The sysadmin's life

A one-line addition to httpd.conf: 30 seconds.

Restarting Apache: 30 seconds.

Making sure that the addition was the right thing to do to an old version of Apache and wouldn't kill the server: much longer.

(And of course the much longer doesn't look too much like work, and doesn't entirely feel like work.)

And more of the sysadmin's life:

Accidentally using kill -USR2 instead of kill -USR1 to gracefully restart the Apache server: priceless. Whoops.

Trying to find exactly where Apache gets started on boot, to restart it with the right arguments, and being unable to do so: nerve-wracking.

Discovering that the machine is actually running Solaris 8 instead of Solaris 9: twitch-inducing. (So much for installing the Solaris 9 recommended patch set during this unexpected downtime.)

Discovering that the web server does not in fact get automatically restarted on reboot, nor do a number of other things: bad.

Discovering that the hostname changed on reboot, to 'test': AUGH. (It turns out that in Solaris 8, /etc/nodename is what sets the host's name. /etc/hostname.<interface> is not.)

I think I have well and truly stubbed my toes today. On the flipside, I know somewhat more about magic Apache things now, including useful bits like 'apachectl startssl' as the magic way of saying 'start Apache with SSL'.

(The management apologizes for this entry being somewhat less coherent than usual. Chris had a little bit of a shock today.)