Back to the Cal Poly Home Page Starting time of service interruption: 6:00 PM on Tuesday, March 25
Ending time of service interruption: 8:00 AM on Saturday, March 29
NOTE: This service interruption on Central UNIX does not affect Internet access via the modem pools.
There are several reasons for this service interruption:
- End-of-quarter user filesystem archival
- This involves the storage of all user files as an end-of-quarter snap-shot which is held for an extended length of time. This is a normal activity which occurs at the end of each quarter.
- Migrate user filesystems to new HP file server
- This is part of the migration to the new HP-UX system. As a result of the move of the user filesystems from the AIX machines to the HP File server, users should noticed an increase in CPU throughput on the AIX machines as a result of them not performing a file server function anymore. Users may also notice a slight increase in access time to their own files since all files will now be accessed via the network.
- Edit user account entries to reflect new home directory paths
- This is being done to provide greater consistency between user paths and has no effect upon your web address. The old paths will continue to work for the immediate future. Users are encouraged to change any scripts or programs to reflect the new path before the old systems are discontinued.
- Migrate OpenMail/OpenTime to production mail server
- These are new technology services which will be phased in for Faculty use during Spring Quarter 1997, then to staff during late Spring and Summer Quarters. The first students will be brought into this service during Fall Quarter, 1997 (projected).
- End-of-quarter system filesystem archival
- This is a normal activity which occurs at the end of each quarter.
Each of these interruptions are a vital part of normal operations or of the migration from AIX to HP-UX. This is an extended version of what would normally happen during a quarter break and its duration is a one time event because of the migration.
All users of Central UNIX will be affected by this outage. Please refer to the table below for the length of time of the outage based on the service affected.
Various services will be affected for different intervals as shown in the table below:
Service Downtime Web Server 3/25@6:00 p.m. through 3/27@12:00 noon 3/25@6:00 p.m. through 3/28@8:00 a.m. Login and all other services 3/25@6:00 p.m. through 3/29@8:00 a.m. During the Web server outage, we will point the www.calpoly.edu toward a temporary server which will produce a single page indicating the down time and the expected uptime.
Revised by: George Westlund (gwestlun@calpoly.edu)
- During the outage no mail services will be available and no mail will be received or sent from Central UNIX. The systems should be up well before any mail from sending systems would be bounced back to the sender (most systems try repeatedly for at least three days). Our plan is to have the mail services back on-line after two days and eighteen hours at the longest.
- File Services
- During the outage all user files will be moved from the IBM RISC/6000 AIX Systems to the new Hewlett-Packard file server. This removes the file server function from the AIX machines, freeing up CPU power. After the outage, access to the user files across the network will take slightly longer than before since all user files will be accessed via the network instead of from local disks.
- NOTE: ACLs (Access Control Lists) will stop functioning with this file movement. ACLs will not reappear until we have migrated to DCE (Distributed Computing Environment) sometime in the future. This will affect user's Web pages and other files that had been made available to specific users in the past. User will now have to rely on standard UNIX permissions.
- Home Directory Entries in the Password File
- During the outage, all users home directory entries will be edited to reflect the new path on the HP file server. After the outage, all prior paths will continue to work until the AIX systems are removed from service. Users are encouraged to change any scripts or programs which rely on these older paths as soon as possible. A table indicating the old path and the new location on the HP file server will be made available to indicate the change.
- Web Services
- During the outage, a temporary Web site will be set up with a single page indicating the outage and its affect on all Web pages.After the outage, Web services will continue to run on the AIX system that it has until sometime in the late summer of this year. Departmental library web files will continue to remain on the AIX system until then. ACLs will continue to work for the departmental library files until they are migrated to the HP Web server (targeted for August 1997).