dhis2-devs team mailing list archive

[Ola Hodne Titlestad <olatitle@xxxxxxxxx>]

On 28 January 2010 14:28, Bob Jolliffe <bobjolliffe@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Hi
>
> 2010/1/28 Knut Staring <knutst@xxxxxxxxx>
>
>> Thanks Bob,
>>
>> I don't know how many people are currently interested in running DHIS2 on
>> Ubuntu, but I don't think it is negligible, and I would like to see it
>> increase. The reason this came up now, is that I have been trying to guide
>> people in Malawi over IM, not an efficient process. Installation needs to be
>> made as easy as possible - preferably also in "standalone" conditions, i.e.
>> where you bring a USB stick or CD to a computer with no or sloooow internet
>> connection. We should not require end users to have to touch the command
>> line or know about config files.
>>
>
> This is exactly what dhis2-live does using h2.  Unpack and run.  And its
> platform neutral.
>
> Yes, so we need something almost as simple for postgres and mysql. There
are many standalone ubuntu installs with postgres in Sierra Leone, and more
to come in other countries I am sure.


> There are several approaches, and we could offer more than one:
>>
>> 0) Write out the steps (including for Postgres and Mysql) in a clear and
>> easy to follow manner, prominently displayed on dhis2.org
>>
>
> OK. I can do that.
>
>>
>> 1) An installer that basically just unzips everything you need. This was
>> done already 3-4 years ago in Kerala by Øystein, using BitRock (he also made
>> a CD image that installed DHIS2 and Mysql on Windows, then created a
>> partition for Linux, installed the very lightweight http://wolvix.org/ distro
>> with Tomcat and pointed it to the same Mysql database on the Windows
>> partition).
>>
>> 2) A more conventional installer using IzPack that does what is required
>>
>> 3) "meta-debs" as you suggest
>>
>
> You can yourself just go into dhis2/tools/dhis2deb and modify the
> hibernate.properties to connect to a postgres database instead.  And add
> postgres to dependencies.  Then make to create a dhis2-postgres.deb
> version.  Its still a bit complicated because you'd have to also create the
> dhis2 database in postgres as part of the installation.  (That's also what
> is nice about h2 :-)
>
>
There are lots of config stuff that needs to be done after a default
postgres/tomcat/java install on any platform, and the dhis installer should
take care of these.

Here are some steps that I can think of now:
- set the postgres password (for the postgres user)
- open postgres to remote connections
- configure the pg_hba.conf correctly (e.g. to allow all on local network to
connect, or all IP)
- create a dhis user in postgres
- create an empty dhis database in postgres owned by dhis user
- make tomcat user own all files in tomcat/ and make this user start the
tomcat process
- create a tomcat startup script that is run at reboot
- create a dhis directory and an envir variable for this
- increase memory allocation with JAVA_OPTS (with user input?)
....and I am sure there are more little steps that we could take care of to
make it a better user/admin experience



> Ideally IMHO we might have a super-admin view of dhis without the database
> connection with a set of simple web steps to setup the connection rather
> than fiddling manually with hibernate.properties.  Not unlike the openmrs
> installer.  A puzzle to solve is that we use the same database for user
> authentication that we use for data.  So without connection you can't log in
> ... and without login you can't set up connections ... etc.  Would be nice
> one day to separate these.
>
> I like the way openmrs is taking care of db stuff at webapp startup in web
UI. The tool they use for this was mentioned here on the list some months
back, can't remember the name now.


> Cheers
> Bob
>
>>
>> 4) Provide downloadable Ubuntu virtual machines images with everything
>> nicely set up
>>
>> My take is that I could do 0) right now, 3) could follow when you have
>> some time, and 4) perhaps longer term.
>>
>> Knut
>>
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Jan 28, 2010 at 12:08 PM, Bob Jolliffe <bobjolliffe@xxxxxxxxx>wrote:
>>
>>> The deb package as it is currently is set up with dependencies on java
>>> and tomcat (so they will be triggered to install if necessary).  By default
>>> it will just run out of the box using an h2 database in /opt/dhis2/database.
>>>
>>> I held off on the postgres dependency because I know there are also mysql
>>> users out there so it didn't seem right to make it a dependency.  So
>>> currently you would be required to:
>>>
>>> 1.  install dhis2 from deb
>>> 2.  install postgres (apt-get install )
>>> 3.  configure hibernate.properties manually
>>>
>>> I guess what would be useful hand-holding would be to have a
>>> dhis2-postgres meta package which does the above three, though I'm not sure
>>> entirely how to handle dependencies where dhis2 is not yet available from
>>> ubuntu repositories.  Basically this would just contain just the
>>> hibernate.properties and the dependency information.  A dhis2-mysql package
>>> would look very similar.
>>>
>>> One solution would be to host the debs in a repository on dhis2.org.
>>> Then it would just be a case of getting users to add http://dhis2.org to
>>> their software sources.
>>>
>>> A simpler (and much uglier) solution is to create dhis2-postgres as an
>>> alternative version of dhis2 package with the exception that this has the
>>> webapp as well as the postgres dependency and hibernate.properties
>>>
>>> Cheers
>>> Bob
>>>
>>> PS.  How real is the use case.  ie is it worth putting effort into this?
>>> I didn't get the sense that there was too much interest in the deb.  It
>>> seems to be a useful little curiosity.
>>>
>>> 2010/1/28 Ola Hodne Titlestad <olatitle@xxxxxxxxx>
>>>
>>> Hi,
>>>>
>>>> I think it would be really useful to have a .deb package that is set up
>>>> to use postgres out of the box.
>>>>
>>>> Ideally the DHIS deb install process should trigger installs of any
>>>> other needed packages, like java, tomcat, postgres. Would that be possible?
>>>>
>>>> Ola
>>>> ----------
>>>>
>>>> 2010/1/28 Knut Staring <knutst@xxxxxxxxx>
>>>>
>>>>>  There is some good info at
>>>>> http://bazaar.launchpad.net/~dhis2-devs-core/dhis2/trunk/annotate/head:/tools/dhis2deb/Readme.txt<http://bazaar.launchpad.net/%7Edhis2-devs-core/dhis2/trunk/annotate/head:/tools/dhis2deb/Readme.txt>
>>>>>
>>>>> But it is hidden away in an obscure place and not complete enough to be
>>>>> truly helpful for an installation - unlike the DHIS2 Live or  IzPack
>>>>> installers we have for Windows.
>>>>>
>>>>> k
>>>>>
>>>>> 2010/1/28 Lars Helge Øverland <larshelge@xxxxxxxxx>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> See dhis2/tools/dhis2deb/Readme.txt in the repo.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>> Cheers,
>>>>> Knut Staring
>>>>>
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~dhis2-devs<https://launchpad.net/%7Edhis2-devs>
>>>>> Post to     : dhis2-devs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>>>> Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~dhis2-devs<https://launchpad.net/%7Edhis2-devs>
>>>>> More help   : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~dhis2-devs<https://launchpad.net/%7Edhis2-devs>
>>>> Post to     : dhis2-devs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>>> Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~dhis2-devs<https://launchpad.net/%7Edhis2-devs>
>>>> More help   : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Cheers,
>> Knut Staring
>>
>
>