September 19, 2008 -- Volume 5 -- Number 2
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In this issue:
* E-mail Updates: Transition, New Features, and Retention
* FTP Reminders and Policy Update
* Research Co-lo Center (Room 002) Infrastructure
* PHP Enhancements
* Port 25 Restrictions
* 64-bit Penguins
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* E-mail: Transition
On September 2, 2008, we had our cut-over from our old e-mail
system to our new e-mail system. This means that incoming e-mail
now arrives on the new system rather than the old system. With
the assistance of some early adopters who helped debug our user
documentation, we had a smooth transition. The next deadline
related to the e-mail system is October 31, 2008. On this day
we will turn off the "old" e-mail service. If you have e-mail
on the old system that you want to transfer to the new system,
you must do it before this date. Detailed information is on the
CS Guide: https://csguide.cs.princeton.edu/email/changes If you
have questions, please contact CS Staff
* E-mail: New Features
With the deployment of our new e-mail system, we now have the
following new features:
* Increased speed
* Calendars with sharing and delegation ability
* Tagging/Conversations similar to that in Google's Gmail
* Much improved web interface
* Powerful e-mail searches
* Web-based filtering
* Web-based vacation message setup
* Mobile Web E-mail - try it from your iPhone
* Multiple-login ability - you can now use more than one
e-mail client at a time.
For details, click on the Help link in the upper left corner of
the web interface at http://webmail.cs.princeton.edu
* E-mail: Retention
Every so often we are asked how long an e-mail message might
exist in backups after it is deleted. There are two answers to
this question and they are related to our backup strategy. Each
night, we perform a backup of the data that is held within the
e-mail system. This includes e-mail, filters, calendars, etc.
These are kept for 3 months. As long as a message existed when
the backup was made, we can retrieve it for up to 3 months.
In addition to these nightly application-level backups, we also
perform a quarterly system-level backup (to tape) for disaster
recovery. These tapes are kept for 1 year and then erased and
recycled. Because this backup includes the contents of the
e-mail system (as it existed on that particular day of the
quarter), a message that was deleted just after the backup was
made could linger for up to 1 year.
So, users should assume that they can only retrieve messages
that have been deleted within the past 3 months (as long as they
existed overnight) and lawyers should be aware that messages are
definitely irretrievable 1 year after they were deleted.
* FTP Reminders and Policy Update
Please remember that the FTP space (found at /n/fs/ftp and
ftp://ftp.cs.princeton.edu) is not intended to be used for long-
term storage of files. The intention of this space is to share
files in a medium that doesn't require authentication. You can
use this space either to make files available to the public, or
to receive incoming files from others. We ask, though, that once
the need passes you clean up any files that no longer need to be
in the FTP space. If you have a need for long-term storage, we
recommend you consider Project Space.
Starting October 1, 2008, we will begin being more aggressive
about automatically cleaning files out of the FTP *incoming*
space. Presently, we remove any file from the top-level FTP
incoming directory that is over five days old. Beginning
October 1, 2008, we will additionally remove files from anywhere
in the incoming directory tree which are more than one month old.
We still request that you remove files from this space when you
no longer need them, but this reaping is meant to catch files
which have been forgotten and would otherwise persist
indefinitely.
* Research Co-lo Center (Room 002) Infrastructure
The project to convert Room 002 into a co-location facility
for research projects is nearly complete. The work that
remains is mostly cosmetic. During the summer, contractors
completed the final installation of the air handler and the
UPS. CS Staff installed new racks and wired them for power
and network. Many thanks to the researchers who use this room
for their patience and assistance during the renovations.
* PHP Update
On Tuesday, September 23, 2008, we will update PHP on the core
web server from version 4.4.x to version 5.2.x. The core web
servers handles the main departmental pages as well as the
user pages (i.e., http://www.cs.princeton.edu/~username). This
update has been requested by many users and is long overdue.
While we don't expect this to impact user pages, there are far
too many for us to check. On Tuesday, we recommend that you
check any PHP generated web pages you control to verify that
they are behaving correctly.
* Port 25 Restrictions
In 2007, in an effort to reduce spam generated by devices on
campus, OIT began blocking of outgoing SMTP (port 25) traffic
at the campus routers to all but registered devices (hosts,
servers, workstations). CS Staff was involved with the
creation of this policy and supports it.
Due to the architecture of the department's network, most of
our devices are hidden behind (and protected by) our firewall.
This means that, from OIT's point of view, everything behind
the firewall is considered one device. Because our firewall
is on OIT's whitelist, it means that all the devices behind
the firewall can use port 25. This violates the spirit of the
port 25 restrictions. Therefore, we will begin blocking
outgoing traffic at our firewall that is destined for port 25
on a device outside the CS network unless the source device is
on our own "allowed" list.
These restrictions will be effective October 1, 2008.
Nearly all devices that connect to outside mail servers on port 25
will be able to transition to using port 587 (the Enhanced SMTP
protocol) with a simple configuration change in their mail client.
Those devices that have a bona fide need to connect using port 25
can be put on our "allowed" list upon request.
To make the transition smooth, we have initially seeded this
"allowed" list with those devices that have made outgoing
connections to port 25 between July 1 and September 16, 2008.
As we contact the owners of these devices and work with them to
switch to the ESMTP protocol on port 587, we will reduce the
size of our "allowed" list to those devices with a true need
for port 25.
* The Penguins Grow Up
On Tuesday, October 28, 2008, (during midterm week), we will
upgrade the hardware for the penguins cycle servers from three
32-bit Intel-based machines (opus, tux, willy) to two 64-bit
AMD-based machines. The two new machines will take the names
opus and tux; we will deprecate the name willy.
Because these machines will continue to run CentOS 5.x and be
based on x86 architecture, this change will be seamless to
most users. However, if you program in assembly language or
compile code to use Intel-specific features, you may need to
make some adjustments. If you are in this category, you can
use the "cycles" machines to prepare for the transition. The
cycles machines have the same CPU architecture and similar OS
as the new penguin machines. (The new penguins will run, at
least, CentOS 5.2 and the current cycles machines run 5.0).