120 likes | 128 Views
Glasgow Site report A personal view. Trends. Continuing move away from group based to experiment/project based local computing - STOP PRESS - evidence of second thoughts Reduced importance of PPARC Rolling grant funding Increased importance E-Science funding
E N D
Glasgow Site report A personal view David Martin / UK HEP System Managers Meeting 28/29 April 2003
Trends • Continuing move away from group based to experiment/project based local computing - STOP PRESS - evidence of second thoughts • Reduced importance of PPARC Rolling grant funding • Increased importance E-Science funding • Collaboration with non HEP E-Science • Grid is the future for Monte Carlo and Analysis • Laptops are becoming more important than desktops • Continuing move towards self management and self support of desktops and laptops • Average age of system increasing - no Pentium disposals yet • It’s getting harder going David Martin / UK HEP System Managers Meeting 28/29 April 2003
Equipment • > 80 Desktop PCs of ages up to ~ 6½ years • Windows 95, NT, 2000, XP • Linux ( RedHat 6.1 and 7.2) • 1 Tbyte File Server ~ 3 years old • RedHat 6.1 with kernel 2.2.19 + NFS3 patches • 2.5 Tbyte File Server - new • just being installed by Will Bell • CDF • original IBM x370 • new Dell cluster • ScotGRID • expecting upgrade via transfer of 5 Tbyte IBM x370 fileserver from ScotGRID-Edinburgh David Martin / UK HEP System Managers Meeting 28/29 April 2003
Laptops Last year’s slide - • 8 for ScotGRID (organised by P.Millar) • 4 For CDF • 3 For Detector Developers • ?? Personal Mixture of Windows 2000 and Linux Latest count (26/3/03) 25 laptop users David Martin / UK HEP System Managers Meeting 28/29 April 2003
Networking • within HEP - mostly switched 100baseT • dual 1GBit /s on Campus backbone • Internet connection now bypasses the ClydeNET-MAN/SuperJanet router (that just happens to be on our campus) giving the Glasgow a direct connection to SuperJanet • works fine David Martin / UK HEP System Managers Meeting 28/29 April 2003
CDF • national CDF procurement • globus toolkit • OpenPBS (?) • D0’s SAM (Sequential data Access via Meta-data http://d0db.fnal.gov/sam/) • 8 x 700 MHz Xeon IBM xSeries 370, 4GB memory, 1TB disk • AIT-3 tape library (no photo) David Martin / UK HEP System Managers Meeting 28/29 April 2003
59 IBM X Series 330 dual 1 Ghz Pentium III with 2GB memory • 2 IBM IBM X series 340 dual 1GHz Pentium III with 2GB memory and dual ethernet • 3 IBM IBM X series 340 dual 1GHz Pentium III with 2GB memory and 100 + 1000 Mbit/sec Ethernet • 1 TB disk • LTO/Ultrium Tape Library • Cisco Ethernet Switches • No Myrinet high performance interconnect for MPI style computing David Martin / UK HEP System Managers Meeting 28/29 April 2003
Desktop Installationand Update • Windows NT • support almost dropped • Windows 2000 • Paul Millar, factory, user, department • Redhat Linux • via m4 generated kickstart file and nfs • minor updates via autorpm (http://www.autorpm.org/) David Martin / UK HEP System Managers Meeting 28/29 April 2003
Staffing • Rolling Grant • Alan Flavell (incl Dept work) • Stan Thompson (CDF) • JREI - ScotGRID • David Martin • Other • Will Bell • Paul Millar (Laptops, incl Dept work) David Martin / UK HEP System Managers Meeting 28/29 April 2003
Hacking • 2 incidents - both on Grid Systems • test box with Apache unpatched because it was not thought to be running - actually it had been activated by a software installation performed by a colleague at CERN … got slapper • SucKit rootkit appeared to have been installed during 1 minute logon from CERN from lxplus using a sniffed username and password. • Moral • there aren’t the resources to do things “properly” • failed to spot warning in Tripwire - lost in the noisy report • such incidents are inevitable ScotGRID hacked 25th March 03 new RedHat kernel built 14th March 03 • perhaps we should ban the storage/processing/accessing of sensitive material • but do what we can to prevent such incidents and have a repair kit • recommendRedHat Linux X.Y System Administrator’s Survival CD out of RedHat Linux Professional Box (credit card sized CD) David Martin / UK HEP System Managers Meeting 28/29 April 2003
Concerns (1) • Self Management • low effectiveness from lack of opportunity to develop and access skill • inefficiency from duplication of effort • Purchasing • poor experience of Linux support from suppliers in PC Purchasing Framework Agreement eg supply of Intel 845G chipset • purchasing Linux systems within the local and legal rules is a problem • how does EU Public Body Purchasing Aggregation Rules work wrt Linux ? David Martin / UK HEP System Managers Meeting 28/29 April 2003
Concerns (2) • Security • low security culture • no plan • thought to be technical matter • self management of systems • mixing of research, teaching and administrative IT • insufficient effort to track and apply patches • got stung by SucKIT coming via CERN • patches break things eg OpenAFS • RedHat’s new more commercial Errata Policy - i.e. need RH9 by 1/1/04 • http://www.redhat.com/apps/support/errata/ • do we pay for RedHat Enterprise versions ? • is there an alternative source of security patches ? • do we abandon RedHat ? David Martin / UK HEP System Managers Meeting 28/29 April 2003