Arch Linux

brewlius_cesar

Member

From: VA

Registered: 2013-06-07

Posts: 24

Developing on Remote Machines

I'm looking to get some feedback from some fellow Linux developers about the system setup at the place where I work.

Where I work, everyone is issued a Windows laptop by the corporate IT department to do all of their work on.  Everything that has the word Windows in it falls under the responsibility of the IT department.  At the same time, there is a cluster of around 40 Linux "servers" that are adminstrated by the department that I work for.  Most of the time these servers run behind a resource manager (TORQUE) and run engineering calculation jobs that are submitted by members of the department.  This works fine for most users because they are able to read/edit their calculation files locally and then submit their jobs to the cluster.

Within this same cluster, there are one or two Linux machines which are designated as "development" machines.  These machines don't receive jobs from users, but instead all developers connect to them to: develop their sources using ClearCase (awful!), perform builds, perform debugging, and running tests.  This is always done from the developer's Windows laptop using SSH and a Windows X11 server.  The machines are often very busy and occassionally somebody is doing something which renders the system unusable to everybody else.

Bottom line is: I find this setup extraordinarily annoying.  Use and development of graphical applications is frequently slow and often freezes.  (Even worse when connecting remotely via the VPN!)  Everyday I come into work and immediately connect to and perform all of my work on the central Linux development machine, effectively making my Windows laptop a paperweight with an email client.

I've told the admins that I think it is in everyone's best interest to just get our users (or at least developers) some local Linux machines, or port all of our software to Windows (please no), but the suggestion has not provided anything fruitful.  Corporate IT clearly is in love with Windows, but that just doesn't seem like enough to justify the productivity hits.

Some desired feedback from this community:
    - Is this setup reasonable and I am just being a whiner?
    - Anyone else worked in setups similar to this?
    - What are some facts that can make an argument for either case (keeping the current or migrating)?

Thanks in advance.

ewaller

Administrator

From: Pasadena, CA

Registered: 2009-07-13

Posts: 20,346

Re: Developing on Remote Machines

A few disjoint thoughts.

Have you considered using something like emacs with tramp?  It lets you treat files on a remote machine as if they are local using an ssh tunnel.
Why not set up a VM in VirtualBox or VMware on the Windows box?.  Be careful of the license though, this is a work environment and the no-cost licenses are often reserved for hobby/educational applications.  I have two screens on my desk attached to the same Windows 7 box.  The screen on the right is always a full screen i3 session running on Arch in a VM.  I even use shared drives in the VM to point to networked "Windows Active Directory" volumes that are authenticated from the Windows side and are mapped to drive letters.

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brewlius_cesar

Member

From: VA

Registered: 2013-06-07

Posts: 24

Re: Developing on Remote Machines

Thanks ewaller

I'm not familiar with emacs/tramp, but I will do some researching.

I hadn't thought about a virtual machine, I will check with my supervisor to see if it is "allowed" by corporate IT's policies.  My recollection was that the software is available but all virtual machines are not allowed to have any network access.

The only possible problem I see with the VM solution is the integration with ClearCase's file system.  It has its own special file system layer which may or may not be friendly to being mounted to a virtual machine.

nadman10

Member

From: Erie, PA

Registered: 2005-10-15

Posts: 201

Re: Developing on Remote Machines

I was in a very similar position within the last year. I started working in the IT department of a medium sized business. Due to the bureaucracy, I couldn't take it anymore and transferred departments. For example, we had maybe five Ubuntu workstations for engineers and they were required by IT to join the Windows domain. WHY!? In the new department, I was allowed to take an old laptop with 512MB of RAM I found in a closet and do any development I needed to do on it. I SSH into it from my assigned Windows laptop. I feel it is still faster than most of the other rack servers here.