Operations Updates
ARM Climate Research Facility Operations Update - August 15, 2005
This bimonthly report provides a brief summary of significant accomplishments and activities in the operations area of the ARM Climate Research Facility (ACRF).
Aging, Overworked Computer Network at SGP Gets Overhauled
This aerial map of instruments deployed at the SGP Central Facility provides an indication of the computer resources needed to manage data at the site, let alone communicate with other ACRF sites. (View larger image.)
Established as the first ARM research facility in 1992, the Southern Great Plains (SGP) site in Oklahoma is the "old man on the block" when it comes to infrastructure. Though significant improvements have been made to facilities and equipment throughout the years, the computer network at the SGP Central Facility—the most heavily used of all the ACRF sites—has been running on essentially the same architecture since site inception. In early July, several welcome upgrades to the network infrastructure were made to improve security, performance, reliability, and growth potential.
Handling approximately 1GB of data from numerous sources every day, the Central Facility computer network was restructured to isolate the various functional groups of instruments, data system, site operations, visitors, and globally accessible services onto separate networks. Installation of higher performance firewall and logging systems provide a new network architecture that better supports implementation of the ACRF cyber security policy. A higher performance router was installed as a gateway to the site to improve performance over both the T1 (internet) link with the Data Archive (located at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee) and several lines of Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP). The new gateway will support increasing bandwidth with the Archive, if needed, in addition to allowing for growth in the use of VOIP in support of communications among SGP data systems operations staff, the ARM Mobile Facility, and ACRF sites in the Tropical Western Pacific.
Finally, new network switches were installed throughout the site both to improve performance for local users and to provide the ability to administer the network down to the individual port level. This level of administration is vital to supporting reliable network operation and site visitors in a secure manner.
