Cambridge HEP Group - site report

March 2000

Hardware

• 2 DIGITAL UNIX (ALPHA) fileservers
  - 450GB disk space, DLT2000 stacker, UPS-protected.
  - disk mainly RAID0 in StorageWorks pedestals.

• 9 DEC ALPHA workstations
  - 3 DIGITAL UNIX, 6 VMS.

• 39 PCs
  - Range from Pentium-100MHz to Pentium III-500MHz
  - 16 Linux, 16 Windows NT
  - 6 Windows 95, 1 Windows 3.1

• SUN workstation (Solaris - for CAD)
  

• 4 MACs, 5 X-terminals

• Total 600GB+ disk space

• Printers
  - 2 HP Laserjet (20ppm+)
  - Tektronix Phaser 550 (colour laser)
  - Epson A2 colour inkjet (mainly for CAD work)

• Network
  Majority of systems on switched ethernet (34 @ 10Mbps, 4 @ 100Mbps). Rest (~35) currently on shared ethernet. Departmental connection to campus now 100Mbps, but only 10Mbps from HEP group to department.

• Sundry items
  - scanners
  - CD-writers

 

Software

• DIGITAL UNIX(4.0D)
  - AFS, CERN software (including SHIFT software for NA48), SAMBA (for WNT) etc. etc.

• Windows NT (4.0SP4)
  - 2 nodes as main and backup servers.
  - Most software served from shared disk space on D.U. box using SAMBA.
  - Exceed, CERN software, Coraldraw, MS Office 97, MS Visual Studio (C++, FORTRAN) etc. etc.
  - Recently bought DriveImagePro from PowerQuest to copy system disks (especially to help with disaster recovery).

• Linux (Redhat 5.1)
  - CERN libraries, MAPLE, AFS, etc. etc. Authorization, home directory common with D.U.

• SUN/PCs for CAD
  - variety of CAD packages (CADENCE, Powerview, etc., etc.)

 

Concerns

• Network charges
  - Currently University charging at departmental level, based on current usage (with overall bill of course based on last year's usage). Current level (~£4000 per annum) is not excessive, but no real incentive (especially for short term visitors) to moderate use.

• Multiple platforms
  - heterogeneous backups, general management, etc. etc.

• Electricity
  - quality of local supply is poor (though seems to be improving)- power cuts are very disruptive. UPS use has reduced the disruption, but not economic to protect every piece of equipment. However, recent tendency has been to consider if a UPS is needed whenever equipment is purchased.

• Disk space serving/management
  - what is the best way to do this?

• Software costs
  - especially tools for LHC software development - many cannot be obtained cheaply via CERN.

• Security
  - how to find the best balance between preventing successful attacks and preventing the users from working?

 

 

 

Future Plans

• Videoconferencing
  - group or (possibly) departmental facility?
  - not directly related to VC, but we have owned and heavily used a conference phone for several years, and are planning in the very near future to buy a portable data projector (for use of visiting speakers in the lab, and for our people in schools).

• Network
  - major departmental upgrade currently being installed, which by end of this summer will offer 100Mbps switched ethernet to all desktops and gigabit ethernet capability.

• Desktops
  - replace on cycle ~4-5 years.

• Servers
  - certainly replace one of existing servers during next year or so, and buy significant (~0.5-1.0TB) extra disk space.

• Analysis farm (or "smallholding"?)
  - planning to put our toe in the water with a small (~10 PC) farm.

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John Hill, 21 March 2000