22nd March 2000HEPSYSMAN Oxford Particle Physics Site Report Pete Gronbech Systems Manager

22nd March 2000HEPSYSMAN Goals and Objectives l Flexibility on the Desktop (Low cost Seats) n Access to networked services (X, http, IMAP) n Access to PC Applications n Reduce management overheads n Reduce costs l Servers provide Compute power n Central Servers for UNIX, VMS, Mail & Web n Compatibility with CERN / DESY / Fermilab n Provide Code development environments

22nd March 2000HEPSYSMAN The Server / Desktop Divide NT PC Unix Workstation Desktops Servers General Purpose Unix Server VMS Server Mail Server Web Server NT Server

22nd March 2000HEPSYSMAN Status l Aim to standardise and centralise as much of the IT infrastructure as provides real benefit across whole department. l HEP specific computing on top of basic infrastructure. l Campus backbone now Gigabit Ethernet with 100Mbs to departments. Physics is mixture or 10 /100MBs switched ethernet behind ‘drawbridge’ firewall. l Desktop Strategy - Windows NT4 Workstation (100 particle physics 200 across physics) MS Office, eXceed, Web browsers, Mail clients etc. Systems generated by cloning (with GHOST) l Server Strategy - HEP Computation - Heavy use of remote compute farms, local compute server (Digital UNIX 3 CPU server) for interactive work especially code development. Linux for CDF group, RAL csf Porting machine and MINOS dual boot DAQ machine.

22nd March 2000HEPSYSMAN Status 2 l Additional CPU is provided by a Digital Alpha 500au. New CPU provided by Linux. Just ordered a dual 800MHz 2GB RAM system for SNO analysis. l Oxford is the ‘Lead site’ for successful CDF_JIF bid, multi-cpu server plus 1 TB store in each CDF institute. Plus larger 2TB store at RAL and even larger at Fermilab. l Server Strategy - IT in general - NT server (6) for desktop file/print, Exchange 5.5 for , IIS 4 for web serving, MS Terminal Server to give NT 4 remote access. l VMS - DAQ systems still important but general purpose service is running down (mail, word processing etc going to NT) l Data Acquisition - LABview on NT for most laboratory DAQ and control (used by wide range of research groups) l Videoconferencing - PC based Intel plus access to ISDN6 Tandberg. MS Netmeeting used frequently to DESY

22nd March 2000HEPSYSMAN Linux NT PC Unix Workstation Desktops Servers CDF Linux (Dual 400MHz PII) RAL Linux Farm Porting Machine Treat Linux as just another Unix and hence a server OS to be managed centrally. Wish to avoid badly managed desktop PC’s running Linux. MINOS Linux/NT DAQ pplx1 RH5.0 pplx2 RH5.2 ppnt109 RH6.1

22nd March 2000HEPSYSMAN Plans and Concerns l Look to replace local compute server with RAID Disk Server and Linux CPU servers. Disk server could be Intel based running NT or Linux but if performance is not sufficient a proprietary solution may be used. l Experience gained with CDF distributed data store will help plan LHC requirements. l Choice of OS/platforms for computation. Clear that this will be Red Hat Linux l NT4 provides all desktop functionality we need. Will look at Windows2000 but no rush (at least for the desktop) l cost of software licensing l MAN POWER