Details of Network, Computer and Power Outages at Wilson Lab: Saturday, August 3, 2013

CLASSE services and Linux computers will be unusable starting at 5PM on Friday evening, August 2, 2013. Please be sure to save your data and logout (but don't shutdown) before 5pm Friday. The Computer Group will be performing critical network and system maintenance Friday evening in preparation for the power outage scheduled for 8AM Saturday, August 3. Most critical infrastructure services should be available again Saturday evening, August 3.

Technicians will be performing maintenance on the switching gear for Wilson Lab's incoming power on Saturday, August 3. The power circuits known as US1, US2 and US3 are scheduled to be down from 8AM to 12PM (Noon). There's the possibility of accidental power interruptions during other parts of the day.

How will this affect you?

• Many CLASSE central services will not work after 5PM on Friday, August 2nd.
  • CLASSE Linux logins will not work
  • Some infrastructure and network services will be unavailable, potentially affecting Windows computers.
• CLASSE Windows logins will not work after 7AM on Saturday, August 3rd.
• There will be no CLASSE network connection to Cornell or to the rest of the world after 7AM Saturday morning.
  • Red Rover in Newman Lab and the Physical Sciences Building should continue to work, but not in Wilson Lab.
  • CLASSE Ethernet and VPN networks in Newman Lab and the Physical Sciences Building will not work, since they connect by way of Wilson Lab.
  • No Videoconferencing will be available
• Most desktop systems in Newman Lab and the Physical Sciences Building will not work correctly while Wilson Lab is without power during the morning. This includes Windows and Linux computers. They'll have many different problems because their servers will be down.
  • E.G. many proprietary software packages will refuse to run. Their license servers are in the East Module trailer without power. E.g.
    • Replicon Time Sheets will not work
    • Microwave Studio will not work
    • Email will not work on desktops (because the CLASSE network will be down)
    • but Microsoft Office will work
• Macintosh file and backup services will not be available during the power outage.
• Windows and Linux backups will not run.
• No CESR, CHESS or ERL online control systems will be running.

• We expect Unix, Linux and Windows desktops will be functional late Saturday afternoon.
• but "Farm" systems will be down at least all day Saturday, and perhaps until late Monday.
  • Unix batch queues will be suspended Thursday at 9AM and not restarted until the Farm systems are up.

• If there are additional power glitches, all systems will be left down until after power work has finished.

What should you do?

• End all of your editing sessions and logout before going home on Friday, and certainly before 5PM.
• If you edit any important files, be sure to make copies elsewhere, just in case.
• People with laptops who will be on campus on Saturday and who need network access should use Cornell's Red Rover service. See http://www.cit.cornell.edu/redrover/
• There is no need for you to turn off any systems. CLASSE computer group staff will be shutting systems down as needed.
• Make sure that all batch jobs, including those running on the various compute farms, will complete before 5:00 AM Saturday morning. The Unix batch queues will be suspended from Thursday morning until late Saturday afternoon at the earliest, and most likely until late on Monday.
• When you return to work on Monday, please reboot your computer. If there are problems after a reboot, please submit a ServiceRequest.

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact any member of the CLASSE computer group or send e'mail to service-classe@cornell.edu.

Background

Saturday, August 3rd, from 8 AM until 12 noon , Power (US1) will be off in Wilson Lab's main building.

Saturday, August 3rd, from 8 AM until 12 noon, Power (US2) will be off in the Modular Facilities (i.e. trailers). Chilled water and air conditioning will be off in Wilson Lab.

• The network will be down starting at 7AM on Saturday. There will be no connection to or from the outside world for any system in Newman, Wilson, the Physical Sciences Building or the trailers until well after 12 noon.
• The Unix Home disk will be read-only starting at 5PM Friday and completely unavailable starting at 7 AM Saturday.
• Most systems won't be available until late Saturday afternoon at the very earliest.
• Only "critical" systems will be brought up immediately after 12 noon Saturday.
  • This includes CESR and ERL online control systems plus central servers like Samba, file and Web servers.
• Windows License servers will be unavailable until after Noon on Saturday.
• "Farm" systems probably will be unavailable until Monday afternoon.

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact the CLASSE computer group or send e'mail to service-classe@cornell.edu.