4 <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=windows-1252">
5 <title>Cake LAMP VM Documentation</title>
8 <h1 style="text-align: center;">The cakelampvm VM:<br>
9 Configuration and Usage</h1>
10 <div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">By Chris
11 Koeritz</span><span style="font-family: Comic Sans MS;"></span><span style="font-family: Comic Sans MS;"></span><br>
12 <span style="font-family: Comic Sans MS;">feisty meow® concerns ltd</span>.</div>
13 <h3 style=" text-align: center;"> Vintage: cakelampvm v003
14 Updated: 2018-2-7 (rev. j)</h3>
15 <p>The cakelampvm project provides a Virtualbox VM that acts as an "internet
16 in a bottle", serving up your web sites securely and only to your local
17 host. The virtual machine provides DNS services (<a target="_blank"
18 title="dns server" href="http://www.bind9.net/">bind9</a>), a Web server
19 (<a target="_blank" title="patchy" href="https://httpd.apache.org/">Apache2</a>),
20 a full <a target="_blank" title="ubuntu means compassion and humanity" href="https://www.ubuntu.com/">Ubuntu</a>
21 <a target="_blank" title="it's pronounced leenoox" href="https://www.linuxfoundation.org/">Linux</a>
22 desktop environment, the <a target="_blank" title="flux is change" href="http://fluxbox.org/">Fluxbox</a>
23 <a target="_blank" title="x11 -- best windowing system" href="https://www.x.org/">X
24 window manager</a>, and a suite of tools called the <a target="_blank"
25 title="feisty meow® concerns ltd. website" href="https://feistymeow.org/">Feisty
26 Meow® codebase</a> . Together, these services provide you with a
27 very flexible and powerful testbed for web development, especially suited
28 for <a target="_blank" title="it's cake" href="https://cakephp.org/">CakePHP</a>.
29 This VM was built with the assistance of and was partially funded by <a target="_blank"
30 title="saco design" href="http://sacodesign.com">Saco Design</a> of <a
31 target="_blank" title="winterport" href="http://www.winterportmaine.gov/">Winterport,
33 <p>Commands in fixed-width bold below are intended to be typed into a bash
34 shell running on the cakelampvm virtual machine. The bash shell can
35 be obtained either by logging into the VM through ssh or by logging in
36 directly to the Virtualbox VM console. You may find the ssh session
37 more convenient, because copy & paste features work as expected.</p>
38 <p>Commands preceded by a greater-than symbol ('>') are intended to be
39 run on the Host PC in a Windows command prompt (or in a bash prompt
40 running on the Host PC).</p>
41 <h2> Guest VM Configuration<a id="#config" name="#config"></a></h2>
43 <li>Hostname: <a target="_blank" title="the vm's website, when configured properly"
44 href="https://cakelampvm.com/">cakelampvm.com</a></li>
45 <li>Local IP Address: 10.28.42.20</li>
46 <li>Services Included: DNS (bind9), apache2, fluxbox X windowing system, <a
47 target="_blank" title="not just in the garden" href="https://www.gnome.org/">gnome
48 display manager</a></li>
49 <li>Main VM User: developer (password distributed separately)</li>
50 <li>Database Access: mysql root account (password distributed separately)</li>
52 <h2>How to set up virtualbox for your host PC<a id="#virtualbox-setup" name="#virtualbox-setup"></a></h2>
54 <li>Download and install virtualbox: <a target="_blank" href="https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads">https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads</a></li>
55 <li>Install the extension pack for Virtualbox: This provides USB drivers
56 and other features. This is installed on Virtualbox itself (on the
57 Host PC), not on the guests.</li>
59 <li>Download the extension pack (also) at <a target="_blank" href="https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads">https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads</a></li>
60 <li>Stop any running Virtualbox VMs.</li>
61 <li>Close the Virtualbox control panel.</li>
62 <li>Double-click on the downloaded extensions package (in a file
63 explorer) and Virtualbox should be launched to install it.</li>
65 <li>Run the Virtualbox control panel.</li>
66 <li>Download the cakelampvm guest vm package and unzip it. Store the
67 unzipped version in some appropriate place where you want the virtual
68 machine to reside on your host's hard drive.</li>
69 <li>Add the guest VM to your list of VMs. From the Virtualbox menus,
70 choose the "Machine" menu and select "Add". Point the selector
71 dialog at the cakelampvm folder you created above and open the
72 cakelampvm.vbox file.</li>
73 <li>Now the cakelampvm should show up in the list of virtual
74 machines. Before starting it, perform the following network
75 configuration sections.</li>
77 <h3>Configure the Host-Only network on Virtualbox<a id="#host-only" name="#host-only"></a></h3>
78 <p>Configuring host-only networking for the VM makes the VM completely local
79 to your machine. The cakelampvm will not be accessible on the
80 internet or from the LAN, and can only be accessed by your host PC.
81 This is a key component of security for your VM and your host PC, and is
82 considered a crucial configuration step.</p>
83 <p>Note: If the host-only or NAT network exist ahead of time, Virtualbox may
84 complain about them even if they have the correct configuration.
85 This can be corrected simply by opening the cakelampvm settings and
86 selecting the appropriate network names again.</p>
87 <p>To configure the host-only network, follow these steps:</p>
89 <li> Go to virtual box "Preferences" (global preferences, not for a
91 <li> Click on the "Network" tab.</li>
92 <li> Choose the "Host-only Networks" tab from within "Network".</li>
93 <li> Click the plus icon to add a new host-only network, or if there is
94 already a Host-only network, then edit it.</li>
95 <li>Set the "Adapter" parameters:<br>
96 IPv4 Address: 10.28.42.1<br>
97 IPv4 Network Mask: 255.255.255.0<br>
98 IPv6 Address: (leave blank)<br>
99 IPv6 Prefix Length: 0<br>
100 Virtualbox will fill in the other details like so (this dialog may
101 differ between versions of virtualbox):<br>
102 <p><img alt="host only network adapter" src="images/host_only_network_adapter.png"></p>
104 <li>Set the "DHCP Server Settings" to disabled, e.g.<br>
105 <img alt="host only dhcp" src="images/host_only_adapter_dhcp_server.png"><br>
106 This is disabled because we will be using statically assigned addresses
107 for convenience and stability.</li>
109 <p>Additional information on host-only (and other) network adapter types is
110 at: https://www.virtualbox.org/manual/ch06.html#network_nat_service</p>
111 <h3>Configure the NAT Network on Virtualbox<a id="#nat-network" name="#nat-network"></a></h3>
112 <p>The NAT (Network Address Translation) network allows the VM to get off of
113 the machine and onto the internet safely. It will use this interface
114 for any communication off of the host machine. This is another
115 crucial component for the security of the VM and your host PC. Since
116 the real IP address of the VM is hidden behind the NAT firewall on
117 Virtualbox, this keeps the VM safe from attackers, and hence your machine
118 stays safe as well.</p>
119 <p>To set up the NAT network, follow these steps:</p>
121 <li> Go to virtual box "Preferences" (global preferences, not for a
123 <li> Click on the "Network" tab.</li>
124 <li> Choose the "Nat Networks" tab from within "Network".</li>
125 <li> Click the plus icon to add a new host-only network.</li>
126 <li>Set the "NAT Network Details" parameters:<br>
127 Network Name: NatNetwork<br>
128 Network CIDR: 10.0.2.0/24<br>
129 Supports DHCP: checked<br>
130 Supports IPv6: optionally checked<br>
131 These are my settings, with IPv6 left disabled (this dialog may differ
132 between versions of virtualbox):<br>
133 <img alt="nat net config" src="images/nat_network_config.png"></li>
135 <h2>Starting up the VM and Connecting to It<a id="#start-vm" name="#start-vm"></a></h2>
136 <p>★ This section requires that the VM is already configured properly for
137 Host-Only and NAT networks.</p>
138 <p>Using the Virtualbox interface, you should now be able to start your
139 virtual machine. Virtualbox will complain if it detects any
140 remaining configuration problems in the VM. The Linux boot sequence
141 will show many lines of text, before bringing up a black console window
142 with a login dialog.</p>
143 <p>If Windows complains about the Virtualbox application slamming into its
144 firewall, then allow the Virtualbox to get through. Usually, telling
145 Windows that once is enough, but if any odd network access problems
146 result, edit the Windows firewall settings and allow Virtualbox to use
147 both "Public" and "Private" networks. (Cortana can find the firewall
148 settings if you ask her about 'firewall'. Within the firewall
149 configuration dialog, look for "Allow an app or feature through..." on the
150 left and configure Virtualbox from within that list.)</p>
151 You can log in directly on the VM console with the developer account, but it
152 is generally more useful to connect to the cakelampvm over ssh. If the
153 networking has been established properly, you should be able to do this
155 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">ssh developer@10.28.42.20<br># or perform the equivalent connection with your ssh client.</span></pre>
156 <p>And then provide the password to log in.</p>
158 <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
161 <meta charset="utf-8">
162 ★ It is very important that the ssh connection is working properly before
163 proceeding to other configuration steps. If ssh is not working, try
164 pinging the host:</p>
165 <pre><b>ping 10.28.42.20</b></pre>
166 <p>If the ping is also failing, then please re-check the two network
167 configuration sections above (for Host-Only networking and NAT
168 networking). These are both required for the VM's network to
169 function as designed.</p>
170 <p>Optional: Once the DNS services are set up (discussed in detail below),
171 you will be able to run the much friendlier command:</p>
172 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">ssh developer@cakelampvm.com</span></pre>
173 <h4>Key Forwarding to the VM</h4>
174 <p>It is important to set up ssh key forwarding to enable your use of git
175 repositories while logged into the VM. Key forwarding should be
176 enabled for the VM's two fake host identities:</p>
177 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">cakelampvm.com<br>10.28.42.20</span></pre>
178 <p>The details of configuring ssh key forwarding vary for each ssh
179 client. For Linux ssh, the <b>~/.ssh/config</b> file might contain
180 this information:</p>
181 <pre><b>Host cakelampvm.com 10.28.42.20<br> ForwardAgent yes<br></b></pre>
182 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;"></span></pre>
183 <h2>Updating cakelampvm to the Latest Model<a id="#update-vm" name="#update-vm"></a></h2>
184 <p>★ This section requires that the VM is already configured and is
185 accessible via ssh.</p>
186 <p>argh: fix this info...
187 The cakelampvm v002 is released with the intention that it not need to be
188 released again. Version 001 was not built with that explicit
189 intention, which then required the release of Version 002. But we
190 hope to not need a v003 release...</p>
191 <p>There is an update feature built into the VM that is quite easy to
192 use. The updates are driven by the feisty meow script repository in
193 conjunction with a local scripted command. To activate the "update
194 process" for your VM, run the following commands on the VM, logged in as
195 the <i>developer</i> user:</p>
196 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;"># update to the latest version of feisty meow.<br>rpuffer $FEISTY_MEOW_APEX; regenerate<br># enact any configuration changes needed, such as permissions and account setup.
197 revamp_cakelampvm</span></pre>
198 <span style="font-weight: bold;"> </span>
199 <p>These two commands can be run at any time to patch up your VM to the
200 latest configuration.</p>
201 <p>Recent versions of feisty meow support a new "<span style="font-weight: bold; font-family: monospace;">get_feisty</span>"
202 command, which will behave the same as the first line above. Once
203 you have run the "puffer..." command above for the first time (on
204 cakelampvm v002), this new command becomes available.</p>
206 <li>The "<span style="font-weight: bold; font-family: monospace;">get_feisty</span>"
207 command is useful in its own right for getting the latest version of the
208 feisty meow code; run it again if you need bug fixes or if you want the
209 most recent cakelampvm documentation.</li>
210 <li>The "<span style="font-weight: bold; font-family: monospace;">revamp_cakelampvm</span>"
211 command can be used to repair many situations when the cakelampvm has
212 gone astray, especially for problems with permissions.</li>
214 <h2>First Tasks as the Developer User</h2>
215 <p>★ This section requires that the VM is already configured and is
216 accessible via ssh.</p>
217 <p>Here are some first steps that will make the vm your own.</p>
219 <li>Change your password for the developer account. (This may
220 eventually be required and automatic.) First, log into the VM with
221 ssh. Then type this command:<br>
222 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">passwd</span></pre>
223 The 'passwd' command will ask for your current password, and then for a
224 new password plus a verification of that new password.<br>
225 You will probably want to change your samba password as well, which is
226 used when accessing the virtual machine over the network. This is
227 a different, but very similar, command on Linux:<br>
228 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">smbpasswd</span></pre>
230 <li>Change your git configuration for the user and email address.
231 This is how we've configured it so far:<br>
234 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">git config --global user.email "developer@cakelampvm.com"</span></pre>
237 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">git config --global user.name "Developer J. Cakemo"</span></pre>
240 If you're developing on a real project, you probably don't want the
241 bogus email and even more bogus name above attached to your
242 commits. Just run the two commands again but with proper values.</li>
244 <h2>Powering up with the Feisty Meow® scripts<a id="#powerup" name="#powerup"></a></h2>
245 The feisty meow scripts are a cohesive bash scripting environment for
246 getting a variety of tasks done. The feisty meow scripts recently
247 incorporated the "avbash" collection from Saco Design and added those
248 scripts to a new "site_avenger" collection of scripts. The site
249 avenger scripts provide tools for bringing up CakePHP web sites and managing
250 the collection of repositories for those sites. Each website is
251 considered an "application", and the application name itself (e.g.
252 "winterportlibrary") can often provide all the details for "powering up" the
253 site. The feisty meow team has added additional scripts for managing
254 DNS domains and Apache websites that provide the capability to "stand up" an
255 entire website around an application, with an accompanying DNS domain and an
256 Apache2 site definition.
257 <p>The site avenger scripts are documented separately within the feisty meow
258 codebase. Consult the <span style="text-decoration: underline;">f</span><a
259 target="_blank" title="quickstart" href="https://feistymeow.org/feisty_meow/readme.txt">eisty
261 readme</a> file first, as it provides some valuable information on
262 configuring the codebase initially. The site avenger script commands
263 are documented in the <a target="_blank" title="useful commands" href="https://feistymeow.org/feisty_meow/documentation/feisty_meow_command_reference.txt">feisty
264 meow command reference</a> file.</p>
265 <p>(The feisty meow codebase is already configured for the developer account
266 on the cakelampvm virtual machine.)</p>
267 <h2>Using the guest VM's DNS services<a id="#dns-from-vm" name="#dns-from-vm"></a></h2>
268 <p>★ This section requires that the VM is already configured and is
269 accessible via ssh.</p>
270 <p>The cakelampvm has been set up to provide a DNS server which will answer
271 name lookup requests on any of the sites that the cakelampvm is hosting
272 for you. It will also serve as a general DNS server for any other
273 domains that need to be looked up.</p>
274 <p>To use the cakelampvm DNS, modify your host operating system network
275 configuration by adding or changing the DNS server to use the guest VM's
276 DNS service. The cakelampvm is available at the local IP address
277 10.28.42.20. (The DNS server can be tested with nslookup, dig and
279 <p>Note that the cakelampvm DNS should be listed first, if one intends to
280 override any DNS names that actually exist out on the internet.
281 Further, we have found it most effective to have *only* the cakelampvm as
282 your DNS server, because a secondary DNS server can "take over" providing
283 the name lookups, and thus foul up DNS requests that should succeed for
284 your VM-hosted sites.</p>
285 <p>If your Host PC is running Windows, see the DNS configuration section
286 below that is tailored to that operating system.</p>
287 <p>Important Note: It behooves you to remember to switch back to a normal
288 DNS server configuration when you shut off the cakelampvm, or your machine
289 will not know the names of any sites on the internet any more! The
290 official Google DNS servers are 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4.</p>
291 <p>Once the DNS server is properly set up (by whatever means necessary),
292 these ping commands should get answering responses (from 10.28.42.20) on
293 both the cakelampvm VM and on your host PC. Note: ping on Linux
294 keeps going forever, so hit control-C when you are tired of seeing the
296 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">ping cakelampvm.com</span></pre>
297 <span style="font-weight: bold;"> </span>
298 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">ping www.cakelampvm.com</span></pre>
299 <p>Note that any other answer than 10.28.42.20 for the address is *bzzzt*
300 wrong, and means something needs to be fixed.</p>
301 <p>If these pings succeed (which hopefully they will!), then try accessing
302 the websites of each domain:</p>
303 <pre>(browse to) <a target="_blank" title="vm website if dns working" href="http://cakelampvm.com">http://cakelampvm.com</a></pre>
304 <pre>(browse to) <a target="_blank" title="mapsdemo app, hopefully functional"
305 href="http://mapsdemo.cakelampvm.com">http://mapsdemo.cakelampvm.com</a></pre>
306 <p>These should show local sites on the VM rather than sites on the
307 internet. If you instead get failures to find the domains, or if the
308 "real internet" site comes up for cakelampvm.com (the page covered with
309 red X marks and complaining), then the DNS is not hooked up properly yet.</p>
310 <h4>Setting up DNS on Windows<a id="#windoze-dns" name="#windoze-dns"></a></h4>
311 <p>The ipconfig tool will provide helpful information about your current
312 networking and DNS configuration:</p>
313 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">> ipconfig /all</span></pre>
314 <p>The DNS configuration on Windows is somewhat byzantine. The pipe
315 characters ('|') below are used to separate the menus or tabs or dialogs
316 to traverse. Follow this path to get to the DNS config:</p>
317 <pre>Control Panel | Network & Internet | Network & Sharing | click WiFI or Ethernet link near top right | click Adapter Settings button...<br> | click on the specific network device to modify | select Properties</pre>
318 <p>Once the properties dialog is displayed, find "internet protocol version
319 4" in the list and double click it.</p>
320 <p>Change the DNS setting from "obtain...automatically" to "use the
321 following dns addresses".</p>
322 <p>Enter 10.28.42.20 as the first DNS address and clear the second address
324 <p>Hit okay, then okay, then close, etc to back out of adapter
326 <h4>Troubleshooting the DNS</h4>
327 <p>If your pings are getting the wrong answers and you're certain the DNS
328 settings on your Host PC are right, then you may need to flush your DNS
329 cache, and that might be sufficient to start getting the right IP
330 address. On Windows, the command for flushing DNS is:</p>
331 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">> ipconfig /flushdns</span></pre>
332 <p>and on Linux the flush DNS command can be many different things, but try
333 these two most common options:</p>
334 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;"># restarts the client side DNS cache.<br>sudo service dns-clean restart</span></pre>
336 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;"># restarts the nscd caching server.<br>sudo service nscd restart</span></pre>
337 After, this try the pings again. If they still fail, please go back
338 over your DNS configuration very carefully. The cakelampvm's DNS
339 feature *does* actually work, but operating systems sometimes do their best
341 <h4>Host Key Issues for ssh</h4>
342 <p>There is one caveat to be aware of when connecting to the cakelampvm.com
343 domain. If you have accidentally added the "real" cakelampvm.com
344 domain from the internet to your ssh known_keys at some point, then ssh
345 will complain about connecting to the VM on the cakelampvm.com
346 domain. This complaint will look like:</p>
347 <pre>The authenticity of host 'cakelampvm.com (104.236.56.82)' can't be established.</pre>
348 <p>Note that the IP address shown is not our beloved 10.28.42.20 local IP
350 <p>To fix this, remove the entry pointing at the "real" site from the
351 known_hosts file (ssh will print out the line number of the offending
352 entry). The DNS configuration needs to be configured before you will
353 get the warning about the cakelampvm.com domain. Up until then, the
354 domain name is always referring to the site out on the internet with the
355 red X's and warnings. See the DNS configuration section below to
356 configure DNS the first time.</p>
357 <p>Once you connect to the VM and the ssh client records the VM's host key
358 in your known_hosts, then you're in good shape. This state also
359 gives you a "canary in a coal mine" warning system... Once the VM is
360 registered as a known host, then any attempt to connect back to the "real"
361 internet version of cakelampvm.com will garner a complaint from ssh.
362 This version of the ssh warning should be heeded; you do not want to
363 connect to the real internet site, and the warning indicates that the host
364 PC is no longer using the DNS on the VM (since it reached the real
365 internet site instead of the VM). That situation needs to be
366 corrected by running through the DNS configuration section again (and
367 testing the DNS until it is working).</p>
368 <h4>Troubleshooting the Apache Sites</h4>
369 <p>If your DNS pings and lookups are functioning properly, but you're just
370 not getting the right websites, then try clearing your browser's cache and
371 shutting the browser application down. Then, start the browser up
372 and try the address again. Often this cache dumping is enough to fix
373 the browser so that you start seeing the local website versions on
375 <h2>Editing files on the guest VM from the host<a id="#editing-files-on-vm"
376 name="#editing-files-on-vm"></a></h2>
377 <p>On the host computer, look for the guest vm as a networked computer
378 called cakelampvm. This should provide some network shares using
379 Microsoft SMB protocol, and they can be attached to using the "developer"
380 user and its password.</p>
381 <p>On windows, one may want to mount this network location as a drive letter
382 for easier access.</p>
383 <p>Currently, the root of all web servers is exposed as "www". Editing
384 the files in those folders requires ownership by the developer user.
385 The existing mapsdemo site is owned by a different user ("fred") rather
386 than developer, mostly as a test case. The "fred", "developer", and
387 "www-data" accounts on the VM have all been put into each others Unix
388 "groups" so that they can access each other's files, and thus you may not
389 notice any issues editing fred's files.</p>
390 <p>One should be able to create a new directory over the network also.
391 Try creating a junk folder in the "www" folder, and then deleting it
392 again. That should succeed, and this approach can be used to create
393 folders (from the Host PC) that are owned by the developer user (on the
394 VM). You should be able to create folders or copy files within the
395 developer's home folder also ("/home/developer").</p>
396 <p>If you run into any permission problems that prevent file access, either
397 remotely or within the VM itself, then try running this command to fix
398 them (repeated from the section above about updating the cakelampvm):</p>
399 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">revamp_cakelampvm</span></pre>
400 <p>Afterwards, the www folder and others should allow the developer user to
401 create new folders at will.</p>
402 <h2>Accessing files on the host PC from the guest VM<a id="#samba-shares" name="#samba-shares"></a></h2>
403 <p>If you want to share a folder from the host to the guest, perhaps for
404 driver updates or other conveniences, then make the share with these
407 <li>Create a folder on the host that is to be shared.</li>
408 <li>Right-click on the vm in Virtualbox manager and choose "Settings".</li>
409 <li>In the "Shared Folders" tab of the settings, go to "Machine Folders".</li>
410 <li>Click the folder plus icon to create a new share.</li>
411 <li>Fill in the "Folder Path" on the host PC to the folder that will be
412 shared, and give it a name for the guest. We assume the folder
413 name will be "myshare".</li>
414 <li>On the guest vm, run the following commands to mount the share:<br>
415 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;"># make the guest's version of the shared folder<br>mkdir ~/shared<br># mount the vm's share name onto the folder on the vm.<br>sudo mount -t vboxsf myshare ~/shared</span></pre>
418 <h2>X11 applications launched from the VM</h2>
419 <p>[incomplete section]</p>
420 <p>If a feature called "X forwarding" is enabled in your ssh client, then
421 you can start graphical applications on the VM and display them on your
422 local machine. This works right away on most Linux hosts, but can
423 also work on PCs with X window system installed. This section
424 describes how to set up Cygwin to run X server, which enables X11
425 forwarding to your local display.</p>
426 <p>...{insert that info}...</p>
427 <h2>Handy Techniques for Using cakelampvm</h2>
428 <h3>Assorted Guides and Cheat-Sheets</h3>
429 <p>A Cheat sheet for the Vim editor (there are many of these available): <a
430 target="_blank" title="vim commands" href="https://vim.rtorr.com/">https://vim.rtorr.com/</a></p>
431 <p>A git branching model that seems to work well: <a target="_blank" title="release and patch process"
432 href="http://nvie.com/posts/a-successful-git-branching-model/">http://nvie.com/posts/a-successful-git-branching-model/</a></p>
433 <p>This is a basic guide to the Google Developer Console and API Key
434 management: <a target="_blank" title="apis and creds at google" href="https://feistymeow.org//feisty_meow/documentation/google_apis/google_apis_and_credentials.pdf">Google
435 API Docs</a> </p>
436 <h3>Using the "meld" Tool to Compare Files & Directories</h3>
437 <p>Meld is a great comparison tool that displays differences between two
438 files or directories or directory trees in a graphical view. Meld is
439 pre-installed on the VM. This tool can be launched either in the
440 VM's X Windowing System (on the console) or if X11 forwarding is enabled.</p>
441 <p>To run meld, just type this command:</p>
442 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">meld A B</span></pre>
443 <p>where A and B are either both file names or they are both directory
444 names. If A and B are directories, meld will compare the entire tree
445 structure between the two directories. It allows one to copy from
446 one side to the other, even if the item that needs to be copied is an
447 entire subdirectory.</p>
448 <h3>Get the network address on the guest vm</h3>
449 <p>Run this command:</p>
450 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">ifconfig</span></pre>
451 <p>In the results, look for "<span style="font-family: monospace;">inet addr</span>".
452 There may be more than one, if there are multiple network interfaces.</p>
453 <p>The standard IP address is 10.28.42.20 for the cakelampvm.</p>
454 <h3>How to cleanly reboot or shut down the guest VM</h3>
455 <p>When you've got the DNS and everything integrated, these commands will
456 manage the vm's state:</p>
457 <p>First, log into the guest VM:</p>
458 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">ssh developer@cakelampvm.com</span></pre>
459 <p>Then, to reboot the guest VM:</p>
460 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">sudo reboot</span></pre>
461 <p>Or, to halt the guest VM:</p>
462 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">sudo shutdown -h now</span></pre>
463 <p>Using these commands is kinder to the VM than just cycling the power from
464 the Virtualbox control panel.</p>
465 <h1>Gritty Details of the Nitty Variety<a id="#nitty-gritty" name="#nitty-gritty"></a></h1>
466 <p>This is the lowest level of plumbing for your VM. Hopefully you
467 will not need to engage with this section. The most useful doc
468 section here is the one below about the "Virtualbox guest additions",
469 which you will probably need at some future point. Oracle releases
470 updates to the guest additions fairly regularly.</p>
471 <h2>Configuring the guest VM</h2>
472 <p>The guest VM should already be set up appropriately. These steps
473 are provided for reference and updates.</p>
474 <h3>Set up Virtualbox guest additions for the VM</h3>
475 This procedure is needed if the guest provides an older or incompatible
476 version of the guest additions (which have already been installed on the
477 guest vm). It may also be necessary when a new version of the guest
478 additions becomes available.
480 <li>To install the guest additions, open the guest VM and have its window
482 <li>Choose the "Devices" menu and select "Insert Guest Additions CD
483 Image". This will mount the CD's ISO image on the VM.</li>
484 <li>On the guest VM, it may be necessary to mount the CD image that's now
486 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">sudo mount /dev/sr0 /media/cdrom</span></pre>
487 <p>Linux will mention that the device is mounted "read-only".</p>
489 <li>Since the VM currently has no windowing system installed, one must
490 start the Guest Additions install manually:<br>
491 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">cd /media/cdrom<br>sudo sh VBoxLinuxAdditions.run</span></pre>
493 <li>The latest Virtualbox guest additions should now be installed.</li>
495 <h3>Set up network adapters on guest VM</h3>
496 <p>The network interfaces should already be configured on the guest within
497 the Virtualbox configuration. This is available by clicking on the
498 VM in the Virtualbox manager and selecting "Settings". These are the
499 configuration settings used:</p>
501 Attached to: Host-only Adapter<br>
502 Name: vboxnet0 <br>
504 Attached to: Nat Network<br>
505 Name: NatNetwork</p>
506 <p>On the guest VM itself, the network settings are specified in a file
507 called /etc/network/interfaces. Here are the current contents of
509 <pre>source /etc/network/interfaces.d/*<br><br>auto lo<br>iface lo inet loopback<br><br>auto enp0s3<br>iface enp0s3 inet static<br> address 10.28.42.20<br> netmask 255.255.255.0<br> network 10.28.42.0<br> broadcast 10.28.42.255<br> dns-domain cakelampvm.com<br> dns-search cakelampvm.com<br> dns-nameservers 127.0.0.1 8.8.8.8</pre>
510 <pre>auto enp0s8</pre>
511 <pre>iface enp0s8 inet dhcp</pre>
513 <h3>Compacting the VM Disk Image</h3>
514 <p>To minimize the size used for the disk image, there are three major
516 <p>1. While running the VM, run this command:</p>
517 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">sudo apt clean</span></pre>
518 <p>This throws away any cached data from the apt tool, which can be
520 <p>If there are other junk files you know of that can be removed, delete
522 <p>2. Reboot the VM to the gparted ISO image (available at the <a target="_blank"
523 title="great free partition editor" href="https://gparted.org/livecd.php">gparted
524 site</a>) and run the following command:</p>
525 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">sudo zerofree /dev/sda</span></pre>
526 <p>This sets all free space to the zero byte, enabling Virtualbox to free
527 that space in the next step.</p>
528 <p>3. Shut the vm down after zerofree is complete and run this command on
529 the host PC (this is the Linux version of the command):</p>
530 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">VBoxManage modifyhd --compact ~/cake_lamp_vm/cake-lamp-vm-hd.vdi</span></pre>
531 <p>Replace the <span style="font-family: monospace;">~/cake_lamp_vm</span>
532 path with the real VM storage path. This command compacts the root
533 (and only) partition of the VM.</p>
534 <p>After these steps are complete, the VM should be its minimal size.</p>
535 <h2>Adding a new website and domain on the guest VM</h2>
536 <p>Note: these instructions, even the quick approaches below, pale in
537 comparison to the ease of use of the "standup" command in feisty meow's
538 site avenger scripts. The standup command is detailed in the <a
539 target="_blank" title="useful commands" href="https://feistymeow.org/feisty_meow/documentation/feisty_meow_command_reference.txt">feisty
540 meow command reference</a> document. These instructions are for
541 situations when the domain or site is idiosyncratic in some way that
542 standup doesn't support.</p>
543 <p>To add a new website, you will first need to pick one of the DNS options
544 below (A or B) depending on how you want to name the site. If the
545 DNS name of the site is contained within another existing domain (e.g.,
546 "A.B.C" has subdomain A contained in domain B.C), use Option A. If
547 the DNS name is a so-called "Second Level Domain" (SLD), then it stands on
548 its own (e.g., "B.C" is an SLD).</p>
549 <p>Once the DNS option has been picked and implemented, continue to the next
550 section of "Creating a New Apache Site".</p>
551 <p>For either Option A or Option B, first connect to the cakelampvm via ssh
552 as the developer user, e.g.: ssh developer@cakelampvm.com </p>
553 <h3>DNS Option A: Adding a sub-domain in an existing domain</h3>
554 <p>Let us say a customer needs an application called "excalibur". It
555 will be a new subdomain within an existing domain, such as the
556 "cakelampvm.com" domain, meaning we want the VM to start answering
557 requests for "excalibur.cakelampvm.com".</p>
558 Note that this option requires the containing domain "cakelampvm.com" to
559 already exist before adding the subdomain; see DNS Option B below for
560 details on how to add a containing domain for the first time.
561 <h4>Quick approach: Use the feisty meow "add_domain" command.</h4>
562 <p>Run this command in a bash shell on the VM:</p>
563 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">add_domain excalibur.cakelampvm.com</span></pre>
565 <h4>Manual approach: Edit the bind9 configuration.</h4>
566 <p>Note: the manual approach is not compatible with later use of feisty
567 meow's "remove_domain".</p>
568 Execute the following command to edit the DNS file for the cakelampvm
570 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">sudo vi /etc/bind/cakelampvm.com.conf</span></pre>
571 <p>Add a stanza for the new site at the end of this file:</p>
572 <pre>excalibur.cakelampvm.com. IN A 10.28.42.20<br> IN HINFO "linux server" "ubuntu"</pre>
573 <p>Restart the DNS server:</p>
574 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">sudo service bind9 restart</span></pre>
575 <p>Afterwards, pinging excalibur.cakelampvm.com should work from both the
576 guest VM and the host PC.</p>
577 <h3>DNS Option B: Using an entirely new domain for the site</h3>
578 <p>This is a similar procedure to Option A, but we will create a totally new
579 config file for the new domain and add it to the bind directory. For
580 this example, we need to add the site "excalibur.tv" into the DNS.</p>
581 <h4>Quick approach: Use the feisty meow "add_domain" command.</h4>
582 Run this command in a bash shell on the VM:
583 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">add_domain excalibur.tv</span></pre>
585 <h4>Manual approach: Edit a new DNS config file</h4>
586 <p>Note: the manual approach is not compatible with later use of feisty
587 meow's "remove_domain".</p>
588 Create a file called /etc/bind/excalibur.tv.conf for our new domain
589 excalibur.tv with these contents:
590 <pre>$TTL 1W<br>@ IN SOA @ fred.cakelampvm.com. (<br> 2017100801 ; serial<br> 2H ; refresh<br> 8M ; retry<br> 14D ; expiry<br> 6H ) ; minimum<br><br> IN NS ns.cakelampvm.com.<br> IN MX 10 mail.cakelampvm.com.<br><br># new SLD for our excalibur site.<br>excalibur.tv. IN A 10.28.42.20<br> IN HINFO "linux server" "ubuntu"</pre>
591 The gnarly prefix stuff above the "excalibur.tv." listing establishes
592 configuration info for the new domain. This file relies on the
593 existing cakelampvm.com infrastructure in DNS, such as the "ns" host, which
594 is the domain's name server. However, the new domain does <span style="text-decoration: underline;">not</span>
595 live inside the cakelampvm.com domain.<br>
596 <p>Now that the config file is in place, edit "/etc/bind/named.conf.local"
597 to add the new file by adding this bit of configuration at the end:</p>
598 <pre>zone "excalibur.tv" in {<br> file "/etc/bind/excalibur.tv.conf";<br> type master;<br> allow-query { any; };<br>};</pre>
599 <p>Restart the DNS server:</p>
600 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">sudo service bind9 restart</span></pre>
601 <p>Afterwards, pinging excalibur.tv should work from both the guest and the
603 <h3>Creating a New Apache Site</h3>
604 <p>First, connect to the cakelampvm via ssh as the developer user, e.g.: ssh
605 developer@cakelampvm.com </p>
606 <h4>Quick approach: Use the feisty meow "add_apache_site" command.</h4>
607 <p>Run this command in a bash shell on the VM:</p>
608 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">add_apache_site excalibur excalibur.tv</span></pre>
609 <p>(The first parameter is the application name, the second is the domain
612 <h4>Manual approach: Edit an Apache config file</h4>
613 <p>Note: the manual approach is not compatible with later use of feisty
614 meow's "remove_apache_site".</p>
615 <p>For Apache, the choice of DNS Option A or B, subdomain or SLD, does not
616 matter. The site configuration file just has to accurately specify
617 the domain in question.</p>
618 <p>Start with the following template file for the new website, and modify it
619 for the appropriate host name and "DocumentRoot" path:</p>
620 <pre><VirtualHost *:80><br> ServerName excalibur.tv
621 DocumentRoot /home/apps/excalibur<br> ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/excalibur.tv-error.log<br> CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/excalibur.tv-access.log combined<br> Include /etc/apache2/conf-library/basic-options.conf<br> Include /etc/apache2/conf-library/rewrite-enabling.conf<br></VirtualHost></pre>
622 <p>The above example is appropriate for our excalibur app in the
623 excalibur.tv domain (using DNS Option B). Modifying the excalibur.tv
624 references in it (and the path in the DocumentRoot) is sufficient to
625 re-target it for any domain you want.</p>
626 <p>Copy the new site config file into "/etc/apache2/sites-available" with an
627 appropriate file name that includes the site's domain name. We will
628 call our config file "excalibur.tv.conf". If you developed the file
629 in your home folder, this would be the command to move it up to Apache:</p>
630 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">sudo cp ~/excalibur.tv.conf /etc/apache2/sites-available</span></pre>
631 <p>Then tell apache to use the new file:</p>
632 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">sudo a2ensite excalibur.tv<br># the '.conf' portion of the filename is unnecessary for this command.</span>
634 <p>Finally, restart apache to get it to begin serving the site:</p>
635 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">sudo service apache2 restart</span></pre>
636 <h3>Test the new web site</h3>
637 <p>Given the configuration above, your host PC should now be able to access
638 the new website on the domain "excalibur.tv".</p>
639 <p>To test this, first try pinging the new DNS name:</p>
640 <pre><span style="font-weight: bold;">ping excalibur.tv</span></pre>
641 <p>If there are responses to the ping <span style="font-weight: bold;">*and*</span>
642 the answer is 10.28.42.20, then it means the DNS is working.</p>
643 <p>If there are no responses or it's some other IP address talking back,
644 check the instructions in the above DNS sections.</p>
645 <p>Once the DNS is working, try browsing to the site at "<a title="it's excalibur, wilbur!"
646 href="http://excalibur.tv">http://excalibur.tv</a>". That should
647 at least bring up the configured site storage path, even if nothing is
648 being served from that folder yet.</p>
649 <p>If the new site is not showing up properly, try examining the apache logs
650 for any error messages that can be corrected. The log files are
651 stored in "/var/log/apache2" and are named after the website (if
652 configured through the above process).</p>
653 <h2>Notes on building the Cake Lamp VM</h2>
654 <p>This is all work that should already have been done. It is
655 mentioned here just as breadcrumbs for a future vm builder.</p>
657 <li>Downloaded and installed Virtualbox for host computer (where the vm
658 image will be built).</li>
659 <li>Downloaded ubuntu server 16.04 iso. (<a target="_blank" title="ubuntu server"
660 href="https://www.ubuntu.com/download/server">https://www.ubuntu.com/download/server</a>)</li>
661 <li>Created a new vm in Virtualbox, telling it to start from the ubuntu
663 <li>Installed LAMP stack on guest VM. Some help here: <a target="_blank"
664 title="lamplighter" href="http://howtoubuntu.org/how-to-install-lamp-on-ubuntu">http://howtoubuntu.org/how-to-install-lamp-on-ubuntu</a></li>
665 <li>Configured CAKE on the guest VM. Useful link: <a target="_blank"
666 title="cakebundtu" href="https://askubuntu.com/questions/628938/how-to-install-cakephp-in-ubuntu-14-04">https://askubuntu.com/questions/628938/how-to-install-cakephp-in-ubuntu-14-04</a></li>
667 <li>Configured the two network adapters as needed (one for host-only
668 network and one for nat network). Here's some info about
669 Virtualbox networking with two adapters similar to our setup: <a target="_blank"
670 href="https://askubuntu.com/questions/293816/in-virtualbox-how-do-i-set-up-host-only-virtual-machines-that-can-access-the-in">https://askubuntu.com/questions/293816/in-virtualbox-how-do-i-set-up-host-only-...</a><br>
672 <li>Installed and configured Samba service for the guest VM. The
673 main config file lives in "/etc/samba/smb.conf". Some pointers
674 here: <a target="_blank" href="https://help.ubuntu.com/community/How%20to%20Create%20a%20Network%20Share%20Via%20Samba%20Via%20CLI%20%28Command-line%20interface/Linux%20Terminal%29%20-%20Uncomplicated%2C%20Simple%20and%20Brief%20Way%21">https://help.ubuntu.com/community/How%20to%20Create...</a></li>
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