[Planetlab-devel] Re: problem #1 (with myplc 0.5-5)

[Stephen Soltesz]

Hey, Lee,

 From your description, it sounds like sendmail is working for you now?

Unfortunately, I have not yet successfully configured the email for myplc.  I 
can appreciate that this is a concern for an actual deployment such as within 
ATT.  For sure, any service that binds to a port should be disabled outside of 
the plc context if plc is using the same service/port.  I'm actually not 
entirely clear how sendmail works, so others may be able to provide a more 
informed reply for this particular option if it's still not working for you.

Thank you,
Stephen.

Lee Breslau wrote:
> Stephen,
> 
> Thanks.  This helps, and it looks like I can now create the PI account 
> to bootstrap the rest.
> 
> I had another problem, which threw me off for a while.  The notification 
> mail wasn't getting sent when new accounts were requested.  The solution 
> that I found was to stop the mail service on the machine, and only 
> enable it within the plc context.  I think otherwise the plc sendmail 
> was failing because the port it was trying to bind to was already in 
> use.   Is this what you would expect to happen?  As I say, things are 
> working now, but just want to make sure I haven't diverged in some way 
> that will cause problems in the future.
> 
> Lee
> 
> 
> Stephen Soltesz wrote:
>> Hello, Lee,
>>
>> First, I'm sorry that I didn't reply to this message sooner.  I didn't 
>> realize you were sending questions to the devel list, and the usual 
>> notification I get for new messages wasn't working correctly.
>>
>> Your question is good.  An administrator account needs to authenticate 
>> the initial account creation request for a PI.  Because the PI is such 
>> a privileged role, only a more privileged account can vouch for him.
>>
>> The admin can find the user who registered, then enable the user and 
>> add the PI role.
>>
>> Does this help?
>>
>> Thank you,
>> Stephen.
>>
>> Lee Breslau wrote:
>>> Stephen,
>>>
>>> This worked great.  Thanks!  Now I'm wondering, once a site is added, 
>>> who authenticates an initial account creation request?  That is, 
>>> there isn't yet a site PI.
>>> Does the site PI also need to be added through the API?
>>>
>>> If so, is that documented here:
>>>
>>> http://www.planet-lab.org/doc/plc_api
>>>
>>> Lee
>>>
>>>
>>> Stephen Soltesz wrote:
>>>> Hello, Lee,
>>>>
>>>> I've forwarded this to the devel list for posterity.  I'm sure 
>>>> others may have a similar question at some point in the future.
>>>>
>>>> I see two questions:
>>>>
>>>> 1) how to add a site (to add a user).
>>>> 2) how to log into the machine (either as site_admin or a new user)
>>>>
>>>> Please let me know if I've missed something.
>>>>
>>>> 1)
>>>> Unfortunately, it's not a current feature to add sites through the 
>>>> web interface.  Instead, this is done manually through the API.  If 
>>>> you've never done this before it may be a little weird, but it 
>>>> should be straight forward.
>>>>
>>>> Start python:
>>>>
>>>>    $ python
>>>>    >>> from xmlrpclib import Server
>>>>    >>> XMLRPC_SERVER="https://boot.planet-lab.org/PLCAPI/"
>>>>    >>> plc = Server(XMLRPC_SERVER, verbose=False, allow_none=True)
>>>>    >>> auth = {'Username': '', 'AuthMethod': 'password', 
>>>> 'AuthString': ''}
>>>>
>>>> Where you add the string for Username with the email address of the 
>>>> administrative account for the system, and 'AuthString' with the 
>>>> clear text password.  The default is root at localhost.localdomain, 
>>>> with password of 'root'.
>>>>
>>>> Therefore, the default auth structure would be:
>>>>
>>>>    >>> auth = {'Username': 'root at localhost.localdomain', 
>>>> 'AuthMethod': 'password', 'AuthString': 'root'}
>>>>
>>>> Then you will invoke a call on the api, using this authorization.
>>>>
>>>>    >>> plc.AddSite(auth, {'name': '',
>>>>                           'url': '',
>>>>                           'enabled': True ,
>>>>                           'max_slices': 10,
>>>>                           'login_base': '',
>>>>                           'is_public': True,
>>>>                           'abbreviated_name': ''})
>>>>
>>>> The number that's returned from the call is the site id for your new 
>>>> site.
>>>>
>>>> The 'is_public' attribute determines whether or not the site is 
>>>> visible on the 'Add Users' form.  The default site has this set to 
>>>> false, and it gets reset at restart.
>>>>
>>>> 2)
>>>> Each user account has an associated ssh public key.  For a given 
>>>> site, only those users that are also Technical contacts have their 
>>>> ssh keys copied to the site_admin account.  It sounds like you know 
>>>> the steps for loading an ssh key with an account, I would just try 
>>>> adding the Technical Contact role to the account you're trying to 
>>>> use with the site_admin login.
>>>>
>>>> Please let me know if these directions are helpful, and please let 
>>>> me know if you have any other questions.
>>>>
>>>> Thank you,
>>>> Stephen.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Lee Breslau wrote:
>>>>> Stephen,
>>>>>
>>>>> So much for batching my questions as I'm stuck again.
>>>>>
>>>>> I'm trying to add a user account, and one of the fields I am 
>>>>> prompted for is a Site Name.  There are no site names to choose 
>>>>> from, but this is a required field.
>>>>>
>>>>> Also, how do I log into the box, either from the console or 
>>>>> remotely?  the console says site admin only, but i don't know the 
>>>>> account name or password.  Remotely, the documentation tells me to 
>>>>> ssh as root using a public key in /etc/planetlab.  This is asking 
>>>>> me for a password, which I don't know (and kind of makes me think 
>>>>> the public key isn't being used.)
>>>>>
>>>>> Lee
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>
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