my own public wasteland

I’ve been using i3 for a few years now & it’s pretty awesome.  I initially started using it because my favorite laptop aged & wasn’t able to run the current desktops effectively.  I was aware of i3 & it’s capabilities but I wasn’t used to configuring it or frankly how to use it. I did some quick research & found a keyboard reference card which outlines all of the default function keys.

I initially installed Arch linux with i3 but that didn’t work out so great on my older laptop.  Arch was not getting along with my laptop at all so I scratched that idea.  I got a copy of Ubuntu Minimal install & began the install.  I recommend installing the Lubuntu packages so that you have a fallback minimal desktop in case you need some app functionality i3 can’t give you.

i3 is definitely a very minimal window manager which is highly configurable but it does require some patience from the beginning.  The transition from GUI desktop managers to i3 was easy for me because I’m used to using old school terminals which I do believe helps. If you get frustrated stay with it most of the frustration comes with learning i3′s navigation & training yourself to remember those commands.

I'm writing these CoreOS tutorials to document & share my experience with the platform.  In my initial dealings with Docker & CoreOS I have found the CoreOS docs to be very minimal & unsatisfactory especially for new users.

Prep for the install

These instructions show how to perform CoreOS install using the .iso method.

Download the CoreOS .iso

Get familiar with the cloud-config.yaml example file & gather all the values for the < your xxxx> tags within the file ( your going to need them later)

Create a bootable CoreOS USB key or burn a CD using the .iso file

Create your own personal SSH Keys (you'll nee the contents of the id_rsa.pub file) 

Make sure you have an active internet connection

Now we're ready for some boot action

Install CoreOS

These directions show how to install CoreOS to a disk

Boot to CoreOS using the bootable USB Key or CD until you see the $ core@localhost~$ prompt

Download the cloud-config.yaml template I mentioned above:      $ wget -O cloud-config.yaml http://bit.ly/1o2J9vA

Get the Network Interface name:     $ ifconfig - the nic name should be something like en... or ens...

Use the VIM text editor to modify the cloud-config.yaml file we just downloaded.    $ vim cloud-config.yaml

Replace all the < your ... > tags with values pertinent to your installation, values such as Hostname, IP Address, Gateway, Public SSH Keys etc...

Save the file with your changes.

Now we'll install CoreOS using the core-install script:     $ sudo coreos-install -d /dev/sda -C stable -c ~/cloud-config.yaml

After a successful installation reboot the server & remove the boot media

Reboot a second time for the new settings to take place

Assign Sudo Access to the cloud-config.yaml users

Unfortunately you have to manually add users to the sudoers file in order to assign root privileges.

 Login into the new server via SSH:     $ ssh core@<your ip address>

$ sudo -i      to get root access

Create a new sudo rule & give the user(s) sudo access (replace the < ..> with your user's name:     $ echo "< your user's name > ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL" > /etc/sudoers.d/< your user's name >

Reboot the server

Login to the server via ssh using your new user & test your sudo access

CoreOS is a very cool tool but still lacking in documentation which is usually the case with cutting edge technologies.  I'll be writing a followup blog that will discuss CoreOS & using docker to create new application containers.

Props to Stevie Holdway's blog which served we well in writing this. It's also a great resource.

Stay tuned

Now I've been evangelizing technology for most of my career & I can't remember a time that I felt as passionate about technology as I have been in the past few years.

The tech scene is on fire again and I 'm enjoying all of it.  Innovations in hardware & software are occurring faster than ever and their foot print is impacting our lives.  In the advent of all this innovation I'd like give a shout out to the RESTFUL APIs.  RESTFUL API's have truly redefined the way we access & interact with data.

Prior to REST APIs data was locked up behind our firewalls in some private database only to be shared & released to users on our private intranets using some outdated & usually home grown user un-friendly app.  That valuable data was sometimes let out to play, embedded in a hard to find & hard to maintain html file.  Organizations are sitting on data that they may not seem relevant to their specific use cases but in reality that same data, if made publicly, is extremely useful given the appropriate context.

Fast forward to present day... REST APIs are providing the modern day developer digital plumbing and access to that once imprisoned valuable data.  REST APIs are enabling developers to build the next evolution of apps which showcase the data like never before because after all data == information & information is the heart of most apps.

In closing I want to encourage developers to continue the innovations in building & using these awesome REST APIs because they're definitely changing the status quo in technology.  I also want to encourage developers to build apps that push the current  boundaries of REST APIs which should provoke evolution in future generations of APIs & data share concepts.

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