I'm having major difficulties with a new server setup. Maybe it's a bit much
to want at once, but here is what I want:

- Ubuntu server with kvm/qemu [DONE]
- Ubuntu JeOS with Kubuntu on that server [INSTALLED]
- remote acces with XDMCP [DONE]
- Home directories on NFS share [?]

Well, installing everything was no problem, but I have several difficulties. I
tried using a Solaris 10 server with ZFS filesystems as NFS server.
Performance was horrible. Starting any program (like Dolphin) took several
minutes. Moving a window was something that could be done with a lot of
patience.

Thinking it was the Solaris implementation of NFS, I tried using the virtual
host as an NFS server. That worked a whole lot better. Desktop performance is
very good.

However, now I noticed that Akonadi does not work. It just will not start. The
first time, akonadi took the whole virtual machine down during the time where
you see the program bar. (That's right. I couldn't even get in with ssh
anymore.) I already tried setting the apparmor profile to complain instead of
enforce. This makes no difference.

What could I be doing wrong? I'm starting to fear Akonadi just doesn't like
NFS, but that would be a disaster. Can anyone confirm this?

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On Mon, Mar 23, 2009 at 8:46 AM, Alvin <info@alvin.be> wrote:
> I'm having major difficulties with a new server setup. Maybe it's a bit much
> to want at once, but here is what I want:
>
> - Ubuntu server with kvm/qemu [DONE]
> - Ubuntu JeOS with Kubuntu on that server [INSTALLED]
> - remote acces with XDMCP [DONE]
> - Home directories on NFS share [?]
>
> Well, installing everything was no problem, but I have several difficulties. I
> tried using a Solaris 10 server with ZFS filesystems as NFS server.
> Performance was horrible. Starting any program (like Dolphin) took several
> minutes. Moving a window was something that could be done with a lot of
> patience.
>
> Thinking it was the Solaris implementation of NFS, I tried using the virtual
> host as an NFS server. That worked a whole lot better. Desktop performance is
> very good.

In general, if only home dirs are on NFS I wouldn't expect much
performance impost on application startup. I suppose if the
application is also stored in the home dir there would be performance
impact.

In general, whene I have unexplained performance problems, look at
your networking. If DNS is not working right, that could explain the
pause. A firewall could prevent identd or some other server from
working and the pause could be caused by waiting for a timeout.

>
> However, now I noticed that Akonadi does not work. It just will not start. The
> first time, akonadi took the whole virtual machine down during the time where
> you see the program bar. (That's right. I couldn't even get in with ssh
> anymore.) I already tried setting the apparmor profile to complain instead of
> enforce. This makes no difference.
>
> What could I be doing wrong? I'm starting to fear Akonadi just doesn't like
> NFS, but that would be a disaster. Can anyone confirm this?

You could use strace to see what akonadi is doing when it starts. Is
everything slow, or are there particular calls that make it hang?

Michael

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On Tuesday 24 March 2009 17:49:08 Michael Hirsch wrote:
> On Mon, Mar 23, 2009 at 8:46 AM, Alvin <info@alvin.be> wrote:
> > I'm having major difficulties with a new server setup. Maybe it's a bit
> > much to want at once, but here is what I want:
> >
> > - Ubuntu server with kvm/qemu [DONE]
> > - Ubuntu JeOS with Kubuntu on that server [INSTALLED]
> > - remote acces with XDMCP [DONE]
> > - Home directories on NFS share [?]
> >
> > Well, installing everything was no problem, but I have several
> > difficulties. I tried using a Solaris 10 server with ZFS filesystems as
> > NFS server. Performance was horrible. Starting any program (like Dolphin)
> > took several minutes. Moving a window was something that could be done
> > with a lot of patience.
> >
> > Thinking it was the Solaris implementation of NFS, I tried using the
> > virtual host as an NFS server. That worked a whole lot better. Desktop
> > performance is very good.
>
> In general, if only home dirs are on NFS I wouldn't expect much
> performance impost on application startup. I suppose if the
> application is also stored in the home dir there would be performance
> impact.
>
> In general, whene I have unexplained performance problems, look at
> your networking. If DNS is not working right, that could explain the
> pause. A firewall could prevent identd or some other server from
> working and the pause could be caused by waiting for a timeout.

Networking is no problem. I don't understand the Solaris NFS troubles. That
server is serving a lot of other machines without any performance issues, but
putting your home with KDE on it just doesn't work.

In the second case, we're talking about NFS from a virtual host to his virtual
guest. There's no physical wire, so I'm not worried about speed. No firewall,
no DNS.

> > However, now I noticed that Akonadi does not work. It just will not
> > start. The first time, akonadi took the whole virtual machine down during
> > the time where you see the program bar. (That's right. I couldn't even
> > get in with ssh anymore.) I already tried setting the apparmor profile to
> > complain instead of enforce. This makes no difference.
> >
> > What could I be doing wrong? I'm starting to fear Akonadi just doesn't
> > like NFS, but that would be a disaster. Can anyone confirm this?
>
> You could use strace to see what akonadi is doing when it starts. Is
> everything slow, or are there particular calls that make it hang?

It's not slow. It crashes X the first time, and other times, it just won't
start.

Today, I used a virtual qemu2 disk and mounted that as /home.
Everything works as it should. Akonadi still takes the X server down on its
first start when you use XDMCP, but after that first session, it behaves.

Conclusion: Akonadi DOES NOT work on NFS shared homes. Therefore, KDE no
longer works on NFS, and that is truly a shame.

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