los sent 2

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

1/22

Web hosting services atWeb hosting services at

CERNCERN

Alex Lossent CERN IT/IS

Hepix Fall 2005

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

2/22

10-Oct-2005 Alex Lossent 2

AgendaAgenda Presentation of the service

Demo

Service infrastructure

Recent achievements

Future

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

3/22



Demo


Recent achievements

Future

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

4/22


CERN Web ServicesCERN Web ServicesMandate

Provide a managed infrastructure for CERN users to publish

web content

Provide users with authoring and publishing tools

Reduce locally (un-)managed web servers

CERN IT/IS Group (mail, Windows

environment)

3 tasks Operate the central web hosting infrastructure

Provide self-service site management interface

User support

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

5/22


FiguresFigures Infrastructure

25 production servers

Hosting > 7000 web sites Serving ~ 2000000 requests/day

People Helpdesk provides 1st & 2nd level support

1.5 FTE Students and associates

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

6/22


CERN Web ServicesCERN Web Services Self-service site management interface

On-line documentation

Site creation, deletion Management of permissions & access restrictions

Management of site & folder properties

script/CGI execution

Visibility (internal/world-visible)

Require HTTPS

http://cern.ch/web

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

7/22


DemoDemo Self-service site creation

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

8/22



Demo


Recent achievements

Future

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

9/22


Service infrastructureService infrastructureWindows (2003 Server) + Linux (SLC3)

Runs on top of CERNs Windows & Linux

server environment Monitoring, HW/SW maintenance

Different server roles Hosting servers (11)

Gateways to distributed file systems (4)

Infrastructure support (6)

redirectors, administration, search engine

Customized hosting servers (5)

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

10/22


Service infrastructure:Service infrastructure:

searchsearch Intranet search engine

Allows searching of intranet-only sites

Only content that is accessible anonymously

1000000 documents, 5000 queries/day

Currently using Inktomi indexing engine Will move to FastSearch (??)

Demo

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

11/22


Support for webSupport for web

applicationsapplications Various technologies are provided for web

application development

ASP, ASP.NET, Perl, PHP Supported on central Hosting Servers

Databases:MS Access, Oracle (IT/DES)

AFS folders: PHP, CGI (Perl etc.)

Java/servlet web application hosting Operated by IT/DES

Access control with NICEaccounts/groups

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

12/22


AuthoringAuthoring Supported authoring software

Frontpage 2003, Dreamweaver

Visual Studio .NET for ASP.NET applications

Several ways for authors to access site

files Direct file access

WebDAV Web interface

FPSE

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

13/22


User recommendationsUser recommendations

Recommended technologies are: Centrally hosted web sites

Authoring with FrontPage 2003 Dynamic content with ASP (VBScript)

Efforts focused on supporting that

environment

Also supported: Dreamweaver Static content

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

14/22


About URLsAbout URLs

Web sites are published ashttp://www.cern.ch/mySiteName This is translated to

http://mysitename.web.cern.ch/mySiteName

Why? Many web sites & servers

No virtual hosting so as to support HTTPS

Web sites are 1st-level folders of a physical web server

Web servers name abstracted with DNS alias Web redirectors are in charge of the translation

Flexible implementation for integration of non-central sites

Support for external DNS names

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

15/22


Web redirectorsWeb redirectors

Web browser Redirectors

Web

servers

http://www.cern.ch/web

302 Redirect

Web namespace

http://webservices.web.cern.ch/webservices

DNS

zones

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

16/22


AgendaAgenda

Presentation of the service

Demo


Recent achievements

Future

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

17/22


Migration to Windows2003Migration to Windows2003

Many improvements over Windows2000

Simple upgrade was not possible

Tedious migration task Transparent for users

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

18/22


Support forPHPSupport forPHP

Popular technology

Many useful applications already exist PhpBB, wikis

PHP4

A few problems Bugs in the Windows port

No version upgrades on SLC, only security fixes

Version compatibility

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

19/22


Java/servlet web hostingJava/servlet web hosting

Provide a central service and limit locallymanaged servers

Service operated by IT/DES Tomcat 5.5, EJB not supported

Multi-hosting with site isolation

Integrated with central web services Managed from the same web interface

NICE authentication

Production since September 05 ~10 production applications + test/dev

half migrated from existing servers

5 servers allow ~200 applications

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

20/22


New webservices siteNew webservices site

Consistent look & usage with other IT/IS

services

Technology upgrade ASP.NET/SOAP vs. ASP/VB6

Complete documentation rewrite

Simpler, easier access to some features Security

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

21/22


AgendaAgenda

Presentation of the service

Demo


Recent achievements

Future

8/3/2019 Los Sent 2

22/22


Whats next?Whats next?

Web-hosted collaboration tools e-groups: forum, mailing list, news, shared workspace

for file exchange

Sharepoint, WWF, custom solution?

Support for authentication with

certificates

Improved search engine Support for External users

los sent 2

Documents