Can't we just share Configs?

[RussellinSacto]

Hi Everyone,

 

I'm just curious - but it seems to me that more experienced users could put together .ZIP downloads or something like that which newbies could load onto their flash drives (with a few instructions to preserve their license key, preserve their user shares, and such) and then newbies could have "well designed" installations of suitable plugins...

 

Perhaps we could even "comment out" plugins we don't want, but we'd have well loaded UnRaid's to use!

 

Is this possible?  Why aren't we all doing this?  :-)

 

Thanks,

 

Russell

[shat]

Is the current methodology confusing?

[whiteatom]

An interesting idea... But difficult to implement. Because all the config files overlap in functionality, you can't just say "if you want feature x install config file y".

 

The current system is really not complex, there just isn't a centralized location for all the instructions... Some are in the wiki, most are here somewhere. They mostly take the form of "download file x and add this like to this config file.

 

There are just too many combinations of features and plugins that various people use to make a library of config files feasible I believe.

 

[Benni-chan]

and every configuration is different.

some people have a cache drive and use it to install app data from plugins. others use a seperate drive, which is only used for app data. and some use an array disk for the app data.

 

so the better way to make installation and configuration easier, would be a good manual in the wiki. (including screenshots etc.)

[RussellinSacto]

Shat, Yes.     

 

I've been using Unraid for several years and still find it confusing.  If you're technical (I'm a software developer) but not Linux versed, things still aren't that easy - and if you're less technical, it's kinda a minefield.

 

My success with UnRaid all comes down to how well I can search the forums (thank goodness there's such a great community here), and that's not a great way to have things.  I can see that a "library" of ALL POSSIBLE configurations would be HUGE... but surely this could be broken down into groups that fit most of us:

 

• BASICS - UnRaid, UnMenu, PowerDown (and PowerDown from Power Button), maybe SimpleFeatures & APC
  
• BASICS PLUS - All of the Above, plus CrashPlan and DropBox
  
• HTPC USERS - BASICS PLUS + CouchPotato, SABnzbd, Plex, PS3 Media Server, etc.
  
• Webserver USERS - BASICS PLUS + SimpleFeatures Webserver, MySQL, etc
  

 

I really think we're only talking about a few different plugin sets.  If you were new to UnRaid and were using it for HTPC purposes - and you could either take a config setup like I'm talking about that might include Plex and CrashPlan (which you aren't going to use), but already had working CouchPotato, SABnzbd, etc - or you were going to have to build it from scratch, I think you'd take the config I'm suggesting.

 

I suspect I'm going to have to find an UnRaid expert to get me setup correctly.  I just can't afford the time and effort to get it all working perfectly...  I would love a preconfigured "BASICS PLUS" configuration like I described above.  Anyone want to sell me a config for my setup?  :-)

 

Thanks,

 

Russell

[Influencer]

We do need to give the wiki an overhaul.... If I can find time I'd like to set up an offsite wiki to build up from scratch.

 

As it was said before it would be hard to create such a package simply because the configurations are so different. It would be easy to throw together a "starter package" with unmenu and a couple other components like the powerdown script, but once you get into stuff like crashplan it would be a headache to try and support. Too many different possibilities.

[theone]

And again each person might need to install the plugin into a different location - doesn't have cache drive, prefers USB boot drive, prefers one of the data drives, wants to use an out-of-array mounted drive, etc...

 

Installing a plugin is just copying the .plg file to the USB boot drive and running installplg or rebooting. The configuration is "more challenging" and that is where the differences are and this can and should be addresses in a wiki or other well documented form (preferably with screenshots).

 

[joyless]

Installing a plugin is just copying the .plg file to the USB boot drive and running installplg or rebooting.

well, i can't say installing plugins is user-friendly...i've been using unraid only for 3 months or so and i feel quite comfortable with it, and this is only thanks to how often i read this forum. for new users this is just one big mess. right now my flash drive has these directories:

/boot/extra
/boot/packages
/boot/plugins
/boot/config/plugins

even now when i reinstall a plugin or install new one i have to double-check where to put it.

SimpleFeatures is both in my /boot/plugins and /boot/config/plugins folders (only one path is correct, must have forgotten to remove the old files, and right now, i don't know which should i keep) because even plugin author gave wrong install paths at some point...

 

i agree with Influencer - wiki badly needs an overhaul

 

[Benni-chan]

actually both plugin directories are correct. tom stated, that he wants to use /boot/plugins for system-plugins and /boot/config/plugins for user-plugins.

i believe (but i'm not sure), that currently plugins from both locations are installed.

packages (not unraid-plugins, but standard slack-unix packages) from /boot/extra are also installed automatically.

/boot packages is just a directory we use to save all the packages from the plugins, so they don't have to be downloaded on every reboot again.

 

tom also stated, that he wanted to include a plugin manager in v5 final (or at least very soon after releasing the final).

so installing plugins will become a lot easier, once there is an official manager included.

 

but i agree (as i wrote before), that we should create some better help pages on how to install and configure the plugins