More Tea Vicar?

Well, the important question of what to name the Geograph servers has been answered.

  • Tea – the load balancer, as everything should start with a nice cup of tea
  • Toast, Scone and Crumpet – web servers, keeping our site sustained!
  • Jam – NAS / database, as toast, scones and crumpets are naught without jam

See, there’s method in it.

While I’m waiting for the new kit to arrive, I’m building some VMWare virtual servers of the new setup, which should help anyone developing for Geograph since it allows them to run an identical setup without needing to know much about Linux configuration, and will also allow us to trial new ideas without messing up the “real” boxes.

O’Reilly turned evil?

I’m hoping there’s been a few crossed wires and misunderstandings surrounding O’Reilly’s lawyers issuing a Cease and Desist against use of the term Web 2.0. O’Reilly are the “Google” of publishing, surely they can do wrong? Geeks worldwide take a pride in their bulging shelves of O’Reilly tomes bedecked in animal engraved covers. There’s a few people venting their frustration in comments on Tim O’Reilly’s blog, but surely some sort of official clarification must be coming!

Say it ain’t so!

(Edit #1) here is a first response, but it’s not going down well.

(Edit #2) …and a second one! No-one denies they have to make a buck, but is no one at O’Reilly actually grasping the irony of this situation?

(Edit #3) …finally Tim O’Reilly responds. Huzzah.

The Naming of Servers

I’ve done all the hard work, the servers are specified, they are ordered and now we must wait for delivery. Now is the time for that most important of tasks.

What to call them?

I think it’s a trait of all geeks to want to give their equipment cool or amusing names. At one of my first jobs in Newcastle we named our equipment after our favourite drinking establishments. I remember I had Trillian and Baltic. All of my own gear has Star Wars names. I’m writing this on Geonosis but it will pass through the frozen wastes of Hoth on its way out into the big wide world. My family photo album is on Naboo.

It’s not sad, just human nature, honestly.

Anyway, we’ve got 5 servers for Geograph, and I’m appealling to the happy bunch who inhabit the site forums to come up with the names.

I’m thinking rodent based names will be popular given our insistence the current server is powered entirely by hamsters….