[Info-vax] Installing and using GNV - some feedback and questions

[Scott Dorsey]

David Froble  <davef at tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
>
>If a user is to only be allowed in the container / application / whatever 
>assigned to him, then logging into the base OS seems to be giving the user more
>than would be appropriate?

Right, and on some big iron virtual system there is no real "base OS" in
the first place.

>Should users logged into the base OS be allowed to access all containers? 
>Perhaps a login to the container might be appropriate?

Users don't get accounts on the base OS.  The systems staff get accounts
on the base OS.  Maybe in some bigger installations the operators might
get a restricted account on the base OS too.

>With one OS, the issue of multiple OS licenses seems to go away?

Indeed.

>Being able to boot from a container doesn't seem to be very useful.  If only 
>that container is to be run, then why use a container?  Yes, I understand 
>testing a new OS version, and such, but that's what test systems are for, not 
>production systems.

In the VM world, you can run production and test LPARs on the same computer
at the same time without interference.  This was a big deal in a day when
hardware was big and expensive.  Today I think it is less of a big deal but
it's still nice in that it allows a quick changeover between development
and production.

>It seems to me that containers may be useful in some scenarios, but not so much
>otherwise.  I've loaded the Python containers, and yes, it was simple, and 
>"contained".  But for production, it adds another layer of complexity.

It does.  I think of containers and virtual machines as a thing that people do
because they can't trust their operating systems to keep applications from
stepping on one another.  If the operating system is good about managing 
resources, then virtual machines buy you little except the ability to switch
between environments, and to freeze and reload running systems.  

However, because virtualization has become pretty much universal today,
people running data centers expect it.  And those abilities to switch 
and suspend and restore turn out to be wonderful.

>A good capability to have, and already to some extent available, but, not to be
>used just because it's available.

A lot of people do use it just because it's available, but that's not the
fault of the designers.
--scott


-- 
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."