[General] Why easy things is so complicated?

[mgoulet65]

It strikes me that many of the criticisms of OP are not fairly directed at TreuNas but reflect underlying lack of knowledge of linux, and lack of familiarity with the idea of a server in general. IMHO TrueNas GUI does an OK (not perfect not awful) job of reflecting the available permissions choices determined by the underlying technology (*nix, ZFS). But if your brain is stuck on folders and windows permissions, then ACL and datasets will take some adjustment. The best thing to do is adjust though,. not try to force your model into the new technology stack.

 

[diogen]

I think this "conflict" between the attitude of new users and annoyance of long-timers will get much worse before it gets better.
And the only thing to "blame" is the SCALE version of TrueNAS...

People using it for data management see it as an app running on Linux.
And since they mastered one (OMV in the case of the OP), the rest should be similar.
"Yes, there is an option of running

Code:

apt-get install/update/upgrade

but you better don't touch it if you want it to work" is a really hard sell...

 

[opensourcefan]

I hear ya and I think where you are coming from is that with features and complexity comes a less simple GUI. That just doesn't need to be. This shouldn't be thought of as an all or nothing approach IMO. Shouldn't be thinking about eliminating features to make the GUI easier to navigate. Wizards are good, hints are good, workflow links are good. Having an expert mode that can be triggered to show more advanced settings that are less commonly used would help.

Lack of effort isn't to blame either, unnecessary effort is what I was referring to. How much effort do users need to put forth to enter into this product should be a development variable.

I don't think myself and the OP are just nitpicking, or being lazy, or not putting in enough effort. This fella posted on Reddit and you can sense the frustration.

 

[opensourcefan]

The best thing to do is adjust though,. not try to force your model into the new technology stack.

I agree, as I stated in my first post TrueNAS's just isn't in my league. It appears as though there are some world's colliding based on a simple word, NAS. I guess just because Synology, Qnap etc are NAS's , being proficient in them doesn't mean that True(NAS) will have the same experience. For some reason TrueNAS continued to show up in my world which isn't native IT, so I thought it would be a natural transition.

I would consider opnsense and others to be quite powerful and loaded full of features but they're designed to not overwhelm. I wouldn't think that they are marketed to your average Joe either.

I don't want to force a mindset / model change here, I guess I'm just saying that TrueNAS isn't as friendly as other powerful systems.

I'll learn what I need to learn. It's running for me now without issue.

 

[diogen]

...TrueNAS isn't as friendly as other powerful systems.

It is not.
And I really hope TrueNAS developer won't redirect their efforts from making it more powerful to more friendly...

 

[opensourcefan]

I wish I would have saw this write up before posting here. It really gives an insight into TrueNAS.

Maybe a link to it can be added in the welcome package upon signing up?

 

[diogen]

I wish I would have saw this write up before posting here.

And then there is this, I believe just as valuable...

In the same vein: this and this... Dialectic!

 

[zbw]

I see that the thread has expanded. I didn't mean to criticize the gui authors. The problem is that TrueNAS has a completely different philosophy of controlling access to resources, about which, unfortunately, it is vain to look in the documentation. Perhaps the advanced will relate the issues, an outsider will certainly not get the idea that samba resource permissions are configured in the datasets tab, where, in addition, the number of options does not facilitate this at all and does not suggest that we configure these permissions. Perhaps this approach is better as it has been used for decades, but it would be worthwhile to describe it in more detail in the documentation.
There's a reason expensive solutions from synology are so popular - there is no need even read documentation, everything is logical to someone familiar with Linux.
Really need to reinvent the wheel? Truenas has great potential, gui is refined, but such small things make the solution will be adopted or not.

 

[danb35]

an outsider will certainly not get the idea that samba resource permissions are configured in the datasets tab

Leaving aside that there is no "datasets tab," it's true that permissions for the resource (i.e., the dataset) are controlled at the resource itself. They're permissions for the data, not for samba. If the user has another way to access the system/data (e.g., by SSH/SFTP), the same permissions apply that way. I don't see what could possibly be more logical or intuitive. It certainly doesn't make sense that you configure permissions on another screen that deals with the sharing protocol, when it isn't the sharing protocol that controls the permissions.

 

[Davvo]

I surely agree the most basic resources (ZFS primer? Hardware guide?) should be made way more visibile.

Anyway, as the saying goes: TrueNAS is not for everyone. You need to put in some effort, which is something I personally enjoy.

 

[mgoulet65]

Comparisons to Synology and Qnap seem irrelevant to me. These are marketed to a differeent segment than TN is shooting for. While I am thrilled that I can use TN for home lab and a small business, I recognize that the target market is huge enterpeises, who have sophisticated staff and are trying to accomplish complex but predictable things. TN can do that. Can they let some one who knows nothing fire up a NAS at home? Not as much.

 

[zbw]

So far, I have manipulated data not only through remote access. It happened that some program on the server added something, deleted something, etc. I set chmod 777 and samba had no problem. Access to the data was controlled by samba or another program, at the same time underneath I had no circuses with permissions similar to dependency hell. Convenience. But if a "real admin" has to work hard to know what he is taking money for then ok. In large companies they also use Synology because of simplicity and relative security, for professional applications there are professional solutions. Free TrueNas is unlikely to fit in anywhere these days. It is much easier to make a mistake with a complicated and logically unrelated configuration than using simple solutions but configured correctly.
Ok, truenas is not for me, I understood the suggestion. I just don't know for whom since my vote is not the only one on this issue.

 

[danb35]

It is much easier to make a mistake with a complicated and logically unrelated configuration

What part of "control access to the resource at the resource level" is "complicated and logically unrelated"?

You've raised two issues in this thread as examples of things that you believe are unnecessarily complicated: (1) assigning a static IP address, and (2) permissions. I think most of us agree with you on the first (in SCALE; in CORE this is much more straightforward), I've put in a ticket on that, and hopefully iX will improve this in due course. But I don't think we agree with you on the second--I certainly don't. It apparently is different than Synology--but "different" is neither "better" nor "worse", it's just different. But it seems entirely straightforward--set permissions on the dataset as desired, and that way you can give whatever level(s) of access you like to whichever user(s) you like. If it's different than you expect, I can't help that, but that doesn't make it either complicated or logically unrelated. It's logical, it's documented, and I don't think it could realistically be much less complicated.

Your complaint at this point sounds like "it doesn't work like Synology." OK, well and good. That doesn't make Synology better. And since you now know how to do it, and you now know the logic behind it, it's starting to sound like you're just complaining for the sake of complaining.

Edit: and lest it appear otherwise, (1) I'm not an IT professional or anything like it (I'm a lawyer), and (2) I'm certainly not a TrueNAS/iXSystems fanboi. I do think TrueNAS is excellent NAS software, which is why I've been using it (and FreeNAS before it) for over a decade--but I've been sharply critical of various of iX' actions and positions at various times, to the point of having been banned from this forum for a time. I call it as I see it--perhaps with less tact than might be appropriate--and it isn't always in iX' favor.

 

[kiriak]

I have no IT background, beside that I like to play with these things in my very limited free time.

For me t was a steeper learning curve to manage file permissions in TrueNAS (Core) than Synology, but it was not more than 2-3 hours of reading and playing on an ancient PC (setup as TrueNAS) just to understand a couple of things before setting up my "production" TrueNAS.

And yes, Synology's UI is usually easier but only as long as you do things the limited way Synology has predicted for. In my case there was no application from Synology to backup my Fedora workstation. I tried some third party solutions without success (as a noob I am).
Especially I spent many many hours and tons of Google searching trying to make Back in Time (it uses SSH rsync) to work with my Synology NAS without sucess. It took me less than half an hour to make it work with my (then) FreeNAS test machine. This was the trigger point for me to leave Synology for TrueNAS.

 

[Etorix]

And then there is this, I believe just as valuable...

I beg to strongly disagree.
The first link from @opensourcefan clearly explains why one should dedicate one full drive for TrueNAS to boot from; full stop. If one cannot bear that, there are other NAS solutions which allow to share data from the boot drive. It may indeed be promoted as recommended reading for all.
The link you provide documents a hack to share a drive between boot and data—with the strong caveat that this is not a supported configuration and that if anything happens with such a setting you're on your own.

In the same vein: this and this... Dialectic!

Same:
One general purpose advice to only run TrueNAS as virtual machine for experiment and training purposes only, and NOT to entrust any important data to a virtual TrueNAS. Highly recommended reading again.
Then, one ressource explaining how a trained ESXi administrator can possibly set up virtualised TrueNAS on data centre-grade hardware. Advanced users only, others should stay safely clear!

If you can't tell the difference in either case, it's probably best that you move your data out of TrueNAS before losing everything to an error of judgement.

 

[diogen]

The first link... clearly explains why one should dedicate one full drive

It's not math/science where one question has one right answer. It's a point of view that one can share or not.

And, to quote you again, "if you can't tell the difference" between the two, then you probably can't be helped.
This "do it this and only this way or you are going to lose everything" BS is ten years old... It's time to move on.

 

[indivision]

I hear ya and I think where you are coming from is that with features and complexity comes a less simple GUI. That just doesn't need to be.

Fair point. It is possible to have a well done GUI on a complex system or a poor GUI on a simple system. Removing features isn't the only way to improve.

However, you have made a number of claims about the TrueNAS GUI without really backing up those claims with anything specific.

You write that it's "clunky." But, we must be using that word differently because I can't imagine a GUI that is more clunky than trying to re-create a 1990s windows look within a browser (ie. Synology Diskstation Manager). User-friendly? Yes. But, also the poster child of clunky.

By contrast, the TrueNAS GUI is not clunky. It is elegant because its functionality is direct, requiring less clicking around and is organized so that the same actions don't have to be repeated in multiple places.

"User-friendly" is not always a good thing. Painting by numbers is a user-friendly way to be a painter. But, who pays money for a paint-by-number painting?

Diskstation Manager is user friendly because it goes to tremendous lengths to allow users to feel like they are still in a windows environment. In my experience, the GUI does not perform very well with all kinds of lag and quirks in the windows opening/closing/dragging.

And underneath it all there are still quirks that require research outside of the app, just like any other NAS OS. For a specific example, out of the box, it doesn't install the latest versions of many popular apps (like Plex). Even after searching for solutions and messing around with repository settings and custom compiled Plex images I still couldn't get it to a version that was compatible with Plex clients on TVs and phones. In other words, despite recreating windows, the system failed to deliver a widely used NAS feature.

Wizards are good, hints are good, workflow links are good. Having an expert mode that can be triggered to show more advanced settings that are less commonly used would help.

TrueNAS includes wizards, hints and advanced modes...

Lack of effort isn't to blame either, unnecessary effort is what I was referring to. How much effort do users need to put forth to enter into this product should be a development variable.

I don't think myself and the OP are just nitpicking, or being lazy, or not putting in enough effort. This fella posted on Reddit and you can sense the frustration.

Well. Again, lets just look at the specific evidence here. You say that it's not a lack of effort. But, you only have 5 posts here and they are all complaints? Where is the effort of you reaching out to ask questions about things you got stuck on?

The existence of frustration or some random guy on reddit that ran into a problem is not automatically proof that something is wrong with TrueNAS.

People get frustrated with shoveling dirt. That doesn't mean it's the shovels fault.

I see that the thread has expanded. I didn't mean to criticize the gui authors. The problem is that TrueNAS has a completely different philosophy of controlling access to resources, about which, unfortunately, it is vain to look in the documentation.

That just isn't true. I linked to the documentation above and the information you asked for is there.

Free TrueNas is unlikely to fit in anywhere these days.

The statistics suggest otherwise.

 

[danb35]

This fella posted on Reddit and you can sense the frustration.

...and here we see the problem with such a vague, unfocused thread subject. @zbw has mentioned concerns with network configuration and permissions. You're linking to a completely unrelated issue, that being OpenVPN server configuration. I can't speak to the server config (though I note it isn't exactly straightforward with either pfSense or OPNsense either), but I agree that the OpenVPN client config (at least in CORE) is a mess; my ticket for that is at https://ixsystems.atlassian.net/browse/NAS-112534.

But that's kind of the point--the broad statement of "too many things are unnecessarily complicated" just isn't actionable. If you just want to vent, vent away, I guess, but if you want the product to improve, iX needs specifics, and they really need to be in a ticket. If there's something you think is overly or unnecessarily complicated, give some thought to how you think it could be done better, and open a ticket suggesting it.

 

[Samuel Tai]

Since we're now well off into the weeds on UI philosophy, and the OP has aired his grievances with the status quo, without offering any concrete suggestions for improvement, I'm closing this thread for further replies.