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Orxonox Server Replacement

Posted: Tue Aug 05, 2008 6:02 am
by beni
As many of you noticed there has been a problem with our server. While this is fixed another problem with less technical difficulties, but rather logistic ones has arisen.

Our server was located in the CAB server room as one of the VSETH computers. This was no problem until lately: The VSETH will outsource there IT department, which means there will no longer be somebody in the VSETH management who is responsible for their IT. This will be the VIS from now on.
The computer scientists needed more space in the server room and in order to avoid two fighting admins, the VSETH erased that position and therefore had to outsource it.

Now the VIS has somehow found our Nautilus standing around, minding nobodies business than his own and surprisingly weren't that happy about it. Since that server is older than any management member of the VSETH nobody knew what this machine was.

In order to fix Nautilus in July, we weren't able to put it back to the server room and it stands around in the VSETH management room, which won't be accepted for long, I figure.

We're searching for an alternative right now.

Somehow still the CAB server room
We could try to argue and pull strings (ask Mr. Kreuzer for help) to maintain our old space in the server room. The VIS should not be able to dictate the content of the server room. There could be some conditions, but there shouldn't be such that we cannot meet.

ISG-migration
We asked the ISG to help us with our problem and since they do not want our server, they would rather migrate Orxonox with their system. However we would loose some abilities and services. Not the important ones, but we won't be as free as we are now of course.
However Oli and I will follow this idea a little bit longer and discuss a few scenarios with the ISG.

Nowic' server
I did ask Nowic yesterday if we could host our server on his server, virtually that is. However we didn't discuss that for very long, so not all the details are clear right now. This solution would grant us more freedom and flexibility. Creating new users and repositories for SVN for instance should not be problematic. We would however have to install Debian instead of Gentoo and will have to use a central mail server instead of our own. Also the hosting of an own DNS server could be abandoned for a more easier one.
Also a problem you always have with virtual servers: One has to share resources with other machines. This could leave us with very little resources or when we use many resources, we could win the anger of many people including Nowic.

Posted: Tue Aug 05, 2008 3:32 pm
by 1337
Hmm, that is a problem... But I cannot really give any comment to it at all because I honestly have no idea about servers.
I would just like to get the commit messages back for next semester ;)

But anyway thanks a lot for the investigations and summary.

Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 5:45 am
by beni
It's also just about information, so everybody knows what is going on.

The CAB-server room is now officially off limits for us. VSETH management has decided to not host anything anymore besides their own stuff and stuff from their own commissions. This means we have to leave at the end of the year.

Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 3:14 pm
by beni
Oli/greenman does not like the ISG's offer of migration. Looks like we have to take Nowic' server or another alternative into consideration.

Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 8:15 pm
by Nowic
Well, my offer would also have several constraints as I want to keep the security risks and maintenance time as low as possible.

- I run Debian stable (aka Etch) on my Xen instance and therefore all services will be offered in the versions that Debian offers and supports. E.g. subversion (1.4.2dfsg1-2), apache2 (2.2.3-4+etch5), trac (0.10.3-1etch3), phpbb2 (2.0.21-7), ...
See: http://www.debian.org/distrib/packages
- You won't get root (or sudo) access.
- I'm not motivated to run a wide range of additional (exotic) services. E.g. IRC.
- Email is hosted on an other Xen instance (SMTP,POP,IMAP,Webmail) (only Web-administration would be possible)

I only own 1/4 of the ressources of the physical server, so If you absue a big chunk of memory, cpu or traffic (>> 200 GiB) during a month, the other server owners are allowed to request a financial compensation from me. But I don't think the current infrastructure (Trac+Svn) would cause a lot of problems. How much storage do you need?

System: DS5000 -> http://hetzner.de/rootserver.html

Nowic

Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 10:54 pm
by lieni
dude this sucks... i dont know whats going on at the vseth or whatsoever... i dont see a good solution either right now... but i'm kinda angry that some people are making our lives difficult... we just wanna continue orxonox as a student project n have fun... :S

Posted: Fri Aug 08, 2008 12:30 pm
by patrick
Since I've gotten used to having access to nautilus I would be interested in also getting one of these root-servers.

Anyone interested in sharing such a thing together? I think 4 people at most. Atm we are 2: me and orxonox (I will pay for the orxonox part but won't administer it!). Who will administer it and who will be interested in the other 2 slots?

Posted: Fri Aug 08, 2008 12:43 pm
by beni
It sounded interesting when Nowic first, when he hadn't got the server yet, talked about it. I'm not really sure what I would do with a server. What services would I be hosting? But as I'm writing this paragraph some ideas are already separating themselves from my vast gray mass, which builds my brain. :P
Also financially no problem, when I would take a third slot.

I would also administer the Orxonox server when we change to Debian.

Posted: Fri Aug 08, 2008 7:31 pm
by lieni
I'm more than ready to take the 4th slot!!! :-) dude, i've been waiting for this for age..... :)

Posted: Sat Aug 09, 2008 7:39 pm
by x3n
Nowic wrote:- I'm not motivated to run a wide range of additional (exotic) services. E.g. IRC.
Just in case we would accept Nowics offer (thanks by the way :)), I might be able to host the "exotic" services on the server of my UT-clan. I got root access, but of course I had to ask the other owners first. But as long as those services don't need much resources, chances are good.

Posted: Mon Aug 11, 2008 10:07 am
by beni
Uhm, so we could possibly buy one of those root-servers and host Orxonox stuff on this one, or we could use Nowic' root-server to host anything but IRC on it, which would be solved by x3n's clan server. Mails would run over the central mail server there. Mailinglist could be handled over the Orxonox server again.

So unless Lieni and Patrick change their minds, we could get one of our own. Otherwise we would surely find a solution to host all our services somewhere and somehow.

Great, problem solved :D. Thank you, everybody, for offering your help. Now there is only a high-level decision to make and we can start changing servers.

Posted: Mon Aug 11, 2008 5:38 pm
by patrick
ok. great! So I would like to continue in purchasing such a root server. So if there is a 4th person interested in the server now, please let me know :)

Posted: Tue Aug 12, 2008 9:50 am
by beni
Wait, don't we have 4 with you, Lieni, me and the Orx-server?

Posted: Wed Aug 13, 2008 4:04 pm
by Nowic
Some thoughts about project infrastructure...

Personally, I prefere my own infrastructure with full control and flexibility too. But lately I realised, that I spend way to much time maintaining and fixing the infrastructure of my own projects. I also change it and 'enhance' it, merely just because I can :-) . All that time would be better spent in actually writing code!

Maybe the project would benefit from outsourcing some of the services and reduce the hosting to a wiki and the forum, or so. Some of the newer project hoster offer quite nice stuff. Launchpad for example offers: sharing bugs (e.g. with ubuntu), a code review interface, automatic build-servers for packages (with your own repository, currently amd64, x86 and Ipia), online translation interface, blueprint management and a user-support-interface (Answers).

https://launchpad.net/+tour/index
http://code.google.com/hosting/
http://savannah.gnu.org/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison ... facilities

As I said, just thoughts. You are still welcome on my server. :)

Posted: Wed Aug 13, 2008 9:04 pm
by greenman
wow cool

i would also share the burden of adminstering the orxonox part, whether we go for debian or stay with gentoo (though I would prefer to stay with gentoo)