IT- GLM 26 th July 2010 Andreas Wagner – CERN IT/ OIS

CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23

Switzerlandwww.cern.ch/

it

OIS

IT-GLM26th July 2010

Andreas Wagner – CERN IT/OIS

Proposal for a Mac Service

CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Outline

• Background

• Proposal for Mac Service

• From Mac Support to Mac Service

• Next Steps and ongoing work

• Summary

CERN Mac Service - 2

CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Background - History

• Mac usage at CERN varied quite a bit over the last decades, e.g. was popular in directorate for some time and with some specific user communities

• In the past due to limited resources the aim was to focus IT support efforts for Windows and SLC

• Mac Support as one-man-show (2005-2009):for several years Mac Support = Patrick Herzog


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Background - Motivation

• Since 2002 Mac OS X– Unix based OS architecture

• Mac HW architecture move to Intel– announced June 2005 – first Intel based models Jan 2006

(15" MacBook Pro & iMac Core Duo line) – Mac OS X 10.6 "Snow Leopard“ (released in 2009)

was the first OS X version that did not support the PowerPC family anymore

Mac became an attractive platform for physicists.


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Background - Motivation

Active hardware population at CERN

Active devices seen on the network, July 2010


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Mac Service - Proposal

• The existing number of Macs onsite is quite significant

• Despite being sometimes more expensive, Macs fully satisfy a number of user communities.

Proposal to recognize and support the Apple laptops & desktops with MacOS X as a standard CERN platform

• NB: This is not a proposal for a “managed platform” a la NICE, for this users should use Windows (NICE). Mac users will be advices to enable auto-update for OS and applications.


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Mac Service – Key areas

• Integration – Interoperability with other IT services

• Data protection– Issue of local data

• Structured dialog with Mac community via ITSRM – To identify user needs and wishes

• Address known pain-points


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Mac Support to Mac Service (I)

• Introduce official support via the Service Desk

– Standard three level support model already implemented since January 2010

– Already during the negotiations for new desktop support contract, that has started in 2010, a dedicated SubSLA for Mac Support was included

– Some cases were already handled via the support contract before, but it was a somewhat grey area since Mac support coverage was not properly reflected in previous contract.

– In view of providing non-standard laptop support via desktop support contract, presently together with UDS a review of all SLAs for Windows, Linux and Mac is taking place to be more coherent for both SW and HW support aspects


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Mac Support to Mac Service (II)

• Official support via the Service Desk (cont.)

– Applies to “CERN supported Mac OS X versions (n, n-1) installed on Standard Apple Hardware”

– Help Macintosh users to install/re-install the operating system software or applications

– Help for configuration and use of CERN services (mail, web applications, printing, remote logins, file services, etc.).

– Help for hardware failure diagnosis – Help users carry out simple maintenance operations on

Macintosh hardware, like adding modules of memory, changing disks or internal components.


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Mac Support to Mac Service (III)

• Establish link with Apple support to provide adequate technical support for the relevant platforms

• Apple offers three levels of enterprise support contracts:“Select” , “Preferred” , “Alliance” – “Select” (~10k/year):

• 10 incidents maximum / year

– “Preferred” (~34k/year):• unlimited number of reported incidents, • 24x7 support coverage • Includes a dedicated Technical Account Manager

– “Alliance” (~84k/year): • multi-sites i.e. covering several institutes

– Order for “Preferred” support contract was sent on Friday July 23rd


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Mac Support to Mac Service (IV)

• Facilitate Mac hardware purchases:– Together with FP & GS departments identify the best

purchase and hardware assistance possible(e.g. Stores / punch-out / dedicated Apple Web portal)

• Ensure proper interoperability between IT services and popular Mac Applications such (Mail, Web applications, printing etc...)

• Provide good documentation and user help– Provide documentation on recommended configuration of

tools and best practices (e.g. fonts to avoid, file extensions, etc...)


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Mac Support to Mac Service (V)

• Streamline Mac software license provision:– With help of FP, provide attractive licensing for

popular Mac OS X software– today:

• OS Upgrades• Antivirus• MS Office• Adobe Products: Dreamweaver, Acrobat, …

– other candidates:• Enterprise subscription for Mac SDK (campus license)• Virtualization: Parallels, Vmware

Mac Service - 12

CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Mac Support to Mac Service (VI)

• Role of support-MacOSX mailing list

– Today used for simple and advanced self help of Mac user community

– Works well, especially for specific problems e.g. with peripherals.

For standard requests redirect users to Service desk

Keep as moderated expert exchange forum

Mac Service - 13

CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Mac Service – Key points

• Ad Integration – AD integration, i.e. use of CERN accounts, to provide

seamless access to CERN resources such as files, Websites etc.

– Being looked at again after pilot in 2003 (issue of domain name that Mac ignores)

• As data protection– Recommendation to place files on AFS/DFS– Evaluation of central backup facility for professional local

data, e.g. time-machine etc.

• Address known pain-points– NetBoot installation server for OS upgrades


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Mac Service - Resources

• Service Manager: Matthias Schröder (25%)Backup Service Manager: Patrick Herzog (100%)

• Prepare proposal to stop support for SLC on PC laptops to liberate some resources that can be reallocated to Mac Support– For users that want Linux based laptop, move in direction

to suggest to use Mac


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Next Steps & on-going work (I)

• Apple Enterprise Support contract in pipeline •

Prepare formal Service Specification

• Present new Mac Service to next ITSRM

• Extend further Mac user documentation

• Prepare user communication (CNL, Bulletin, etc)


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Next Steps & on-going work (II)

• Ad Integration – AD integration, i.e. use of CERN accounts, to provide

seamless access to CERN resources– Being looked at again after pilot in 2003

(issue of domain name that Mac ignores)

• Ad data protection– Evaluation of feasibility of central backup framework for

professional local data, e.g. time-machine etc.

• Ad known pain-points– Test with NetBoot installation server for OS upgrades


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS Summary

• Increasing usage of Mac over the last years• A certain range of assistance was already provided

via previous Mac Support

Acknowledge Mac as supported platform

Offer a Mac Service to address the needs of Mac user community


CERN IT Department

CH-1211 Geneva 23


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OIS


Questions ?

IT- GLM 26 th July 2010 Andreas Wagner – CERN IT/ OIS

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Transcript of IT- GLM 26 th July 2010 Andreas Wagner – CERN IT/ OIS