Shirithian administration course?
Posted: Sun Nov 23, 2008 2:21 pm
I'm interested in giving a course on the MiniInt: A practical tutorial to administrating the forum without disrupting its function overly much and without confusion.
If you're wondering whether a course like this is needed, I'm afraid that... yes, it is. We have a rather strange online presence across two different webhosts, a forum with several (although small) homebrewed code modifications, three databases to maintain backups of, fractured maintenance conventions, and a populace who's used to (reasonably
) timely response to requests for administrative work. While we have a lot of government jobs with some technical subtlety to them, I think MiniInt is the one that would cause the most friction for someone trying to just pick it up without first getting tutored somehow.
I'm not planning on leaving the MiniInt job any time soon. However it *would* always speed things up if people with administrative permissions could just put in the changes they need without going through me, and it'd be even more convenient if they also knew how I do things, so neither of us will have to be confused. There's also the insurance factor. I do occasionally drop off the face of the planet. Having someone other than me around who knows all this stuff might be a good idea simply for continuity.
All Shirithians with basic technical competence are invited. Those without can join in anyway to develop some
.
If I do give the course (this depends mostly on whether there's interest - I'd like to see at least two people sign up), I'll set up an environment for each on you on a server (my home box...) that should mostly look like Shireroth's online presence, minus any data that shouldn't be public (passwords in configuration files, hashed passwords, private messages, posts on nonpublic forums). Exercises of administrative tasks will be run in this environment.
(I'm also not going to be able to set up a web control panel like on shireroth.org's host; I'll be teaching the use of good ol' ssh and scp.)
The curriculum will depend entirely on what the students know beforehand, however, this is the goal for what all should be able to do after it:
- Uploading and manipulating files on both shireroth.kuroshiro.net and shireroth.org; this would include the basic Unix commandline and use of things like tar, chmod, GNU nano, ssh or putty, and scp or pscp.
- Handling of image files (for uploading flags and such); I use ImageMagick and OptiPNG on the commandline to resize and optimise them, but we'd best just work out the most convenient way for everyone to handle it.
- A general idea of where I generally put stuff (this isn't going to be important if I end up permanently replaced - I ignored the previous admins' conventions anyway - but it'd be nice for concurrent admins)
- Perhaps a quick rehearsal of HTML and CSS before working with the template system
- Really basic programming concepts, applied to PHP and the phpBB template system, in order to understand how to work with the board code; at least enough to know how to make basic template edits
- Also, for students with a decent grounding in programming, I would present our homebrewed board mods and the little that I know about phpBB's architecture beyond the template system. I wouldn't trust a person who can't code in PHP to upgrade the board to a new version.
- Enough about databases and SQL to understand how to put together some interesting informational queries, perhaps; but this part would be optional.
- The backupping cron stuff I've currently got up, for the purpose of being able to replicate it to keep the board, bank and wiki data safe if I die or become a Buddhist monk or something.
- Oh, and the stuff you can do from the administration control panel too, of course. But really, that's all pretty simple. The permissions systems is a little bit weird, so I'll be handling that.
There won't be a test. I'll try to make the exercises (which you'd take to pass) short and small enough that those who don't hit roadblocks can easily just finish them on a coffee break. Passing this course would mean my personal blessing for the student's technical ability to work as MiniInt. Psychological evaluation for administrative trustworthiness is not included.
If you're wondering whether a course like this is needed, I'm afraid that... yes, it is. We have a rather strange online presence across two different webhosts, a forum with several (although small) homebrewed code modifications, three databases to maintain backups of, fractured maintenance conventions, and a populace who's used to (reasonably
) timely response to requests for administrative work. While we have a lot of government jobs with some technical subtlety to them, I think MiniInt is the one that would cause the most friction for someone trying to just pick it up without first getting tutored somehow.I'm not planning on leaving the MiniInt job any time soon. However it *would* always speed things up if people with administrative permissions could just put in the changes they need without going through me, and it'd be even more convenient if they also knew how I do things, so neither of us will have to be confused. There's also the insurance factor. I do occasionally drop off the face of the planet. Having someone other than me around who knows all this stuff might be a good idea simply for continuity.
All Shirithians with basic technical competence are invited. Those without can join in anyway to develop some
. If I do give the course (this depends mostly on whether there's interest - I'd like to see at least two people sign up), I'll set up an environment for each on you on a server (my home box...) that should mostly look like Shireroth's online presence, minus any data that shouldn't be public (passwords in configuration files, hashed passwords, private messages, posts on nonpublic forums). Exercises of administrative tasks will be run in this environment.
(I'm also not going to be able to set up a web control panel like on shireroth.org's host; I'll be teaching the use of good ol' ssh and scp.)
The curriculum will depend entirely on what the students know beforehand, however, this is the goal for what all should be able to do after it:
- Uploading and manipulating files on both shireroth.kuroshiro.net and shireroth.org; this would include the basic Unix commandline and use of things like tar, chmod, GNU nano, ssh or putty, and scp or pscp.
- Handling of image files (for uploading flags and such); I use ImageMagick and OptiPNG on the commandline to resize and optimise them, but we'd best just work out the most convenient way for everyone to handle it.
- A general idea of where I generally put stuff (this isn't going to be important if I end up permanently replaced - I ignored the previous admins' conventions anyway - but it'd be nice for concurrent admins)
- Perhaps a quick rehearsal of HTML and CSS before working with the template system
- Really basic programming concepts, applied to PHP and the phpBB template system, in order to understand how to work with the board code; at least enough to know how to make basic template edits
- Also, for students with a decent grounding in programming, I would present our homebrewed board mods and the little that I know about phpBB's architecture beyond the template system. I wouldn't trust a person who can't code in PHP to upgrade the board to a new version.
- Enough about databases and SQL to understand how to put together some interesting informational queries, perhaps; but this part would be optional.
- The backupping cron stuff I've currently got up, for the purpose of being able to replicate it to keep the board, bank and wiki data safe if I die or become a Buddhist monk or something.
- Oh, and the stuff you can do from the administration control panel too, of course. But really, that's all pretty simple. The permissions systems is a little bit weird, so I'll be handling that.
There won't be a test. I'll try to make the exercises (which you'd take to pass) short and small enough that those who don't hit roadblocks can easily just finish them on a coffee break. Passing this course would mean my personal blessing for the student's technical ability to work as MiniInt. Psychological evaluation for administrative trustworthiness is not included
.