[nylug-talk] NYLUG 15 November General Meeting Presents: Dan Crosta on Trackle

[John Bacall]

Wednesday November 15th, 2006
6:30pm-8:00pm
IBM Headquarters Building
590 Madison Avenue at 57th Street
12th Floor

** RSVP Closes at 4:15pm the day of the meeting (sharp!) ***
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Register at http://rsvp.nylug.org/
Check in with photo ID at the lobby for badge and room number.


                            Dan Crosta (Trackle)
                                    -on-
                                  Trackle


   For part-time sysadmins a record of past actions is an invaluable tool
   that provides guidance in repairing or extending system services.
   However, requiring sysadmins to keep a detailed log of changes made to
   a live system can often seem like a low priority task when compared to
   addressing long and growing to-do lists. This problem is worse if the
   system administrator is a part-time volunteer, an overworked student
   or a harried administrator.

   On this meeting Dan Crosta speaks on Trackle, an integrated trouble
   ticket and solution tracking system which takes the legwork out of
   creating and maintaining a sort of institutional memory.

   Trackle is designed to allow untrained student sysadmins to bootstrap
   their knowledge by peeking over the shoulders of their more
   experienced colleagues -- even if those colleagues graduated years
   earlier. This is accomplished by tracking the exact actions taken by
   sysadmins, showing what lines were changed and in which configuration
   files. This allows experienced and inexperienced sysadmins to freely
   annotate and cross-reference shell session logs through an integrated
   Wiki web interface.

   As the Trackle team writes, here is a web- and console-based
   integrated issue-and-solution tracking system. Where open issues may
   be viewed through a web browser, freely annotated, edited and
   cross-referenced with the built-in Wiki. Alternatively they may be
   seen through a console interface, from which a tracked shell session
   can be started. All actions taken in the shell session, and all files
   changed, are recorded in the Trackle database.

   Dan will present Wednesday 15 November from 6:30 to 8:00 p.m.

   Happy Thanksgiving!

For More Information Visit:

     * There are a sadly few good resources on the internet about library
       interposition, which is the _good juicy core of Trackle_. For
       applicable overviews visit here.
          http://developers.sun.com/solaris/articles/lib_interposers.html
     * And here.
          http://usenix.org/publications/library/proceedings/bos94/full_papers/curry.a
     * As well as here.
          http://usenix.org/publications/library/proceedings/bos94/full_papers/curry.ps
     * The Trackle homepage hints at some of the creators' goals in
       designing Trackle.
          http://www.sccs.swarthmore.edu/org/trackle/
     * Trackle is based on Trac, a bugtracker. Find what sets it apart
       here.
          http://trac.edgewall.org/wiki/TracGuide

About Dan Crosta:

   Dan is a Swarthmore alum.

   Swag (Give Away) - -During the meeting... unusally terrific swag of
   non-predetermined origin may be given out to attendees at the regular
   meeting for free.
   
   Stammtisch - After the meeting ... Join us around 8:15pm or so at PJ
   Carney's located at 135 East 56th Street.

Books!!!
  Our friends at Prentice-Hall have kindly provided us again with
  review copies of various new texts.  One of these could be yours,
  all you have to do is agree to review the book within a reasonable
  period of time.

Swag (Give Away)
  During/after the meeting... unusually terrific swag *will* be given
  away.

Stammtisch
  After the meeting ... Join us after the meeting around 8:15pm-9pm
  for drinks and conversation at PJ Carney's at 135 East 56th Street.

  After the meeting ... Join us around 8:30pm or so at TGI Friday's,
  located at 677 Lexington Avenue and 56th Street, second floor.
  Northeast corner.

Please see our home page at http://www.nylug.org/ for the HTMLized
version of this announcement, our archives, and a lot of other good
stuff.