ocurrent / ocurrent/obuilder

Extend macOS obuilder to support multi-user

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enhancement
Dominant language
OCaml
Stars
67
Forks
19
PR merge metrics
No merged PRs in 30d

Description

Currently obuilder on macOS only supports a single user account, limiting the throughput on the macOS workers.
Extending macOS obuilder to support multiple users should improve throughput and resource usage.

Things to consider:

  • homebrew assumes a single user install, extend the File system redirection to handle multiple users
  • macOS base images might need to be relocatable so they can be shared between users
  • opam root also needs to be sharable

Mark tried putting OPAMROOT on an obuilderfs mounted file system, unfortunately we see issues with opam installing software such as opam install dune and in some cases even opam init. He tested the macOS file system using https://github.com/pjd/pjdfstest and compared the results to a fuse-mounted file system. macOS directly failed 82 of the 8720 tests. When mounted through obuilderfs/macFuse approximately 3500 tests failed. https://ocamllabs.slack.com/archives/D02LTUAT74K/p1665657002246979

As macFuse doesn’t seem to be good enough other alternatives need to be investigated.

Contributor guide

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First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start by reviewing the obuilderfs/macFuse filesystem behavior and reproducing the pjdfstest comparison described in the issue. Investigate alternatives that can support shared Homebrew installs, relocatable macOS base images, and a sharable OPAMROOT; done means macOS obuilder can serve multiple users while maintaining reliable filesystem and package installation behavior.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
macos, ocaml
Domain
build-system, operating-systems
Issue type
Feature
Difficulty
5/5
Estimated time
Over a week
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
25/100

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