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| th1a | hi menesis. | 15:13 |
|---|---|---|
| menesis | hi | 15:23 |
| th1a | Hey. | 15:24 |
| th1a | So, I met the guys from a school in Dover who do this: http://www.linuxgfx.co.uk/index.html | 15:25 |
| th1a | Or more usefully: https://github.com/the-linux-schools-project | 15:25 |
| th1a | Basically it is a 100% Bash system that very slickly sets up servers for an English (and other) schools. | 15:26 |
| th1a | Web based, but generating HTML in Bash. :-D | 15:26 |
| th1a | They use kerberos for sso, menesis. | 15:27 |
| menesis | html in bash? :-o | 15:32 |
| th1a | Echo! | 15:32 |
| th1a | Anyhow, it works, and you'd never guess from looking at the interface. | 15:34 |
| th1a | They were talking about just having Apache do the kerberos auth, which they already do, and then SchoolTool using Apache's remote auth? | 15:35 |
| th1a | If that makes any sense... | 15:35 |
| th1a | Or of course there should be a Kerberos Python module we could plug in. | 15:36 |
| th1a | They SEEM to know what they're doing, and the code looks clean and well organized. | 15:36 |
| menesis | I have never used Kerberos. | 15:36 |
| menesis | But of course it makes sense | 15:37 |
| th1a | Do you know what they are talking about with Apache? | 15:37 |
| th1a | Have we done that? | 15:37 |
| menesis | But schooltool needs to create persons for kerberos users | 15:39 |
| menesis | Apache Basic auth should work, some tests login this way | 15:40 |
| th1a | Well, assuming it would be going the other way. | 15:40 |
| th1a | Karoshi users creating SchoolTool users. | 15:40 |
| th1a | Anyhow, I'm trying to set up a chat so we won't be dependent on my interpretation of their explanation. | 15:45 |
| menesis | Is there Samba or LDAP used, or only authentication? | 15:51 |
| th1a | They use Samba 4 in the current version. | 15:52 |
| th1a | Which is pretty impressive. | 15:52 |
| th1a | They've switched to Samba's LDAP. | 15:52 |
| th1a | One of their debs filed a LDAP bug or question, actually. | 15:52 |
| th1a | (with us) | 15:52 |
| menesis | ok, so there is LDAP | 15:54 |
| menesis | But... | 15:55 |
| menesis | SchoolTool asks for username & password and then authenticates through LDAP | 15:55 |
| th1a | Yeah, ideally we'd be able to do SSO for their system. | 15:56 |
| menesis | But user is already logged in so there should be no login to schooltool required | 15:56 |
| th1a | Right. | 15:57 |
| menesis | Understood. | 15:59 |
| menesis | But don't know what needs to be done to enable that | 16:00 |
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| nedosa1 | hi there, i'm trying to build debs from the schooltool src, is there a reason why there isn't a debian directory included in trunk ? | 16:18 |
| th1a | hi menesis. | 16:20 |
| th1a | Er. | 16:20 |
| th1a | hi nedosa1. | 16:20 |
| nedosa1 | looking at the daily builds logs, it seems bzr builder is being used and merges the schooltool packaging branch into trunk | 16:20 |
| nedosa1 | hi th1a :) | 16:20 |
| th1a | menesis would be the person to answer your question. | 16:20 |
| th1a | Why do you need this, if I may ask nedosa1? | 16:21 |
| nedosa1 | ah great, thanks a lot | 16:21 |
| nedosa1 | i'm making some changes to the source code and need to build debs in order to make deployment easier | 16:22 |
| nedosa1 | i'd like to add a contact parent by sms/email action when looking at a student | 16:23 |
| th1a | Ah, yes, that is a good idea. | 16:24 |
| th1a | Do you have any Zope experience or are you just figuring it out as you go? | 16:24 |
| th1a | That would be a reasonable thing to include in the core release, ofc. | 16:25 |
| menesis | debian/ directory is usually separate. Upstream maintainers and packagers are different people, packaging may need fixes for the same upstream release. And when multiple ubuntu versions need to be supported, packaging may be different | 16:26 |
| nedosa1 | th1a, i have some zope experience, yes | 16:27 |
| th1a | Ah, excellent. | 16:28 |
| nedosa1 | menesis, that's true, what is confusing I guess is that the packaging repo also contains the src dir | 16:28 |
| menesis | You can do the same as the daily builds, merge the packaging branch. | 16:29 |
| nedosa1 | so ignore the src dir of the packaging branch and just use the debian dir I guess ? | 16:30 |
| menesis | Yeah, I don't have a separate branch with only the debian directory, like zope packages have at alioth.debian.org | 16:30 |
| menesis | no, commit your changes, and merge the packaging branch | 16:31 |
| menesis | probably some older revision if you don't want latest trunk | 16:32 |
| nedosa1 | ok, i'll try that | 16:33 |
| th1a | We'd love to hear more about how you are using schooltool, nedosa1. | 16:33 |
| menesis | you do work in a branch, not an extracted tar.gz? | 16:33 |
| nedosa1 | th1a, certainly | 16:34 |
| nedosa1 | i plan to work in a branch, correct | 16:34 |
| menesis | another way is to download the source package and extract it | 16:39 |
| menesis | apt-get source schooltool | 16:39 |
| menesis | then go to you branch | 16:39 |
| menesis | bzr builddeb --merge ../schooltool-2.6.1.2 | 16:39 |
| nedosa1 | ah yes, that's a good idea also | 16:40 |
| menesis | but the versions need to match | 16:42 |
| nedosa1 | right, so there are no source packages for 2.7, is that correct ? | 16:43 |
| menesis | there is no 2.7 release yet | 16:46 |
| menesis | it is in development and there are some big, unfinished features | 16:48 |
| nedosa1 | is it Q1 or Q2 that you expect 2.7 to be released ? | 16:50 |
| th1a | Yes... don't jump on that yet. | 16:50 |
| th1a | April, with the Ubuntu release. | 16:50 |
| nedosa1 | ah ok :) | 16:50 |
| nedosa1 | cool | 16:50 |
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| th1a | how'd it go replaceafill? | 20:54 |
| replaceafill | hey th1a | 20:54 |
| replaceafill | will you be around at 8 pm? | 20:54 |
| replaceafill | i'm about to have lunch | 20:55 |
| th1a | 9:00 might be better. | 20:55 |
| th1a | Did it go ok? | 20:55 |
| replaceafill | it went very well | 20:55 |
| th1a | Great! | 20:55 |
| th1a | OK, see you in two hours. | 20:55 |
| replaceafill | although experience has taught me i shouldn't get too excited about these things... | 20:55 |
| replaceafill | cool, see you then | 20:55 |
| th1a | Yeah, of course. | 20:55 |
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| th1a | hi replaceafill. | 23:02 |
| replaceafill | hey th1a | 23:03 |
| replaceafill | i just fwd'ed you their latest email | 23:03 |
| replaceafill | so, the meeting went well | 23:03 |
| th1a | A little IT pushback. ;-) | 23:03 |
| replaceafill | as usual... | 23:03 |
| replaceafill | so, the bottleneck is the ZODB | 23:03 |
| th1a | What do they use now? | 23:03 |
| replaceafill | they're a british academy, right? | 23:04 |
| replaceafill | ;) | 23:04 |
| th1a | I don't know how these things work. | 23:04 |
| replaceafill | what's the monopoly of SIS there? | 23:04 |
| th1a | Oh, SIMS? | 23:04 |
| replaceafill | yep | 23:04 |
| th1a | AH. | 23:04 |
| replaceafill | but they say it's "old" | 23:04 |
| th1a | But they probably don't have to deal with the English census... | 23:05 |
| replaceafill | right | 23:05 |
| th1a | Upgrading would probably be *very* expensive. | 23:05 |
| replaceafill | but they were very interested in custom demographics | 23:05 |
| replaceafill | and attendance | 23:05 |
| replaceafill | basically, we have what they want | 23:05 |
| replaceafill | and they know they'll always need multiple systems | 23:06 |
| replaceafill | they didn't mention a financial module for example | 23:06 |
| replaceafill | which lots of people asks | 23:06 |
| replaceafill | so after the demo | 23:06 |
| replaceafill | where i showed like "everything"! | 23:06 |
| replaceafill | including our custom work | 23:06 |
| replaceafill | cairo, niepa, quiz | 23:07 |
| th1a | Ah, you're probably better at that part than me! | 23:07 |
| replaceafill | you know | 23:07 |
| replaceafill | this is the first time in 5!!!! years | 23:07 |
| replaceafill | i see potential in the app | 23:07 |
| replaceafill | :) | 23:07 |
| th1a | lol | 23:07 |
| replaceafill | no s**t | 23:07 |
| replaceafill | i think it can go somewhere... | 23:07 |
| replaceafill | anyway | 23:07 |
| th1a | :-) | 23:07 |
| replaceafill | the last part of the discussion was | 23:08 |
| replaceafill | how do we handle import/exporting | 23:08 |
| replaceafill | and then the SQL topic came out | 23:08 |
| replaceafill | "we can't query the data easily" | 23:08 |
| replaceafill | the IT manager says | 23:08 |
| th1a | It is a valid concern. | 23:08 |
| replaceafill | "this ZODB is really weird/unknown" | 23:08 |
| replaceafill | that's what i said | 23:08 |
| replaceafill | before that came up | 23:09 |
| replaceafill | they even asked me to come back in 1-2 weeks | 23:09 |
| replaceafill | to set it up | 23:09 |
| replaceafill | to be used in a class | 23:09 |
| replaceafill | as a pilot | 23:09 |
| replaceafill | they're willing to pay for that | 23:09 |
| replaceafill | so they know it well | 23:09 |
| th1a | Cool. | 23:09 |
| replaceafill | their vice-principal reminded me of dwelsh | 23:10 |
| replaceafill | but with a british accent :D | 23:10 |
| th1a | Yeah, the guy who brought me down to London was also a british dwelsh. | 23:10 |
| replaceafill | :D | 23:10 |
| replaceafill | and the school, wow | 23:10 |
| replaceafill | what money can buy you... | 23:10 |
| replaceafill | so | 23:10 |
| replaceafill | what do you recommend me to reply? | 23:11 |
| replaceafill | ah | 23:11 |
| replaceafill | they also appreciated having a local developer | 23:11 |
| th1a | That's why we really need to get this one. | 23:11 |
| th1a | *really* | 23:11 |
| th1a | So... | 23:12 |
| th1a | They would be running this locally? | 23:12 |
| replaceafill | yes | 23:12 |
| replaceafill | the IT manager considers it trivial | 23:12 |
| th1a | OK, about the zodb I'd say 3 things. | 23:12 |
| replaceafill | (to run it locally) | 23:12 |
| * replaceafill listens | 23:12 | |
| th1a | 1) zodb is unusual but it is simple, robust, and used in big production systems all over the world for a long time. | 23:13 |
| replaceafill | i did | 23:13 |
| th1a | We have found it to be very reliable. | 23:13 |
| th1a | OK. | 23:13 |
| th1a | Good. | 23:13 |
| th1a | 2) We'll set up daily incremental backups. | 23:14 |
| th1a | 3) Whatever queries they run on SIMS we can implement for them easily. | 23:15 |
| replaceafill | hhmm | 23:15 |
| replaceafill | i see | 23:15 |
| th1a | ? | 23:15 |
| th1a | hhmm? | 23:15 |
| replaceafill | i mean | 23:15 |
| replaceafill | i'm not sure if the backups story could change their mind | 23:15 |
| replaceafill | i mean | 23:15 |
| replaceafill | they really want queries | 23:15 |
| th1a | Of what? | 23:16 |
| replaceafill | but 3) | 23:16 |
| replaceafill | SQL queries | 23:16 |
| th1a | I know, but what kind? | 23:16 |
| replaceafill | right | 23:16 |
| th1a | I mean, do these change frequently? | 23:16 |
| replaceafill | why don't you jump into the loop? | 23:16 |
| th1a | Sure. | 23:17 |
| replaceafill | i agree with what you say | 23:17 |
| replaceafill | at some point i mentioned our xml-rpc experience | 23:17 |
| replaceafill | getting data from the gradebook | 23:17 |
| replaceafill | and now we have json | 23:17 |
| replaceafill | maybe that could be part of the solution? | 23:18 |
| replaceafill | as i see it, and i mentioned it | 23:18 |
| replaceafill | users won't mind what persistency the app uses | 23:18 |
| th1a | There is a pretty wide range of things they might be thinking about. | 23:18 |
| replaceafill | as long as they get the data they need | 23:19 |
| replaceafill | i mean, UI users | 23:19 |
| replaceafill | it's the IT staff that is used to go low level | 23:19 |
| replaceafill | maybe for creating custom reports | 23:19 |
| th1a | I'd say you just need to see exactly what they actually do. | 23:19 |
| replaceafill | got it | 23:20 |
| th1a | I mean, with SQL you can do anything. | 23:20 |
| th1a | And if they want to be able to do anything, that's difficult for us. | 23:20 |
| replaceafill | sure | 23:21 |
| th1a | I mean, there is no practical way for us to teach them to just query our db using Python, right? | 23:21 |
| replaceafill | well, we have zeo now... | 23:22 |
| replaceafill | but no | 23:22 |
| replaceafill | unless they're realy really interested i guess | 23:22 |
| replaceafill | it's like training a new dev | 23:22 |
| replaceafill | you'll have to know the data model | 23:22 |
| th1a | It is not practical. | 23:23 |
| replaceafill | right | 23:23 |
| th1a | Much easier to write simple scripts for them. | 23:23 |
| replaceafill | ah | 23:23 |
| th1a | ah? | 23:24 |
| replaceafill | they were also interested in marking absences as explained | 23:24 |
| replaceafill | parent access was briefly touched | 23:24 |
| replaceafill | they didn't seem very interested on that | 23:25 |
| replaceafill | i told them about the plan for 14.04 | 23:25 |
| replaceafill | i found a bug in interventions btw :) | 23:25 |
| replaceafill | thank you demos ;) | 23:25 |
| replaceafill | but to answer your question from yesterday | 23:26 |
| replaceafill | i can tell fairly quickly their expectations are not *way* outside of what we do | 23:26 |
| th1a | OK. They probably weren't maxing out their SIMS. | 23:27 |
| replaceafill | yeah | 23:28 |
| th1a | Regarding ZODB, another issue is, essentially, "How can we get all our data out if you are kit by a truck?" | 23:29 |
| th1a | Which is something we may need to address. | 23:29 |
| replaceafill | yes | 23:30 |
| th1a | It is generally a problem of "Well exactly what data in what format would you want, anyway?" | 23:30 |
| th1a | So perhaps we could dump to them all the data in whatever format they dump it to us. | 23:30 |
| replaceafill | all the data? | 23:31 |
| replaceafill | even our export doesn't do that | 23:31 |
| th1a | Well, yes, depending on what "all the data" means. | 23:32 |
| replaceafill | ah, got it | 23:32 |
| th1a | Basically just try to get across to the IT guys that we have no problem giving them the data if they know specifically what they want. | 23:34 |
| replaceafill | ok | 23:35 |
| th1a | I mean, as long as you agree that's the case. ;-) | 23:35 |
| th1a | Unless there is an underlying unaddressed "data model issue." | 23:35 |
| replaceafill | sure | 23:35 |
| replaceafill | oh we have those indeed :D | 23:36 |
| replaceafill | but not for this | 23:36 |
| replaceafill | the transcript was mentioned too | 23:36 |
| th1a | It is kind of necessaryl ;-) | 23:36 |
| th1a | I gather this isn't a "Oh, also we have no money" situation. | 23:37 |
| replaceafill | no | 23:37 |
| th1a | Great. | 23:37 |
| replaceafill | but i did told them what you say yesterday | 23:37 |
| replaceafill | about supplement/backstop the rest | 23:37 |
| replaceafill | in case they come on board | 23:38 |
| th1a | Yeah, that's fine. | 23:38 |
| replaceafill | i explained them how we try to solve problems first for the general case | 23:38 |
| replaceafill | etc | 23:38 |
| replaceafill | ok, i'll reply now | 23:38 |
| th1a | OK. Great. | 23:38 |
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| replaceafill | th1a, you still around? | 23:59 |
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