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22.20.2 System Administration

Guix System configuration for all our systems is held in this repository:

https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/guix/maintenance.git/tree/hydra/

The two front-ends are berlin.scm (the machine behind ci.guix.gnu.org) and bayfront.scm (the machine behind bordeaux.guix.gnu.org, guix.gnu.org, hpc.guix.info, qa.guix.gnu.org, and more). Both connect to a number of build machines and helpers.

Without even having SSH access to the machine, you can help by posting patches to improve the configuration (you can test it with guix system vm). Here are ways you can help:

• Improve infra monitoring: set up a dashboard to monitor all the infrastructure, and an out-of-band channel to communicate about downtime.
• Implement web site redundancy: guix.gnu.org should be backed by several machines on different sites. Get in touch with us and/or send a patch!
• Implement substitute redundancy: likewise, bordeaux.guix.gnu.org and ci.guix.gnu.org should be backed by several head nodes.
• Improve backup: there’s currently ad-hoc backup of selected pieces over rsync between the two head nodes; we can improve on that, for example with a dedicated backup site and proper testing of recoverability.
• Support mirroring: We’d like to make it easy for others to mirror substitutes from ci.guix and bordeaux.guix, perhaps by offering public rsync access.
• Optimize our web services: Monitor the performance of our services and tweak nginx config or whatever it takes to improve it.

  There is no time constraint on this activity: any improvement is welcome, whenever you can work on it.

  Prerequisite: Familiarity with Guix System administration and ideally with the infrastructure handbook:

  Infra-Handbook