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| Subject: | Re: [gislist] help with the database and server question. |
| Date: |
04/03/2004 10:35:00 AM |
| From: |
James Coss |
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Monica and List users, I while back I asked a question about servers
and database on the demand of my director, I truly appreciate the
assistance that was afforded me by the members of the List. This
resources, the Gislist is indispensable Thanks again to all those that
answered my questions. I wanted to give back some of my findings, and
suggestions.
Sorry this is so late. Overwhelmingly I found that open source is the
route being taken and suggested. The costs tend to be more hidden with
open source than with a turnkey database like Oracle. MySQL,
PostgreSQL, PostGIS, PHP were sited by multiple sources as the
preferred software solutions for database and interactivity on the web.
In my report to our director I cited some experience I have had
personally with another research center. There I was involved with the
installation of online databases and servers. I am a remote sensor GIS
person with little in the way of real training in the art of network
administration, and my database experience is only in support of GIS
work. given my limited experience with these technologies I did some
research and then I pitched for and was successful in obtaining an OS
Xserve from Apple. The software and hardware work together well for
us, allowing an inexperienced person like me provide substantial and
significant network services with limited training. At that other
research center we are serving 4 TB of Raid to a couple of dozen users,
as well as providing online database with Filemaker Pro, FTP, Http, and
most importantly we are providing a distributive computing resource
with the Unix based Xserve. Currently at this new research center we
don't have ready access to anyone that could be called proficient
beyond the level of novice in Linux. I will start by saying that if you
are or have someone on your staff that is Linux savvy, or Unix trained
you can get away with Linux Open source. If not you need to consider
some alternatives. The suggestions I made to our director were:
Keep the oracle service until it breaks and we can't fix it. use it
only as an educational resource.
Keep the labs heterogeneous, mix and match is a far more viable setup,
any biologist would agree, I think.
Keep your reliance on Windows to a minimum, As servers they are not to
be trusted. As a Personal Computer they are good at doing one thing at
a time, think of them more like adding machines. Security is dreadful
and reliability is equally disturbing. I would not trust my large
storage device to a Windows Server.
Commit more resources to an Xserve distributed computing environment.
All of the open source software mentioned will run on the Xserve, and
run with a fairly causal investment in IT. Our research center is in a
state of transition where we need to maintain a fairly advanced level
of sophisticated services without a dedicated IT element. The server
needs to support a wide range of uses as well evolve with the changing
needs of the center. This was the case with another center I helped to
develop. Xserve has been unbelievably forgiving while handling enormous
demands with relative ease, and is advance enough to withstand more
aggressive demands. Training new people isn't difficult.
Begin to foster in an educational capacity some linux machines they are
by and far the most dangerous in terms of active hacking, these are not
causal fire and forget computers. Linux boxes if not baby-sat will
eventually bring the FBI to your door asking why your machine is port
scanning local banks and government offices--happened to us a few years
ago. But this technology can't be dismissed and must be addressed.
I have been a geographic computer user--GIS and RS--for the last 7
years. I recognize that this field has been dominated by the Windows
Environment. However, the Windows OS has too many seams to be
considered viable at an enterprise level. I have found that the OS X a
reasonable alternative for computing beyond the ArcView ArcInfo needs.
for that I VNC into a computer running those softwares. I hope this
helps ,
Thanks again to the list, and if I have made any glaring errors in
judgment I welcome any dialogs.
Cheers.
JIM
On Mar 9, 2004, at 12:52 PM, Monica DeAngelo wrote:
> Hi Jim,
>
> I was just recently hired with FERC (Federal Energy regulatory
> Commission) to start up a GIS for a variety of GIS environmental
> analysis and I would appreciate it if you could pass along any
> information you receive regarding this matter. Thanks in advance!
>
> Monica DeAngelo
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: gislist-bounces@lists.geocomm.com
> [mailto:gislist-bounces@lists.geocomm.com] On Behalf Of James Coss
> Sent: Tuesday, March 09, 2004 12:33 PM
> To: gislist@lists.geocomm.com
> Subject: [gislist] help with the database and server question.
>
> hello all,
>
> I have a query that I think some of yo
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