Re: Rack mounted backend ideas
It is also more space appropriate to do this headless than to go with a separate traditional box/monitor/keyboard, so long as I'm not walking into more headaches than I can guess at at present. Hi Mark, Given that you are putting all this in a rack, Have you considered using a KVM switch, such as those supplied by Belkin. You would then only need a single Keyboard, Monitor Mouse for all of your PC's, this would get around any potential problems you may have with serial as well as providing a backup means of using your machines in the event that serial input fails. Regards Lee -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Rack mounted backend ideas
On Tue, 2003-01-14 at 02:15, Lee W wrote: It is also more space appropriate to do this headless than to go with a separate traditional box/monitor/keyboard, so long as I'm not walking into more headaches than I can guess at at present. Hi Mark, Given that you are putting all this in a rack, Have you considered using a KVM switch, such as those supplied by Belkin. You would then only need a single Keyboard, Monitor Mouse for all of your PC's, this would get around any potential problems you may have with serial as well as providing a backup means of using your machines in the event that serial input fails. That, and you can run X or text mode (with all attendant benefits) native to each box at full wire speed, which is much faster than the 115Kbps (or is the console restricted to 19.2Kbps?) serial speed -- ++ | Ron Johnson, Jr. mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] | | Jefferson, LA USA http://members.cox.net/ron.l.johnson | || | Basically, I got on the plane with a bomb. Basically, I | | tried to ignite it. Basically, yeah, I intended to damage | | the plane. | |RICHARD REID, who tried to blow up American Airlines| | Flight 63 | ++ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Rack mounted backend ideas
On Tue, 2003-01-14 at 04:18, Ron Johnson wrote: On Tue, 2003-01-14 at 02:15, Lee W wrote: It is also more space appropriate to do this headless than to go with a separate traditional box/monitor/keyboard, so long as I'm not walking into more headaches than I can guess at at present. Hi Mark, Given that you are putting all this in a rack, Have you considered using a KVM switch, such as those supplied by Belkin. You would then only need a single Keyboard, Monitor Mouse for all of your PC's, this would get around any potential problems you may have with serial as well as providing a backup means of using your machines in the event that serial input fails. That, and you can run X or text mode (with all attendant benefits) native to each box at full wire speed, which is much faster than the 115Kbps (or is the console restricted to 19.2Kbps?) serial speed -- ++ | Ron Johnson, Jr. mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] | | Jefferson, LA USA http://members.cox.net/ron.l.johnson | || | Basically, I got on the plane with a bomb. Basically, I | | tried to ignite it. Basically, yeah, I intended to damage | | the plane. | |RICHARD REID, who tried to blow up American Airlines| | Flight 63 | ++ My understanding is that the serial speed can be set to what the hardware can support, but don't think that will be the only connection among the computers - they will be bound by Ethernet. The serial line is only because the boot loaders only support serial as a way of connecting from another device - once the kernel and networking are up, they will be on the local Ethernet backbone as the method of interaction. -- Mark L. Kahnt, FLMI/M, ALHC, HIA, AIAA, ACS, MHP ML Kahnt New Markets Consulting Tel: (613) 531-8684 / (613) 539-0935 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: Rack mounted backend ideas
On Mon, Jan 13, 2003 at 04:46:14PM -0500, Mark L. Kahnt wrote: On Mon, 2003-01-13 at 14:48, Carel Fellinger wrote: ... Here me English is lacking, atleast I can't parse the above. ... Yeah, I did say something weird there :) ...sniped the explanation Okee, I see. In my experience most linux related things go swell with a headless box. Bootup selections are easily handled over the serial line, (root) login over the serial line is almost like the console but for the fact that I haven't managed yet to get minitel to deal with colors nor to pass on Home, Page-up, Ctrl-Alt-Del, etc keys. Not that big of a problem for me, as I very often log in onto such system with ssh over the ethernet from a normal console or from an xterm. The one thing that's really troublesome is things the BIOS tries to tell, like the other day I had a harddisk start to fail, and the BIOS tolled me so thanks to S.M.A.R.T. But on a headless system such messages would have been invisible, and depending on your BIOS you have a change that the BIOS will keep waiting for you to press a key:(, preventing it to complete the booting. There is some S.M.A.R.T. aware software under linux, but I haven't tried it out yet. So yes it works. Have it hooked up onto your local network to easily access the servers using ssh (and X-forwarding), use a serial line for boot control and root access, enable S.M.A.R.T. under linux, and prey the linux S.M.A.R.T. software detects harddisk failures before the BIOS does. -- groetjes, carel -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Rack mounted backend ideas
On Tue, 2003-01-14 at 09:09, Mark L. Kahnt wrote: On Tue, 2003-01-14 at 04:18, Ron Johnson wrote: On Tue, 2003-01-14 at 02:15, Lee W wrote: It is also more space appropriate to do this headless than to go with a separate traditional box/monitor/keyboard, so long as I'm not walking into more headaches than I can guess at at present. Hi Mark, Given that you are putting all this in a rack, Have you considered using a KVM switch, such as those supplied by Belkin. You would then only need a single Keyboard, Monitor Mouse for all of your PC's, this would get around any potential problems you may have with serial as well as providing a backup means of using your machines in the event that serial input fails. That, and you can run X or text mode (with all attendant benefits) native to each box at full wire speed, which is much faster than the 115Kbps (or is the console restricted to 19.2Kbps?) serial speed [snip] My understanding is that the serial speed can be set to what the hardware can support, but don't think that will be the only connection But the serial h/w can only support 115Kbps. among the computers - they will be bound by Ethernet. The serial line is only because the boot loaders only support serial as a way of connecting from another device - once the kernel and networking are up, they will be on the local Ethernet backbone as the method of interaction. What boot loader only supports serial console?? Personally, I'm very happy using KVM... -- ++ | Ron Johnson, Jr. mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] | | Jefferson, LA USA http://members.cox.net/ron.l.johnson | || | Basically, I got on the plane with a bomb. Basically, I | | tried to ignite it. Basically, yeah, I intended to damage | | the plane. | |RICHARD REID, who tried to blow up American Airlines| | Flight 63 | ++ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Rack mounted backend ideas
On Tue, 2003-01-14 at 16:39, Ron Johnson wrote: On Tue, 2003-01-14 at 09:09, Mark L. Kahnt wrote: On Tue, 2003-01-14 at 04:18, Ron Johnson wrote: On Tue, 2003-01-14 at 02:15, Lee W wrote: It is also more space appropriate to do this headless than to go with a separate traditional box/monitor/keyboard, so long as I'm not walking into more headaches than I can guess at at present. Hi Mark, Given that you are putting all this in a rack, Have you considered using a KVM switch, such as those supplied by Belkin. You would then only need a single Keyboard, Monitor Mouse for all of your PC's, this would get around any potential problems you may have with serial as well as providing a backup means of using your machines in the event that serial input fails. That, and you can run X or text mode (with all attendant benefits) native to each box at full wire speed, which is much faster than the 115Kbps (or is the console restricted to 19.2Kbps?) serial speed [snip] My understanding is that the serial speed can be set to what the hardware can support, but don't think that will be the only connection But the serial h/w can only support 115Kbps. among the computers - they will be bound by Ethernet. The serial line is only because the boot loaders only support serial as a way of connecting from another device - once the kernel and networking are up, they will be on the local Ethernet backbone as the method of interaction. What boot loader only supports serial console?? Personally, I'm very happy using KVM... From what I've been reading, unless I went right past it, the common boot loaders only support local or serial console - not something over a lan for the boot prompt et al. What I'm looking at, KVM is more connection with the headless servers than I need - hey, I use Linux to leverage running applications anywhere - the boot-up is the only point I wasn't sure about in terms of what could go wrong that I haven't seen so far. -- ++ | Ron Johnson, Jr. mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] | | Jefferson, LA USA http://members.cox.net/ron.l.johnson | || | Basically, I got on the plane with a bomb. Basically, I | | tried to ignite it. Basically, yeah, I intended to damage | | the plane. | |RICHARD REID, who tried to blow up American Airlines| | Flight 63 | ++ -- Mark L. Kahnt, FLMI/M, ALHC, HIA, AIAA, ACS, MHP ML Kahnt New Markets Consulting Tel: (613) 531-8684 / (613) 539-0935 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Rack mounted backend ideas
I'm looking at putting a couple rack mounted systems in as a reorganisation of my computing environment - one an SMP IA32 type system (we'll see how many CPUs make sense) running as a file and computing server with Debian GNU/Linux, and the other likely only one CPU at present to run as an experimentation box - something I can put various BSD (both Debian and *elsewhere*) the Hurd and even a Debian GNU/Linux Sid and even more unstable, and maybe even a development kernel partition if I get *really adventurous*. The current desktop box would become a combination firewall and X terminal, but it all raises one key question: with the second rack computer being meant to be rebooted regularly as I switch between various o/s, how reliable is it to control the boot process/selection from a separate machine? I know that Lilo and Grub do have the serial option for sending the info to another machine (I'm hoping that means that Minicom would handle it fine.) Any heads-up of use, given that it is one thing to point clients to the HOWTOs when setting things up, but I haven't regularly run a system this way - only installed and troubleshot them? -- Mark L. Kahnt, FLMI/M, ALHC, HIA, AIAA, ACS, MHP ML Kahnt New Markets Consulting Tel: (613) 531-8684 / (613) 539-0935 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: Rack mounted backend ideas
Mark L. Kahnt said: a separate machine? I know that Lilo and Grub do have the serial option for sending the info to another machine (I'm hoping that means that Minicom would handle it fine.) Any heads-up of use, given that it is one I haven't tried GRUB, but with LILO the serial options doesn't let me interact with lilo, it just spits the information out to the serial port. So if the kernel broke or something, I wouldn't be able to use vmlinuz.old nate -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Rack mounted backend ideas
On Mon, Jan 13, 2003 at 01:59:15PM -0500, Mark L. Kahnt wrote: .. The current desktop box would become a combination firewall and X terminal, but it all raises one key question: with the second rack computer being meant to be rebooted regularly as I switch between various o/s, how reliable is it to control the boot process/selection from a separate machine? I know that Lilo and Grub do have the serial Not sure where your doubts stem from, but the only reason to have a screen and keyboard attached to the machine it self is to fiddle with the BIOS. Linux doesn't care, log messages can be directed to the serial port. Grub and lilo are capable to read from the serial port to get there instructions, heck, they're even capable during boot to let you decide to switch to console or serial. And ofcourse running programs on those servers with there output directed to your X-terminal is just a matter of setting it up that way:) option for sending the info to another machine (I'm hoping that means that Minicom would handle it fine.) Any heads-up of use, given that it yep, minicom is fine is one thing to point clients to the HOWTOs when setting things up, but I haven't regularly run a system this way - only installed and troubleshot them? Here me English is lacking, atleast I can't parse the above. Do or don't you have experience with using a headless server? Do you have clients in the sence of costumers that you want to use those rack mounted systems? -- groetjes, carel -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Rack mounted backend ideas
On Mon, Jan 13, 2003 at 11:18:58AM -0800, nate wrote: Mark L. Kahnt said: a separate machine? I know that Lilo and Grub do have the serial option for sending the info to another machine (I'm hoping that means that Minicom would handle it fine.) Any heads-up of use, given that it is one I haven't tried GRUB, but with LILO the serial options doesn't let me GRUB is fine, I use it and it nevers fails:) interact with lilo, it just spits the information out to the serial port. This I find hard to believe, did you try to send a break? According to the lilo docs one needs to send a break instead of pressing shift to get lilo's attention. -- groetjes, carel -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Rack mounted backend ideas
Carel Fellinger said: This I find hard to believe, did you try to send a break? According to the lilo docs one needs to send a break instead of pressing shift to get lilo's attention. no, haven't tried that:) thanks nate -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Rack mounted backend ideas
On Mon, 2003-01-13 at 14:48, Carel Fellinger wrote: On Mon, Jan 13, 2003 at 01:59:15PM -0500, Mark L. Kahnt wrote: .. The current desktop box would become a combination firewall and X terminal, but it all raises one key question: with the second rack computer being meant to be rebooted regularly as I switch between various o/s, how reliable is it to control the boot process/selection from a separate machine? I know that Lilo and Grub do have the serial Not sure where your doubts stem from, but the only reason to have a screen and keyboard attached to the machine it self is to fiddle with the BIOS. Linux doesn't care, log messages can be directed to the serial port. Grub and lilo are capable to read from the serial port to get there instructions, heck, they're even capable during boot to let you decide to switch to console or serial. And ofcourse running programs on those servers with there output directed to your X-terminal is just a matter of setting it up that way:) option for sending the info to another machine (I'm hoping that means that Minicom would handle it fine.) Any heads-up of use, given that it yep, minicom is fine is one thing to point clients to the HOWTOs when setting things up, but I haven't regularly run a system this way - only installed and troubleshot them? Here me English is lacking, atleast I can't parse the above. Do or don't you have experience with using a headless server? Do you have clients in the sence of costumers that you want to use those rack mounted systems? Yeah, I did say something weird there :) I have limited experience with headless servers - I have set up a couple, and a few times I've had to deal with problems on them that has lead to re-booting. However, I've not had the job of running one on an ongoing basis to the point that I have run into any and every possible problem of this configuration (other than rats eating at the null modem cable so that a minicom connection won't *quite* work for the restart - luckily, I just let the prompt timeout, and the boot went okay according to the logs.) I have enough experience to know it can be done, and to have done it (both the installation and the use when necessary) but expect that things can go wrong, and was wondering what those are that I need to look out for and stand by with solutions. I also tend to pull out an old vt102 to do the actual install (they just don't make keyboards that feel that good to the fingers anymore) over a network for headless servers, but the thing is on its last legs (I got it originally from someone who was replacing his dialup to the office with an actual computer.) Beyond that, I am the client - I just see this all as a way to get away from data and processing bottlenecks with the SMP server, and to learn about multiple o/s and new software with the other box. It is also more space appropriate to do this headless than to go with a separate traditional box/monitor/keyboard, so long as I'm not walking into more headaches than I can guess at at present. -- groetjes, carel -- Mark L. Kahnt, FLMI/M, ALHC, HIA, AIAA, ACS, MHP ML Kahnt New Markets Consulting Tel: (613) 531-8684 / (613) 539-0935 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: Rack mounted backend ideas
In article [EMAIL PROTECTED], Carel Fellinger [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Mon, Jan 13, 2003 at 11:18:58AM -0800, nate wrote: I haven't tried GRUB, but with LILO the serial options doesn't let me interact with lilo, it just spits the information out to the serial port. This I find hard to believe, did you try to send a break? According to the lilo docs one needs to send a break instead of pressing shift to get lilo's attention. We run all our machines with a serial port, and you can interact with lilo just fine. Just make sure you set: prompt timeout=50 in /etc/lilo.conf. LILO will prompt for input and if you don't enter anything within 5 seconds will continue booting. Mike. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
