Backend problem

[Adrien Monteleone]

First, I will second Liz’s suggestion that the problem is most likely something to do with permissions. I will also second her suggestion that your file server should be a linux/BSD or similarly based NAS, not Windows 10.

On the permissions issue, I had a client decide to go for dual boot on a laptop because no matter how hard we tried, PhotoShop wouldn’t play nice in a win7 VM on Ubuntu. (It did work fine save for a few annoying minor inconveniences with two tools dealing with keyboard mapping, and the fact that a VM can’t expose the graphics hardware directly, which was not very robust in the first place on a $400 laptop) So I set up a shared partition to hold all of his images so he could access them from Windows or Linux. Unfortunately, Windows 8.1 ‘did something’ after the first time I accessed the partition so it would not mount properly at boot under Linux. (Bad superblock errors every time) I was never able to solve it. He has to click-mount the drive in Nautilus every time he runs a fresh session. It does mount and the files are accessible, but Linux doesn’t like whatever Windows 8 did to it. Incidentally, now he rarely even uses Windows for PhotoShop on that laptop and just uses his desktop instead.

I had another client that had piles of grief accessing files stored on a laptop he opted to ‘free upgrade’ to Win10. He was trying to access them from a Windows 7 laptop. This one was a 2-way roadblock. Neither machine could play nice and share files to the other. (I think Win7 was trying, it was Win10 that didn’t like it’s older brother) I’m sorry I don’t recall where the setting was, but I had to change a Win10 access control setting to get it to work properly again. Maybe that will point you in a productive direction.

On the file server side, I’ve converted a small business network from XP to Ubuntu. (about 11 machines) The first thing I did was change the files from being served by Windows to Linux, initially via Samba. I also networked all printers. (printing to shared USB printers connected to Windows boxes leads to no end of grief) That solved about 75% of all previous issues. A remaining 20% was solved by moving all of their desktops which had a propriety Windows only point of sale system, to VirtualBox VMs. I had every box running Ubuntu desktops that mounted NFS shares from the server at boot, then shared those directories to the VMs. Worked like a charm. I would have eventually massaged the POS app to work under Wine, but instead, I’m going to write them something custom that will address the remaining 5% of headaches that are a result of a poorly written and conceived app.

Has your client tested running the terminal emulators under Wine/Crossover? Were VMs considered for those apps?

Furthermore, I see your client is concerned with support cycles. As for Ubuntu vs. Win10, does he know Win10 only has support for 18 months?

Ubuntu issues releases every 6 months. Those have support for 18 months. Every 24 months, they issue a Long Term Support (LTS) release that they commit to supporting for 5 years. This doesn’t mean end of life. The software doesn’t stop working. And indeed, some software will still be updatable on it and someone usually compiles backports for a spell of the most popular apps. However, you won’t receive security patches after that 5 years. Ubuntu offers LTS > LTS upgrade paths. I’ve already used it twice with zero issues on multiple machines. (once from 12.04 > 14.04 and again from 14.04 > 16.04, I’ve even done more critical boxes from 12.04 > 16.04 at once albeit in two steps) Certainly, it is trivial to script application installation and configuration if you even wanted to fresh install the upgrades. My current server plan is to use 16.04 until support ends in April 2021, then upgrade to a more seasoned 20.04 and use that till April 2025, upgrade to 24.04 etc. I’ll be jumping two LTS versions every four years, but always to the latest version which has already had two rounds of point release bug fixes.

If your client switches to Windows 10, they will have to upgrade every 18 months. As it is, the first Windows 10 release (the free one) is already out of support. They planned for a 4 month release cycle with a 12 month!! support commitment, but they found that was ambitious. Their current paces is a 6-7 month release cycle and 18 months of support. They support 2 versions at a time, the most recent and the previous. Canonical supports up to 3 LTS versions over their 5 year span, along with 2-3 intervening regular releases. (12.04 just lost support when 17.04 came out, when 16.04 was released there were 3 LTS versions being supported, presently they support 14.04LTS, 16.04LTS, 16.10 and 17.04, and will still support all of these when 17.10 comes out)

Also, I went to the PowerTerm and TinyTerm websites and I can’t find any indication they are not going to support Linux further. They both still offer their linux (and Mac) versions and TinyTerm even still supports 32 bit linux distros. (and quite a number of distros overall)

Again, even if they stop ‘supporting’ the apps, that doesn’t mean they will cease to function. We’re talking terminal emulators here. I see from the PowerTerm version history they didn’t have any updates between 2006 and 2016, and then that latest one was for some font changes and to support newer SSH servers. Your client could be dealing with very mature software that simply doesn’t require constant development.

The bottom line is I don’t think this is a GnuCash issue. It’s an issue created by changes in Windows Access Control policy introduced in Windows 10, which your client exposed themselves to based on a possible misunderstanding of software support cycles. It’s your client, but If I had someone who liked Ubuntu and wanted to stay there, I’d suggest other approaches to deal with the support issues. This route doesn’t seem to be working.


> On Jan 24, 2017, at 11:00 AM, gnucash-user-request at gnucash.org wrote:
> 
> From: GatwickDP <gatwickdp at britmail.net <mailto:gatwickdp at britmail.net>>
> Subject: Re: Backend problem
> Date: January 23, 2017 at 11:38:58 PM CST
> To: <gnucash-user at gnucash.org <mailto:gnucash-user at gnucash.org>>
> Cc: <gnucash-user at gnucash.org <mailto:gnucash-user at gnucash.org>>
> Reply-To: <gatwickdp at britmail.net <mailto:gatwickdp at britmail.net>>
> 
> 
> Liz- this makes much sense to me and I can accept. The one minor question relative- is that he has an old win xp machine that when he creates a mirror- that the gnucash files will open from a ubuntu box.
> 
> --- edodd at billiau.net <mailto:edodd at billiau.net> wrote:
> 
> From: Liz <edodd at billiau.net <mailto:edodd at billiau.net>>
> To: gnucash-user at gnucash.org <mailto:gnucash-user at gnucash.org>
> Subject: Re: Backend problem
> Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2017 12:07:40 +1100
> 
> On Mon, 23 Jan 2017 16:57:08 -0800
> GatwickDP <gatwickdp at britmail.net <mailto:gatwickdp at britmail.net>> wrote:
> 
>> All the folders show
>>   and are an exact mirror from what is on the Ubuntu machine. 
> 
> This is not possible, an "exact mirror". The windows file systems do
> not have the ownerships and permissions of the ext4 or other filesystem
> used in linux systems.
> 
> Often when something doesn't work in linux it's a permissions problem.
> 
> Bluntly, Win10 is not a solution to this person's problem. It opens up
> huge problems, as the plan is to store a private database on what is
> well reported to be a system which "calls home" repeatedly.
> 
> A commercial NAS box, or a home built one, would be a better solution.
> 
> 
> Liz