Subject: Server Upgrade / Maintenance Outage / Monday January 27th / 1700 GMT

From: Glen <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 24 Jan 2020 19:22:01 -0800

Dear IETF Community:

On Monday, January 27th, we will be switching all IETF services to a
new virtual production server group.  These new servers contain the
latest version of the Linux operating system on which they run, a new
Linux kernel, new versions of many of the open source software
packages we've come to know and love, and Python 3.6, opening the door
for the Tools Team to work additional magic with the software packages
they continue developing for the community.  Last month, when we were
preparing to do an in-place server upgrade [1], I felt that the
upgraded servers were not as reliable as I had wanted [2].  Further
testing led me to abandon the upgrade process completely, and instead
build an entirely new, fresh server group, on the latest OS and
package versions.  That new server group is ready to go, and we'll be
rolling over to it on Monday morning. This operation is significant,
and will involve the brief shutdown of a number of services, a
transfer of data, and the subsequent activation of the new servers.

While the process itself will begin earlier, there will be a visible
one-hour outage window beginning at 9AM Pacific Time (Noon Eastern,
5PM GMT, overnight elsewhere), Monday January 27th.  During this
window, some services will be interrupted at different intervals.
Email and list transport will stop before 9AM, and remain down for
most of the window, while web and Datatracker will be down for shorter
intervals during the window.  The presence or absence of any one
service should not imply expectations for other services during this
interval.  Once we're finished, we will perform a complete reboot,
after which the new servers will be brought online.  As a part of our
testing, we'll send an announcement out again when the work is
completed.

Working together with the Tools Team, we've configured and tested the
new servers as much as possible, performed the transfer process as a
test run several times, and we believe that this process will be
smooth.  Nonetheless, there may be problems we have not yet been able
to identify.  Both AMS and the Tools Team will be performing
additional checks and testing post-cutover, and we will work to
correct any identified issues as quickly as possible.  We ask for your
patience with this process.  As always, if you have questions or
concerns, you can direct them to the IETF-ACTION desk (
[email-masked] ) which I supervise, or you can contact me
directly via email or Jabber at:  [email-masked] .

Thank you for your patience as we work together to continue to improve
the IETF's online presence, infrastructure and services.

Glen
--
Glen Barney
IT Director
AMS (IETF Secretariat)

[1] https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf-announce/Rgxr1HcQuAUf6KNwN7Xc6Ve8o9k/
[2] https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/ietf-announce/FTeiyr8glm8X8pj0YY4IoH5-nnI/