heya,

i'm the server admin for this site that's running really smooth. part of my contract is that i'm on call in case anything goes wrong. it's a smooth running super over-powered box, fresh install (fedora core 4 with cpanel), and the chances of something going wrong are extremely unlikely.

if a service fails, and that hasn't happened yet, cpanel will restart the service. but anyhow, as part of the contract, i need someone to be on call at all times, and i'm going away this June 21 - 25th. The server is both internally and externally monitored, and if a service goes down, it SMS's my cellphone with the message right away. If I can forward that to you, that's all that would be required.

The requirement is that you have a cell on you at all times for the time that I'm gone. You must also be able to respond to emergency calls from the client (again, not likely).

I figure like $50 to cover those days is good. Basically you just make $50 for giving me your cellphone number and agreeing to cover it. If something does happen to go wrong, you'll have SSH to the server and you can go fix er up at your hourly wage (let me know what it is).


I've really put this off to way too late... so I'm hoping it works out. Otherwise, if anyone can recommend some such service, I'd be thankful. I don't want to pay for a generic reboot service cuz that wouldn't make me feel comfortable enough to go out partying for 5 days.

Thanks bloods,

Shiraz
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  • J ¤ þ ☆
    J ¤ þ ☆
    offline 117

    Re: can you be on call for this server and make some easy cash?

    Wed, June 13, 2007 - 11:23 AM
    Yo,

    I feel ya, as I also am an admin that will be out on the land for solstice. but will be back around on the 22nd or 23rd through the 25th.

    Currently I don't have a cell, just a regular phone and will be in and out of the office for these days. If you don't find your ideal babysitter drop me a line it would be no thing for me to watch your dedi as I watch mine. I will basicly be totally out of touch noon to midnight on the solstice and keeping my standard loose eye on things the rest of the time. FYI I think $50 is low for this even though its simple. Most good admins w/cell would ask more to be on call especially on a holiday which this is for most tribers.

    Peace... Jopa


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    • Re: can you be on call for this server and make some easy cash?

      Wed, June 13, 2007 - 7:39 PM
      Jopa,

      Thanks kindly for offering, and for your feedback on the offer of $50. I thought maybe it was a bit low myself but it's like the chances are sooooo slim that anything's gonna go wrong. It's some quad core processor or something crazy like that for two sites, a fresh install with both internal monitoring, and two external monitoring services on it, on a good network (aplus.net). One of the sites barely has any traffic and the other is low. I'm paid $300/month to admin this server so in that light $50 seemed reasonable.

      I think you might end up being my best bet, cell phone or not, 21st or not. So don't be surprised if I get in touch with you next week.

      Excuse me if I seem like a noob -- this is only the second server I'm paid to admin. I'm actually a PHP programmer but I like to keep one hand in the server admin side just for variety and to stay abreast of things, and cuz it feels to me like easy money as long as I stay on top of things. I came to Tribe looking for someone to fill in for me during said time as opposed to just starting point blank with a google search in large part because I knew I'd find like-valued souls that I could trust, if in fact anyone answered -- so you're fulfilling my prediction. Of course, Tribees are that much more likely to be partying next weekend than your average geek, and the readership here is way less than a designated sys admin community, so if you have any suggestions on where I should seek, please pass it on.

      Thanks kindly, and in case I forget to say -- have a wicked solstice!

      Shiraz
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      • J ¤ þ ☆
        J ¤ þ ☆
        offline 117

        Re: can you be on call for this server and make some easy cash?

        Thu, June 14, 2007 - 9:46 AM
        Cool,

        Keep me posted. Tribe is where I would look first also, if you are like me it would be hard to give access to me servers to ANYONE.

        craigslist.com is a good place to post jobs but you won't get such a great audiance of irie peeps there as on tribe, though there are good people everywhere if you are looking with good eyes.

        Peace,
        Jopa
        ~~~~~`
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        Re: can you be on call for this server and make some easy cash?

        Thu, June 14, 2007 - 7:56 PM

        Out of curiousity, what happens if the problem is hardware related?
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        • Re: can you be on call for this server and make some easy cash?

          Fri, June 15, 2007 - 1:57 AM
          you mean in general or with respect to this specific scenario?

          In general, you call the server hosts and get them to replace the hardware. If it's the drive then typically they'll try to save your data for you.

          I'm hardly concerned here -- drive failures are becoming far less frequent. On top of that I have a RAID setup such that the data is mirrored (in real time) to a backup drive. And on top of *that*, I have the sites backed up nightly to a separate server on the same LAN.

          Honestly the hardware is a major overkill for what they're using it for but they were reaaaaaaaallly concerned about possible downtime and slowness based on bad experiences in the past -- like more than most, and I used to work in tech support at a hosting company, so I *know* how concerned (read: 'panicked') people can get.

          So I've really set this puppy up with a good deal of redundancy built in as well as 3 different service monitoring systems (one internal and two external), two of which SMS my pager within 5 minutes if ever any of the services go down. For that matter the internal monitor restarts any critical service which goes down, which has not happened for any service on the server yet outside of my tests. And I'm no security master but I've got a good firewall configured along with a login failure daemon to prevent brute force attacks, and have kept everything patched, among other basic security measures.

          So really what I'm asking for here is just mental assurance for the client (and for myself, really -- so that I can go and get high in the forest and dance my ass off without even having to think about it) more than any likely request to do any work. That's why I'm calling it easy cash for someone that's available anyhow and would know what to do in the event of emergency. It's insurance money.


          I'm getting wordy again.. :-/


          Thanks Jopa for being on the thread. You're still my main man. You're right about the trust factor. Craig's List is a good suggestion actually. I might just do that, but I'll see how it pans out. Are you for sure available at the times you mention, or is there any possibility you won't be around? ie. you'd be comfortable with me giving your phone number to the client.. and $50 is fine, given you're cell-less?

          Have a good weekend!!

          Shiraz
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