|
|
| Author |
Message |
janc
|
|
Grex's Long-Term Plan
| 
Apr 28 05:27 UTC 1999 |
Last month we talked about having a "Plan the Budget Meeting". This
didn't materialize because of a lack of any ideas posted on-line.
The board feels that we need to develop a longer range plan before we
can do any sensible shorter range planning. Long range issues include:
* Do we stick with a single server, or go toward distributed servers?
Staying with a single server has the problem that we'd have to
transition away from SunOS to some other operating system (Linux or
Solaris or something), because there aren't many SunOS machines that
are faster than our current one. Going to distributed servers
may require various new software like Kerberos, AFS, client/server
versions of Picospan, Backtalk, and party, and so forth. Either
way, there is a lot of software development needed, and it will
likely take more than a year to get done, so we need an advance plan.
* Do we want to try change our emphasis? A suggestion was made to
split Grex into two systems, a conferencing/party system, and an
E-mail. Each would have separate telnet queues. Conferencing
would perhaps be available from the E-mail system, but E-mail would
not be available from the conferencing system. This would limit
the growth of the E-mail service, without impinging on the growth
of the growth of the on-line community. Is this a good idea?
* Do we want Grex to continue to grow at all? If not, how do we
stop it from growing?
We need to start some discussion aimed at producing (one or more) plans
for Grex's future development. This item is meant as a starting point
for that. The board has also tentatively scheduled a face-to-face
"Plan the Future" meeting on Sunday May 23 at the home of Mark Conger.
This meeting will be open to the public.
Whatever plans are created should should probably be put to a membership
vote.
|
| 65 responses total. |
keesan
|
|
response 1 of 65:
|
Apr 29 15:30 UTC 1999 |
Re not being able to e-mail from the conferences, I often e-mail an individual
in response to something I read in a response. Examples are offering Jon and
Julie (lumen and bookworm) a bed for a week, and sending confused new users
offers of help on how to use grex. (Several have written back). I frequently
switch back and forth between pine and bbs. I get 'new mail' messages. I
don't think separation would be a good idea.
|
toking
|
|
response 2 of 65:
|
Apr 29 18:38 UTC 1999 |
resp:1 that's avery good point, if I telnet into Grex and something
really catches my eye I like being able to do a !mail right then before
I forget what it was that I wanted to say (this coming from the guy with
the attention span of a 3 year old on carck)
|
toking
|
|
response 3 of 65:
|
Apr 29 18:38 UTC 1999 |
crack that is
|
devnull
|
|
response 4 of 65:
|
Apr 30 07:00 UTC 1999 |
I really don't want to see a split to two systems, one of which doesn't
support email, either. I don't use mail on grex much, but occasionally
want to send mail from grex for whatever reason.
|
scott
|
|
response 5 of 65:
|
Apr 30 10:57 UTC 1999 |
OK, so how would you deal with unending growth? That is the big social
question here.
|
scg
|
|
response 6 of 65:
|
Apr 30 17:00 UTC 1999 |
One proposal thrown out at the board meeting would be to use shared
filesystems, so that one system would have just bbs and party, and the other
would have bbs and party, as well as everything else. That way, those who
just want to use bbs and party could do so on a system that wasn't bogged down
by the other users, while those who wanted to use Grex for all those other
things would still have access to the features of the conferencing only
system.
|
pfv
|
|
response 7 of 65:
|
Apr 30 17:05 UTC 1999 |
Nope.
Yer looking at the following:
1) Increased Loading of an Increasingly limited system:
A) increased immigration;
B) increased software/interface requirements;
C) increased volumes of mail/file transfer;
D) decreasing "free" bandwidth;
2) Increasing costs of operation;
3) Increasing usage of a previously restricted medium;
4) Decreasing levels of user sophistication;
5) Social issues:
A) system (grex) society changing;
B) cultural "clashes"
i) grex-culture;
ii) national culture;
C) self-defense and Responsibility issues;
6) Issues related to the 501c3 situation.
|
lilmo
|
|
response 8 of 65:
|
Apr 30 21:50 UTC 1999 |
Re resp:7 - "Nope" what?
#6 is a non-issue; we've always had a 501c3-type organization, we just have
the status officially, now. We won't pay taxes, and donations are
unquestionably tax-deductable. All that relates to Cyberspace Communications,
Inc, and only indirectly impinges on the computer system, Grex.
#2 isn't really much of an issue: computer hardware costs are dropping
precipitously, so that each higher level costs about the same as the last one
we got (staff, back me up or correct me on this point, please)
#1,3-5 are definitely things to think about, tho'
|
pfv
|
|
response 9 of 65:
|
Apr 30 23:15 UTC 1999 |
#7 was re #5 - picospan can't handle re: for shit.
if a meal is a nickel - and you have a penny - it's an issue.
|
aruba
|
|
response 10 of 65:
|
May 1 02:39 UTC 1999 |
Re #8: Actually, our costs rose pretty much steadily from 1993 through the
fall of 1998, when we cut two phone lines and the ICNET link. They took a
dip then, then went up when we paid our first insurance premium, and are
started down again.
|
pfv
|
|
response 11 of 65:
|
May 1 02:42 UTC 1999 |
re 10:
Yeah, that's as I expected... Plus, I saw some rumbling about
perhaps needing a new net link in the near future here?
Plus, while the "pumpkin" is working again, that hassle was weird
- and I sure wouldn't bet my life that it's all "stable".
(by this I mean the lease/rent)
Even the issues have issues.
|
dang
|
|
response 12 of 65:
|
May 6 05:42 UTC 1999 |
So, those are the issues. How do we deal with them? I'm not sure that
increasingly large monolithic computers are the way to go. We'd start
running into disk I/O issues pretty quickly, even if we could keep
getting faster processors. I'd personally go for some sort of
multi-server setup. The question is, do we try and offer everything on
all servers, ala U of M login servers, or do we split up services? I,
personally, wouldn't mind a conf only server, as I don't ever to
non-staff related mail on grex and usually conf via backtalk. However,
if we continue to grow, we will need a larger net link. That will cost
money. I guess I'd like to see a continuation of our current services
in the future, accomidating as many people as is technically feasible.
|
richard
|
|
response 13 of 65:
|
May 6 22:00 UTC 1999 |
is it time for grex to finally upgrade toa T1 connection? grex would
seem to have the funds, and these days some people think you are in the
dark ages if you dont have a T1.
|
dang
|
|
response 14 of 65:
|
May 6 22:53 UTC 1999 |
I really doubt Grex has the funds for more than a month or two of a T1
unless some significate portion thereof was donated.
|
richard
|
|
response 15 of 65:
|
May 6 23:33 UTC 1999 |
oh cmon, how much per month would a good cheap T1 connection be? grex
could pay a couple hundred extra month for its connectivity than it does
now if it was that good right>
.\
|
jep
|
|
response 16 of 65:
|
May 7 02:03 UTC 1999 |
Last I knew, T1 connections ran between $1000-2000 per month.
Anyway, I don't think Grex needs a T1 connection; it seems plenty fast
to me just as it is.
|
mdw
|
|
response 17 of 65:
|
May 7 04:42 UTC 1999 |
Kerouac - our treasurer is anxiously awaiting your check to pay for the
first year's worth of T1 connectivity.
The phone company's charges for a T1 connection aren't actually all that
unreasonable. I think they're something like $300/mo. There is also
the capital expense of the T1 equipment -- that's probably a one-time
expense of around $1k-2k for the actual equipment, and another chunk of
change for the telephone's installation expenses, & there's the final
kicker - the monthly charge an ISP would charge us for T1 bandwidth
(which would cover both the costs of their per-port equipment charges,
and their network connectivity costs beyond.) $1200/mo sounds a bit high
to me, but I can't say I've priced this out recently. There is some
chance that this cost is dropping -- ideally, it should be following
Moore's law. It is also possible we might be able to get a break on
this as a non-profit, although the last time we looked, we had a hard
time finding an attractive bargain (admittedly, this was before we got
the IRS tax exemption status.)
The major advantage I can see to getting a T1 is we'd have a lot less
excuse to forbid graphics on grex web pages.
|
scg
|
|
response 18 of 65:
|
May 7 04:56 UTC 1999 |
For a T1, Grex, or at least a for-profit customer in SouthEastern Michigan,
would probably be paying at least $700-$800 per month for the bandwidth, plus
the telco charge for the T1 circuit. If that T1 went to an ISP off the Ann
Arbor Main CO, it would be somewhere around $250 per month if I'm remembering
correctly. However, it's likely that the line would have to go to somewhere
in the Detroit area, which would make it more expensive. It would be far
cheaper to look at some of the SDSL stuff that's getting introduced in this
area in the next month or two.
|
mdw
|
|
response 19 of 65:
|
May 7 05:33 UTC 1999 |
Ok, that's $15,000 we'll need from you, Kerouac. When can we expect the
check?
How is SDSL related to ADSL? If it's an ameritech thing, are they still
flakey, or have they gotten their act together? What are the prospects
for a static IP subnet?
|
dang
|
|
response 20 of 65:
|
May 7 06:53 UTC 1999 |
xDSL is a new (relatively) class of connections. It stands for Digital
Subscriber Line (or Loop, depending on who you talk to.) ADSL, which is
what I have, is Async. I get 1.5 Mb down, 128 Kb up. It's from
Ameritech. It's not at all flakey, in my experience. I have a static
IP, but that's not normal for ADSL, they're usually dynamic.
SDSL is syncronous. Both directions are the same speed. This is what
Grex needs. They are more expensive. Several ISPs in the area are
getting ready to offer it. The main kicker is distance from the CO.
I'd guess Grex is close enough. You can get up to 1.5 Mb in each
direction (T1 speeds.) You pay for bandwidth, like in a T1. The loop,
however, is much cheaper. I don't know what pricing will be. Ameritech
will not offer them, as far as I know. Since they're aimed at corperate
users, I'd guess you can get a subnet.
|
devnull
|
|
response 21 of 65:
|
May 8 00:11 UTC 1999 |
Re #12: So, I just did an upload to grex using ftp for a response I wanted
to post in the coop conference, but dumping the file in /tmp/togrex. Is
your conf server going to let me do that?
Re #19: I don't know what pricing in Ann Arbor is like, but it looks
like you can get 384K in each direction from a DSL loop for about
$200/month in Boston. (The $200 includes both the local loop, and the
connection between your ISP and the rest of the universe.) You can
get a reasonable size subnet with that (one provider charges an extra
$150/year if you want a 64 host subnet, which works out to $12/month
for the IPs, so figure about $212/month).
I think 384K is about a quarter of a T1; 384K is three times faster
than what grex currently has.
|
scg
|
|
response 22 of 65:
|
May 8 00:15 UTC 1999 |
a 384K synchronous connection is six times the speed of what Grex has now,
assuming an even amount of traffic in both directions. I need to ask the
sales people at work what we're going to be charging for the DSL connections,
since I don't remember.
|
jazz
|
|
response 23 of 65:
|
Jun 26 14:16 UTC 1999 |
GREX is only using a single 64k B channel?
|
janc
|
|
response 24 of 65:
|
Jun 26 15:27 UTC 1999 |
No, we are using two channels for 128K.
|