 
> If you use RemoteFrameBuffer (VNC) you are very likely tunneling
> through an SSH connection anyway. I guess nobody wants to keep an
> unencrypted VNC port open on their server.
> 
> Cheers,
> Lukas
> 

I'm using nx server from nomachine for remote desktop linux. It goes on ssh and
do its magic noticeably fast. 

	cheers,

Sebastian

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Bill Schwab | 15 Jul 15:58

Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

Lukas,

With respect to "plug it in and throw the switch," you mention that it
is possible.  Are there any tricks to it, other than setting up the
Squeak/Pharo image as a service?  Are the following links worthy of
attention?

 
http://onsmalltalk.com/programming/smalltalk/seaside/my-journey-to-linux/

http://onsmalltalk.com/programming/smalltalk/scaling-seaside-redux-enter-the-penguin/

Re configuration, most of it would be things that I would do through
Seaside.  The exact details (Seaside served from "the" image doing the
work, or a Seaside image along side of other images doing the real work)
will depend on my experience with reliability.  I have read widely
differing reports on what to expect, and need to try it.  My BibTeX
gizmo looks like it will be the sentinel.

OmniBrowser is prominent in your reply.  What feature(s) of it earn that
position?

RemoteFrameBuffer looks like it could be very useful, though it appears
to encrypt only for password exchange.  Do you have any concerns about
its security?  Assuming I am seriously paranoid about such things (gotta
be with medical records), should *I* be concerned about its security?  I
reserve the right to be concerned regardless of your reply, but I am
curious about your take on it.

Thanks!

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Avi Bryant | 15 Jul 19:44

Re: Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

On Tue, Jul 15, 2008 at 7:00 AM, Bill Schwab <BSchwab <at> anest.ufl.edu> wrote:

> RemoteFrameBuffer looks like it could be very useful, though it appears
> to encrypt only for password exchange.  Do you have any concerns about
> its security?  Assuming I am seriously paranoid about such things (gotta
> be with medical records), should *I* be concerned about its security?  I
> reserve the right to be concerned regardless of your reply, but I am
> curious about your take on it.

We have modified the RemoteFrameBuffer package to only listen on the
internal IP.  To access it from the outside, we use an ssh tunnel, eg,

ssh -L 5900:localhost:5900 server.example.com

And then we point our VNC client at localhost:0.

This ensures the the network traffic is encrypted, and uses ssh as an
additional level of authentication.

Avi

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Lukas Renggli | 15 Jul 21:15

Re: Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

>  is possible.  Are there any tricks to it, other than setting up the
>  Squeak/Pharo image as a service?  Are the following links worthy of
>  attention?
>
>  http://onsmalltalk.com/programming/smalltalk/seaside/my-journey-to-linux/
>  http://onsmalltalk.com/programming/smalltalk/scaling-seaside-redux-enter-the-penguin/

Sure, that's about the setup I am using . The config file for Apache
looks like the one for my web-site, I guess this is a modified one
that I once published here in the list.

>  Re configuration, most of it would be things that I would do through
>  Seaside.  The exact details (Seaside served from "the" image doing the

That would be a cool project that could provide another brick into a
full-stack Seaside solution.

>  OmniBrowser is prominent in your reply.  What feature(s) of it earn that
>  position?

You were talking about editing code from the web.

OmniBrowser is a browser framework that is independent of the GUI.
Most people probably use it with Morphic, but there is also an
interface to the web (not Seaside based) and XUL (Seaside based).
OmniBrowser has implementations of all the common code browser and a
full integration with the refactoring tools. Furthermore there are
implementations of workspace, transcript, file-browser, inspector,
debugger, process browser and monticello-tools available. OmniBrowser
is much more sophisticated than WABrowser and friends, and essentially

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Rick Flower | 15 Jul 22:13

Re: Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

On Tue, July 15, 2008 12:15 pm, Lukas Renggli wrote:

> OmniBrowser is a browser framework that is independent of the GUI.
> Most people probably use it with Morphic, but there is also an
> interface to the web (not Seaside based) and XUL (Seaside based).
> OmniBrowser has implementations of all the common code browser and a
> full integration with the refactoring tools. Furthermore there are
> implementations of workspace, transcript, file-browser, inspector,
> debugger, process browser and monticello-tools available. OmniBrowser
> is much more sophisticated than WABrowser and friends, and essentially
> everything you need to de everything you need to do development.
>
> I am just wondering why many people keep on ignoring it. I use
> OmniBrowser exclusively for all my development for more than 2 years
> now. It should replace all the crappy existing tools (but that's
> another discussion).

Lukas (or anyone else that wants to chime in) :

Is there anything akin to Omnibrowser for VW?  Just curious as there are
times that I can do some work but may not be on the machine in question..
Thx!

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Lukas Renggli | 15 Jul 22:49

Re: Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

> Lukas (or anyone else that wants to chime in) :
>
>  Is there anything akin to Omnibrowser for VW?  Just curious as there are
>  times that I can do some work but may not be on the machine in question..
>  Thx!

I don't know, it is the baby of Colin. OmniBrowser should be fairly
easy to port, for example it is the default browser of GemStone.

Lukas

--

-- 
Lukas Renggli
http://www.lukas-renggli.ch

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Colin Putney | 16 Jul 03:51

Re: Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

On 15-Jul-08, at 1:49 PM, Lukas Renggli wrote:

>> Lukas (or anyone else that wants to chime in) :
>>
>> Is there anything akin to Omnibrowser for VW?  Just curious as  
>> there are
>> times that I can do some work but may not be on the machine in  
>> question..
>> Thx!
>
> I don't know, it is the baby of Colin. OmniBrowser should be fairly
> easy to port, for example it is the default browser of GemStone.

There's no port to VW, as far as I know.

I don't see any major roadblocks, just a whole bunch of little issues  
and incompatibilities to deal with. On the other hand, VW's native  
toolset is pretty good, so there's not much motivation to do it.

Colin

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Randal L. Schwartz | 15 Jul 22:40

Re: Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

>>>>> "Lukas" == Lukas Renggli <renggli <at> gmail.com> writes:

Lukas> I am just wondering why many people keep on ignoring it. I use
Lukas> OmniBrowser exclusively for all my development for more than 2 years
Lukas> now. It should replace all the crappy existing tools (but that's
Lukas> another discussion).

The last time I looked at it, the OB code pane was missing my essential
"senders of methods sent in this method" and "implementors of methods sent in
this method".  All it had was "senders of this method" and "implementors of
this method".

If that hasn't changed, it still makes OB a non-starter for me.

And this is just to answer your question.  I found it easier to go back to the
classic browser than to even figure out who to ask to get this fixed, or how
to fix it myself.

--

-- 
Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc. - +1 503 777 0095
<merlyn <at> stonehenge.com> <URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/>
Smalltalk/Perl/Unix consulting, Technical writing, Comedy, etc. etc.
See http://methodsandmessages.vox.com/ for Smalltalk and Seaside discussion

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Bill Schwab | 15 Jul 19:57

Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

Avi,

Sounds good.  If your changes have not made it into the copy on SM,
they would no doubt be a welcome addition.

Bill

================================
Avi Bryant avi at dabbledb.com
Tue Jul 15 17:44:16 UTC 2008

On Tue, Jul 15, 2008 at 7:00 AM, Bill Schwab <BSchwab at anest.ufl.edu>
wrote:

> RemoteFrameBuffer looks like it could be very useful, though it
appears
> to encrypt only for password exchange.  Do you have any concerns
about
> its security?  Assuming I am seriously paranoid about such things
(gotta
> be with medical records), should *I* be concerned about its security?
 I
> reserve the right to be concerned regardless of your reply, but I am
> curious about your take on it.

We have modified the RemoteFrameBuffer package to only listen on the
internal IP.  To access it from the outside, we use an ssh tunnel, eg,

ssh -L 5900:localhost:5900 server.example.com

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Bill Schwab | 16 Jul 00:38

Seaside/Squeak/Linux: service with GUI as needed

Lukas,

I certainly did not intentionally ignore OB.  However, it was easy to
do :)  Knowing there was more to see, I did some searching.  Even with
the pre-built image, the Seaside-driven part was a hassle to get
working, leaves a somewhat cumbersome setup of the server and web
browser running together, and (just my experience, however unfair)
appears to not work very well, for whatever reason.  No doubt, one would
run the image headless, and smooth over the rest of the installation. 
Still, it is a lot more complicated than the Pinesoft approach of
slapping pixels on the screen, and probably more complicated than using
wxWidgets, or whatever they call it now.

I am not particularly worried about a native widget interface.  My
experience is that users will tolerate almost any non-ugly look, but are
VERY fussy about feel.  The latter gets to "muscle memory," intuitive
design, and consistency of interaction.

Thanks for the insights into Seaside configuration!

Bill

==========================
Lukas Renggli renggli at gmail.com 
Tue Jul 15 19:15:59 UTC 2008

>  is possible.  Are there any tricks to it, other than setting up the
>  Squeak/Pharo image as a service?  Are the following links worthy of
>  attention?
>

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