Back to the Cal Poly Home Page Phase One of the migration involves moving the UNIX mail function from the AIX site "oboe" to the new HP-UX Mail Server. This phase is composed of multiple parts as outlined below:
NIS allows the machines to share a common account/password database. Currently this is hosted by the AIX site "oboe" and it is to be migrated to the Mail Server site where it will become part of the Service Guard package "polymail". The package "polymail" will also contain all mail related data and programs including incoming mail spools, system aliases, filtering utilities, and additional mail services.
System aliases are used for a variety of purposes within the cluster. The most notable is that of class and departmental aliases which allow a mail to be distributed to all of the members of the alias via a single address from any Internet mail source.
One of the tools used by most system aliases is "distribute". Distribute allows mail to be sent to the members of an alias without the message bearing the email addresses of each of the members of the alias. Instead it places the name of the alias in the "To:" or "Cc:" fields saving a large amount of network bandwidth and disk space. Distribute also allows the systems programmers to tune mail flow without affecting user configurations.
One of the tools being used to manage system aliases is called Alias Manager. This tools was written locally an provides several functions including:
- Departmental adds of departmental aliases
- Departmental adds of course aliases
- Departmental deletes of departmental or course aliases
- Future expirations of old aliases
There are also a host of additional tools provided by the AIXMENU (to become UNIXMENU on the new system) which assist the alias owner in maintaining the aliases and alias data files.
This is one of the most critical parts of the migration. In order for the system to be able to deliver mail it must have the incoming mail filesystem as a local filesystem that it owns. Also making sure that this filesystem is mounted back to all of the old AIX systems is of critical importance in maintaining the user's ability to access their mail.
Mail filtering mechanisms allow user to process their incoming mail as its received. The following two packages are being migrated to the new system.
NOTE: All user binaries used in addition to those listed below WILL NOT function when mail is running on the HP-UX system. They are NOT binary compatible. Once users have access to the HP-UX Session Server, they may recompile any binary programs used in conjunction with their incoming mail.
The "filter" program, which is used by several users, will be located on the HP-UX Mail Server in /usr/local/bin. It will have access to users home filesystems and any subsequent SCRIPTS that the user may wish to execute. User may not execute AIX binaries via the "filter" program. For more information on "filter" enter "man filter" at the system prompt.
Hypermail allows the user to process their incoming mail into an HTML archive. Hypermail will be located in /usr/local/bin and must be executed from a "filter" rule. For more information on "hypermail" enter "man hypermail" at the system prompt.
There are a couple of other mail services available on AIX that will be migrated to the HP-UX Mail Server. These are outlined as follows:
The Qualcomm Pop server is being installed on the HP-UX Mail Server to replace that function that currently is provided with limited support on the AIX site "oboe". It is our hope to be able to provide more support for pop clients such as Eudora, Netscape, QVTNet, etc. in the coming year.
NOTE: Keep your eyes open for announcements on the implementation of OpenMail which will provide mail to the desktop with more efficiency and functionality.
We are also looking at other technologies for providing client/server mail services. These services may or may not be implemented based on available resources and resource demands of the technology.
As part of the procurement, a systems management host is also being installed which has a variety of utilities to help manage the other machines as they are installed. It also has the capabilities of monitoring the old AIX machines providing a single point for most management functions.
Revised by: George Westlund (gwestlun@calpoly.edu)