Collaboration not working in ubuntu intrepid

[askvictor]

In neighborhood view there are no other machines. Running 'avahi-browse -a -t' shows other machines with an iChat presence, suggesting avahi is working correctly. Logfiles are attached.

[askvictor]

I believe I have identified the problem - the files .sugar/default/owner.key and owner.key.pub were identical in the two machines tested. This is due to the machines being clones (ubuntu was installed in a windows host via wubi, then cloned with ghost. Subsequently the key files are the same, which shouldn't happen, and seems to confuse sugar. I deleted the entire .sugar directory, which brought up the configuration screen when starting sugar, and collaboration worked after that. Another test involved creating a new user on both machines, starting sugar as that user, then going through the configuration process, which created unique keys. Collaboration worked after this as well.

While I agree that disk-cloning is not an ideal way to manage linux machines, I think it is likely that some educational deployments will use a setup similar to mine, or use linux virtual machines running in windows hosts, which will likely be clones. This will probably not be an issue as long as users log in as different users, or if the machine is properly configured (wiped) before cloning.

Another issue that may come up later (I haven't got to this in my testing yet) in computer lab environments is if logins and home drives are held on a server (e.g. using LDAP and NFS) rather than the local machine. If a student logs in to computer A uses sugar, logs off, then logs in to computer B some time later, the files in the .sugar directory will be identical, but running on a different machine this time, with at least a different MAC address. This might not be a problem, but is worth considering.