NethServer on a Apple MacMini

NethServer Version: NethServer release 7.6.1810 (final)

I would like to put some photos, but I’m not allowed… :frowning: I’m new…

Hi, fellas. I’d like to tell you a little bit about myself.
I’ve been a user of Apple systems since 1998. Apple has changed a lot in these years, and as you well know has abandoned the server market, I do not think it was a good move, but I do not want to do politics here.
I had to look around because I had to offer my customers services that they used a lot on MacOS servers. And I met Nethserver and was very happy. On Monday I got an Apple Macmini server 2010 (4.1) and what do you think the OS I installed? Ubuntu o Win server ?? :slight_smile: noooo!

I used the ISO installation burned to DVD and booted from external USB drive.

I customized the formatting of the discs in this way:

BIOS boot
Boot
RAID BTRFS 2 disk (RAID1)
Swap

[root@srv ~]# btrfs fi show
Label: ‘BTR_RAID1’ uuid: 570d41c9-d1b0-45ce-977c-6b125adc2e7a
Total devices 2 FS bytes used 10.70GiB
devid 1 size 461.34GiB used 12.01GiB path /dev/sda2
devid 2 size 461.34GiB used 12.01GiB path /dev/sdb2

[root@srv ~]# lsblk -f
NAME FSTYPE LABEL UUID MOUNTPOINT
sda
├─sda1 ext2 16307521-4e9d-4171-8532-6886bd493b6f /boot
└─sda2 btrfs BTR_RAID1 570d41c9-d1b0-45ce-977c-6b125adc2e7a /
sdb
├─sdb1
├─sdb2 btrfs BTR_RAID1 570d41c9-d1b0-45ce-977c-6b125adc2e7a
└─sdb3 swap 4135e47e-42d6-4066-92a7-cccddcff63d5 [SWAP]

I admit that I’m not really that expert on linux platforms and then I used Boot Repair to “fix” the boot partition because it started only by pressing the “Alt” key at the start of the Macmini. “Alt” allows you to manually choose the boot disk.

I know that BTRFS is still experimental but I already use it on other Lenovo ThinkSystem and HP Proliant servers and I feel really good (I installed Nethserver Enterprice), but with RAID hardware and not RAID BTRFS software. This is the first with BTRFS with software raid.

I activated these services
WebTop (shared calendar only)
AD
Document sharing
Fail 2 ban
UPS support
Statistics
SNMP

These are the specifications:
Macmini 8GB of ram
Intel® Core™2 Duo CPU P8800 @ 2.66GHz
2x 500GB HDD 7200

Too bad the dashboard doesn’t detect the BTRFS raid :frowning: it would be very useful to implement this filesystem.

Italian translation!

Dato che sono italiano scrivo anche per gli italiani :smiley: perchè è bello.

Ciao amici, vorrei raccontavi un po di me.
Sono un utilizzatore di sistemi Apple dal 1998. Apple è cambiata molto in questi anni, e come ben sapete ha abbandonato il mercato server, secondo me non è stata una buona mossa, ma non voglio fare politica qui.
Ho dovuto guardarmi attorno perchè ai miei clienti dovevo offrire dei servizi che usavano molto su MacOS server. E ho conosciuto Nethserver e sono rimasto molto contento. Lunedi mi è capitato in mano un Apple Macmini server 2010 (4.1) e secondo voi che OS ho installato? Ubuntu o Win server ?? :slight_smile: noooo!

Ho usato la ISO di installazione masterizzata su DVD e ho avviato da unità esterna USB.

Ho personalizzato la formattazione dei dischi in questa modo:

BIOS boot
Boot
RAID BTRFS 2 disk (RAID1)
Swap

[root@srv ~]# btrfs fi show
Label: ‘BTR_RAID1’ uuid: 570d41c9-d1b0-45ce-977c-6b125adc2e7a
Total devices 2 FS bytes used 10.70GiB
devid 1 size 461.34GiB used 12.01GiB path /dev/sda2
devid 2 size 461.34GiB used 12.01GiB path /dev/sdb2

[root@srv ~]# lsblk -f
NAME FSTYPE LABEL UUID MOUNTPOINT
sda
├─sda1 ext2 16307521-4e9d-4171-8532-6886bd493b6f /boot
└─sda2 btrfs BTR_RAID1 570d41c9-d1b0-45ce-977c-6b125adc2e7a /
sdb
├─sdb1
├─sdb2 btrfs BTR_RAID1 570d41c9-d1b0-45ce-977c-6b125adc2e7a
└─sdb3 swap 4135e47e-42d6-4066-92a7-cccddcff63d5 [SWAP]

Ammetto che non sono proprio cosi esperto di piattaforme linux e quindi ho poi usato Boot Repair per “aggiustare” la partizione di boot perchè si avviava solo premendo il tasto “Alt” all’avvio del Macmini. “Alt” permette di scegliere manualmente il disco di avvio.

So che BTRFS è ancora sperimentale ma lo uso già su altri server Lenovo ThinkSystem e HP Proliant e mi trovo davvero bene (ho installato Nethserver Enterprice), ma con RAID hardware e non RAID BTRFS software. Questo è il primo con BTRFS con raid software.

Ho attivato questi servizi
WebTop (solo calendario condiviso)
AD
Condivisione documenti
Fail 2 ban
UPS support
Statistiche
SNMP

Queste le specifiche:
Macmini 8GB di ram
Intel® Core™2 Duo CPU P8800 @ 2.66GHz
2x 500GB HDD 7200

Peccato che nella dashboard non venga rilevato il raid BTRFS :frowning: sarebbe molto utile implementare questo filesystem.

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What I’ve found is that BTRFS is not updated by Redhat anymore

https://www.centos.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=63558

What Do you think about ZFS

Perhaps @danb35 can say something more about it.

XFS that is proposed by default I do not like, ZFS I had some experience testing with nas4free but I did not get along very well, if the capacity starts to saturate you lose significantly performance.
BTRFS seemed to me the most modern choice. I am very surprised that the RHEL 7.4 BTRFS was no longer supported.

Are you comfortable with ZFS?
EXT4 and EX3 are not considered at all!

…and good riddance to it, it’s broken by design.

I wouldn’t recommend ZFS for a RHEL/CentOS-based system, unfortunately (and certainly not to boot from ZFS); there’s just too much manual configuration necessary. It could be usable for a data pool (i.e., boot as normal, but mount a ZFS pool in the desired configuration at /var/lib/nethserver), but even then CentOS doesn’t make it all that easy*. Ubuntu seems to support it pretty well, but that doesn’t really help us for Nethserver.

  • Edit: the problem here is that, with new CentOS minor releases (e.g., 7.5 to 7.6), the ZFS tools change, and you’ll need to manually update the yum repo to point to the correct version.

But the only software RAID that will show up in the dashboard would be the md-based version that’s used by default in Nethserver.

Well, it’s more “modern” than ZFS in that it was written more recently. If it actually worked and delivered on its promises, it would be great. But it doesn’t. Synology seems to have some success using btrfs as a filesystem, but mdadm as the volume manager, which would seem to avoid the most badly-broken parts of btrfs (which are pretty much anything that deals with RAID), but also loses the RAID benefits it’s supposed to have.

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