The Second Version

05/04/08

Serve the Servers

Where I've been? Generally fooling around, and doing some more computer update work.

Which had some aspects that, in retrospective, look quite hilarious. The servers I had to installe are Acer Altos boxes, which come with dual CPU (and dual extraible power sources), three SCSI RAID extraible hard drives and tape drive. The whole thing is close to twice the size of a home mid-tower desktop machine, and it is fitted with one serious system fan.

The other day I was told "You go there and install the additonal server and two clients; all the stuff will be there when you arrive".
So I went but when I got on the site, the clients where nowhere to be seen. Only the server together with its monitor and UPS had been shipped. I thought it was better than nothing, so I enquired about the network point where to attach the new machine. But the employees there had never heard about such a thing.

I called my operational desk again, and they suggested me to install the additional server in the "server room" with the new server and the old one, which is due to be phased out soon. But that was not a room; the wardrobe in my bedroom here is bigger than that. It was a closet, cramped with the network switch locker, main electrical panel, phone system and probably a few more assorted bells and whistles. The old server was placed on the floor, and the new one on the desk. There was just enough space to add a palm computer in there. Ah, and the closet got so hot that they had to take down the door and keep a table fan running all the time in there just to obtain sufficient ventilation.

After a breif consultation with my operational desk, we decided to forget about the additional server for the time being. The week after, two new PCs were shipped and I installed those.

Another day, I was sent to another place with the same instructions. In that case, the machines were already there, but the first shipped server was faulty. A working one was waiting for me, so I began my work - but then, when the moment of joining the domain came, I was given a network error. It turns out, the nice and new network socket placed in a resonable position was useless.

The what can I do? Move everything to a precarious position near the network switch in order to obtain a direct connection, and that one worked. But then, the domain controller went unavailable. That means the network is working but the new machine is not recognized; the remote installation of clients was thus not possible (because it depends on the correct functioning of the server). After quite a few phone calls, the truth emerged: the network administrators had not been notified of the installation of an additional server, so they had not set up the network to accept it. Great, isn't it?

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