[OPEN-ILS-GENERAL] ***SPAM*** Re: Should we have a systems administrators list?

[Ben Shum]

I'm -1 to this proposal.

For many years, I've mused with other Evergreen system administrators on 
the issues facing our particular role and areas for discussion.  The 
idea of making our own mailing list seemed like a good idea at many 
points in those discussions, and if you asked me a few years ago, I 
would have said yes.

But here are some potential concerns I have now:

While our role within our organizations may be to find the best 
practices for implementing/running an Evergreen system (and all the 
related areas of interest noted), we can also have a key role to play in 
Evergreen's overall development.  As system administrators, we are often 
at the cutting edge of testing, bug reporting, and troubleshooting how 
Evergreen performs in the field.  We can provide invaluable feedback to 
the Evergreen developers when we discuss our sys-admin issues in the 
existing lists / IRC.

Creating a separate list introduces the possibility that more 
information can become lost between groups if people do not subscribe to 
every list.  While of course, many of us would likely be signed up to 
these multiple lists and potentially act as representatives between 
groups, I do not like to see the burden of communication between various 
lists/groups to become a necessary conscious act on behalf of those 
subscribed to several lists.

Like say for example:

John Smith has an installation problem and mentions it only on the sys 
admin list.  But it turns out to be an actual issue with the Evergreen 
code itself and we have to involve developers to get it fixed for 
everyone in the community.  Do we then have to take the originally 
reported issue from the sys admin list and forward it to the dev list 
and discuss solutions?  The extra time and potential for lost 
information/facts gives me concerns that having that extra layer of 
communication may prove unwieldy.

Alternatively, what if someone posted a question to both mailing lists 
(sys admin and dev) and different people respond on each thread (based 
on whichever list they were subscribed) and the conversation becomes 
fractured between two lists?  How does everything get put back together 
in a nice ordered way for the next generation of users searching for 
information / learning.

To summarize, in my opinion, the system administrators while definitely 
having their own set of issues and topics of discussion are still a core 
part of the overall Evergreen development community and we should 
participate using the same areas for discussion such as the dev mailing 
list and IRC so that we don't miss anything or leave anything out of the 
mainstream Evergreen community.  The main thing I would want to change 
at this point in time is perhaps the wording used to describe the dev 
mailing list to expand beyond just technical code/patches, but to be a 
broader description and reinforce the "technical discussion list" 
title.  Unless of course, the developers tell us that they'd prefer to 
keep that list to talking only about real development only...  ;)

-- Ben

On 4/30/2012 8:11 PM, Justin Hopkins wrote:
> We just wrapped up the post-conference systems administrator training,
> which was awesome. Afterwards we were talking about the utility of a
> new discussion list focused on Evergreen systems administration.
>
> I think the topic is deep enough to warrant a list, and if this group
> is any indication there is also sufficient interest. Systems
> administration (troubleshooting server config issues,
> installing/setting up Evergreen, using git, performance tuning,
> network issues, cluster configuration, security, etc) seems to be an
> area that deserves it's own forum. I've received plenty of great help
> on those topics in IRC, which I'm very appreciative of, but let's face
> it - IRC is and probably always will be the domain of developers.
>
> I'm hoping that if enough people on this list express an interest that
> someone (Chris Sharp?) could create such a list. So let's hear it
> sysads - should we create the "missing list"?
>
> Regards,
> Justin Hopkins
> Coordinator, IT&  Web Services
> MOBIUS Consortium Office
> c: 573-808-2309
>
> --sent from a mobile device--
>

-- 
Benjamin Shum
Open Source Software Coordinator
Bibliomation, Inc.
32 Crest Road
Middlebury, CT 06762
203-577-4070, ext. 113