WebGUI Blog

Admin tip, install modules using cpanm

mandatoryurl — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 20:57:08 -0600

cpanm is a great addition to your perl toolbox. It makes installing new modules very, very easy. I’ve known about it for a while, but never really needed it until I tried to install a module that was created with a BSD tar, instead of GNU tar. cpan would die during the tar extraction stage, but cpanm just ignored the error about unknown inodes and installed the module right away.

If you’d like to use cpanm to install all the modules required when upgrading WebGUI, you can invoke this:

perl testEnvironment.pl —simpleReport | ack ‘Not Install’ | perl -ane ‘print $F[3]. ” “’ | perl -pe ‘s/: / /g’ | cpanm

To update any modules which require newer versions:

perl testEnvironment.pl —simpleReport | ack ‘Outdated’ | perl -ane ‘print $F[3]. ” “’ | perl -pe ‘s/: / /g’ | cpanm

ack is a pure-perl replacement for grep, so if you want to do install and upgrade at the same time all you need to do is change the regexp.

Source

plainblackguy — Sun, 26 Feb 2012 23:55:39 -0600

Source

Using WebGUI 8 before it's released...

mandatoryurl — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 10:02:06 -0600

If you are looking for a dead stable, slow moving branch of WebGUI to use for your website, WebGUI 8.0 is not for you. We will be pouring features into it. If you need stable, then please use WebGUI 7.10, which will only ever have bug-fixes applied to it. If you need absolutely stable, then use WebGUI 7.9, which will never have releases again.

As has been for the last several months, all of our work is in getting the hosting infrastructure set up for WebGUI 8, so that Plain Black’s websites can be moved over to it. The last element of that is the demo server, and we’re debugging it now.

Another part of that hosting infrastructure is Task::WebGUI, a new cpan module that will setup and install all of WebGUI’s perl module dependencies for you. If you choose a source install, then a simple:

cpanm Task::WebGUI

will install everything for you. However, the version on CPAN is currently minorly out of date. If you install it today, then you will not get every module needed for WebGUI 8. After the demo system is working, then Task::WebGUI will be updated.

Major milestone: branching

mandatoryurl — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 13:33:45 -0600

We keep inching closer to making the 8.0 beta release. Today was a major milestone in that we created the webgui-7.10 branch, and merged in all the WebGUI code in the master branch of our git repository.

For those of you with git access, please note that from this point onward, any bugfixing in 7.10 will need to hand ported over to the master branch with WebGUI 8 code. Pay careful attention to the API changes in docs/migration.txt, and the new upgrade script style.

WebGUI 7.10.24 released

mandatoryurl — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 23:21:56 -0600

This stable release of WebGUI 7.10.24 contains fixes for 13 different bugs
in the Asset Manager, Calendar, Asset Report, Login Macros, Passive Analytics, Shop
and the Survey.

Gotchas

WebGUI now depends on Business::OnlinePayment::AuthorizeNet. This version should install automatically via the testEnvironment.pl script, or the perl-standard CPAN module.

Bug Fixes

- fixed #12318: asset error causes asset manager to fail
- fixed #12308: error message used scalar as reference
- fixed #12256: Calendar Search doesn’t show admin controls
- fixed #12268: Point of sale form missing from cart screen.
- fixed #12201: AssetReport - no selects.
- fixed #12269: Login / Loginbox with encryptlogin
- fixed #12271: Calendar List View does not always show labels
- fixed Passive Analytics, UI, Progress Bar, server load.
- fixed #12303: Survey custom multiple choice question types
- fixed #12304: Surven packages do not include custom question types
- fixed #12309: Some child assets ignore visitor cache timeouts
- fixed possible values and default values on EMS submission.
- fixed #12312: Shop account plugin has unrendered macro
- fixed #12315: Remove yui tests from git repo.

wreservice shortcuts

mandatoryurl — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 08:03:05 -0600

WRE 8 still uses the wreservice.pl script for starting and stopping web processes. However, since we have new binaries, you have access to some new switches

Nginx replaces Apache/modproxy so you can use wreservice.pl —option nginx to control it. modproxy remains and is an alias for nginx for people with strong muscle memory. In addition to —start, —stop and —restart, there is also —reload, which forces nginx to reread its configuration files with less downtime than —restart. We may add —reopen as well, which makes nginx close and reopen its logfiles quickly without a full shutdown.

Starman replaces Apache/modperl and you use wreservice.pl —option starman to control it. Like with nginx/modproxy, modperl is an alias for starman. There are no fancy options for starman yet, but we may add support for start_server’s —restart switch, which is a little cleaner

web is an alias for “nginx starman”, so wreservice.pl —restart web still does the right thing.

—ping works with all web services.

wreservice.pl no longer has any controls for starting or stopping mysql. You’ll need to use the init scripts for mysql.

YAW8 Update

mandatoryurl — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 17:17:53 -0600

(that’s Yet Another WRE 8 Update. Sorry, been reading too many YAPC posts.)

New stuff that works:

Testing logfile rotation.
Testing backups.
Testing the wremonitor.
nginx handling of static content from /extras.
Documentation, lots and lots of documentation about what’s changed and how to use the WRE now.

What’s still to be done (in rough order of decreasing priority):

The demo server.
nginx handling of public files from /uploads.

What happens to my custom code in WebGUI 8?

mandatoryurl — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 15:36:26 -0600

The simplest, shortest answer is as follows:

It will require upgrading.

WebGUI 8 has API changes to WebGUI::Session and to WebGUI::Asset, and those changes pretty much require that most custom code will need to be upgraded. Many simple macros and form plugins may not need changes, but by far and large it is safest to assume that they will.

That was the bad news, this is the good news.

We had to migrate WebGUI itself over to the new API so it can be done. Between Plain Black support and the WebGUI forums you have resources for help in doing that.
We have a script to help automate some of the Asset work. It will be released to the Add ons and Plugins section on webgui.org.
The migration document has a full list of the API changes.

WRE 8: Help with nginx configurations

mandatoryurl — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 00:02:05 -0600

There is no easy way to build good nginx configurations by translating your Apache configurations. I did find a site that offers a translator, but it often generates configs using the If directive, which can have some nasty side effects inside nginx.

The nginx wiki is a good technical reference on what nginx can do and how to set things up. It also has examples of full configuration files.

Most people add rewrite rules to their modproxy configurations, and nginx does have URL rewriting rules, but they work differently from Apache’s and nginx also provides more efficient ways of handling some situations. Please read the Common Configuration Pitfalls for examples of that.

WRE 8 update

mandatoryurl — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 19:48:09 -0600

A quick bullet point update:

Stuff that works:

Setting up a new site with the WRE via wresetup.pl
Adding sites.
Removing sites.
wreservice can start, stop and ping nginx and starman.
starman is service up WebGUI.
nginx is passing dynamic content.
Logs are going to the correct places.

What’s still to be done (in rough order of decreasing priority):

Testing logfile rotation.
Testing backups.
Testing the wremonitor.
nginx handling of static content from /extras, and public files from /uploads.
Documentation, lots and lots of documentation about what’s changed and how to use the WRE now.
The demo server.

Although this has been said in the past, and probably too many, I think we can have a WRE beta done by Friday, which means that releases could start flowing again the following Monday.

Stay tuned for more details.

Learning about WebGUI 8 - Thanks Doug!

mandatoryurl — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 00:03:05 -0600

Doug Bell (aka preaction on IRC and various other places) wrote a series of articles about WebGUI 8. You’ll find them in his blog and archives at blogs.perl.org.

What do I need to learn to use WebGUI 8

mandatoryurl — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 11:09:05 -0600

If you are a regular user of WebGUI 8, then you should spend some time in the new Admin Console to get a feel for how it works. It’s always a good idea to learn how to use Template::Toolkit as it will save you time and give you more power and flexibility in your templating.

If you are a developer of WebGUI and want to work in 8, then I suggest the following list of modules:

Moose, concentrating on attributes, method modifiers and roles.
Plack, since we use Plack::Response and Plack::Request objects instead of the older way of interacting with modperl.
plackup, starman and starlet for replacing Apache & modperl.
nginx, so that you can migrate your configuration files from Apache.

What happens to WebGUI 7 bugs and RFEs

mandatoryurl — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 00:18:06 -0600

After WebGUI 8 is released, our focus will be stabilize it. We will also resume making 7.10 releases as time and resources allow so that bug fixes get out to our customers and users.

The release of WebGUI 8 will obsolete some RFEs and bugs, and they will be closed. It will also give us the chance to fix some long standing problems with WebGUI that could not be easily fixed in 7.

What are the risks of upgrading to WebGUI 8?

mandatoryurl — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 12:01:00 -0600

Hopefully, the last post whet your appetite for using WebGUI 8. You should remember that when WebGUI 8.0 is released, it will be a beta. Beta means that www.webgui.org and www.plainblack.com are using the software, and that we expect it to be usable but less stable than 7.10. This helps to guarantee that we feel your pain, even before you do.

The new Admin console required changes to the Layout templates. Existing templates will continue to work, with caveats I’ve described in this blog post. As part of an early effort to make WebGUI 8 more compatible with Template::Toolkit, variables were changed in two macro templates. Existing templates will be upgraded for the new names.

It has taken many man-weeks of time to upgrade our custom code. If you have custom code, you should have similar expectations. Large pieces of the WebGUI API have changed. To help developers understand the extent of the changes, we’ve created a migration document that you can read now on github.

People familiar with WebGUI know to read the gotchas file for more details about what is changing.

WebGUI 8 will contain new bugs. Some of them are already on the bug tracker. More discussion about bugs and 7 vs 8 in the next post.

What are the benefits of upgrading to WebGUI 8

mandatoryurl — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 22:08:05 -0600

It’s been a long time since WebGUI 8 was initially announced, and from the postings on forums and questions on IRC I have the feeling that:

People have forgotten what WebGUI 8’s goals are.
We haven’t done a very good job of communicating the difference between where 8 was headed, and where it is today.

That changes today. This is the first in a series of posts to answer FAQ-type questions about WebGUI 8. If you have a question like this, please post them as a comment to this blog.

So, what are the benefits of WebGUI 8?

Simply, WebGUI 8 is supposed to be a faster version of WebGUI 7 in two aspects, from a UI perspective, and from a development perspective.

From a UI perspective, we’ve made WebGUI use less memory and be faster at generating content. The new Admin Console is an AJAX application, so managing Assets does not require loading a new page for every edit.

From a developer’s standpoint, we’ve made it easier to write WebGUI code. WebGUI 8 is much more modern. We’ve adopted Moose for most objects in the system. We use Plack. WebGUI 8 will take advantage of perl 5.10 features like smart match. All of those changes, and others unmentioned, mean API changes.

But that’s the next Post, “What are the risks of upgrading to WebGUI 8”.

WebGUI 8 is ready, WRE 8 not so much

mandatoryurl — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 10:06:48 -0600

The coding for the custom apps is done. The HelpDesk, Karma Gifter, and Bazaar are all working in WebGUI 8. However, there is still one more hurdle to overcome, and that’s the WRE.

The WRE for WebGUI 8 will be very different. Instead of apache and modperl, we will be using starman, which is a small webserver written in Perl and C. Instead of apache’s modproxy, we will be using nginx, which is a high performance proxy server. The backup system has been changed to use rsync instead of sftp for more speed in backing up sites with large uploads directories, and instead of a custom log rotation system we will be using logrotate.

What does all this mean?

We no longer need two apache binaries for the WRE. This means that it should be possible to use native system packages on Debian, Fedora, SUSE and other Unix operating systems and use the WRE utilities for site creation.
The WRE is much smaller than it used to be, so we will be maintaining less code. This is a very good thing.
A formal release of WebGUI 8 will continue to be delayed until the new WRE is done. All the changes above require new scripts and modules and templating and configuration and testing.
The aforementioned changes also are preventing me from making a WebGUI 8 demo server available in the short term.

However, just like WebGUI 7, it is possible for developers and advanced users to run WebGUI 8 in an environment without the WRE. Instructions will be posted in the next few days on how to do that.

My hope is that several of you from the community will do that, and help with the testing of WebGUI 8 beta. I have been posting version 8 specific bugs to the WebGUI bug tracker, with 8: as a prefix in the bug title.

2 down, one to go

mandatoryurl — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 23:50:07 -0600

There are three main custom apps used on plainblack.com and webgui.org:

The HelpDesk (used for bug reports and RFEs)
The Bazaar (so people can share their WebGUI work)
The Karma Gifter (so people can give other people karma for doing great things)

There are some custom macros, but macros only change if they use the Asset, Session or Auth APIs.

As of this evening, both the Karma Gifter and the Bazaar are working in WebGUI 8. They could use some CSS and layout work, but they’re functional.

That leaves the HelpDesk, which is really the most important user facing app that we use.

Something to be thankful for...

mandatoryurl — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 13:51:50 -0600

Yesterday we finished the conversion of most of WebGUI’s tables from MyISAM to InnoDB. The only table that stays is the table used for doing searches in WebGUI. Someday we’ll replace out text search with a real plugin like ElasticSearch or something similar.

That means that the development part of WebGUI 8 is done. Now, we have to make sure that Plain Black’s custom code (the HelpDesk and Bazaar) still works, try converting some large sites and fix bugs and then we can release it.

If you’re interested in the bug fixing part, please make a post on the dev board.

Admin tip, resetting a site.

mandatoryurl — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 14:05:05 -0600

If you have a site with its WebGUI configuration files all set up, and then you decide that you want to reset the site contents back to a default state, the wgd utility can help you with that.

You would download it, make it executable, and then run this command:

wgd -F my.site.conf reset —backup —import —starter —uploads

You should read the wgd help documents for more details, however, here’s a brief explanation of the switches

-F : pick a particular site by it’s WebGUI config file
—backup : make a database backup for safety
—import : Import a new database dump, by default, use the one from WebGUI for a new site.
—starter : Turn on the site starter
—uploads : Also reset the uploads directory with default contents

WebGUI 8, moving forward

mandatoryurl — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 17:06:30 -0600

The old style layout template work with the new Admin Console, with a few caveats:

You get two sets of editing controls.
The drag controls are displayed to everyone in the group Turn on Admin, whether you’re in the admin console or not.

The good news is that they keep the arrangement of your content, they allow drag and drop rearranging, they still allow editing of content, and to users who cannot edit your site, they’ll look the same. That means that we’ll publish information on how to upgrade the templates, and then continue on.

There is one last hurdle to check before we can begin testing upgrades on WebGUI 8, and that the conversion of the database tables to InnoDB. This will be a performance improvement for WebGUI 8, but if it fails would not actually prevent us from releasing it soon, we could work on the conversion and make it part of 8.1, or even an early release in the 8.0 series before it’s declared stable.

I’ll have another posting before Thanksgiving with the results of the conversion testing.