Hello all, I've been googling around for some answers and I thought I would ask the list as well.
In the past I have used different compters for different tasks. I would have many different installs of OpenBSD on many different platforms. However, i am moving some stuff into a data center and am getting a blade server with 10 blades (up to 20 total). I have been playing with this and it is running great, but as each blade has exactly the same specs (same drive, ram, processor etc) I was wondering about improving my skills on handling a lot of identical computers on the administration side. There are basically three types of blade, database, app server and front end world facing (proxy, mail, dns). I want to automate handling them as much as possible and would like some list suggestions on reading materials, software, or web howtos. Examples of what I am after: 1) Create images or post install diffs so that if I need to add a blade to expand, I put it in, connect via the console, install via PXE and then download the diff - I know you can do this wth the post install scrips in OpenBSD's install script, but any real world use of this, things to avoid or good things to do? 2) Keeping 10 - 20 copies of OpenBSD up to the latest patch levels without having to do more than trial on one (for each type) and then for the rest type something as trivial as "/bin/sh -x update.sh" rotating through the servers and testing as you go? I can see myself spending two days a month otherwise doing upgrades on all the servers. 3) Guides on how to manage the logs of this many servers. Any experiences with splunk on this sort of environment, other options? 4) Anything else I should think about / avoid? I know this is a bit of a broad ranging question, but I am looking for general gaps in my sys admin knowledge at the moment so I apologise for any vagueness. Regards Mikel
