Friday, December 01, 2006
NTP, Backups & P/M Steve Patterson
I had a little task that was requested of me to setup NTP service on a couple of servers for a network. Apparently NTP traffic is mistakenly identified as P2P traffic and throttled at the doorstep on the network. Should be easy enough yes? Well it would have been had I not found out about the network limitations until after I had it working. ;-) I had installed ntp-server packages then I started changing some configurations. Since I have never run my own NTP server, as I do not have an atomic clock in my possession, I was learning as I went along. I mean I know how NTP basically works. I had to find some nice stratum 1 servers I could freely use, and although ntpq -p showed all the right things (eventually ... not more jitter of 4000). I could not make use of the servers with ntpdate from my machine. I spent time checking configs, reading up on the web, checking everything on my system, my firewall. Everything seemed correct, and I simply could not figure it out. Then I got the bright idea to try another server on the same network and bingo ... all is well. I am glad that the entire network has available NTP servers.
I also had the bug to fix some backup routines for ourselves. I have changed my method of backing up parts of kolab to simply taking an rsync share of /kolab. It's just way easier to restore when you have the whole tree. There is no recreation of LDAP, not reconstruction of mailboxes. Nothing to copy. Simply make sure the kolab users and groups exist and start kolab. So things moved around, and I'm backing things up to a USB drive. Gregg came back to me with some access issues. Seems in my rsync of the file server shares, I also synced the backup directory with symlinks to the file server with the backup directory with symlinks to the file server with the backup directory with symlinks ... well since windows has a 256 char limit on paths ... oops. I rectified that immediately. I also discovered the joys of using --link-dest option with rsync for differential backups. Hard links make things much nice, and easier to care for. I need to do some more testing, but that is definitely the way to go.
Last night I attended a special band practice for the Calgary Police Pipe Band. I had not been around the band for quite a while. It was nice to see everyone, and I even sat in a little bit on the practice. It was a truly special event because they were having a special presentation to the the former Pipe Major Steve Patterson. Steve had stepped down, and retired from the band this year. We headed to the cuff for drinks and pizza. Al Redford, the previous band officer, gave a set of kind words for Steve, and presented him with a plaque from when we performed with the Strathclyde Police Pipe Band in George Square in downtown Glasgow.
When I joined the band Steve was the PM. In his thank you speech he mentioned members he played with in the band over the years. And although as a leading drummer I played with Steve near the end of his time, he thanked me personally in his speech. I was quite moved. I also owe Steve a thank-you in return. Steve did many things over our time together to help me. From arranging uniform fittings at the airport when the taylor had a 20 mintue layover, to meeting me in parking lots with uniform parts, to hand delivering my #1 tunic to my apartment the day we were leaving for Europe. But I will forever be indebted to him for one special act.
I do not remember the exact dates, but the trip deposit was due for our trip to Europe in the early year of 2004. Just before it was due I was in a car accident and spent almost $8000 to fix my vehicle. When it came time to push of shove for the deposit I had to back out of the trip. Steve paid my deposit out of his own pocket to get the money in for the deadline. I repaid him in due time, along with a bottle on single malt as a token of appreciation. The point is that had it not been for Steve's generosity, I would have never been able to make it to Scotland. I had never been in my life, and Steve told me neither had he. So the best way to say this is "Steve ... we lost our cherries together". Thank you Pipe Major Steve Patterson.
slainte, ¶ 12:06:00 AM
I also had the bug to fix some backup routines for ourselves. I have changed my method of backing up parts of kolab to simply taking an rsync share of /kolab. It's just way easier to restore when you have the whole tree. There is no recreation of LDAP, not reconstruction of mailboxes. Nothing to copy. Simply make sure the kolab users and groups exist and start kolab. So things moved around, and I'm backing things up to a USB drive. Gregg came back to me with some access issues. Seems in my rsync of the file server shares, I also synced the backup directory with symlinks to the file server with the backup directory with symlinks to the file server with the backup directory with symlinks ... well since windows has a 256 char limit on paths ... oops. I rectified that immediately. I also discovered the joys of using --link-dest option with rsync for differential backups. Hard links make things much nice, and easier to care for. I need to do some more testing, but that is definitely the way to go.
Last night I attended a special band practice for the Calgary Police Pipe Band. I had not been around the band for quite a while. It was nice to see everyone, and I even sat in a little bit on the practice. It was a truly special event because they were having a special presentation to the the former Pipe Major Steve Patterson. Steve had stepped down, and retired from the band this year. We headed to the cuff for drinks and pizza. Al Redford, the previous band officer, gave a set of kind words for Steve, and presented him with a plaque from when we performed with the Strathclyde Police Pipe Band in George Square in downtown Glasgow.
When I joined the band Steve was the PM. In his thank you speech he mentioned members he played with in the band over the years. And although as a leading drummer I played with Steve near the end of his time, he thanked me personally in his speech. I was quite moved. I also owe Steve a thank-you in return. Steve did many things over our time together to help me. From arranging uniform fittings at the airport when the taylor had a 20 mintue layover, to meeting me in parking lots with uniform parts, to hand delivering my #1 tunic to my apartment the day we were leaving for Europe. But I will forever be indebted to him for one special act.
I do not remember the exact dates, but the trip deposit was due for our trip to Europe in the early year of 2004. Just before it was due I was in a car accident and spent almost $8000 to fix my vehicle. When it came time to push of shove for the deposit I had to back out of the trip. Steve paid my deposit out of his own pocket to get the money in for the deadline. I repaid him in due time, along with a bottle on single malt as a token of appreciation. The point is that had it not been for Steve's generosity, I would have never been able to make it to Scotland. I had never been in my life, and Steve told me neither had he. So the best way to say this is "Steve ... we lost our cherries together". Thank you Pipe Major Steve Patterson.
slainte, ¶ 12:06:00 AM
