Ok, exactly who or what is Lazlo?

Glad you asked.

Lazlo is Sweet Briar's private fileserver. It is available to all students, faculty, and staff.

Some of you are intimately familiar with another large fileserver on the campus by the name of Indy. Indy hosts the aptly titled Public Landfill. Nobody ever could have predicted that the tongue in cheek name would have been so accurate after a year or two of constant use. Landfill was never intended as a place to store important, personal files, but rather as a temporary dumping ground for large files to be shuffled between labs and office PCs.

But since we never made obtaining personal, secure filespace an easy task, the community can hardly be blamed for making due with what was on hand.

So in steps Lazlo, your personal footlocker on the wired campus.

Like Landfill, it is accessible from any computer on the campus regardless of type. Unlike Landfill, however, Lazlo's shares are private to each individual user.

 

Is that it? Just a fileserver? Whoopie.

Wanna publish a personal website? If so, Lazlo is your friend.

Every account on Lazlo includes a folder called (guess what?) "website". Anything you put in that folder (including additional folders) becomes your personal web page on the global internet.

 

Anything else?

Well... let's see. We take care of backing it all up for you on a daily basis. That can be handy. Hhhmmm... you can reach it from anywhere in the world that you have an Internet connection. That's pretty useful when you're home for vacation or spending your Junior year abroad.

 

So where do I go for help with this thing?

Oh, the usual places. There is some documentation available online now and more appearing all the time. If you're in a lab, check with the lab assistant on duty. You can always call the HELP line at x4357 if something is really giving you fits. Also, feel free to email Aaron Mahler (amahler@sbc.edu) if you have specific technical issues you need addressed.

 

Fine. Any rules I need to know?

Yeah, but not many and they are mostly common sense. Here we go:

In general, play nice. This is a community system that is shared by many others at SBC. The honor code applies here, so don't do anything you know will cause other people grief (like invade someone's personal file space if they happen to leave it unattended in a lab, for instance).

On that note, be attentive. The system is protected, but that can only go so far. Don't leave your shares open on a public machine like the ones in the lab. When you're done, close the shares. If you aren't sure, just reboot the machine as you leave.

Lazlo uses space quotas. They are fairly relaxed and will generally be increased upon request. This deals with one of the biggest problems on Indy - runaway drive usage. If you're approaching the limits, Lazlo will let you know. We'll also keep an eye on the system and try to stay ahead of demand.

Don't use the webserver to distribute illegal stuff. It can get both you and SBC into deep doo doo. In other words, use some discretion about sharing those music files of yours. Really. It's all fun and games until somebody gets a cease and desist order.

That's about it for the rules department. If anything else comes up, we'll let folks know.

 

Who the heck named it Lazlo and why?

Its designer and maintainer, Aaron Mahler. Check out the 80s geek cult classic 'Real Genius' for clues to the name. While you're at it, see if you can find the sources or significance to its silicon siblings: Jordan, Ripley, Bishop, Grendel, Indy, Sparhawk, and Geppeto. There's a prize for anyone that gets them all right.

 

What makes it tick, anyway?

Linux, Apache-SSL, OpenSSL, MySQL, Netatalk, Samba and lots of Python code. We just don't use the 'M' word around here in polite conversation.