Solaris Admin advice needed for a volunteer project

Victor Odhner plug-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us
Sun, 29 Dec 2002 15:00:10 -0700


A public-service organization I've worked with
is in need of some Solaris admin advice, to get
over a re-hosting problem.  In the long run,
they will be looking to convert this system over
to Linux, which is why I'm going off-topic here.

The Arizona Freenet (Aztec.asu.edu) is a public
service host that provides free accounts for the
public including e-mail addresses; and hosts
web pages for public organizations.  They've been
operating since 1995.  The system is a little
antiquated, pretty much text-only, and their goal
has not been to compete with ISPs but rather to
provide a community bulletin-board service.
Web access is currently through Lynx.  The overall
system is called "Freeport", which is a layer
providing a dumbed-down public BBS service on top
of Solaris.

AzTeC is in crisis right now and could use some
volunteer consulting to help back-up, clean up
and bring online a relocated service.  The cool
part is that once the rehosted service is stable,
they'd like to start conversion towards a new
freenet system hosted under Linux.

ASU has hosted AzTeC since 1995, but has now
withdrawn support due to lean times.  A company
has stepped forward to offer co-hosting.  The
machines (a couple of sparc-20s) have been cloned
but need to be cleaned up and brought online
so that ASU can turn off the old boxes.

The new machines need to be backed up, then
some over-full volumes need to be dealt with.
The configuration needs to be set up with the new
IP addresses so it can go online.

If anybody with Solaris administration know-how
would be willing to step in and help, possibly
over the phone with advice to the one guy who's
struggling with this right now, that would be very
welcome.  His name is Ivan <bcawzy@myrealbox.com>.
The machines are currently located in Mesa until
they can be ready to plug in at the new co-hosting
site.

Thanks,

Vic Odhner