Ask HN: Server Management Best Practices

#1

Post by napcae » Tue, Nov 12, 2013, 7:41 AM UTC

So let's say you have a bunch(or just one) of servers. Is there any good guide or Best Practices on how to be actually a good admin? I'm asking for things like, how you document what software you installed, reporting and monitoring mechanisms/software etc. What do you use for backup and/or do you revision control your configuration files? I'm using an excel sheet at the moment, but I don't think that's the best way. Btw, I'm asking for UNIX systems, but I think most concepts should work also for other systems as well.

Re: Ask HN: Server Management Best Practices

#2

Post by skimmas » Tue, Nov 12, 2013, 10:17 AM UTC

I know this might is not the best approach but I also only manage one or two servers... http://plusbryan.com/my-first-5-minutes-on-a-server-or-essen...

Re: Ask HN: Server Management Best Practices

#3

Post by napcae » Tue, Nov 12, 2013, 11:49 AM UTC

skimmas wrote: post #2

I know this might is not the best approach but I also only manage one or two servers... http://plusbryan.com/my-first-5-minutes-on-a-server-or-essen...

This is almost the same I also did. Except I'm using iptables and logwatch seems good. I'll read it! Thank you

Re: Ask HN: Server Management Best Practices

#4

Post by staunch » Tue, Nov 12, 2013, 6:14 PM UTC

There is no canonical book that I know of. I'm sure there are some books though if you check Amazon for "Linux System Administration". They might not be a bad place to start.

I use rsync for backups. Storing configuration management files in Git works. Puppet and Chef are the most popular configuration management systems, they work just fine.

Re: Ask HN: Server Management Best Practices

#5

Post by jacquesct » Tue, Nov 26, 2013, 1:31 PM UTC

staunch wrote: post #4

There is no canonical book that I know of. I'm sure there are some books though if you check Amazon for "Linux System Administration". They might not be a bad place to start. I use rsync for backups. Storing configuration management files in Git works. Puppet and Chef are the most popular configuration management systems, they work just fine.

Chef for configuration files. Customisations for Chef Attributes are in a json.php file on the chef host that merges various things like specific settings for a datacenter, host role, etc.

Google Docs for certain information as well as a wiki. There are Standard Operating Proceedures (SOP's) for numerous tasks also in the wiki which explains things in detail.

Munin for graphing along with some metrics being polulated into Zabbix.