Re: Quote of the day...
Typing away merrily, Matt Harmon produced the immortal words:
> At 23:01 4/2/00 +0200, Paul van Empelen wrote:
> ...
> > > A trolley with a console and keyboard (..) has been raised as a
> > > requirement for the Unix platform (..). However, the canteen
> > > asked their trolley back, and Mike doesn't have budget to buy a
> > > new one.
> .....
> >Now, do I work for a strange company, or does it sound familiar to you?
>
> Something like this happens practically every d%%med day at my workplace.
> It's lovely when the accountants drive everything at a company...They must
> still be pissed that most payroll accounting is now handled by *computers*.
Check your contract. See how much you can charge for having to come
into work out of normal hours. Inflate this figure as much as you can.
Then point out how, in comparison, console servers are quite cheap.
With them, the need for a console & keyboard more of less disappears.
For those who aren't familiar: these devices typically have about 12
'cpu' serial connections each. Each of those is attached to the serial
port of a Unix box, and provides things like history, etc. The boxes
have an embedded OS, which allows you to switch between serial lines, go
into 'direct' mode, do some stuff, escape out, switch to another box,
etc. The servers have a few other ports. One of which you connect to
a serial port on a 'master' box which you can ssh into. Then you just
ssh into that box, tip/kermit to the port connecting you to the console
server, and connect from there to the console of whichever machine you
want.
If you can choose for the interface machine a really reliable box, then
you're onto a winner.
Even more so if you can cost-justify a Remote Power-Bar. Getting called
up at 3am and being able to just:
(1) Stagger over to computer [i]
(2) Log in, dial up, ssh in
(3) Go to console server, from there go a an RPB
(4) Remotely toggle the power-supply to a machine
(5) Log out
(6) Go back to bed
has numerous advantages to courses of action involving getting dressed
and staggering through a biting cold, probably rainy, night into work.
HTH HAND
[i] I really ought to get that WYSE terminal working - it's silent, so I
have it next to my bed. I really want to be able to fix things
without getting out of bed and without having noisy computers in my
bedroom.
--
HTML email - just say no --> Phil Pennock
"We've got a patent on the conquering of a country through the use of force.
We believe in world peace through extortionate license fees." -Bluemeat
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