[Biojava-l] Important OBF update for biojava developers and users

[Chris Dagdigian]

Executive summary:

biojava.org new DNS is propagating as I write this email. Eventually  
everyone should see the new wiki-based site running on the new OBF  
server hardware.  Read on for more info on some other upcoming  
changes...


Hi biojava people,

Sorry for the interruption but I've got some important site and  
server news. People will also see multiple copies of this note as I  
slowly transition sites over one at a time.

We are in the midst of moving all of our websites, mailing lists,  
developers and sourcecode repositories onto more modern hardware  
located in a 2nd Boston area datacenter facility.

The transition is important for a couple of reasons - the most urgent  
being that we are going to lose internet connectivity in our current  
hosting facility on March 27th 2006.  That datacenter belongs to  
Wyeth Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts.  Wyeth Research &  
Genetics Institute have been long time significant supporters &  
hosting providers for OBF servers and projects -- we owe them a great  
deal of gratitude and public acknowledgment for hosting our servers  
over many years. Speaking as a hardware geek I can tell you that the  
many years of high-bandwidth, trouble free hosting have been  
invaluable for our efforts and projects.   Sadly, it is no longer  
possible for them to host our servers as they need to begin making  
some network and WAN circuit changes that will no longer support  
direct internet facing servers (such as ours) in Cambridge.

The other major reason for the transition is our need to relocate  
onto hardware that can better be remotely managed (as our volunteer  
administrators are scattered all over the globe).

My employer, BioTeam Inc. has donated new server hardware and is also  
providing the hosting facilities in a Tier 1 Boston area colocation  
facility.
Infrastructure geeks can see pictures of the colocation  cage and the  
new OBF servers online at this URL:
http://bioteam.net/gallery/bioteamBDC  -- those servers also host  
EMBOSS FTP/CVS and mailing lists.


Current status of the migration:

  - All 57 mailing lists have been moved over to the new hardware  
(you may have noticed "lists.open-bio.org" showing up in your list  
messages)

  - The new anonymous sourcecode server is running at http:// 
code.open-bio.org. "cvs.biojava.org" is already pointing at it.

  - Your website (biojava.org) was moved to the new hardware (and new  
Wiki site!) about an hour ago

  - Developers with CVS accounts have *NOT* been migrated yet

Basically we are trying to relocate everything but the developers  
over the next few days so we can spend the weekend on the developer  
and CVS transition.


If DNS has not propagated yet, point your browser at http:// 
biojava.open-bio.org -- that is the new site your group has been  
building. What is happening now is DNS pointers for biojava.org and  
www.biojava.org are slowly changing over to point at the wiki and the  
new hardware. Eventually you'll see the same site regardless of which  
URL you use.


  For biojava users
  --------------------------
Please keep an eye on your website and mailing lists and let  
support at open-bio.org know if there are any problems with the  
transition. In particular your new wiki site contains embedded links  
to some parts of the 'old' static website.  I caught the obvious ones  
-- (biojava.org/downloads/ and biojava.org/docs/ but I may have  
missed some.  Please let me know about any broken links.

Also someone may want to clean up the biojava logo image now in the  
wiki to make the white background transparent.


  For developers and leaders
  ---------------------------------------------
Whomever will be updating the static parts of the website (/downlaod/  
and /docs/)  in the future will need login access to our new central  
webserver  machine, please contact support at open-bio.org to request a  
user account for biojava website maintenance.

For people with CVS commit/write access
---------------------------------------------------------
Also note that when we finally do transition over to the new  
developer machine (where the real sourcecode lives), ALL developers  
will need to email support at open-bio.org to request a password reset.  
Although we can transition usernames, settings and home directories  
over from the old to the new machine we can not transition over  
existing passwords as they are stored in incompatible hashed formats.  
All developers are going to need new passwords for the new developer  
machine.  We will likely make the developer machine swap this weekend.


Reporting Problems / Help & Assistance
------------------------------------------------------
The transition will be complicated, we need your help to spot  
problems and glitches! The OBF has a new helpdesk ticketing system  
set up at "support at open-bio.org" so that all OBF admins can read and  
respond to issues and problems. Most troubles should be reported to  
that address. For urgent problems, especially during this transition  
period,  feel free to contact me directly (dag at sonsorol.org) (ichat/ 
aol/aim screen name:  bioteamdag).


Regards,
Chris Dagdigian
open-bio.org