October 2006

On Tuesday, October 31, 2006, there will be an interruption of all campus networking services from 5:00am to 7:00am EST. For details, see the OIT posting. During this time, CS systems will remain up but there will be an interruption in network connectivity outside the department.

On Thursday, October 26, 2006, we will have a scheduled downtime from 4:00am to 8:00am EDT.

Planned maintenance:

• We will copy user home directories from one disk array to another. This is the second step in a multi-step process to more effectively use our disk space. Note that we will not be copying the contents of the snapshot backups. If, in the next week or so, you wish to restore a file that would ordinarily be in a snapshot, please use the file restore form on the CS Guide and we will restore it from the nightly backup.
• We will re-install CentOS on the Linux cycle servers. Due to an unexpected (and frankly, strange) change in the installer, several software packages went missing in the transition from RHEL to CentOS during our October 10, downtime. We have revised our installation procedure and will re-install the operating system on these machines to get them in a known and repeatable state. NOTE: user crontabs on the penguin machines will be lost. Be sure to back them up before the downtime and restore them after the downtime.
• We will apply other miscellaneous patches to our systems.

On Tuesday, October 10, 2006, we will have a scheduled downtime from 4:00am to 8:00am EDT.

Planned maintenance:

• We will move a disk volume from one disk array to another. This is the first step in a multi-step process to more effectively use our disk space.
• We will transition the Linux cycle servers from RHEL to CentOS. Most users will not notice the change. However, user crontabs on the penguin machines will be lost. Be sure to back them up before the downtime and restore them after the downtime.
• We will apply other miscellaneous patches.