FreeNAS GUI ?

[steak87]

First and foremost, I havent got a setup built yet, I'm simply thinking of doing it within the next few months, but would like a few queries addressed.....

Im fairly proficient in windows, and Ive been dabbling about in linux for the past few years (mint, fedora), and as useful as command line is, im not entirely confident with it.

I know you guys have a great web protal, but, is it possible to have a FreeNAS server running, with some sort of light desktop environment (eg, LXDE, or XFCE, or something), which can be accessed via VNC or RDP ?

That way, I can simply "remote desktop" to my headless system, and perform actions (Virtual box, subsonic, transmission), in a graphical environment im comfortable with.

Why not simply install a desktop flavour onto a FreeNAS home server ?

Ive been told that ZFS is pretty "neat", to summarize, and I couldnt find may distros that support it.

Cheers, and thanks for your time and help.

EDIT : Apparently Debian squeeze, can do ZFS with a gui. Why woud I want FreeNAS over debian for a headless system ?

EDIT 2 : Usage will be 90% of the time as a content/back server and 10% remote desktop managing stuff.

 

[James]

If PBIs are available for the third party software you need (e.g. subsonic, transmission), you can also configure them using the FreeNAS GUI. Basically, FreeNAS is designed to be used from the GUI.

 

[steak87]

If PBIs are available for the third party software you need (e.g. subsonic, transmission), you can also configure them using the FreeNAS GUI. Basically, FreeNAS is designed to be used from the GUI.

Is there any way to atleast partially manage freenas with a desktop type GUI ?

 

[TimeBandit]

Is there any way to atleast partially manage freenas with a desktop type GUI ?

I can't speak for the FreeNAS team, but developing my own thinned-down aplliance-style OS's in the past, we tend to stay clear of X (xorg libraries) as a good best effort in keeping the final image size small, boot-up fast, and build/mainatnance complexity low.

 

[Joshua Parker Ruehlig]

The main reason I'd use FreeNAS over a linux distro like debian squeeze is FreeNAS has kernel support for zfs. Debian squeeze needs to use a FUSE (file system in userspace) driver. Also the webgui on freenas makes zfs management a breeze

 

[peterh]

why take your bad habits with you ? Why not take the chance to use a portable user interface that has what you need ( and use ssh for the remaining stuff ) ?

 

[survive]

Hi steak87,

First thing I would do is grab a copy of FreeNAS & see if you really feel like you need a proper desktop GUI. Just install it into a VM under VirtualBox or something & just give it a try, I bet you will find that you just don't need local "explorer-like" functionality. As for adding it yourself....I'd imagine you could, but I would expect it to be quite a challenge, that you will learn a ton about FreeBSD & the inner workings of X, and that ultimately you will be left with a sinking feeling of "why did I bother" when you are done.

Then there will be another Samba security fix & you can do it all over.

In short, don't overthink this. FreeNAS is supposed to be a lightweight storage-oriented OS and for the home user success is probably better measured best by how little you need to touch it after you have it set up!

-Will