Dear all,
(I am reposting a question I asked on the guix-science list --
with a broader audience here I hope someone has an answer :) )
I am interested in introducing Guix to the HPC cluster at my
institution, and it turns out they have user namespaces activated
\o/. So I'm looking into getting things running as an unpriviliged
user, to show other people how useful Guix can be (before
approaching higher levels in the administration). Is it possible
to install guix without being root?
I tried a few things, based on the following notes:
https://hpc.guix.info/blog/2017/09/reproducibility-and-root-privileges/
https://hpc.guix.info/blog/2017/10/using-guix-without-being-root/
http://issues.guix.gnu.org/34494
I am now following Guix's binary installation inside a user
namespace. After decompressing the binary distribution of guix
inside `~/local-guix`, my naïve next step was `unshare -mrf chroot
~/local-guix
gnu/store/mmhimfwmmidf09jw1plw3aw1g1zn2nkh-bash-static-5.0.16/bin/bash`.
Then after setting $GUIX_PROFILE and sourcing
`/root/.config/guix/current`, running `guix` warns with:
GC Warning: pthread_getattr_np or pthread_attr_getstack failed
for main thread
GC Warning: Couldn't read /proc/stat
So my very limited knowledge of linux namespaces is hindering my
next steps :). A few questions:
1. Should I do anything about the first warning? About the second
warning: should I be binding `/proc` somehow?
2. Is it possible to create build users inside the user-namespaced
chroot?
3. Last but not least: if I can create build users inside the
chroot (question 2.), I suppose I can then run guix-daemon
properly. How would I go about sharing this setup with other users
on the cluster? Ideally I would like to have a non-priviliged
build daemon that other users can call on. (Is there such a thing
as kernel group namespaces?)
Is this the right way to go for running guix without being root,
or is there a better way?
Thanks for any guidance you might provide!
Best,
Sébastien
