October 2005 - Ag-tech - mailman3.cels.anl.gov

Re: [AG-TECH] AG Town Hall
by Thomas D. Uram 31 Oct '05

31 Oct '05

This week: http://www-unix.mcs.anl.gov/web-mail-archive/lists/ag-tech/2005/10/msg00125… Tom On 10/31/05 4:24 PM, Michael Miller wrote: > Is the AG Town Hall meeting this week or next? >

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Re: [AG-TECH] AG Town Hall
by Susanne Lefvert 31 Oct '05

31 Oct '05

Mike, The AG townhall is scheduled for tomorrow...here's the info: Susanne Date: Tue, 25 Oct 2005 23:39:54 -0500 From: Thomas D. Uram <turam(a)mcs.anl.gov> To: ag-tech <ag-tech(a)mcs.anl.gov> Subject: [AG-TECH] Access Grid Townhall Reminder - November The November Townhall is scheduled for Tuesday, November 1, at 10:00AM CST (16:00 UTC). It will be held in the Argonne National Laboratory venue on the institutional venue server (Go to https://ivs.mcs.anl.gov:9000/Venues/default, then Government Institutions Lobby, then Argonne National Lab). Invited Speaker: Robert Putnam, Boston University Positional Audio and Window Highlighting for the Access Grid Boston University has developed a system to help users determine which Access Grid participant is speaking at a given time. In the current test system, when the amplitude of a site's audio rises above a minimum threshold, the video windows from that site are highlighted by a color outline, and the audio is positioned in the stereo field at the same relative location as the last-moved video window. Robert will discuss the [sometimes tortuous] development of the system, its current implementation, and the prospects for inclusion in the AGtk. There will be a second session held for those in the Asia-Pacific region, at 6:00PM CST (Wednesday, 00:00 UTC). Of course, anyone is welcome to attend this session, if it's more agreeable with their schedules. ANL will be running bridges in the Argonne venue for this meeting. On Mon, 31 Oct 2005, Michael Miller wrote: > Is the AG Town Hall meeting this week or next? > > -- > Thanx, > > Michael Miller > System Engineer > Video Technology Services > Persistent Infrastructure Directorate > National Center for Supercomputing Applications > University of Illinois - UC > 217-649-0747 > > "If you're clear in your vision and trust the people in your team with clear objectives, they will invariably do their best to achieve everything desired, and usually deliver everything you could have hoped for and even more." -Paul Debevec > > >

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AG Town Hall
by Michael Miller 31 Oct '05

31 Oct '05

Is the AG Town Hall meeting this week or next? -- Thanx, Michael Miller System Engineer Video Technology Services Persistent Infrastructure Directorate National Center for Supercomputing Applications University of Illinois - UC 217-649-0747 "If you're clear in your vision and trust the people in your team with clear objectives, they will invariably do their best to achieve everything desired, and usually deliver everything you could have hoped for and even more." -Paul Debevec

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Re: [AG-TECH] ANL bridge machine and port info?
by Thomas D. Uram 31 Oct '05

31 Oct '05

Derek: See this ag-tech mail from Namgon, who wrote the umtp server: http://www.mcs.anl.gov/web-mail-archive/lists/ag-tech/2005/09/msg00133.html We do need to shake bugs out, so any feedback you can provide from your trials would be helpful. Tom On 10/31/05 7:30 AM, Derek Piper wrote: > > Hi, > > How would I go about running the server on its own? The binary that > comes with the AGConnector package complains about being run incorrectly > but doesn't give any useful information. I'm having trouble finding a > UMTP server that I can run on a central machine. I'm modifying the > AGConnector python script to have this machine as the default, so people > should be able to run it without configuring a new server. > > Derek > > Thomas D. Uram wrote: > >> Hi Derek: >> >> Comments inline... >> >> On 10/27/05 8:55 AM, Derek Piper wrote: >> >>> >>> Hi Tom, >>> >>> I tried playing with AGConnector, does it have to go to just your >>> server there? Is it possible to run a server on a local machine and >>> have other clients connect to it? Like the local bridge, but simpler? >> >> >> >> The default server is the one here at ANL (umtp.mcs.anl.gov) >> AGConnector >> does allow you to specify which server to use, so yes: if you have a >> UMTP server running, you can specify it in AGConnector and it will be >> used instead. In fact, in the future I'd like to see umtp servers >> proliferate >> and be discoverable. >> >> I also >> >>> have a question about how it works too, in trying to test it on two >>> machines that are on a LAN (and so have full visibility of each other >>> wrt multicast) I didn't notice any difference - should I? .. >> >> >> >> UMTP is a solution for people who have no multicast, and it actually >> shuts down if it receives a packet from itself over multicast (see >> the ietf UMTP draft). >> >> I'm trying >> >>> to test it so I know what I'm doing with it to help a remote site >>> with their AG connection. Actually, I'm wanting it for helping >>> someone at Argonne / University of Chicago combat the draconian >>> firewalling :) >>> >>> Derek >>> >>> Thomas D. Uram wrote: >>> >>>> I'd recommend that you look at the AGConnector shared app. It does >>>> everything over >>>> a single, fixed port (8010) to a server here at ANL >>>> (umtp.mcs.anl.gov) No port range >>>> needed, and coverage for every venue, not just those that people >>>> chose to bridge. >>>> >>>> Tom >>>> >>>> >>>> On 10/26/05 12:36 PM, Julia Mullen wrote: >>>> >>>>> Hi - >>>>> >>>>> I'm trying to get the okay to open ports so that I can attend the Town >>>>> Halls, and any >>>>> other events on the ANL venue server, so I need some information re: >>>>> the bridge server IP and ports. Is there a document, or easy way to >>>>> get the list of bridged ANL venues, and the >>>>> bridge IP address, as well as the range of ports for the bridge. . . >>>>> >>>>> yup, a continuation of the Security Office's questions. >>>>> >>>>> Thanks - >>>>> >>>>> Julie >>>>> >>>>> >>>> >>>> >>> >> >> >

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Re: [AG-TECH]Question About Node Backup/Fault Tolerance
by John I Quebedeaux Jr 31 Oct '05

31 Oct '05

John, Our full node (4 machines) is designed for some fault tolerance in mind in terms of equipment but mostly because we have a portable node that can take up the slack if hardware failures occur and we built in a "5th" machine for "just in case". Our two capture machines have the ability to each do video and audio capture so that if one fails, the other can take up the slack. We've actually had to do this before when we had a failure (OS) on one of the capture machines. Took about 15 minutes to realize we couldn't recover it in time and switch things over (because I had had the student practice this about 3 weeks prior). The echo canceler can temporarily be relieved by our 4 channel echo canceler on our pig node if the echo canceler itself fails. Our pig node can function in place of the display node should it fail. We have a 5th machine with a couple of spare capture cards that currently serves as our venue server, but it is ready at a moment's notice to be a video capture/audio machine as well. If we bring in everything into play - we actually have (from our full node with our portable as supplement) 14 video captures, 4 audio captures, two echo cancelers, 4 speakers, 4 projectors, two 61" plasmas, and 8 microphones (2 wireless) to bring to bear. Mostly because our portable node has a full complement of audio and video to go with it. Granted, we can over load it's bus pretty easily if we really want to, but it serves as redundancy to the full node and it's own node in it's own right for auditoriums and small conference rooms with the ability to run 2 projectors in addition to it's own two operator displays (or 1 display and 3 projectors.) I've found that with the AG 2.x toolkit it is extremely easy to be flexible with regards to what resources you want to bring in. I have a two room node run by 6 machines - and the rooms are nearby. The xap800 runs BOTH ROOMS. Why? because it's designed to run many rooms in what it can really do. I split up the displays and the captures - and even run two service managers (hard coded one for separate port) on one of the machines where i run video for one room and audio for the other (splitting up it's load between the two rooms). Essentially it's two 3 machine nodes thrown together in the same rack - we've utilized one of the rooms as a result as an overflow room locally when we had too many in the audience to fit into one room. Quite flexible indeed. I've run ALL the nodes on campus as one huge node... just to try it. We have 3 full nodes on campus (going to double very soon) and one portable. -John Q. -- John I. Quebedeaux, Jr.; Louisiana State University Computer Manager LBRN; 131 Life Sciences Bldg. e-mail: johnq(a)lsu.edu; web: http://lbrn.lsu.edu phone: 225-578-0062 / fax: 225-578-2597 On Oct 31, 2005, at 9:22 AM, John Langkals wrote: > Hello AGTech, > > > > How do you support fault tolerance within your Access Grid node? > If you would experience catastrophic failure of your node hardware, > what kind of backup have you designed into your production nodes to > maintain service? > > > > Thank you, > > > > John > > > > John Langkals > Systems Manager > OCTS > M2021 Physics Research Building > 191 West Woodruff Avenue > Columbus, Ohio 43210 > 614.292.6957 Office > 614.327.3732 Cell > 614.292.7557 FAX > www.octs.osu.edu > > > >

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Re: [AG-TECH]Question About Node Backup/Fault Tolerance
by John Hodrien 31 Oct '05

31 Oct '05

On Mon, 31 Oct 2005, John Langkals wrote: > How do you support fault tolerance within your Access Grid node? If you > would experience catastrophic failure of your node hardware, what kind of > backup have you designed into your production nodes to maintain service? Admittedly we don't run it as a service, but... We're in the process of replacing our old AG1 hardware with a shiny single machine AG2 setup (and buying two machines). A spare echo-cancelling microphone so if the Gentner gave up we could switch over to that as a passable short term solution. So if the PC breaks we should be able to provide normal service, if the audio hardware breaks we should be able to provide degraded service. If a projector dies (as one has) you run in a degraded state. If the PC catches fire it'll take the spare out... jh -- "I happen to feel that the degree of a person's intelligence is directly reflected by the number of conflicting attitudes she can bring to bear on the same topic." -- Lisa Alther

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[AG-TECH]Question About Node Backup/Fault Tolerance
by John Langkals 31 Oct '05

31 Oct '05

Hello AGTech, How do you support fault tolerance within your Access Grid node? If you would experience catastrophic failure of your node hardware, what kind of backup have you designed into your production nodes to maintain service? Thank you, John John Langkals Systems Manager OCTS M2021 Physics Research Building 191 West Woodruff Avenue Columbus, Ohio 43210 614.292.6957 Office 614.327.3732 Cell 614.292.7557 FAX www.octs.osu.edu

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AGSchedule time change reminder
by Michael Miller 31 Oct '05

31 Oct '05

Hey folks, Please remember that if you are using a Gecko based browser, that when the time changes for DST, it corrupts the cookie that AGSchedule places on your machine. If you run into a problem with your browser looping on the startup pages, stop your browser and delete any cookies associated with agschedule.ncsa.uiuc.edu. Then try again and answer the DST questions. This will reset the cookie. Please let me know if you have any problems. -- Thanx, Michael Miller System Engineer Video Technology Services Persistent Infrastructure Directorate National Center for Supercomputing Applications University of Illinois - UC 217-649-0747 "If you're clear in your vision and trust the people in your team with clear objectives, they will invariably do their best to achieve everything desired, and usually deliver everything you could have hoped for and even more." -Paul Debevec

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Re: [AG-TECH] IVS SERVER?
by Eric Olson 31 Oct '05

31 Oct '05

The server was brought up shortly after your e-mail. The machine wasn't responding and I suspect it had to due with networking downtime and maintenance over the weekend. Eric Nathan P Johnson wrote: > Is the IVS server down? I was planning a session in our venue there this morning in about 30 minutes and a full meeting tomorrow morning. > > Thanks, > Nate > > Nathan Johnson > sysAdmin > Dahlem Supercomputer Lab > Speed Scientific School > University of Louisville > (502) 852-0164 > nathan.johnson(a)louisville.edu > >

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IVS SERVER?
by Nathan P Johnson 31 Oct '05

31 Oct '05

Is the IVS server down? I was planning a session in our venue there this morning in about 30 minutes and a full meeting tomorrow morning. Thanks, Nate Nathan Johnson sysAdmin Dahlem Supercomputer Lab Speed Scientific School University of Louisville (502) 852-0164 nathan.johnson(a)louisville.edu

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