management software for Gentoo desktops

[rbr28]

Is there any kind of management application currently, or in development, for management of a large number of Gentoo desktops? I'm looking for something like Spacewalk/Satellite (Fedora/Redhat), Landscape (Ubuntu), etc. An application running on one machine that can most importantly show the status of updates on each workstation, push updates, have some reporting capabilities, etc. Other features would just be a bonus, such as log monitoring, process monitoring, configuration capabilities, etc...all that's available in other apps, but having it all integrated in an application that does updates is very beneficial in an enterprise environment.

I've deployed Linux workstations in our organization over the years, mostly just in limited pilot studies, compared to the server side where we have had Linux everywhere for ages, but there are still many limitations to a widespread desktop deployment. It's frustrating because we never seem to be able to get beyond a few machines here or there, due to technical roadblocks, staffing, organizational priorities, etc.

1. Our department gets Windows and plenty of Windows software free, via contracts our organization negotiates. This levels the field between Windows/Linux much more than in other environments.

2. We still have plenty of Windows only software, but we've got most of those issues worked out utilizing Citrix, Wine, etc.

3. Active directory integration is still problematic, and essential in our environment. It works, but seems to always be a challenge to maintain with each big change on the Windows side, or occasionally with updates to the desktop components like Samba, Kerberos, etc.

4. IT staff skills in Linux are still behind Windows in our environment and that's not changing at any reasonable pace. Linux skills are still much harder to find, especially at a low level where we need staff that just help users with the routine stuff. All our expertise is in enterprise type stuff and staff there don't have the time to mess with desktops or training the other staff (which as I've found is a never-ending process).

5. The enterprise management of Linux is a big issue. Windows, partly because we have had it forever, is easy to manage in our environment. WSUS is free, an unbelievable number of things can be managed with AD policies, we have access to tons of no-cost applications for monitoring and reporting of systems, etc. We have none of this for Linux. We can do a ton via scripting, but managing more than a few workstations is really a significant issue for us. We have contracts with two commercial Linux distributions, so we have access to their management applications for free. That puts those on more equal footing with Windows, but I hate to get into another commercial OS, even though as a department we aren't paying for things. Ubuntu/Canonical is not one of the companies we have a contract with, so we don't have access to Landscape for free, meaning we would have to pay for that. My goal is to really have an end-to-end, completely free, desktop environment and I'm not sure it's really possible. I'm currently evaluating Fedora's Spacewalk, even though I can't stand the distribution! I have a feeling that I'm probably have to cave in and go with one of the commercial distributions that we have contracts with. It's not my ideal solution, but it is seeming more and more like the only way we can manage a large number of desktops, and I'd compromise to get a large number out there, rather than always just sticking to much more limited deployments.

Any ideas or suggestions from others who have done any large deployments. Anyone who has done such a deployment knows that what works great with one workstation, or even 20, doesn't often scale to 100+ workstations scattered all over the place! I'm only talking about 100 machines or less in our environment. We have over 1000 workstations in over 20 locations, but I can't see more than 100 Linux workstations in the short-term. I just want the ability to scale without worrying that each additional workstation is going to be significantly more work to manage.

[dol-sen]

There have been several people in the past that have had classroom deployments, etc. They have even created some scripts, etc. to do much of what you describe. There is even a gentoo project for this type of useasge. I believe it is Scire.

Also, if you are looking for a gui solution for package management. I would be open to work on that capability for porthole. There is an old patch for an earlier version of porthole that allowed it to connect to other systems for its backend and installs. Python-2.6 has that capability built in (securely) from what I've read in the changes.
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Brian
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[rbr28]

Thanks for the link to Scire. I thought there had to be something like this for Gentoo, but hadn't found Scire. Sounds like they were trying to create exactly what I need, but 3 years and it looks like not even an official alpha, and no updates since 2008. I didn't have high hopes for using Gentoo for our enterprise deployment, but I love it so much I've just been trying to find some way to make it work! If our organization was a bit different, paying wouldn't be an issue, but with how dominant Windows is in our environment, and how little we pay for it as a department, it's hard to justify any alternatives even if they are free, let alone if they cost anything extra. I have a feeling I'm going to be stuck with Fedora, one of my least favorite distributions, just because Spacewalk seems to be the only completely free product in it's class, and something like this is so crucial for us.

The scripts idea would be do-able if we had some expertise in our department. Unfortunately this project would probably fall on me, having been a sysadmin for years, with few scripting skills even back then, and I've been in management for the last few with the real techie stuff just being a hobby now...that's not good! As it is, the only way we will ever have a substantial Linux desktop base is if I do it myself in my spare time, and that's why I'm really looking for the easiest option.