Core Services Cumulative Monthly Report, June 2003
Overview
Primary activities in June included finalizing server configurations
for remaining purchases in the fiscal year and housekeeping tasks in system
administration.
- Refining and Improving Core Infrastructure
- New storage model.
- Nov/Dec: Marsh and Snavely continued to collect
information on NAS and SAN related technologies for our upcoming storage
needs and new storage model.
- Apr: Snavely confirmed with Bonn that LLMC plans
to fund two storage servers and two web servers to meet redundancy recommendations.
- May: Snavely confirmed that NAS on high-bandwidth
network is the preferable storage model for DLXS, although SAN may be
used as a back end. Marsh coordinated the transfer of DLPS3 to Hatcher
for testing as a NAS server.
- Redundant web services.
- Production server replacement.
- Nov/Dec: Marsh replaced DLPS1 with a new Sun 280R
server, dlps8, and coordinated the transfer of services.
- Nov/Dec: Marsh and Snavely coordinated the removal
of failing storage equipment from dlps4.
- Jan: Marsh replaced DLPS3 with a new Sun 280R
server, dlps9, and coordinated the transfer of all services with the
exception of Pictures of Record pending a DNS registration change.
- Feb: Snavely coordinated the configuration of
backup software on dlps6, dlps7, dlps8, and dlps9.
- Apr: Marsh coordinated the transfer of Pictures
of Record from dlps3 to dlps9, working around persistent DNS registration
problems.
- June: Marsh and Snavely prepared and Marsh ordered
configurations for replacement servers for hank, DLPS4, and DLPS5.
- Development server replacement.
- Nov/Dec: Marsh prepared and ordered configurations
for replacement servers for fizzie and kukicha.
- Apr: Marsh installed
and deployed clamato to replace fizzie.
- Apr: Marsh installed
and deployed sangria to replace kukicha.
- June: Marsh and Snavely prepared and Marsh ordered
a configuration for a replacement server for alice.
- DHCP services.
- Mar: Snavely transferred the load-balancing DNS
server from kombucha to sake, the new DNS/DHCP server.
- Image and OCR processing workflows.
- Nov/Dec: Snavely began planning work for the LLMC
project with Bonn and Stephenson.
- Jan: Snavely, in coordination with Stephenson
and Pagliere, made a small modification to the DLXS Pageview table
to allow the handling of companion contoen page images.
- Feb: Snavely revised existing load scripts to
handle "continuing content" on image media.
- Mar: Snavely, working with Hall, began investigation
of the PrimeOCR "job server" functionality to better balance OCR load.
- Apr: Snavely, working with Hall, successfully
set up a proof-of-concept OCR "farm" using job server functionality and
proposed a partial architecture for OCR workflow.
- May: Marsh and Snavely prepared and Marsh ordered
a configuration for an OCR file server.
- June: Marsh began the setup of the OCR file server
and a single replacement server for bill-ko (CD loading) and water (contone
image processing).
- Digital object integrity.
- Cost model.
- Nov/Dec: Snavely developed a provisional model
for tracking server administration costs and began to apply the model
to generate several cost estimates.
- Documentation.
- Technology trends awareness.
- Nov/Dec: Snavely began receiving subscriptions
of several IT publications.
- Mar: Marsh attended
the Rubi-Con computer security conference in SE Michigan.
- Support and Development for Access Systems
- Library management system implementation.
- Nov/Dec: Marsh, Snavely, and Prettyman researched
server configurations for the LMS development server. Many different
configurations were explored and many sales quotes generated. An eight-processor
Sunfire 4800 with two attached 400GB disk arrays was chosen and ordered.
- Jan: Marsh, working with Sun staff, installed
and configured the LMS development server in room 10.
- Feb: Snavely coordinated the installation of SFX
on the LMS development sevrer with Ex Libris.
- Mar: Snavely coordinated the installation of ALEPH
on the LMS development server with Ex Libris.
- Apr: Snavely prepared a configuration for the
production Metalib/SFX server according to Ex Libris recommendations,
and placed the order.
- Apr: Snavely, coordinating with Farber, Plantinga,
and Steinberg, proposed and set up CVS on the LMS development server to
facilitate version-tracking and release processes.
- May: Marsh installed
tequila, a new production SFX server. Snavely attended ALEPH System Admininistration
training.
- June: Marsh re-installed tequila with an older
version of Red Hat Linux to satisfy late-breaking support requirements
from Ex Libris.
- DLXS.
- Feb: Marsh successfully coordinated the use of
the staging server, jolt, as a new environment for conducting the workshop.
- Mar: Snavely met with Zieske to gather information
on the workings of the stats system.
- May: Snavely merged the CVS repository on the
data prep server sangria into the repository on the primary development
server clamato.
- Production OAI harvesting.
- Nov/Dec: Marsh and Snavely coordinated a meeting
with data preparation staff and developed a plan to run data preparation
and OAI harvesting on the same (new) server. Funds for the server will
be supplied jointly by the OAI grant and Core Services.
- May:
Snavely, in coordination with Blanco, Burek, and Hagedorn, moved the
OAI harvester from its temporary location on quik to the new data prep
server sangria.
- Institutional repository initiative.
- June: Marsh and Snavely prepared and Marsh ordered
a configuration for a DSpace server.
- Collaborating with Other Areas of the Library and the
University
- Library/Core Services coordination.
- IT Commons.
- Nov/Dec: Snavely contributed heavily to the Authentication/Authorization
and Directory working groups to help prepare final reports, due at year's
end.
- Jan: Snavely continued work at a slower pace in
both working groups on various tasks in follow-up to the final reports.
- Mar: Snavely contributed to sourcing and prioritization
dicsussions in both working groups.
- May: Snavely and Stephenson participated in an IT
Commons meeting regarding disaster recovery.
- CHEF/DLXS integration.
- Nov/Dec: Snavely participated in a joint meeting
with other DLXS staff and the CHEF group to help provide a better understanding
of the DLXS system.
- Feb: Snavely and Powell discussed strategies for
exploring collaboration between DLXS and CHEF.
- Integration with campus authentication.
- Nov/Dec: Snavely joined the COSIGN co-design group
and attended his first meeting to get an overview of the COSIGN system
architecture and workings.
- Feb: Snavely attended another COSIGN co-design
group meeting to gather information on the proposed "Friend" system to
handle authentication of non-UM affiliates.
- Apr: Snavely began a discussion within the LMS
group which will investigate the steps necessary to integrate COSIGN with
ALEPH and identify issues associated with the rollout of COSIGN for
DLS resources in general.
- Miscellaneous/Unplanned
- Nov/Dec: Marsh, working closely with DSS, reorganized
space in room 10 to consolidate space usage and accommodate new servers.
- Nov/Dec: Marsh applied OpenSSL and sendmail upgrades
to resolve security vulnerabilities on several servers.
- Nov/Dec: Marsh upgraded Perl from 5.6.1 to 5.8.0
on all systems not scheduled for near-term retirement.
- Jan: Marsh, in coordination with Blanco and Simpson,
began an iterative problem-solving process with ESRI to address several
problems with the ArcIMS system.
- Mar: Marsh began the installation of a LOCKSS server.
- Mar: Snavely, working closely with technical staff
at Oxford, set up rsync for synchronizing EEBO content from DLPS servers
to the mirror at Oxford, and integrated the rsync configuration into
existing local update scripts.
- Apr: Snavely, working closely with Syrigos, set
up rsync for synchronizing geospatial content from the geospatial lab
to DLPS servers.
- May: Snavely transitioned service of electronic
University and Social Work reserves from DLPS8 to hank.
- May: Snavely coordinated the beginning stages of
an improved design for production (on-call) support for DLS.
- May: Marsh and Snavely worked with Blanco, Simpson,
and Syrigos to refine directory conventions for automatic synchronization
from the geospatial lab to DLPS servers.
- May: Marsh did an initial install of the LOCKSS
service on repurposed desktop hardware.
- June: Marsh and Snavely did a second install of
a new version of the LOCKSS service.
- June: Marsh moved
the backup server (nog) to new hardware (lambic) and developed a plan
for upgrading our Arkeia backup sofware from version 4 to 5.
- System Performance
- Central Campus server environment
- betty.umdl (MedSearch server): No down time
- coffee.umdl (Oracle server for access control): No down
time
- gin.umdl (WebCheckout server): No down time
- hank.umdl (Library Web server): No down time
- myrna.umdl (MIRLYNWeb server): No down time
- opal.umdl (SilverPlatter server): No down time
- North Campus server environment
- dlps4.umdl (primary web server for DLPS and public collections): No
down time
- dlps5.umdl (library proxy server): No down time
- dlps6.umdl (Oracle server for access control and usage
statistics): No down time
- dlps7.umdl (Numeric Data server): No down time
- dlps8.umdl (non-public collections): No down time
- dlps9.umdl (Image Services): No down time