Wow has it been that long?

I checked the blog based on something posted on the avimark yahoo group, and saw that it has been Since February.

For anyone keeping score, my office is running pretty well, and the architecture is as follows.  8 core motherboard with 12 gig of memory running Ubuntu 12.04 LTS.  Still set up the users and rdp sessions using the script obtained from Scarygliders.net.

We have upgraded all of the xp and vista machines to Win7.  All stations log into a remote desktop on the linux server, and can start up a session of avimark running under Wine.

Machines include 8 hp thin clients with embedded win7  4 laptops running win7 1 laptop running ubuntu linux, 2 desktops running win7.   So we run as many as 15 rdp sessions at a time, with no appreciable speed penalty.  I had to increase the memory to accomodate that many sessions concurrant.  The sessions would have trouble as multiple sessions of avimark and open office were loaded, if the memory use approached 90% or more.  I think it was probably related to disk/memory swapping.  More breathing room fixed us right up.

Avimark has proven relatively well behaved.  In all honesty, we do have the occasional session hang on an rdp session, which seems to coincide with a user walking away from avimark with multiple specialty windows open and then letting the avimark session time out.

I may increase the user time out setting in avimark to avoid this.   Easily fixed by opening a terminal window on the server and issuing the "sudo pkill -u username" command.  Session closes and then can be restarted by the user.

All in all the heterogenous network seems to be pretty happy, even the printing, some of which happens under windows, and most of which is handled by linux/cups.

I will probably look at Windows server 2012 again this fall/winter, but the economics of what I have done are hard to beat.

The looming "death" of xp

There was some discussion the other day on the avimark yahoo group about the looming drop dead date this spring of xp.   One concern that I hadn't thought of was those clinics that run their credit card machines through the internet will not be allowed to continue using xp.  A user has several choices.

1. Keep running xp and hope for the best.  Probably not as high risk as some might think as long as you stay local and off the internet behind a firewall.... but who does that. Your users WILL fire up the web browser... so say goodby to xp

2. Upgrade workstations to Win7.  Well thank you very much microsoft, you killed the upgrade package with the intro of Win8.  You still can get Win7 in the OEM (original equipment manufacturer) version, but there are varying interpretations of whether mere mortals are allowed to do this to older hardware.  As far as microsoft support goes you will be on your own.. you become in effect the OEM, and provide support to your end user.. who happens to be ..you.

3. Upgrade to Win8.. just say no..  the new top layer will drive business users batty, and very likely legacy equipment may not run it well anyway.

4. Buy new hardware. $$$$ For the business environment, be advised you can still get Win7 on new hardware from certain vendors.. see number 3

5. Go with Linux.  Free.

More about 5.  If you are running rdp sessions off of a true windows server, then this is a no brainer.  Ubuntu 12.04 lts (long term stable) version has about 3 years remaining on it's support cycle.  It will install itself either as a dual boot beside your existing win xp install, and you can still go back to xp for historical purposes, or you can do a fresh install.  The install is actually smoother nicer and quicker than any windows install I have done.  The ubuntu installation iso can be downloaded, and then burned to a cd on your windows machine.  Then just boot from the cd to start the process.  it will let you test drive from the cd before any installation or modification of your machine is done.  Support is wonderful  Paid support is available, but Google is your friend and really all you need to answer almost any question. 

Install,  press the little round ubuntu icon in the upper left, type in Remmina to bring up the rdp program, and log in to your server.   Wahoo.. No changes in settings on the server, and it's free.

If you are running local sessions loaded off of an xp or win7 "server" in peer to peer fashion, you can still do the ubuntu install, but you probably have to wait for me to get off my keester and write the cookbook on how to run Avimark on a peer linux workstaion under WINE.  It can be done, and with no mods to your peer "server" other than maybe creating a new user account. 

Note that neither of these scenarios are putting you on a Linux server like I am running.  You are just salvaging existing machinery, but making it safe and secure, instead of the inevitable xp vulnerabilities that will arise with the end of service.

Changed the name today, because I ended up doing very little sailing this year, and wrote even less about it...sigh

On the upside, Avimark and Ubuntu linux continue their peaceful coexistance.  Had a router failure this month, and a primary hard drive failure on the server, but it wasnt hard to replace either.  The staff was not happy about running windows peer to peer for a day, while I fixed the Server though.

newest experiments

There really is little to give up moving avimark to wine/linux 

I now have been able to run avimark  client/server  with the guardian program running on the linux server.

I can run a totally native linux client either in standalone, or client/server connected mode.

I can run windows boxes and linux boxes in a mixed environment.

I can re index natively on the linux server.

I can run rdp sessions to the linux server concurrant with other native windows sessions and native linux sessions all in the same environment

I can use open office or libre office 

Netnotes works on Linux / WINE, complete with the avimark merge words. 

As it turned out, the last nut to crack was the native linux session on a linux client.  As it works out, you cannot access avimark through the nautilus browser and have it run correctly.  You have to mount the server drive/directory through the fstab configuration file at startup.  If avimark.exe appears with the real avimark icon, it will run.  If the real avimark icon isn't visible in the nautilus browser, it will not.

Finally using a simple bash script, it is possible to create a simple desktop icon for the end user to start avimark.

In essence, once set up, they can just double click on the avimark icon like in windows, and the session will appear to them, just like it did on the windows machine.

The only things you give up are

1. Updates must be loaded by off loading to a windows machine, updateing and then transfering back to the linux machine  (fails crc check through the automated avimark update system)

2. the real time spell checker has to be turned off for certain notes windows to work

3. certain key combos like ctrl alt f10 are reserved for the linux system, and the menu/mouse alternatives must be used.

4. certain times you must either access the appt book or another feature before the system will recognize a click on the magnifying glass (client lookup)

5. SENDING LOTS OF MONEY TO MICROSOFT FOR UPGRADES.

I am still here

I have been pretty busy as of late with Theatrical projects.  But that said, as fall and winter weather has descended, I am experimenting more again

My main clinic is still running on Ubuntu linux 12.04  It has x11rdp installed thanks to the script provide by scary gliders.

we run almost exclusively wine sessions served up by the server via rdp.

The boxes running rdp are mostly HP thin clients with Windows7 embedded running.

We also have a vista machine, some xp machines, and a couple of windows 7 machines all connected.  The lab aquisition runs on an xp box in native windows.  I also have the emergency clinic running lab aquisition on one of the thin clients.

Very stable at present.

Thin clients and linux just soldier on

Very quiet week here in Lake Wobegone.  The stuff is just working.  Avimark still works best when Wine is set to the "emulate a virtual desktop" mode.  Otherwise it it possible for a user to get themselves stuck with an alert window shuffled to the background, but not allowing them to go on. There are simple ways out of it, but its better if it doesnt happen in the first place.

Spent part of the morning configuring a thin client for use at the emergency clinic.  You do have to eliminate some software that you dont use in order to have room to load what you will use, but small price to pay, for the small price I paid :-)

If the weather is bad this weekend, I may spend some time working through a cookbook for all this at another vet who followed me down the rabbit hole started to put together.

Might also be able to prepare a live install disk to do the dirty work for folks ahead of time.  Starting to get some emails about this stuff.

If you stopped in, leave a comment, if only to say hello

HP thin clients are installed and running.. great product

So far the HP t5740e units with windows 7 embedded seem to be just what the doctor ordered.  Silent, low power consumption.  Option of running Avimark on the client, or rdp to the server, and run it there. 

I have now removed all the ncomputing terminals and replaced them with the standalone thin clients. 

We had some big storms through which they soldiered on.  I took a long weekend vacation, and they all functioned flawlessly while I was gone.

So for anyone keeping score, I am running about 15 rdp sessions with Avimark running on the Linux server in WINE. 

Interestingly there is a limit of 10 sessions built into the base configuration of the x11rdp, but  a quick edit of a config file fixed that.  

Ubuntu 12.04   WINE (ver?)  x11rdp    remote desktop on the windows machines. 

CUPS runs the printers on the linux side, and is very stable as long as you don't have any ip conflicts on your internal network.  A power outage, loss of internet, and a non total restart of my network pointed that out 

Total shutdown that evening and restart with everyone assigned a new ip by the router made it all happy again.