ReneV Posted March 7, 2009 Share Posted March 7, 2009 [...] its like buying a BMW with a dashboard from a Skoda. [...] NAS is closer to reality. Absolutely not. We're taking about the instrumentation panel on the diesel generator in the shed at the back of the garden. If you're ever tasked with getting one that I am going to depend on, I hope you the read the technical documentation of the various candidates beyond the drawing of the instrumentation in the preamble. Link to comment
bubbaQ Posted March 7, 2009 Share Posted March 7, 2009 I have no idea what those damn images in the ASLite menu do. I NEVER use bare image links. Link to comment
btlupin Posted March 7, 2009 Share Posted March 7, 2009 I for one look at the unraid standard web gui several times per day - I turn unraid off every night. I also need to keep an eye on free space, I shouldn't have to add up free space per disk to see the total free space. I think that there is lots of room for improvement in the current gui - the current gui is ok, but only because of the general lack of functionality in unraid beyond redundancy and serving up files via smb or nfs. There isn't really any reason either for not modernizing the gui - one day of work would probably do wonders both for looks and clarity. Roland Link to comment
ReneV Posted March 7, 2009 Share Posted March 7, 2009 I think it would add value if people could start posting images of other NAS user interfaces. raidz on zfs: Link to comment
btlupin Posted March 7, 2009 Share Posted March 7, 2009 zfs is hardly mainstream and won't be until it becomes part of Mac OS X (hopefully in Snow Leopard) and the management interface will not be the terminal. ZFS will never be mainstream as long as the interface is a terminal window no matter how great the functionality may be. Link to comment
ReneV Posted March 7, 2009 Share Posted March 7, 2009 zfs is hardly mainstream and won't be until it becomes part of Mac OS X (hopefully in Snow Leopard) and the management interface will not be the terminal. ZFS will never be mainstream as long as the interface is a terminal window no matter how great the functionality may be. My point is that zfs was mentioned in the OP. Link to comment
NAS Posted March 7, 2009 Author Share Posted March 7, 2009 WHS First to admit were not comparing like for like here but were talking about style and substance not method of delivery Link to comment
SSD Posted March 7, 2009 Share Posted March 7, 2009 I think we may be mixing functionality vs GUI design on some of these. I think there is room for improvement in both areas. Commenting on samples ... 1. WHS is clearly better. But I don't think comparing with WHS is appropriate. The function sets are very different. That is not a Web based interface. WHS also has a huge footprint. There is a user that got unRAID running on an i386 system - don't think you'll see many i386 WHS installs! Just being honest here, but if WHS had the redundancy features that unRAID had, I think unRAID would have a very hard time competing. 2. The FreeNAS interface is okay. Maybe a little better designed than unRAID's, but also seems you'd be clicking a lot to get the info you're after. Reminds me of my router's interface, which drives me crazy with all the clicks. Maybe its because of getting used to it, but I like the simple table format and to be able to see lots of information on one screen. FreeNas does seem to provide access to functionality that unRAID does not. But it lacks unRAID's redundancy features. 3. The OpenFilter looks like a huge step BACKWARDS. If I had seen that I would have been running for the doors. I'd love to see a WHS user try to navigate that! ;D 4. NASLite is okay. Is it browser based? Kind of feels like Windows 3.1. Does not have a modern feel IMO. 5. ZFS is command line interface. So why are people raving about it? Maybe because it doesn't need a facncy GUI. In general my opinion is that unRAID's current interface holds its own with these. Not a lot better or a lot worse. unRAID's new face, however, is going to blow all of these (except WHS) away. But I still think that features are going to rule the day in terms of people deciding what to buy. Link to comment
bubbaQ Posted March 7, 2009 Share Posted March 7, 2009 Of course, we can have all of them, and many more, with a web server and PHP. Link to comment
Biggy2872 Posted March 7, 2009 Share Posted March 7, 2009 But I still think that features are going to rule the day in terms of people deciding what to buy. I see this thread as being a competion between two seperate desires.. one side wants functionality.. who cares what it looks like (i'm included here) and the second want a pretty interface and don't care about functionality (as seen in the OP, where people are more worried about the asthetics and not the core functionality). They way I see it is that you can put s#%$ in a box and put a nice, pretty bow on it but what's inside is still S*^&. On the other hand, if I needed a blue pen and my choices were between a blue pen with ink all over it or the prettiest, most elegant red pen I have ever seen. I would still use the blue one, because I needed a blue pen, the red one, in all its glory, will not fill my functional needs. Another situation, returning to the cars example... You are going to buy a BMW, you have the choice between two (can be extended to more, but for simplicity we'll use two)... you can buy a M3 and a M6 (both are well within your price range for buying a car). Now make a choice based just on LOOKING at the cars... you don't get to test drive them... you don't get to look under the hood... just pick based on looking at it 10 feet away. That is what was described in the OP.. they looked at the gui and ran... Any organizational decision based on this approach is laughable. It shows a lack of knowledge in simple business decision making. It is a case where inproper weights are applied to a weighted decision criteria making matrix. They should have, at the very least, figured out their functional criteria and eliminate possibilities based solely on these needs. They could then do some more intense investigation through testing each system that remained. If your tech guy(s)/gal(s) do not have enough knowledge to be able to quickly learn a system based on a well-know operating system, then they are not qualified to be your tech person, period. Your choices are two fold: 1) replace your tech person with someone who knows what they are doing, or 2) train/educate either in-house or through programs to ensure they are qualified to actually do their jobs. This is a cost of implimenting a system and should be included regardless of which system the company picks (they will need to learn the ins and outs of whatever system they choose to be able to administer it) To be perfectly blunt, if your tech person NEEDS a web gui and is command-line illeterate, how can you trust them to oversee the preventative maintenance and troubleshooting if something does go wrong? I wouldn't even trust them to be able to answer simple questions like: is the hardware running right? any syslog problems? how are the drives doing? might we need to replace one soon? And what about being prepared for a problem... would they have hard drives ready to go to reduce as much as possible the downtime of the server (directly affecting company bottom-line). However, given that unRAID is marketed for home use as well, I do agree that the current interface needs more functionality and be much less based on command-line operation. And who is to say that Tom has not been working behind the scenes to add these types of features? We already saw in one post (PS3 streamer thread) that he is working on a package manager of sorts. Something that I have found no reference of by Tom previously in the forum but that was requested/demanded by the forum. We have no idea how long he has been working on it. This pacakge manager(as well as other features) might have been planned from day 1 but required alot of work to implement the way he desires. All good things come to those that wait. unRAID's new face, however, is going to blow all of these (except WHS) away. I agree and am excited about this new initiative, but my excitment is directed towards the functionality and the access that new developers will have to create new functionality as it is based on a more well know language(php). I've already started beefing up php when I have a few spare moments to be able to contribute in the future. I would like to give some kodos to NAS because it seems that this thread did help to spark the unraid-web project which is turning into a great additon very quicky. Cheers, Matt Link to comment
NAS Posted March 7, 2009 Author Share Posted March 7, 2009 Some very good points here. One thing worth saying though that judging a book buy its cover isnt always a bad thing. When it comes to sales people read alot into how something looks way before they decide to delve in more. Some people buy on looks alone. Sensible people look at features and function but that needs a certain level of technical knowledge which unRAID is supposed/does not need. A happy feeling GUI would better fit with the ease of use sales point. The technical users can chose to ignore it and probably do anyway it the main user base that needs it more. I refer back to an earlier post. One of the test client thought it looked home made which a company isnt going to buy unless they take the time to really delve into it. Chicken and egg. TBH i see the community GUI and features exceeding the built in interface very quickly and with the right branding (say a dedicated website) and a easy package management system we could have the best of both worlds. Id really like Limetech to come into this thread and help/discuss with the hooks and generally support the hacker community more directly here as they are doing wonders for the core commercial product. Link to comment
NLS Posted March 7, 2009 Share Posted March 7, 2009 I have no idea what those damn images in the ASLite menu do. I NEVER use bare image links. AGREED! Link to comment
NAS Posted March 7, 2009 Author Share Posted March 7, 2009 I re read quite a few of the last set of posts and I think GUI wise were down do debating style and preference. Since theres now a web interface project started elsewhere thats probably the palce for that kind of discussion. So.... taking it right back to the beginning. In the context of "what stops unRAID being a major contender" do you think the way license keys and flash ids work is a stumbling block? This includes areas such as: manually issued keys manually re-issued keys .... and associated timings buying a spare key as backup to allow for continuous service on a USB key breaking. You get the idea. Link to comment
NLS Posted March 7, 2009 Share Posted March 7, 2009 I don't have a problem with the issuing of the keys. The only change I'd suggest is that the "middle" license is eliminated and the free version allows a bit more things (in fact it should have full functionality but limited disks). Else people are not testing everything. Link to comment
prostuff1 Posted March 7, 2009 Share Posted March 7, 2009 I don't have a problem with the issuing of the keys. The only change I'd suggest is that the "middle" license is eliminated and the free version allows a bit more things (in fact it should have full functionality but limited disks). Else people are not testing everything. I agree with this!! I think the free version should only work on 3 disks (maybe 4) but include all the functionallity of the Pro version. Having to spend the money to test what key features are there is not what most want to do. I ran on the free version for quite a while before i finally purchased. I probably would have purchased much sooner had I been able to testing thing like user shares, cache drive, etc. Link to comment
limetech Posted March 8, 2009 Share Posted March 8, 2009 ... As time has passed and I use my server more, I start to think: 1. How about an option in the GUI to hide/unshare the "disk1" "disk2" "disk3" etc shares when browsing from Windows Explorer? How about an option to only show those shares and hide the user shares? Let me guess... there's probably some fancy command line that will do this. This feature has been available almost since day 1 in the GUI. 2. Where's the page for security so I can handle LDAP integration? Oh, there isn't one... which probably means unRAID doesn't support it. How many media server environments use LDAP?? However, we are releasing Active Directory support. Now I gotta create new accounts and give separate logins to others.... so how do you get them to change their password without using telnet or PuTTY to connect to the server? Oh well, you guys just PuTTY in... oops I see PuTTY connects and then the window disappears. What's that about? Oh, maybe I didn't set up user home directories. (You know, it's kinda like your "My Documents" but you actually have to "be there" when you login.) Guess I'll have to do that. Anyway, when you get in just run the "password" command... what? "-bash: password: command not found"?... oops, I meant "passwd". Isn't that what I said? The 'security model' is not designed to let anyone other than a single admin (called root) "log in". User level security is facilitated by the Admin specifying the users permitted or not permitted to access shares. The fact you have to create the users (and passwords) locally is a necessary artifact of Windows networking. Aforementioned Active Directory support will alleviate this for many environments. 3. Even in unmenu... how do I change the font for my syslog to a fixed width? And I do like the use of colors... though the first thing I tried to was to click the word "Errors" hoping it would filter and show me just the error... oops... not a link. 6. one of them asked if it had a WHS like windows backup solution Does it? 7. neither would consider taking unRAID onboard for a trial A trial is a lot more than just sticking in a USB key; you do have to allocate hardware and time. Additionally, right away I knew I wanted to use user shares and that was something not available in the trial version. Not true, User Shares are available in all versions, always have been. One thing I've learned working at commercial software companies is that a lot of time customers just don't want the product first for no particular reason (maybe they just don't want to spend the money, or they don't see it as a necessity), and then they'll tell you what it's missing as the reason they don't buy it. "Well, if it just did X, I'd buy it" they say. Then you put X in and come back to them, and they say "well, if it just did Y, I'd buy it". Reality: they just don't want it. True indeed. Also they say, "add feature X and you will sell many more of them"... right. Anyway, I love unRAID, but that's because I knew what to expect going in and ultimately I wanted the product. I basically agree with bjp999's last post... I see unRAID as a niche product for those who need to economically store a lot of data with some level of protection, no more. This indeed was the original product spec. If I needed automated backups or plug and play install, obviously I'd have to look elsewhere, Automated backup yes, Plug and Play - what do you mean by that? Pre-defined shares? but until it makes economic sense for Lime Technology to hire dozens of engineers to boost the product, they should not get into the habit of catering to the "well, if it just had DoD level encryption, I'd buy it" crowd. Hard learned lesson. Link to comment
limetech Posted March 8, 2009 Share Posted March 8, 2009 I agree with this!! I think the free version should only work on 3 disks (maybe 4) but include all the functionallity of the Pro version. Having to spend the money to test what key features are there is not what most want to do. I ran on the free version for quite a while before i finally purchased. I probably would have purchased much sooner had I been able to testing thing like user shares, cache drive, etc. User Shares are included in 'free' version. Here is the breakdown: Feature Basic Plus Pro #drives 3 6 16+ simple security Yes Yes Yes user security no Yes Yes active directory security no no Yes Cache drive no no Yes Probably will enable Cache drive feature in all versions, so that only differences will involve #drives and security model. Link to comment
prostuff1 Posted March 8, 2009 Share Posted March 8, 2009 User Shares are included in 'free' version. Here is the breakdown: Feature Basic Plus Pro #drives 3 6 16+ simple security Yes Yes Yes user security no Yes Yes active directory security no no Yes Cache drive no no Yes Probably will enable Cache drive feature in all versions, so that only differences will involve #drives and security model. Yup, i meant User level security not User shares. That was my mistake. Link to comment
limetech Posted March 8, 2009 Share Posted March 8, 2009 First, I completely appreciate all the comments, observations, and suggestions, both positive and negative. I never thought unRAID would generate such a following, even if it's "I love to hate it" I think this thread boils down to two main gripes: 1. The GUI is ugly. 2. We want more functionality. So here's the plan. First, I will be releasing the 4.5 beta series & 4.5 will be the last release with the GUI in it's current closed form. Next, I want to start on version 5.0. This version will include lighttpd and php, with the current GUI pages converted to php. More importantly I want to "open" the API so that anyone can add additional functionality. It is abundantly clear that there are some very talented people in the unRAID community & I think everyone could benefit greatly by "turning them loose". Link to comment
bubbaQ Posted March 8, 2009 Share Posted March 8, 2009 Excellent! Does the API come in 4.5, or do we wait until 5.x? Link to comment
NAS Posted March 8, 2009 Author Share Posted March 8, 2009 Gob smacked. Superb Limetech Link to comment
NLS Posted March 8, 2009 Share Posted March 8, 2009 That is a great post Tom. 1) You talk using "I" (thanks - finally). 2) You answer to comments (that's possibly a first) - inc. negative 3) You disclose specific plans 4) You completely switched from our older conversations. I know you initially didn't want easy access to plugins and such. I could understand it to a point, but that could never work over the years (see everything out there... wins by opening up). So great... Make sure you do utilize the work already done by our precious (YOUR precious) "hero" members. You have probably seen the great attempts to design a new GUI, the additions they have made to functionality etc. I would definitely use those guys and let them have some 5.0alpha even when we have 4.5 beta. Privately. Anyway. I really like this post. As long as 5.0 beta is in 2009. Link to comment
limetech Posted March 8, 2009 Share Posted March 8, 2009 Excellent! Does the API come in 4.5, or do we wait until 5.x? It will be 5.X, but I will try to get a 5.0-beta1 out soon and in parallel with 4.5-beta series. Link to comment
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