[Bio-Linux] Re: Clone Questions (Kerr Wall)

[Dr Dan Swan]

On Fri, 2003-02-07 at 12:01, bio-linux-request at bioinf.ceh.ac.uk wrote:

> Hi Milo et all,

Hi Kerr, and everyone else on the list.  I would just like to introduce
myself.  My name is Dan and I have taken over the Bio-Linux project from
Milo as of last week.  This includes the development of Bio-Linux v2.0,
maintenance of all Bio-Linux documentation and mailing list
administration and support.

> We just hired a new computer science student that will be helping with
> system administration and programming.  His name is Siddharth Ray and his
> email is rays at psu.edu.  I would like to have his name added to the list and
> let you guys know that he might be shooting you emails from time to time as
> he learns the administration on the clone.

I have manually subscribed Siddharth to the list.  If he would like to
change to a digest form of the Bio-Linux list then he can contact me
privately at dswan at ceh.ac.uk and I will make the necessary changes.
For future people subscribing there is a mailman interface for the
Bio-Linux list at http://www.bioinf.ceh.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/bio-linux

> The clone that I have running here has 2 80 GB hard drives.  I am wondering
> what commands that I need to use to format the second hard drive (It came
> with Windows XP so I think it would be formatted in FAT32).  We would like
> to use reiserfs to allow for large files and would like to have it mounted
> on '/usr/db' and set up its configuration to automatically mount when the
> machine boots.

There is a comprehensive article on managing the addition of further
hard drives at http://www.linuxplanet.com/linuxplanet/tutorials/4232/1/
The process is relatively simple (fdisk, mkfs, and additions to
/etc/fstab).  The document includes information on how to set up the
ReiserFS.  If you have any problems, please don't hesitate to get in
touch.

> We have two other Dell machines that are nearly identical to the ones you
> guys have in Oxford.  I want to clone both of these machines.  The first one
> that I want to clone has a bad floppy drive.  The machine is running Windows
> 2000 right now and I have a zip drive attached through USB.  Can we still
> clone without a floppy drive?  If so, I would like to do this next week.  I
> still have the CD that I made back in October/November.  Once I clone this
> machine, I will then clone the second machine that has a working floppy
> drive.  We are cloning all of our linux machines in the lab to hopefully
> make administration easier.

No, you can't clone without a floppy drive - can I suggest that you take
a working floppy drive from one of the machines in which it is known to
work, and simply use it during the installation process?  You can swap
it back out after the installation if theres one machine you absolutely
must have a working floppy drive in.

Please note that for the installation I will still require all the
information passed to us for the installation of the initial clone
(network, computer name, IP, DNS servers etc etc.) as I will need this
a) for our records and b) to prepare a configuration floppy for you (I
can send you this via email, all you will need to do is write the config
files to a floppy disk).

> Two other issues that I'd like to get your thoughts on.  We are wanting to
> set up one of the machines as a print server.  Do you guys have any thoughts
> on this.  We need to set it up to allow for windows, mac os x, and other
> linux (clones) to print to a laser jet printer and color ink jet printer
> that I would assume would be attached to one of the clones.  Our previous
> computer science dude set up cups, samba, and appletalk on a suse linux
> computer that worked fine for about a month but I have been unable to
> resolve the current issues.  He didn't leave any documentation on how he set
> it up and I don't want to use Suse anymore.  Therefore, we will be starting
> from scratch again.

I am not aware of cups (http://www.cups.org/) I'm afraid. Samba
(http://us2.samba.org/samba/samba.html) is relatively simple to set up,
netatalk (http://rsug.itd.umich.edu/software/netatalk.html) (the
appletalk implementation) is a little more tricky (or it was when I last
did it a couple of years ago).

Does the laserjet have an ethernet card in it?  If so it might be easier
to set it up plugged into the network, than trying to set up a print
server on a Linux clone with the printer attached.  Drivers for network
printing with Mac/Win platforms would be trivial to install, and I have
previously used rlpr (http://freshmeat.net/projects/rlpr/?topic_id=154)
for network printing under Linux with a variety of laser printers.

> We are in the process of resolving our backup problems and have gone to a
> group here on campus that will automatically login every night to one of the
> machines to backup.  We would like to set up all of the clones and me and
> Jim's os x laptops in a  Network File System to allow for us to easily share
> resources and get important files to the backup machine.  Do you guys have
> any thoughts on NFS?  I am really tired of having to ssh to each of the
> machines or scp things from my laptop to other computers and thought that
> NFS would help remedy the situation.  But if this is too complicated, I
> understand.

NFS is again, relatively simple to set up.  However it is a security
concern if set up incorrectly.  I am unsure as to why you would want all
the clones to export NFS file systems (or maybe thats not what you're
suggesting!), what you need to do is set up the backup server as an NFS
file server, and then the clones would act as NFS clients, so any data
you wanted shared would be placed in an NFS mounted directory.  The
NFS-HOWTO (http://nfs.sourceforge.net/nfs-howto/)is the definitive
guide, and I have set up NFS so many times that if you need any help
just ask.  We will need to secure access to any NFS shares on a per-IP
basis.  Exporting shares to the world will make a 14 year old computer
hackers day...  

I hope this is of some use,

regards,

Dan

-- 
Dr Dan Swan - Linux Developer/Bioinformatician
EGTDC, CEH, Mansfield Road, Oxford, OX1 3SR
Tel: 01865 281 976 Fax: 01865 281 696
http://envgen.nox.ac.uk/ | dswan at ceh.ac.uk