I'm responding to two issues raised:

Virtualization:

We are running two listserver systems on virtual machines with no
problems. They are both running on Linux, sharing an VMware ESX
virtual server with over a dozen other servers.


Remote Archives:

Using Linux as an operating system also makes remote web archives
easy: use NFS to mount the remote filesystem. Over the years we have
run all kinds of systems with remote data using NFS, including a
listserv system where the entire listserv directory tree was remote
from the machine actually running the software. NFS is very robust and
has a long history.


In both cases using Linux as a platform makes things easier. A linux
server has a much smaller footprint, both memory and disk space, on an
ESX host, although listserv on a Windows virtual ought to work just
fine. Linux (or any Unix) can use NFS mounts and treat them as local
disks for almost any purpose where I would be be very reluctant to
treat windows remote drive mappings in the same way.

  - Mark
--
Director, Networks & Systems
Williams College





> On Fri, 25 Apr 2008 17:02:24 -0400, "Slusarczyk, Theodore"
> <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
>> I know that the manual says that putting the web archives on a
>> server other than the ListServ server is not supported.  But can it
>> be done, even if it is not supported?
>
> I know of only 1-2 sites that have ever attempted this.  None were
> successful.
> LISTSERV needs to write files to its web server directory tree.
> Although
> conceptually possible, the secruity implications of remote drive
> mapping are
> probably worse than you want to take on.
>
>




>
> From: Randy Klumph <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: April 29, 2008 5:20:48 PM EDT
> Subject: Listserv in a virtual server
>
>
> Our server is getting old and out of date (running Win2K server) and
> the hardware is *many* years old
>
> Our Computing Services Dept is planning on creating a virtual image
> of the machine and running it in a virtual server on our Sun
> servers. Does anyone have experience with this and/or suggestions on
> what issues they should watch for regarding Listerv (15.5) operation?
>
>
> ------------
> Regards,
> Randy Klumph
> [log in to unmask]
> The National Consortium on Deaf-Blindness
> The Teaching Research Institute
> 345 N Monmouth Ave
> Monmouth, OR 97361
>
>