Comment on Setting up a server for a research team. What should be in my checklist?
frongt@lemmy.zip 8 months ago
Step one is check with the university IT department. Don’t put random unmanageable shit on other people’s networks.
Why a Mac running Linux? I can’t think of a use case for that.
The setup should be no problem to the university as long as it’s set up to do what I was told it would do.
Is it okay to use macOS too? I thought Linux was more prevalent among servers. Although if there is no significant change in operating one compared to Linux, then I’ll just stick to macOS after all.
And why can't university IT set up the server? No offense but you're a nobody asking us, also nobodies, how to set up some sort of a funky server on the university network, meanwhile the university pays people to do this for a living.
Where will the server actually be? Will it be in a secure location where only authorized personnel can physically access the machine or will it be behind the trash can in the cafeteria where anyone can access it?
Since you will lose access to it once it's set up who will monitor the system? Who turns it on in case it somehow gets shut down? Who sets up backups and does rollbacks if something breaks?
What happens to the hardware when research project is over?
To me it all smells like something the IT department should set up. They already know the best practices. They also know whatever security guidelines they need to follow. They will have monitoring systems in place so they could admin the system instead of leaving it without an actual administrator. And they're probably the ones decommissioning the hardware when the research project is over.
My suggestion is to leave it to the people who are getting paid to do this. It's one thing to know how to set up a home server on your home network, it's a different thing to set up a server on an enterprise network.
Mostly it boils down to laziness. They for sure have the ability to set up the server themselves but they can’t be bothered to unless it’s for a larger number of machines. They have essentially given a thumbs up to proceed with the setup but haven’t offered assistance themselves. I think the team might already have reached out to them, but were let down which is why they tried to contact me.
The server will be stored in the personal office of one of the members of the team. It should be physically secure.
I don’t think I would completely lose access to it, rather it’s just that I won’t be allowed to personally SSH to the server with my own devices. I may still be able to connect to it through one of the members’ devices or onsite. The team member earlier mentioned will take care of the system after the setup.
I don’t know what’ll happen to the server after the project is over, nor am I in a position to assume something.
Why do you want to help lazy people? You are most certainly going to regret getting yourself into this.
What you describe is a workstation under someone’s desk. Usually when you connect to your campus vpn you should be on the network and be able to reach most things.
The problem is who is gonna manage it when you are gone? I’ve had teams come and ask to get their trash can Mac’s rescued because whoever managed them left the team. How are you going to do backups? Are you gonna put a NAS next to it? Or actually use the tape drives that ITS can provide?
Ask your local research computing group what this team needs to do to host or contribute an actual server. A Mac mini is a consumer product, research grants can I include hardware, your computing group has actual racks and people who know how to manage it.
Can you ask to use the universities Identity Management system? That way only current students and faculty will have access.
I was told the some team members work in different universities, so we would need to accommodate them as well
PITA, but if this is a small # of uni, you could have separate realms per each.
It depends on what you’re trying to do with it. Typically people only use Macs as servers when they’re doing development for Apple products.
The biggest pain is that its apple silicon, which limits what’s built for it.
Depending on what its doing, you may need to build dependencies from source. You also may have to use some mac-specific tools to download pre-builts and to do builds.
In some cases, it may be better to run a VM with Linux and forge on ahead, but its really going to depend on what tasks the server is handling.
It shouldn’t be significantly different from Linux, except maybe in what would be required to truly lock it down for a server. Assuming you’ll be installing normal server side stuff, all that should be nearly identical, especially if you use Docker or other containers/vm/interpreter based things.
Though it’s been yeeaaaars since I’ve touched a mac, so someone far more experienced will have to chime in if I’m off base!
aubeynarf@lemmynsfw.com 8 months ago
probably because they already own it.