1. Astronomy System Managers Report Barry Smalley Keele University Report to CNAP 4 November 2003

2. Site Managers Meetings ● Loss of System Managers Meetings supported by Starlink – Last meeting was SMM67 in October 2002 – SMM68 in Spring 2003 was cancelled. ● Decided to convene our own Site Managers Meeting in September 2003 at UCLan. ● Meetings help to provide cohesion and sharing of best practice.

3. Report on Sept 2003 Meeting ● This one-day meeting attended by 13 Site Managers (c.f. ~25 normally) – Normally have 2-day meetings (lunch to lunch) ● Discussed – Security and General Issues – Starlink Project Status – Operating System Issues – Future Meetings

4. Central Support from Starlink ● Loss of Central (RAL) Support for System Managers – Advice on hardware, networking and security – Feeling of lack of overall strategic guidance ● Effect on training of new site managers

5. Support for Tru64 ● No further development of Tru64 Starlink Software ● Some sites still run Alpha Workstations, but none are not totally reliant upon them – Sites are no longer buying Alpha Hardware – Some legacy software not ported from Alphas ● e.g. VAX/VMS heritage software? ● No plans to remove Solaris Starlink Software

6. Support for MS Windows ● Increasing need for this at sites: – MS Office files ● Open Office ● Codeweavers CrossOver Office – Users Laptops ● Also user Linux installations – Starlink (and other) JAVA software ● Security issues and extra (significant) work load for Site Managers.

7. Maintenance ● Oct 2003 Starlink-funded maintenance ended – But still contracts available for sites to pay into ● Up take has been relatively low ● Drop in equipment budgets mean more old kit is still used – Without maintenance – Storage space for spares is limited

8. IDL Licences ● Training stopped, but Licences continue ● Continued central support for IDL vital, since per-site costs would be significantly more. ● Currently no one to officially administer the licence requests. – Sites have been waiting for new licences and latest software release ● Other licenses include NAG numerical libraries and Fortran 90/95 compiler.

9. Starlink Software ● Effects of changes to Starlink Software on Site Managers. – Move to JAVA-based software is not universally welcomed: ● “Slow”, “crashes a lot”,... – However, the new GUI-based software is appreciated by users ● Users still mostly use the traditional Software

10. e-science and GRID ● e-science/Grid/AVO requirements – Still somewhat unclear of computing requirements for Sites ● Security issues ● Local networking requirements ● Workload implications

11. Linux Distributions ● RedHat falling out of favour – commercialisation and upgrading strategy ● Conflict between security and stability of user experience – Upgrading often breaks important software – Applications software lags behind latest OS releases ● Current feeling to consider Debian for future upgrades, but not immediately.

12. Intra Site Manager Communications ● STARMAN JISCmail e-mail list for Site Managers to replace our existing web Forum. ● Mixed views on this: – Forum has proved very useful, but no support for maintenance and enhancements. – Mailing list looses thread of topics, but the list web archive does sort messages by subject and date. However, not as convenient as Forum.

13. Liaison with STP and Solar ● A few STP and Solar Physics System Managers have attended Starlink Site Managers Meetings in the past. – Barbara Bromage from UCLan attended our recent meeting. ● Aim to include STP and Solar Physics Managers in future meetings.

14. Summary of Issues ● Two 2-day Site Manager Meetings per year – Request some central support for organising meetings ● Continued central support for IDL and other licences – Requires some central administration ● Linux Distribution for future updates ● Representation on CNAP