JMU UUG virtual machine build script
This is a set of Ansible roles that can be used to configure a Linux Mint or Ubuntu system for JMU computer science courses. It is primarily used to deliver the Unix Users Group virtual machine, but can be run outside that VM using instructions later in this document. Extended end user documentation about using these tasks and the VM is available separately.
Installed packages and features
Common
- Filezilla
- JDK/JRE 11
- SFTP connection to stu
- Shortcuts to re-run tasks
- Unzip
- Vim with GTK3 extension
- VM management script
- JMU wireless printing
CS101
- Eclipse (with checkstyle plugin)
- Finch robot
- Mint packages (basic-prog-pkgs role)
- artha
- bless
- chromium-browser
- geany
- idle
- libreoffice
- logisim
- meld
- sqlitebrowser
- thonny
- wireshark
CS149
- Eclipse (with checkstyle plugin)
- jGRASP
- Visual Studio Code (with Java and checkstyle plugins)
CS159
- Eclipse (with checkstyle plugin)
CS261
- Mint packages (adv-prog-pkgs role)
- Compilers and interpreters
- build-essential
- g++
- gcc
- gdb
- graphviz
- logisim
- valgrind
- Code editors
- astyle
- bvi
- check
- gedit
- indent
- nano
- Source control
- git
- gitg
- mercurial
- meld
- Compilers and interpreters
- y86 tools
- Assembler (
yas
) - Reference solution (
y86ref
) - Reference solution manual page (
y86ref(1)
)
- Assembler (
CS361
- Mint packages (adv-prog-pkgs role)
- Compilers and interpreters
- build-essential
- g++
- gcc
- gdb
- graphviz
- logisim
- valgrind
- Code editors
- astyle
- bvi
- check
- gedit
- indent
- nano
- Source control
- git
- gitg
- mercurial
- meld
- Compilers and interpreters
CS430
- Ruby
- ruby
- Haskell
- haskell-platform
- Prolog
- swi-prolog
CS432
- (essentially same as CS261)
Manual use of these Ansible roles
This project was developed on and for Linux Mint, and receives occasional testing on Ubuntu. It may work on other Debian-based distributions, or may require minor modifications. If you find a case like this, feel free to open an issue to discuss what changes would be needed, and how they can be incorporated. Adaptions for distributions that do not use apt will require more extensive modifications, and would likely need signficant justification for inclusion.
If you have a Mint or Ubuntu instance (VM or laptop) that you built yourself, and wish to use this project to get started with JMU CS software, follow these steps:
apt-get install ansible git
git clone https://github.com/jmunixusers/cs-vm-build
cd cs-vm-build
ansible-playbook -i hosts -K -t TAGS local.yml
or directly from GitHub:
ansible-pull -U https://github.com/jmunixusers/cs-vm-build --directory /tmp/cs-vm-build --purge -i hosts -K -t TAGS
where TAGS is a comma separated list (with no spaces) of cs101, cs149, cs159, cs261, cs361 and/or cs430 as appropriate.
Building the UUG VM
To build the UUG VM, configure a system with git
,
Oracle VirtualBox,
Hashicorp Packer,
and approximately 20GB of free disk space. VM builds are tested regularly on
Linux and Windows hosts, but feedback on other platforms is always welcome.
Due to difficulties with Packer packaging, this VM is frequently built with the
latest version of Packer available directly from Hashicorp. Check the
mint-build.json
file for the current minimum version required.
Once the prerequisites are installed, change into the cs-vm-build/packer
directory and execute packer build mint-build.json
. This will take a
considerable amount of time, depending on host resources available, but should
output progress indicators along the way.
The build process can be customized by passing parameters to the packer build
command using the -var
flag. The supported parameters are:
git_repo
- the repository containing the setup scripts to run before exporting the VM appliance. Defaults to https://github.com/jmunixusers/cs-vm-build.git_branch
- the branch of the above repository to choose. Defaults tomain
.headless
- whether or not to show the desktop session during installation. Defaults totrue
.audio
- choose the host driver to use. Defaults topulse
for Linux, or specifydsound
for Windows,coreaudio
for Mac.
Building beta images
A large number of variables can be overridden at once by passing a var-file
to Packer. An example of this is provided as beta-vars.json
, and can be used
like this:
packer build -var-file=beta-vars.json mint-build.json
Packer allows further overrides, with precedence given to the last option in the command. For example, to build a beta image on Windows, use this command:
packer build -var-file=beta-vars.json -var 'audio=dsound' mint-build.json
Contributing
Feedback and involvement is always welcome in JMU UUG projects. The issue tracker on this repository is a great place to start, whether you're looking for previous design discussions, want to ask a question, or would like to contribute additional functionality. The UUG can also be reached via Twitter or check our upcoming meeting schedule. For more suggestions on getting involved, please see the CONTRIBUTING document.
License
This project is licensed under the MIT license. See LICENSE for more information.