Introduction
This is a project suggested by Marco Zennaro of ICTP Trieste to build a PingER monitoring host based on an inexpensive embedded Linux platform. If successful one could consider using these in production reducing the costs, power drain (they draw about 5W of 120V DC power compared to typically over 100W for a deskside computer or 20W for a laptop) and space (6x6") assisting monitoring sites to be able to procure and support such monitoring hosts. This could be very valuable for sites in developing countries where cost, power utilization and to a lesser extent space may be crucial.
Embedded Linux Processor
The initial two machines were alix2d2 models purchased from PCEngines located in Switzerland. The cost is about $110/machine. The machines purchased each have 256MB RAM, on a 500MHZ AMD Geode CPU, with 128KB L2 cache, and a 4GB Flash memory. They have 2 USB and 2 Ethernet interfaces. There is a picture here of one of the machines, and there is more information at the PCEngines site.
Operating System
The installed system is called Voyage Linux a Linux variant. The machines had perl and Apache installed. We accessed it through ssh. We also had to install: make, dig, mail, and XML::Simple. Marco: how do patches get applied?
Installation of PingER2
Following the instructions in PingER End-to-end Reporting version 2, we logged in from SLAC to the machines located at ICTP and installed PingER2 under the /root/pinger-2.0.2 directory. There is an example of the installation here.
Something here from Marco about handling crontab, maybe some rationale why it is different. Also something on /etc/log/apache and modifying httpd.conf to put log files there. What about remountpw.
After installing the PingER2 monitoring code, we installed the ping_data gathering agent, and the traceroute server following the instructions.
Deployment
After installing and testing we plan to place the first ePingER host at the University of Zambia in Lusaka, Zambia following the SCINDA/IHY meeting in Livingstone, Zambia June 2009.
Experiences
Marco any concerns about flash memory and repeated accesses, lifetime etc.?