dd365111ba
the now mandatory 'long' format. This should catch everything, with the exception of the release notes.
239 lines
9.9 KiB
Text
239 lines
9.9 KiB
Text
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" [
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<!ENTITY base CDATA "..">
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<!ENTITY date "$FreeBSD: www/en/projects/updater.sgml,v 1.7 2001/11/07 17:55:37 phantom Exp $">
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<!ENTITY title "FreeBSD Binary Updater Project (binup)">
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<!ENTITY email 'freebsd-binup'>
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<!ENTITY % includes SYSTEM "../includes.sgml"> %includes;
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<!ENTITY done "<font color='green'>Done</font>">
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<!ENTITY inprogress "<font color='blue'>In Progress</font>">
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<!ENTITY notstarted "<font color='red'>Not Started</font>">
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]>
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<html>
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&header;
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<h2>Contents</h2>
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<ul>
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<li><a href="#goals">Goals</a></li>
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<li><a href="#design">Design</a></li>
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<li><a href="#implementation">Implementation</a></li>
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<li><a href="#code">Code</a></li>
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</ul>
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<a name="goals"></a>
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<h2>Goals</h2>
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<p>The FreeBSD Binary Updater Project aims to provide a secure
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mechanism for the distribution of binary updates for FreeBSD.
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This project is complementary to the <a
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href="http://www.openpackages.org">Open Packages</a> and
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<a href="libh.html">libh</a> projects efforts and there should be
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very little overlap.</p>
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<p>This system is a client / server mechanism that allows clients
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to install any known "profile" or release of FreeBSD over the
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network. Where a specific profile might contain a specific set
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of FreeBSD software to install, additional packages, and
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configuration actions that make it more ideal for a specific
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environment (ie FreeBSD 4.3 Secure Web server profile)</p>
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<p>Our current implementation aims to abstract the actual ontology
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of the FreeBSD software collections so that future development
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in the direction of a more fine grained base system can be
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leveraged effectively without unnecessary reimplementation.</p>
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<a name="design"></a>
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<h2>Design</h2>
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<h3>"Profiles"</h3>
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<p>What the user sees as "top level objects" in the upgrade system
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are canned profiles. A profile can represent a given user's
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system configuration or a generic system template (web server,
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mail server, etc) that we provide.</p>
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<p>Each profile consists of file entries and/or collection
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entries. A collection entry represents a grouped set of files
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like a package or what sysinstall calls a "distribution."
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Profiles exist on the server machine, though the client can also
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choose to cache copies for "tripwire" types of activities. Some
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typical profiles and their contents might look like this:</p>
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<pre>
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[mysystem] [web-server]
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bin 4.2 bin 4.2
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bash 2.02 manpages 4.2
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src 4.2 apache 2.1
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xblaster 1.0
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</pre>
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<p>A collection can also have a specific version number associated
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with it or have a "floating" version number, meaning that it
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tracks whatever's newest for that entity.</p>
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<p>Authentication</p>
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<p>Users will authenticate with the server via a username /
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password scheme which allows them to access their custom
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profiles as well as any system-defined ones.</p>
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<p>Binary packages from the server are signed using public key
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cryptography.</p>
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<h3>Upgrade Client</h3>
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<p>The client supports connecting to an upgrade server,
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authenticating a user, browsing existing profiles or creating
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new ones and downloading file data and "actions" from the
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server. New file data will be created in such a way that
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partial updates do not cause corruption and whole transactions
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are committed in reasonably atomic fashion.</p>
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<p>The client will be implemented in a 3-stage process:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>A set of libraries which implement the bulk of the
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client<->server mutt functionality.</li>
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<li>A command-line version of the client which supports all
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available library functions.</li>
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<li>A GUI version of the client which either wraps around the
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client or calls the library routines directly, dependinng on
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whichever makes the most sense.</li>
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</ul>
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<p>Since a system can also be "upgraded" from a standing start, a
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next-generation installation tool could take care of the
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disklabelling filesystem formatting, and network setup then make
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heavy use of the client library to actually bring up a menu of
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available software and perform the installation.</p>
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<h3>Upgrade Server</h3>
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<p>The server supports connections by arbitrary numbers of clients
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and authenticating a user (or "anonymous" if the server is
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configured to support anonymous connections) for determining the
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available profiles.</p>
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<p>Once the server receives a manifest (e.g. a set of collections)
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from a client machine and a server-side profile name to match it
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with, it goes looking through each collection to see if a newer
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version of that collection exists on the server or if there are
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any change deltas pending against the collection which are
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greater than the corresponding patchlevel of the collection in
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the client manifest.</p>
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<p>Deltas and/or entire collections are sent to the client for
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unpacking along with any before/after actions for each delta or
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collection which should be executed on the client. Once the
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client has confirmed that all before/after actions and
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extraction of a given collection has completed successfully, it
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updates the stored profile and goes on to the next. If the
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transfer is interrupted at any point, the process can therefore
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pick up where it left off.</p>
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<p>The upgrade server provides local storage for a certain amount
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of profile data depending on disk space constraints and can also
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be used as a way of cloning machines. The user installs one
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machine entirely according to taste and then uploads its
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profile. Each subsequent machine is installed from this profile
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and voila, an army of clones.</p>
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<p>The server will probably not keep any truly client-side data
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like <tt>/etc/master.passwd</tt> or anything else it doesn't
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offer out of its own collections, but we can leave this decision
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open for later or make it a configuration option.</p>
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<a name="implementation"></a>
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<h2>Implementation Details</h2>
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<a name="update-server"></a>
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<h3>Update Server</h3>
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<p>The update server is for the most part in a usable state.
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Information about profiles, collections, and actions are stored
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in a SQL database. A database abstraction layer talks calls the
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relevant hooks (MySQL and PostgreSQL supported at the moment) to
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service client requests. Using a relational database has made
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it very easy for us to change the organization of the data
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without spending time rewriting code. As we finalize our data
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structures it might be more efficient to move to BerkeleyDB or
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another solution but for now SQL has saved a lot of development
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time.</p>
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<p>The server can be used to successfully install or upgrade a
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system to FreeBSD 4.X but there is a lot of polishing up to do
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and many additional features are needed.</p>
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<a name="update-server-todo"></a>
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<p>Server TODO list :</p>
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<ul>
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<li>Add ability to manage packages as they are currently defined
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and used in FreeBSD</li>
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<li>Add mechanism to read the ontology of the FreeBSD src tree
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from an XML file, instead of hard coding this into a Perl
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script which generates the necessary database tables. This
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will provide much needed flexibility in the creation of
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profiles and software components. There should also provide a
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description for packages that can obviate subsets of what
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sysinstall currently calls the "base system" (e.g, a profile
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with Postfix instead of Sendmail, and all of the configuration
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dependencies that go along with that)</li>
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<li>Add checksum information and provide a "tripwire"-like
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service to clients.</li>
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</ul>
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<a name="update-client"></a>
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<h3>Update Client</h3>
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<p>The update client is not currently usable. At the moment, it
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consists of some code to perform the actual updates, and some
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quick code to test the various functions of the updater. Also,
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the client does not currently handle packages. Once this
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capability has been added, and the various ugly bugs have been
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worked out, the existing code needs to be turned into a
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library.</p>
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<p>From there, it will possible to easily create an installer as
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well as an end-user upgrade program, in forms of a text
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application, an X application, and maybe even big eye candy
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GNOME and KDE applications as well.</p>
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<a name="update-client-todo"></a>
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<p>Client TODO list :</p>
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<ul>
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<li>add copyright/license information to all various source
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files</li>
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<li>conform to style(9)</li>
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<li>serious bug removal</li>
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<li>add ability to manage packages</li>
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<li>turn into a library</li>
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</ul>
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<a name="code"></a>
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<h2>Where's the Code?</h2>
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<p>This project is currently being developed in main FreeBSD
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CVS repository. Its sources are located under <tt>projects/binup</tt>
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hierarchy. You can use the usual methods of retrieving FreeBSD sources
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to access it. <b>NOTE:</b> cvsup users should use <tt>projects-all</tt>
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cvsup collection to access projects under <tt>projects/</tt> hierarchy</p>
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<p>A mailing list has been setup for this project. Please post
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all questions, patches, etc to the <a
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href="mailto:freebsd-binup@FreeBSD.org">freebsd-binup@FreeBSD.org</a>
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mailing list. For instructions on how to subscribe to thsi
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list, please see the <a
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href="../doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/eresources.html#ERESOURCES-MAIL">FreeBSD
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Handbook</a></p>
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&footer;
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</body>
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</html>
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