The system administration policies and procedures for the UHWeb server system are intended to achieve the following goals:

• Provide maximum availability (uptime)
• Ensure reliability and integrity of system and user data (backups and security)
• Monitor resource use for possible performance tuning and upgrades

Planned downtime is scheduled in one of two ways: Minor downtime may be scheduled on Friday mornings between the hours of 6 a.m. and 8 a.m. Notice of minor downtime should be given as soon as the requirement is known and no later than 24 hours beforehand. Major planned downtime can be scheduled on any day of the week, but not during University business hours. Notice of major downtime should be given at least three weeks beforehand.

Minor downtime is defined as an outage of less than 15 minutes, typically to make changes requiring a system reboot.

An emergency backup server will be available, which will be able to provide web services in the event of any outage. The emergency server will, at a minimum, provide a home page stating there is an outage and the backup server is in use, and provide links to independent servers around campus. The emergency server may, resources permitting, provide any greater level of service up to a complete mirror of the entire UH website.

The UHWeb server system will be part of the multiplexed console management system (VCS). With this, University Information Technology Central Computing Services operators will be able to monitor the server system for alerts and other messages that describe system availability.

The system will be housed in a machine room at the University Computing Center. The building UPS will provide conditioned electrical power with a battery backup of several hours. Air temperature and humidity will monitored by the IT-CCS operators.

Hardware support will be contracted on a 24x7 basis.

Backup of system and user files will be performed by ADSM. Backups will be performed on a daily basis. Such backups are not for archival purposes, but are intended to recover data immediately following an accident.

The system is configured to use C2 level security features. Encrypted passwords are not visible to unprivileged users. Network connections, interactive user logins and logouts as well as password modifications are recorded in audit logs.

Auditing tools will be used to periodically scan the state of system files and alert the system manager of changes. User files will not be monitored. Operating system software patches and new releases that address security issues will be given high priority.

Standard operating system tools will be used to monitor the use of major system resources to identify possible tuning strategies and to indicate the need for future upgrades. Processor and memory resources will be monitored for average trends and for peak use. Disk storage will be monitored on a simple linear basis.