A few years back, I invested in some N computing thin clients, that divvie up a windows xp computer into multiple user desktops, for a couple hundred a pop, and running silently with only 5 watt power consumption.
Fast forward a few years, and microsoft got smart, and updated their user agreement in vista and win7, so that even though the technology works still, you need to buy licenses for each session to stay legal. They also work with windows server, but you have to choose between regular terminal services, or ncomputing devices, as both wont work together on one server.
LINUX TO THE RESCUE. It seems that the n computing devices are happy as a clam to work with ubuntu 12.04 64 bit. I was able to log on from rdp and ncomputing at the same time with no ill effect, so I wont have to replace my terminals. They deliver a nice linux desktop environment to each user, totally isolated from the other.
So I will wait until after some scheduled travel, and then bring the 64 bit machine online at work. And go linux on the thin clients.
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
Saturday, February 9, 2013
3 weeks and no explosions
Biggest accomplishment this week, was figuring out the intracacies of the dymo drivers for linux. We have at least 3 flavors of dymo printer, but once you get the counterintuitive settings right, its all good.
Also had one document that wouldnt merge right, but it turns out it was something hidden in the document itself as a fresh copy with the same merge words works.
I created some more user accounts, and have had as many as 8 rdp sessions live with no slowdown apparent. This is with the server also hosting a virtual machine that runs my pacs system. Got a couple of error messages on one terminal that had admin rights when ubuntu popped up that it wanted to update but overall a very stable environment, stable log ins and log outs. I even did a few experimental setting things on the main machine that kludged it desktop session, but everything else just kept running, even when I logged in and out of the main administrative account.
I will probably roll out a couple more sessions next week, and then hopefully convert the thin clients over.
3 of the machines are in the lab, pharmacy area, one of the busiest places in the clinic. No crash, no hiccup.
I also found out that ncomputing now has server software that should work natively in linux, just updated to Ubuntu 12.04, which is what i am running,so I will probably play with that and see if it peacefully coexists with the other rdp sessions. I know that on a windows server, you have to choose either or.. Rdp, or ncomputing vspace... It looks like vspace for linux uses lightdm display manager, so I am hopeful.
I am also recreating and documenting my footsteps on a fresh install, to make sure I can replicate this experiment, in an organized straight forward fashion, because there were many dead ends along the way.
If I can figure out a way to have a bogus research database, without real clients, I might be inclined to put a demo machine online for the curious to log in to.
Also had one document that wouldnt merge right, but it turns out it was something hidden in the document itself as a fresh copy with the same merge words works.
I created some more user accounts, and have had as many as 8 rdp sessions live with no slowdown apparent. This is with the server also hosting a virtual machine that runs my pacs system. Got a couple of error messages on one terminal that had admin rights when ubuntu popped up that it wanted to update but overall a very stable environment, stable log ins and log outs. I even did a few experimental setting things on the main machine that kludged it desktop session, but everything else just kept running, even when I logged in and out of the main administrative account.
I will probably roll out a couple more sessions next week, and then hopefully convert the thin clients over.
3 of the machines are in the lab, pharmacy area, one of the busiest places in the clinic. No crash, no hiccup.
I also found out that ncomputing now has server software that should work natively in linux, just updated to Ubuntu 12.04, which is what i am running,so I will probably play with that and see if it peacefully coexists with the other rdp sessions. I know that on a windows server, you have to choose either or.. Rdp, or ncomputing vspace... It looks like vspace for linux uses lightdm display manager, so I am hopeful.
I am also recreating and documenting my footsteps on a fresh install, to make sure I can replicate this experiment, in an organized straight forward fashion, because there were many dead ends along the way.
If I can figure out a way to have a bogus research database, without real clients, I might be inclined to put a demo machine online for the curious to log in to.
Friday, February 1, 2013
So why does it work now?
I have a sneaking suspicion, that I just gave up too soon, when a few years back, Avimark seemed to "kind of work" in Linux. Fully resolving the file addresses across the network is the crux of it. Initially, I tried running the linux session off of an xp share... And of course it failed when some files could not be accessed. Could have been address resolution, file permissions, or both.
A few years of running windows machnes off a linux server gave me some insight into file permissions, file ownership, and file locking.
Some digging into why one method of logging on to a windows share seemed to work, and others didn't was the biggest clue.
It seems that networked machines use any of about 4 methods to resolve a netbios address for the location of a file that is needed. The linux workstation may run through the 4 methods trying to find the right file in the right place on the network. You may get lucky if your linux machine has the right choices intalled in the right order, or if not, it may be "close but no cigar".
One clue as to whether your share is resolving the avimark directory correctly is if you display the directory in icon mode rather than list. If avimark.exe is displaying with the real avimark icon, you are golden. If not, and it displays with a generic icon, you are only getting partial name resolution for your file, and some of the calls (whiteboard in particular) will hang...looking to access a file that never answers. I'm sure every windows user has seen this as well when starting a machine, and the avimark icon is generic. The icon file isnt being found..you are having some sort of communication or disk problem.
Why in the world are there 4 methods? History... Way back in the dinosaur ages we found files on a network from a hard coded list. Later machines on a peer to peer negotiated who kept the list and how it was updated. Shares periodically broadcasted themselves across the network to all listening. Later, You could set one machine to be master, and update, and search only from it...Then we move into different protocols for Server class machines with domains.
You can set your linux machine to use any of these, and even the order in which they are tried when a file is called for,. But alas.. Not all linux distros have for example WINS installed by default...so the whiteboard, across certain network shares will fail.
THE GOOD NEWS. It makes much less difference running natively on one machine, and running multiple terminal sessions on that machine. This gets rid of the futzy network resolution, and gains you the speed of not doing all the database heavy lifting over the network..only the screen and keyboard events cross back and forth.
A few years of running windows machnes off a linux server gave me some insight into file permissions, file ownership, and file locking.
Some digging into why one method of logging on to a windows share seemed to work, and others didn't was the biggest clue.
It seems that networked machines use any of about 4 methods to resolve a netbios address for the location of a file that is needed. The linux workstation may run through the 4 methods trying to find the right file in the right place on the network. You may get lucky if your linux machine has the right choices intalled in the right order, or if not, it may be "close but no cigar".
One clue as to whether your share is resolving the avimark directory correctly is if you display the directory in icon mode rather than list. If avimark.exe is displaying with the real avimark icon, you are golden. If not, and it displays with a generic icon, you are only getting partial name resolution for your file, and some of the calls (whiteboard in particular) will hang...looking to access a file that never answers. I'm sure every windows user has seen this as well when starting a machine, and the avimark icon is generic. The icon file isnt being found..you are having some sort of communication or disk problem.
Why in the world are there 4 methods? History... Way back in the dinosaur ages we found files on a network from a hard coded list. Later machines on a peer to peer negotiated who kept the list and how it was updated. Shares periodically broadcasted themselves across the network to all listening. Later, You could set one machine to be master, and update, and search only from it...Then we move into different protocols for Server class machines with domains.
You can set your linux machine to use any of these, and even the order in which they are tried when a file is called for,. But alas.. Not all linux distros have for example WINS installed by default...so the whiteboard, across certain network shares will fail.
THE GOOD NEWS. It makes much less difference running natively on one machine, and running multiple terminal sessions on that machine. This gets rid of the futzy network resolution, and gains you the speed of not doing all the database heavy lifting over the network..only the screen and keyboard events cross back and forth.
Sunday, January 27, 2013
A few more details and some clean up
The ladies at the front desk quickly noted that the 10 key pad wasnt working. I chased this around and around, looking at keyboard mapping, and googling my heart out. Finally a clue.. It seemed that some had better luck with x11rdp running the show rather than xdrp.
Found that it wasnt in the normal ubuntu repositories, but a wickedly good programmer had a script available to load, and compile x11rdp along with a configuration gui for the user accounts to choose which gui they would each load. Bottom line... It just plain works. I sent him a nice donation via paypal. X11rdp. Seems to have made the login and log out processes rock solid.
Ubuntu itself also had a little problem with some false error reporting, un related to all this, but some good references let me change a config flag, and now that annoyance is gone.... It was popping up occasionally and ruining the desktop session.
No cookbook yet.. But for those who feel they have to try... Ubuntu 12.04. Wine 1.5. Must run x11rdp. Must have samba and especially the smbfs services loaded. Turn off oplocks on your samba share. If you dont, then the windows avimark sessions get blown out of the water, while the linux wine sessions soldier on. Samba share needs to have default user forced to guest. The easiest way to set up your samba share is to download and use the debian package of Webmin. Webmin gives you a very nice interface for looking at and tweaking all of your setup. I am not much for memorizing command line stuff.
Each log in session needs its own user account. Each account needs a .xsession file in its home directory to tell which gui loads.. The x11drp auto script from scarygliders.net and the gui config utility will get you there quicker. Setting user accounts and groups and passwords is much easier with webmin as well.
Now its off to week 2 of a windows light office.
Found that it wasnt in the normal ubuntu repositories, but a wickedly good programmer had a script available to load, and compile x11rdp along with a configuration gui for the user accounts to choose which gui they would each load. Bottom line... It just plain works. I sent him a nice donation via paypal. X11rdp. Seems to have made the login and log out processes rock solid.
Ubuntu itself also had a little problem with some false error reporting, un related to all this, but some good references let me change a config flag, and now that annoyance is gone.... It was popping up occasionally and ruining the desktop session.
No cookbook yet.. But for those who feel they have to try... Ubuntu 12.04. Wine 1.5. Must run x11rdp. Must have samba and especially the smbfs services loaded. Turn off oplocks on your samba share. If you dont, then the windows avimark sessions get blown out of the water, while the linux wine sessions soldier on. Samba share needs to have default user forced to guest. The easiest way to set up your samba share is to download and use the debian package of Webmin. Webmin gives you a very nice interface for looking at and tweaking all of your setup. I am not much for memorizing command line stuff.
Each log in session needs its own user account. Each account needs a .xsession file in its home directory to tell which gui loads.. The x11drp auto script from scarygliders.net and the gui config utility will get you there quicker. Setting user accounts and groups and passwords is much easier with webmin as well.
Now its off to week 2 of a windows light office.
Saturday, January 26, 2013
Well we made it through over a week of running Avimark on Linux. Tweaked and optimized some settings, but it ran all week. Architecture was Ubuntu 12.4 server 3 ghz quad processor, 4 gig memory, 500 gig raid mirror.
Set up our normal windows workstations (5 out of the 12 available) and ran rdp sessions logged into the server, and ran Avimark under wine.
With the settings all figured out, it peacefully coexisted with the other stations running Avimark under windows off of the linux server.
You tube video here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzl-ggFZINE
This runs scary fast, and was very stable all week.
Set up our normal windows workstations (5 out of the 12 available) and ran rdp sessions logged into the server, and ran Avimark under wine.
With the settings all figured out, it peacefully coexisted with the other stations running Avimark under windows off of the linux server.
You tube video here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzl-ggFZINE
This runs scary fast, and was very stable all week.
Thursday, January 24, 2013
Remoter pro (a 10 buck app) makes it a joy with the translucent keyboard and trackpad.
.PNG)
So it is that I have spent the last 3 weeks of spare time figuring out the next step in computing upgrades for the office. With the impending death of Windows xp next spring ( or at least the end of active microsoft support) has me looking at what's next
I loaded a demo copy of Window server 2008, thinking I'd try out terminal services. I was able to get it running, but the terminology, and plethora of settings was not trivial. I also started thinking about linux again
I've run 2 offices on linux servers for years, but all the work stations are various flavors of Windows running Avimark practice management software.
Several years back. I tried Avimark in linux using the Wine application loader. It kinda worked.
Big news.. this time with Ubuntu 12.04 and Wine 1.5xx it worked. I spent much of the last 3 weeks figuring out the settings to give me an optimal Avimark setup.
I also have accomplished stable terminal sessions via Remote Desktop Protocol.
It may not seem like much, but running terminal sessions is as fast as running Terminal services on a Microsoft 2008 server.
The cost savings will be very significant. Nothing says updates in Avimark won't break this, but the gamers keep the Wine team on their toes
Since the server is doing all the heavy lifting, I can use my ageing fleet of windows computers as terminals and get a significant speed boost. Upgrades can be incremental instead of all at once.
A significant plus, is that I can log in on my ipad via a secure tunnel, as well as use it over the wireless in the office. This also solves the problem of trying to use notebooks on a wireless network. As many can attest, it was slow, and it was unstable.
I went live on 5 terminals in the office this week, and after tweaking settings, it all works. It can peacefully coexist with other stations running on windows.
The only thing I had to give up was the real time spell checker. (direct screen writes blanked the child screens like notes and mcr) The spell checker can be left on, but the auto correct while typing has to be turned off. Stay tuned.
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