[MLB-WIRELESS] Server Virtualisation - (was RE: possible vpn

[mw at freenet.net.au]

Cool!  Real debate! :-)

> The hardware isn't a problem but the squabbling is.  If MW needed
> a new server I could find a new sun X2200 or better to take the job
> but I can't back it up and manage it was as well as our main server.
> 
> I like that people have great ideas... the network and club would
> not exist without them but can we stop dissing other peoples hard
> work (that has proven useful) until we have something else better
> in place?

I don't think anybody is dimissing other peoples hard work.  If you think
that's what I'm doing (not sure if the implication is there) then let me
square it for the record:

I think that Steve and everyone else who has been involved in developing,
maintaining, managing, improving the MW web site/s, applications and
resources have done an excellent job.  Honestly, I think that the MW site
node database is one of the coolest systems I have ever seen - really!

I think that the folks who have built the independent parts and glued it all
together are quite obviously very smart cookies - honestly.

What I *do* think, is that unless that excellent work is picked up by new
volunteers, then it will all be for naught - and I for one would consider
that a complete travesty.

Thus my suggestions and offers of assistance are intended to be more than
just soapbox rhetoric, and put up some real offer of assistance.  I'm not
one to sit back in my armchair and complain about the inaction of others
without offering to do something myself.

I've been offering to help out for the past 18 months, and yet my offers of
assistance seem to have been systematically ignored (or overlooked) - and
I'm not the only one.  I've seen more than one good idea posted to this list
over the last 18 months, and more than one indication of interest.  At the
last AGM, there were lots of hands up to contribute.  Hopefully we can find
a way that those guys can make a real contribution.

> Today Tyson offered two good ideas that he wants to work on... but
> he is one of the few people who understand how members get expired
> so I asked him to work on that 1st.  Lets fix the member database
> so we can tell who is a member or not and then we can do other
> things.

With all due respect to Tyson and others, this has been a priority for more
than a year now.  Look, again: no offense intended, and I hope it won't be
taken - Tyson is definitely one of those smart blokes that has my full
support, but let's give the bloke a break! :-}  Let someone else have a
crack - if it took me personally 12 months to get the job done, then at
least there's progress.

> We need clear goals.  I don't see them at this point.

OK, let me make some suggestions:

1.  virtualise the MW server/s - that makes it easy to set up an offline
development platform so that hacks like me can disk around with the code
without screwing up the live site.  

2.  split the various subsystems into independent VMs - not only makes it
scalable, but also allows modular administration and development of those
subsystems.

I keep hearing that 'person x' is the only one who knows anything about how
this-or-that system works.  Well, what if that person is eaten by a
crocodile tomorrow?  We all hope that won't happen, but if it does, then
someone ends up with the job of trawling through the code and get something
sorted.

Once we have a system in place to support multiple
developers/debuggers/coders/call-em-what-you-will, then we are no longer
dependent on a few overworked individuals to do what needs to be done.

That's the way I see it.

Cheers!

Mike.