Difference between revisions of "Sysadmin Todo List"

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This is an unordered set of tasks.  Detailed information on any of the tasks typically goes in related topics' pages, although usually not until the task has been filed under [[Sysadmin Todo List#Completed|Completed]].
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This is the new Sysadmin Todo List as of 05/27/2010. The previous list was moved to [[Old Sysadmin Todo List]]. This list list is incomplete, and needs updating.
== Important ==
 
=== Einstein Upgrade ===
 
[http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/enterprise/RHEL-5-manual/Deployment_Guide-en-US/index.html Massive amount of deployment documentation for RHEL 5]
 
# Pick a date within the next week '''Monday, 7/23/2007'''
 
# Send an e-mail to Aaron, warning him of the future takedown of tomato '''Done'''
 
# Update Tomato to RHEL5 '''Installed w/ basic configuration (auth, autofs, etc)'''
 
# Check all services einstein currently provides. Locate as many custom scripts, etc. as is reasonable and label/copy them.
 
## [[DNS]] ''Installed, set up, working''
 
## [[LDAP]] ''Installed, set up, working.'' Changed config files on tomato and einstein to do replication, but their LDAP services need restarted. Need to schedule a time to do it on einstein. Double-check configs!
 
## [[Postfix]] ''Installed, set up, working!''
 
## [[AMaViS]] ''Installed, set up''
 
## [[ClamAV]] ''Installed, set up''
 
## [[SpamAssassin]] ''Installed, set up, working? (need to test to make sure)''
 
## [[Cyrus Imap|IMAP]] <code>cyradm localhost</code> gives "cannot connect to server". This all seems to be sasl-related. It'd be probably be easy if there was a way to have cyrus use PAM. <del>[http://www.openldap.org/doc/admin23/sasl.html LDAP and sasl]</del> <ins>Nevermind, that has to do with using SASL to authenticate LDAP</ins><code>saslauthd -v</code> lists pam and ldap as available authentication mechanisms, and /etc/sysconfig/saslauthd has an entry "MECH=pam"&hellip;! What am I missing? '''Tried making a new "mail.physics.unh.edu.crt" for tomato, but couldn't because that would have required revoking einstein's cert of the same name. Tried using the "tomato.unh.edu.crt" and "tomato.unh.edu.key", but is giving the same results as the "mail.physics.unh.edu.*" copied from einstein.''' Tried using tomato's UNH address instead of hostname: same result. '''I'm able to login using the <code>imtest</code> program, but the server doesn't send the same messages as shown [http://cyrusimap.web.cmu.edu/twiki/bin/view/Cyrus/ImtestByHand here].'''
 
## [[automount|/home]] ''Installed, set up, working''
 
## [[Samba]] ''Installed, set up, working.'' If anyone needs samba access, they need to find us and have us make them a samba account. No LDAP integration.
 
## [[Web Servers|Web]]?
 
## Fortran compilers and things like that? (Also needs compat libs--'''Nope, tomato is 32-bit.''')
 
# Clone those services to tomato
 
# Switch einstein <-> tomato, and then upgrade what was originally einstein
 
# Look into making an einstein, tomato failsafe setup.
 
  
=== Miscellaneous ===
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== Projects ==
* The latest kernel on pepper doesn't have a SMP version? Had to go back to the second-most recent.
+
*Convert physical and VMs to CentOS 6 for compute servers ([[taro]],[[endeavour]]) and all others to either 6 or 7.   
* Pauli crashes nearly every day, not when backups come around. We need to set up detailed system logging to find out why.
+
**VMs: Einstein
* Pauli2 and 4 don't give out their data via /net to the other paulis. This doesn't seem to be an autofs setting, since I see nothing about it in the working nodes' configs. Similarly, 2,4, and 6 won't access the other paulis via /net. 2,4 were nodes we rebuilt this summer, so it makes sense they don't have the right settings, but 6 is a mystery.
+
**Physical: [[endeavour]], [[taro]], and [[gourd]]
* Pauli2's hard drive may be dying. Some files in /data are inaccessible, and smartctl shows a large number of errors (98 if I'm reading this right...). Time to get Heisenberg a new hard drive? '''Or maybe just ween him off of NPG&hellip;'''
+
*Mailman: Clean up mailman and make sure all the groups and users are in order.
* Steve can't log into roentgen. Don't appear in <code>getent passwd | grep mccoyst</code>, but that's the case on several other machines that I can log into, such as einstein. However, <code>getent passwd mccoyst</code> ''does'' return my info on einstein, but not roentgen. <code>ldapsearch -x '(uid=mccoyst)'</code> returns me on roentgen. Fake user "fdelete" had my uid as its gid, so I finally deleted it and the other deletes "just in case". They still show up in roentgen's <code>getent passwd</code>, but not ldap searches, and I was able to log in directly as jdelete and remotely as ndelete&hellip; Bwah??:
+
*CUPS: Look into getting CUPS authenticating users through LDAP instead of using Samba.
  root@roentgen:root>luserdel fdelete
+
*Printer: Get printtracker.py working and see if you can get a driver to properly recognize page number count instead of just giving the value as a number of 1 which corresponds to a job submission not the number of pages.
  User fdelete does not exist.
+
*Check /etc/apcupsd/shutdown2 script on Gourd to make sure all the keys are correctly implemented so the machines go down properly during a power outage.
   root@roentgen:root>userdel fdelete
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*Do a check on Lentil to see if there is any unneccessary data being backed up.
  userdel: error deleting password entry
 
  userdel: error deleting shadow password entry
 
  userdel: error removing group entry
 
  userdel: error removing shadow group entry
 
  root@roentgen:root>id fdelete
 
  uid=4239(fdelete) gid=4235(fdelete) groups=4235(fdelete),4199(farm)
 
* Learn how to use [[cacti]] on okra. Seems like a nice tool, mostly set up for us already. '''Find out why lentil and okra (and tomato?) aren't being read by [[cacti]]. Could be related to the warnings that repeat in ''okra:/var/www/cacti/log/cacti.log''.''' Not related to the warnings; those are for other machines that are otherwise being monitored. <font color="blue">Try adding cacti to the exclude exclude list in access.conf</font>  Nevermind, lentil doesn't have any restrictions. Need to find out the requirements for a machine to be monitored by cacti/rrdtools.  The documentaion makes it sound like only the cacti host needs any configuration, but I'm dubious. '''Ahh, it looks like every client has a file snmpd.conf, which affects what can be graphed.''' Tried configuring things on improv as in the Cacti HowTo, but no go. Must be some other settings as well. '''At some point on friday, cacti stopped being able to monitor einstein. Update-related? There are no errors in cacti.log, but the status page for einstein just says "down".'''
 
* Install the right SNMP stuff on tomato so that it can be graphed
 
* '''jalapeno hangups:''' Look at sensors on jalapeno, so that cacti can monitor the temp. The crashing probably isn't the splunk beta (no longer beta!), since it runs entirely in userspace. '''lm_sensors fails to detect anything readable. Is there a way around this?'''
 
* Try to pull as much data from Jim William's old drives as possible, if there's even anything on them.
 
  
== Ongoing ==
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==Daily Tasks==
=== Documentation ===
 
* '''<font color="red" size="+1">Maintain the Documentation of all systems!</font>'''
 
** Main function
 
** Hardware
 
** OS
 
** Network
 
* Continue homogenizing the configurations of the machines.
 
* Improve documentation of [[Software Issues#Mail Chain Dependencies|mail software]], specifically SpamAssassin, Cyrus, etc.
 
=== Maintenance ===
 
* Check e-mails to root every morning
 
* Resize/clean up partitions as necessary. Seems to be a running trend that a computer gets 0 free space and problems crop up. Symanzik, bohr seem imminent. '''Yup, bohr died. Expanded his root by 2.5 gigs. Still serious monitor problems though, temporarily bypassed with vesa...''' Bohr's problem seems tied to the nvidia drivers, let's wait until the next release and see how those work out.
 
* Check up on security [http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/enterprise/RHEL-5-manual/Deployment_Guide-en-US/ch-sec-network.html#ch-wstation]
 
  
=== On-the-Side ===
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These are things that should be done every day when you come into work.
* See if we can get the busted printer in 322 to work down here.
 
* Certain settings are similar or identical for all machines, such as resolv.conf.  It would be beneficial to write a program to do remote configuration.  This would also simplify the process of adding/upgrading machines.  '''Since resolv.conf was mentioned, I made a [[Script Prototypes#setres|prototype]] that seems to work.''' Another idea that was tossed around was a program that periodically compared such files against master copies, to see if the settings somehow got changed. '''Learn how to use ssh-agent for most of these tasks'''
 
* Backup stuff: We need exclude filters on the backups. We need to plan and execute extensive tests before modifying the production backup program. Also, see if we can implement some sort of NFS user access. '''I've set up both filters and read-only snapshot access to backups at home. Uses what essentially amounts to a bash script version of the fancy perl thing we use now, only far less sophisticated. However, the filtering and user access uses a standard rsync exclude file (syntax in man page) and the user access is fairly obvious NFS read-only hosting.''' <font color="green"> I am wondering if this is needed. The current scheme (ie the perl script) uses excludes by having a .rsync-filter is each of the directories where you want excluded contents. This has worked well. See ~maurik/tmp/.rsync-filter . The current script takes care of some important issues, like incomplete backups.</font> Ah. So we need to get users to somehow keep that .rsync-filter file fairly updated. And to get them to use data to hold things, not home. Also, I wasn't suggesting we get rid of the perl script, I was saying that I've become familiar with a number of the things it does. [http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/enterprise/RHEL-5-manual/Deployment_Guide-en-US/ch-acls.html#s2-acls-mounting-nfs] '''Put this on the backburner for now, since the current rate of backup disk consumption will give about 10 months before the next empty disk is needed.'''
 
  
== Waiting ==
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#Do a physical walk-through/visual inspection of the server room
* That guy's computer has a BIOS checksum error. Flashing the BIOS to the newest version succeeds, but doesn't fix the problem. No obvious mobo damage either. What happen?  '''Who was that guy, anyhow?''' (Silviu Covrig, probably) The machine is gluon, according to him. '''Waiting on ASUS tech support for warranty info'''  Aaron said it might be power-supply-related. '''Nope. Definitely not. Used a known good PSU and still got error, reflashed bios with it and still got error. '''Got RMA, sending out on wed.''' Waiting on ASUS to send us a working one!''' Called ASUS on 8/6, they said it's getting repaired right now. '''Wohoo! Got a notification that it shipped!''' ...they didn't fix it... Still has the EXACT same error it had when we shipped it to them. '''What should we do about this?'''
+
#Verify that all systems are running and all necessary services are functioning properly
* Printer queue for Copier: Konica Minolta Bizhub 750. IP=pita.unh.edu '''Seems like we need info from the Konica guy to get it set up on Red Hat. The installation documentation for the driver doesn't mention things like the passcode, because those are machine-specific. Katie says that if he doesn't come on Monday, she'll make an inquiry.''' <font color="green">Mac OS X now working,  IT guy should be here week of June 26th</font> '''Did he ever come?''' No, he didn't, and did not respond to a voice message left. Will call again.
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#*For a quick look at which systems are up you can use /usr/local/bin/[[serversup.py]]
 +
#*[[Gourd]]: Make sure that home folders are accessible, all virtual machines are running
 +
#*[[Einstein]]: Make sure that [[LDAP]] and all [[e-mail]] services (dovecot, spamassassain, postfix, mailman) are running
 +
#*[[Roentgen]]: Make sure website/MySQL are available
 +
#*[[Jalapeno]]: Named and Cups
 +
#*[[Lentil]]: Verify that backups ran successfully overnight. Check space on backup drives, and add new drives as needed.
 +
#Check [[Splunk]]: [https://pumpkin.farm.physics.unh.edu:8000 click here if you're in the server room], or open localhost:8000 (use https) from [[Pumpkin]]
 +
#*Check logs for errors, keep an eye out for other irregularities.
 +
#Check [[Cacti]]: [http://roentgen.unh.edu/cacti http://roentgen.unh.edu/cacti]
 +
#*Verify that temperatures are acceptable.
 +
#*Monitor other graphs/indicators for any unusual activity.
  
== Completed ==
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==Weekly Tasks==
* Figure out proper monitor refresh rates in an effort to fix bohr's strange graphics setup. '''[http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/monitors/1901FP/en/specs.htm] has them. Just need to wait for a convienient time for Silas to test and see if it worked.''' The display problems seem to be tied to the proprietary nvidia driver, it won't load right on its own, but loads and runs fine if you manually kill X and start it again. Hopefully the next release fixes that.
 
* '''<code>sudo</code> is hanging for me. <code>groups</code> shows my groups, ''/etc/sudoers'' has the "domain_admins" line'''. It eventually returned, saying that my user number doesn't exist in the passwd file. Something missing from nsswitch.conf? '''Nope, it's just like blackbody's, which works.''' getent passwd has everybody listed, as well. '''This was the result of a typo in ''/etc/ldap.conf'' '''
 
* Some machines, including pepper, have lost their RHN entitlements. Do we want more, or should we just swap entitlements from workstations like compton? '''compton and fermi are VMs on solo, so that's a no''' Entitlements were reapplied during the week of 9/23.
 
* Set up 32-bit compatibility libraries on pepper and taro.
 
* Myriad is only printing 70 pages at a time? '''Miscellaneous printing issues may be worked-around by setting clients to use different protocols that seem to work for some poeple --e.g. AppleTalk-- but keep an eye on the random shutting down of CUPS as well.''' Matt changed the protocol some of the clients use to jetdirect, the problems seem to have subsided temporarily. '''Nope, it seems to be telecom related. Maurik's called them in and hopefully they'll flip a few switches and all will be well.'''
 
* Test unknown equipment:* UPS '''I need a known good battery to play with. I'll probably get a surplus one cheap and bring it in. Seems like both UPSes I've looked at so far had bad batteries, since they were swollen and misshapen.''' The APC Smart-UPS 620 is good, just needs a new battery. The Belkin is dead. Is this the one the movers dropped? '''Applied for an RMA for the Belkin. Need to ship it out.''' Yeah, with the new super supplies, we shouldn't waste our time by going out of the way to get a new dinky one.
 
* Set up a few VM's to play with for settings, scripts, etc. Either xen or qemu should work fine. <font color="green">Good idea! We will also need a VM on the new server which allows someone to log into the system with a 32-bit environment. This will be needed for legacy software.</font> There's some set up on improv, under the names fermi and compton. '''Wait, is it solo or improv?'''
 
* Had to take ennui's strip to set up benfranklin. There are enough slots by quark, though.
 
* Removed the ancient kernels from symanzik's boot partition, because they were taking up space needed by kernels from up2date
 
* Figure out how to password-protect a webpage for Silas. He hosts from his personal space on nuclear.unh.edu '''http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.0/howto/auth.html#gettingitworking'''
 
* pepper, taro got kernel updates, but we have to wait on some users to finish some long jobs. <del>lzana says that he'll be finished around Tuesday (9/25/2007), so we should send out an e-mail on Monday to inform others. Tenetatively schedule the reboots for that Friday.</del> He's still running his jobs. New estimate for completion is over the weekend. '''Done on 9/28'''
 
* Jalapeno was hung when I came in, so I took the opportunity to boot it with the latest uniprocessor kernel.  Let's see how long it can last with this.  If it hangs again soon, then the issue probably isn't the SMP kernel. '''"Found" a newer SMP kernel, <del>but it panics on boot.</del>''' Tried the SMP again, but it made it to startup. Let's see how long it goes this time. It could be a power issue (e.g. Taro). '''Hung up again this morning (8/22). Let's look into the power angle.''' Hung up last night with the single-processor kernel (8/24). '''Hung sometime between the mornings of 8/26 and 8/27. Restarted this morning (8/27) with the default kernel.''' Was hung on 9/03 when the backup script came by, judging by the email records. '''Stopped by wed night, noticed jalapeno panicked. Copied down everything visible on-screen. Maybe we can use this to narrow down what's happening here.... (9/12, 7:40)''' Unsolved, just tidying; todo list has another jalapeno entry
 
* Removed the "delete" set of fake users from the database
 
  
== Previous Months Completed ==
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These are things that should be done once every 7 days or so.
[[Completed in June 2007|June 2007]]
 
  
[[Completed in July 2007|July 2007]]
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#Check physical interface connections
 +
#*Verify that all devices are connected appropriately, that cables are labeled properly, and that all devices (including RAID and IPMI cards) are accessible on the network.
 +
#Check Areca RAID interfaces
 +
#*The RAID interfaces on each machine are configured to send e-mail to the administrators if an error occurs. It may still be a good idea to login and check them manually on occasion as well, just for the sake of caution.
 +
#Clean up the server room, sweep the floors.
  
[[Completed in August 2007|August 2007]]
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==Monthly Tasks==
 +
 
 +
#Perform [[Enviromental_Control_Info#Scheduled_Maintenance|scheduled maintenance]] on the server room air conditioning units.
 +
#Check S.M.A.R.T. information on all server hard drives
 +
#*Make a record of any drives which are reporting errors or nearing failure.
 +
 
 +
==Annual Tasks==
 +
 
 +
These are tasks that are necessary but not critical, or that might require some amount of downtime. These should be done during semester breaks (probably mostly in the summer) when we're likely to have more time, and when downtime won't have as detrimental of an impact on users.
 +
 
 +
#Server software upgrades
 +
#*Kernel updates, or updates for any software related to critical services, should only be performed during breaks to minimize the inconvenience caused by reboots, or unexpected problems and downtime.
 +
#Run fsck on data volumes
 +
#Clean/Dust out systems
 +
#Rotate old disks out of RAID arrays
 +
#Take an inventory of our server room / computing equipment
 +
 
 +
<!--{| cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" border="1"
 +
! Time of Year !! Things to Do !! Misc.
 +
|-
 +
| Summer Break || ||
 +
|-
 +
|  || Major Kernel Upgrades ||
 +
|-
 +
|  || Run FDisk ||
 +
|-
 +
|  || Clean (Dust-off/Filters) while Systems are Shut down ||
 +
|-
 +
| Thanksgiving Break || ||
 +
|-
 +
| Winter Break || ||
 +
|-
 +
|  || Upgrade RAID disks || Upgrade only disks connected to a RAID card
 +
|--
 +
| Spring Break || ||
 +
|-
 +
|} -->

Latest revision as of 16:42, 15 February 2015

This is the new Sysadmin Todo List as of 05/27/2010. The previous list was moved to Old Sysadmin Todo List. This list list is incomplete, and needs updating.

Projects

  • Convert physical and VMs to CentOS 6 for compute servers (taro,endeavour) and all others to either 6 or 7.
  • Mailman: Clean up mailman and make sure all the groups and users are in order.
  • CUPS: Look into getting CUPS authenticating users through LDAP instead of using Samba.
  • Printer: Get printtracker.py working and see if you can get a driver to properly recognize page number count instead of just giving the value as a number of 1 which corresponds to a job submission not the number of pages.
  • Check /etc/apcupsd/shutdown2 script on Gourd to make sure all the keys are correctly implemented so the machines go down properly during a power outage.
  • Do a check on Lentil to see if there is any unneccessary data being backed up.

Daily Tasks

These are things that should be done every day when you come into work.

  1. Do a physical walk-through/visual inspection of the server room
  2. Verify that all systems are running and all necessary services are functioning properly
    • For a quick look at which systems are up you can use /usr/local/bin/serversup.py
    • Gourd: Make sure that home folders are accessible, all virtual machines are running
    • Einstein: Make sure that LDAP and all e-mail services (dovecot, spamassassain, postfix, mailman) are running
    • Roentgen: Make sure website/MySQL are available
    • Jalapeno: Named and Cups
    • Lentil: Verify that backups ran successfully overnight. Check space on backup drives, and add new drives as needed.
  3. Check Splunk: click here if you're in the server room, or open localhost:8000 (use https) from Pumpkin
    • Check logs for errors, keep an eye out for other irregularities.
  4. Check Cacti: http://roentgen.unh.edu/cacti
    • Verify that temperatures are acceptable.
    • Monitor other graphs/indicators for any unusual activity.

Weekly Tasks

These are things that should be done once every 7 days or so.

  1. Check physical interface connections
    • Verify that all devices are connected appropriately, that cables are labeled properly, and that all devices (including RAID and IPMI cards) are accessible on the network.
  2. Check Areca RAID interfaces
    • The RAID interfaces on each machine are configured to send e-mail to the administrators if an error occurs. It may still be a good idea to login and check them manually on occasion as well, just for the sake of caution.
  3. Clean up the server room, sweep the floors.

Monthly Tasks

  1. Perform scheduled maintenance on the server room air conditioning units.
  2. Check S.M.A.R.T. information on all server hard drives
    • Make a record of any drives which are reporting errors or nearing failure.

Annual Tasks

These are tasks that are necessary but not critical, or that might require some amount of downtime. These should be done during semester breaks (probably mostly in the summer) when we're likely to have more time, and when downtime won't have as detrimental of an impact on users.

  1. Server software upgrades
    • Kernel updates, or updates for any software related to critical services, should only be performed during breaks to minimize the inconvenience caused by reboots, or unexpected problems and downtime.
  2. Run fsck on data volumes
  3. Clean/Dust out systems
  4. Rotate old disks out of RAID arrays
  5. Take an inventory of our server room / computing equipment