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Reclaiming the lost art of Linux server administration

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Re: Reclaiming the lost art of Linux server administration

#421

Post by maccard »

cerved wrote: post #376
DarylZero wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People don't need a 42U rack to put a server in their closet though. You buy some surplus server on ebay and throw it on a shelf, no big deal.

It's really not that easy. There's a lot of considerations to make. Which rack size, model you want. Finding someone who will ship that brick to you. Not trivial

Well it is, to get started. If your needs are "mild to moderate", you can buy a brand new intel NUC or a mac mini for <$500 if space is a priority, or go on ebay and buy a beater laptop (I found 5 advertised for <$100 within a minute of searching).

Re: Reclaiming the lost art of Linux server administration

#422

Post by southerntofu »

viraptor wrote: post #139
c2h5oh wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember how surprised people were when I demoed a $200/month bare metal server outperforming by a huge margin RDS MySQL instance that they were paying something upwards of 16k/month. IIRC we ended up using it as a disposable replica for some non-real time but heavy operations.

Here's what the bare metal server didn't come with: API access for managing configuration, version updates/rollbacks, and ACL. A solution for unlimited scheduled snapshots without affecting performance. Close to immediate replacement of identical setup within seconds of failure. API-managed VPC/VPN built in. No underlying OS management. (Probably forgot a few...) I get that going bare metal is a good solution for som…

Most selfhosted distros have some/all of these features baked in: yunohost, freedombox or libreserver come to mind (note the latter is maintained only by a single person).

"Identical setup within seconds of failure" being the exception as you need to deploy from backup which can take minutes/hours (depending on backup size) even if you have the spare hardware. Fortunately, that's the least-needed feature in your list.

Re: Reclaiming the lost art of Linux server administration

#423

Post by hammersec »

c2h5oh wrote: post #87
lrvick wrote: post #61

I have over 20 years of Linux/FreeBSD sysadmin experience ranging from universities to major silicon valley companies in both cloud and on-prem. When it comes to companies I mostly support cloud these days but when it comes to me and my family I accept every downside and host as almost all of our digital lives in a 42u rack in a gutted closet in our house with static IPs and business fiber. I know where our data live…

I remember how surprised people were when I demoed a $200/month bare metal server outperforming by a huge margin RDS MySQL instance that they were paying something upwards of 16k/month. IIRC we ended up using it as a disposable replica for some non-real time but heavy operations.

Yeah but for the 16k a month they have someone they can sue for damages and costs if there is a serious issue. You're more likely to win a payout against a massive bluechip than a teeny weeny IT outfit or your own sysadmins.

Re: Reclaiming the lost art of Linux server administration

#424

Post by papito »

bushbaba wrote: post #347
dilyevsky wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tbf iscsi and especially it’s future demise - nvmeof can be made quite fast. The problem that in gp2/3, gce-pd cases it’s probably not some native storage but another layer of software-based distributed store which makes stuff slow/expensive

But also less prone to single drive failures. And easily auto expanding storage sizes. Everything is a trade off.

I actually don't suggest that people get off the cloud. My gripe is with the devil may care attitude toward costs. I am still very cost-conscious about it (even those most business aren't). Newer engineers just don't think of it as a factor. Push a button, get a load balancer. It all adds up.

Your AWS bill is directly proportional to the number of developers, because they all spin up cloud toys they are fond of.

Re: Reclaiming the lost art of Linux server administration

#425

Post by LaGrange »

reaperducer wrote: post #298
senko wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Here's what the bare metal server didn't come with: [bunch of stuff I don't need] Exactly. Imagine paying for all that when all you need is bare metal. Now imagine paying for all that just because you've read on the Internet that it's best practice and that's what the big guys do. Way back the best practice was what Microsoft, Oracle or Cisco wanted you to buy. Now it's what Amazon wants you to buy. Buy what you ne…

best practice Ugh. I hate that phrase. The translation into plain English is almost always "What I read in some blog" or "Because I want to" or "It's what our sales rep told us." Even from C-levels who should know better.

It should mean something. There are things that are just good ideas you probably shouldn’t stray from. But the moment a concept like this materializes it gets hijacked by marketers and celebrity developers and distorted into oblivion.

Re: Reclaiming the lost art of Linux server administration

#426

Post by BatteryMountain »

andrewmcwatters wrote: post #251
solatic wrote: post #102

Why can't people just pick the right tool for the job? The truth behind these managed services is that, for the correct usecases, they are VERY cheap. And for the wrong usecases, they are RIDICULOUSLY expensive. Most businesses have nightly cronjobs generating some kind of report that is then emailed to stakeholders. Why on Earth would you run a dedicated Linux box for that anymore? Glue a nightly trigger to AWS Lamb…

> Pick the right tool for the job. This is such a tired expression. It basically means nothing in the industry, and exactly because of comments like yours. Exactly who are you to say what my infrastructure desires are? Software is personal and people ignore this completely.

Some people just don't know any better or have starlight in their eyes and they manage to convince the business they need it. No brakes, no caution, no reflection on if they reallly need it. They just want it cause it is fashionable. Then when they eventually realize they are deep in a hole or it that it was the incorrect solution to their problem, then it becomes everyone else's fault (aws's fault, cloud computing industry blah blah blah) and they write blog posts about how terrible everything is, all while making businesses and other people trust us less and less each year. But that one clown not "using the right tool for the job" will never admit it or they disappear or move onto the next fad (he's probably a crypto bro now after implementing a piss poor chatbot somewhere).

Measure twice, cut once. Fail fast is load of nonsense and burns a lot of money for no good reason.

Re: Reclaiming the lost art of Linux server administration

#427

Post by DarylZero »

cerved wrote: post #376
DarylZero wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People don't need a 42U rack to put a server in their closet though. You buy some surplus server on ebay and throw it on a shelf, no big deal.

It's really not that easy. There's a lot of considerations to make. Which rack size, model you want. Finding someone who will ship that brick to you. Not trivial

Yes it's trivial. Just go on ebay and buy something. Finding someone? Literally ebay.com. Found.

Also I said _not_ buy a rack, just put it on a shelf.

Re: Reclaiming the lost art of Linux server administration

#428

Post by ozim »

_xnmw wrote: post #386
SkipperCat wrote: post #2

Time is money, and the more time I spend on infrastructure, the less time I spend on product. And thus is born the incredible demand of infrastructure as a service. Thankfully one person's cloud is another person's on prem infrastructure so sysadmin skills will always be in demand. From my perspective in enterprise computing, I now see people taking 2 paths. One where they become super deep sysadmins and work on infr…

This is a straw-man argument. Of course if the cloud could save me time and energy, I would use it, but it doesn't. In my experience, you spend just as much time in the long run tweaking/configuring the AWS console as you do simply running bash scripts on a baremetal server. That's why "AWS consultant" roles exist as a full-time job. The cloud does NOT save time for me, and it's far worse in many ways: opaque, more e…

If you look from business perspective AWS consultant is as opaque as any SysAdmin with bare metal servers.

You don't even know if Sys Admin is doing any backups at all.

From perspective of a person that does not know anything about administering systems tweaking stuff in AWS is I would say a lot easier than setting up a server properly.

So people that know nothing about administering systems pay more because they don't have the knowledge.

If you have the knowledge then yes it is cheaper to run your own sever but what is obvious or easy for one person is not really true for someone else.

Re: Reclaiming the lost art of Linux server administration

#429

Post by DarylZero »

2Gkashmiri wrote: post #405
e-dt wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a difference between what you are allowed to do with the code, which is what the MIT license covers, and what you are allowed to do with a specific hosted platform on which the code is running, which is what that term is part of.

oh. Do... you need to specify another license for that? this is interesting.

It's not a license, it's rule #2, where "This _network_ has three rules: [...]"
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