XO-Lite beta
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Link to original article: https://xcp-ng.org/forum/topic/4731/xen-orchestra-lite/5
Found this while watching Lawrence Systems Thursday live stream. Most areas of the interface still say (coming soon), but you can do basic tasks for VMs on the host.
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@travisdh1 Installation note from Oliver
olivierlambertolivierlambert VATES 🪐 FOUNDER & CEO 🦸 Jun 30, 2021, 12:27 PM
@gskger To answer about the availability: in fact, it's already working, but very very very basic for now. I'd like to have something "not ugly" to start, even with not a lot of features, so let's say end of this summer
But if you can't hold until then, it's pretty easy to test:
Create a /opt/xensource/www/xolite.html file
Put that inside:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en" class="no-js">
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8" />
<meta
name="viewport"
content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1, shrink-to-fit=no"
/>
<meta name="theme-color" content="#cc584c" />
<title>XoLite</title>
</head>
<body>
<noscript>You need to enable JavaScript to run this app.</noscript>
<div id="root">The application is loading…</div>
<script src="https://lite.xen-orchestra.com/dist/index.js"></script>
</body>
</html>
Go in your host IP address <host address>/xolite.html
That's it!edit: until the XAPI fix is in 8.2 or 8.3, consoles only work with Chrome.
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@travisdh1 said in XO-Lite beta:
Link to original article: https://xcp-ng.org/forum/topic/4731/xen-orchestra-lite/5
Found this while watching Lawrence Systems Thursday live stream. Most areas of the interface still say (coming soon), but you can do basic tasks for VMs on the host.
I don't know what to think about this web ui feature. There is already a TUI interface for basic management - which you can operate from the console or ssh. Perfect when installaing hypervisors and basic things (like changing network settings, starting stopping VMs etc) because you can use it over IPMI.
And there is the xcp-ng center Windows desktop app, which has all the features that is part of the Xen and the hypervisor itself. Developed by Citrix but not part of Vates' (company behind XO and xcp-ng) business model though.
And there is Xen Orchestra (XO) web app from Free to Enterprise if you want support and the fully unlocked community edition if you don't need support. There you can do things that are not actually part of Xen and the hypervisor itself, like replication. Runs in a VM, not on the hypervisor itself. But there are options to deploy it with a click.
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@Pete-S said in XO-Lite beta:
@travisdh1 said in XO-Lite beta:
Link to original article: https://xcp-ng.org/forum/topic/4731/xen-orchestra-lite/5
Found this while watching Lawrence Systems Thursday live stream. Most areas of the interface still say (coming soon), but you can do basic tasks for VMs on the host.
I don't know what to think about this web ui feature. There is already a TUI interface for basic management - which you can operate from the console or ssh. Perfect when installaing hypervisors and basic things (like changing network settings, starting stopping VMs etc) because you can use it over IPMI.
And there is the xcp-ng center Windows desktop app, which has all the features that is part of the Xen and the hypervisor itself. Developed by Citrix but not part of Vates' (company behind XO and xcp-ng) business model though.
And there is Xen Orchestra (XO) web app from Free to Enterprise if you want support and the fully unlocked community edition if you don't need support. There you can do things that are not actually part of Xen and the hypervisor itself, like replication. Runs in a VM, not on the hypervisor itself. But there are options to deploy it with a click.
I think the big difference between what XO Lite will be and the web TUI is that you don't need console access, just hit the IP address via a web browser. With how so many other things are moving to the web browser to work or manage, I think it's a good thing for them to be doing.
I also think having XO Lite available will make XCP-NG more approachable for less experienced techs. I'll still use XO to manage my XCP-NG servers, but XO Lite will make that initial server rollout and XO install more approachable.
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@travisdh1 said in XO-Lite beta:
I think the big difference between what XO Lite will be and the web TUI is that you don't need console access, just hit the IP address via a web browser. With how so many other things are moving to the web browser to work or manage, I think it's a good thing for them to be doing.
You don't need console access for the TUI, you have the exact same interface over ssh. You start it by running
xsconsole. -
@travisdh1 said in XO-Lite beta:
I also think having XO Lite available will make XCP-NG more approachable for less experienced techs. I'll still use XO to manage my XCP-NG servers, but XO Lite will make that initial server rollout and XO install more approachable.
For the home lab crowd it will probably be better for sure. But why mess with xcp-ng at all when they can get a full featured web interface with proxmox?
Which is kind of my point. Why even put the effort into a simplified web interface running in dom0 when XO is the real thing and can be deployed with a one-liner? And it comes in a free version.
For me at this point all this is more of an theoretical question though as we are moving to pure KVM instead. I feel that the world is moving towards automation and away from pretty web UI. And also away from self-hosting and towards services that someone else will be responsible for.
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@Pete-S said in XO-Lite beta:
And also away from self-hosting and towards services that someone else will be responsible for.
This I don't feel is true. And when it is, that's still IT managing it, just under a different organizational structure. So all of the needs, whatever they are, remain the same just... elsewhere.
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@Pete-S said in XO-Lite beta:
I feel that the world is moving towards automation and away from pretty web UI.
This for sure, BUT the pace is like a snail. The number of shops still arguing that they don't want virtualization, or to work with IT pros, is extreme. The MAJORITY of the market won't even talk about best practices or minimum standards.
Heck, we're still supporting 2012 R2 physical machines out there!
Yes, people are moving towards modern systems, but.... we've got decades to go.
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@scottalanmiller said in XO-Lite beta:
Heck, we're still supporting 2012 R2 physical machines out there!
Yes, people are moving towards modern systems, but.... we've got decades to go.
I have a customer running Epicor's P21 solution. When it was installed in 2014, Epicor intentionally put it on Server 2008 R2. Still running.
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nah...
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@Pete-S said in XO-Lite beta:
@travisdh1 said in XO-Lite beta:
I also think having XO Lite available will make XCP-NG more approachable for less experienced techs. I'll still use XO to manage my XCP-NG servers, but XO Lite will make that initial server rollout and XO install more approachable.
I feel that the world is moving towards automation and away from pretty web UI. And also away from self-hosting and towards services that someone else will be responsible for.
Having automation doesn’t preclude having a web ui. A lot of times (most of the time) the web ui uses the same API as the automation.
There are a lot of cases where you will have people interacting with the ui instead of automation so it’s still a valid option. And having a lighter weight version of the old xen orchestra stuff would be nice.
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@stacksofplates said in XO-Lite beta:
@Pete-S said in XO-Lite beta:
@travisdh1 said in XO-Lite beta:
I also think having XO Lite available will make XCP-NG more approachable for less experienced techs. I'll still use XO to manage my XCP-NG servers, but XO Lite will make that initial server rollout and XO install more approachable.
I feel that the world is moving towards automation and away from pretty web UI. And also away from self-hosting and towards services that someone else will be responsible for.
Having automation doesn’t preclude having a web ui. A lot of times (most of the time) the web ui uses the same API as the automation.
There are a lot of cases where you will have people interacting with the ui instead of automation so it’s still a valid option. And having a lighter weight version of the old xen orchestra stuff would be nice.
That's exactly what they're doing. XO-Lite is using their API to manage XCP-NG.
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Hey there,
To answer @Pete-S ' question about the "why" of XO Lite:
- addressing the chicken-egg problem when you bootstrap your infrastructure (easier to have nothing to install to start doing very basic stuff).
- answering some cases where you lose access to your XOA (so as a "second choice", as it's better than the TUI for many operations, also don't need to plug a screen, any machine in the network could display the web UI, even a tablet/phone where SSH access isn't optimal vs a browser)
- prepare XO 6 new web UI, since it will share many components with it (so the work done for XO Lite will be "recycled" at 90% for XO 6 on the "basic" management features): kind of a head start on XO 6 if you prefer. Also helped us to develop new ways and process while building the new UI.
- giving XCP-ng a "visible" interface out-of-the-box with our brand identity
- finish to kill the last reasons for using XCP-ng Center
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A good illustration of what I said: https://xen-orchestra.com/blog/xo-lite-components/
Next article on this: the design system that will be useful for all our apps (XO 6 included).
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@scottalanmiller said in XO-Lite beta:
Heck, we're still supporting 2012 R2 physical machines out there!
It keeps going and going and going.......
Installed November 12, 2004
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@JasGot said in XO-Lite beta:
@scottalanmiller said in XO-Lite beta:
Heck, we're still supporting 2012 R2 physical machines out there!
It keeps going and going and going.......
Installed November 12, 2004
OMG!!!
