Maintaining a Learning Management System

in 10 Easy StepsDavid Millians

millia@uga.edu · @millia13 @ugaetc

University of GeorgiaEducational Technology Center

LMS (& CMS)• What is…• Linux vs. Windows • Remote vs. Local Hosting• Source Programming Language

1. Install & Log• Write down what you do!

Paste URLs Note all the fiddly bits Write down passwords (!)

• Planning Storage Performance

2. Updates• Yes, really.• Main OS• Main Servers• “Fiddly Bits”• LMS• Automatic vs. Manual• Mailing Lists

3. Script Script Script • Windows

PowerShell, VBS… or Perl, Shell, et al• Linux

Perl, BASH, et al• Why?

Reliability Reproducibility Scheduling

4. Delegate • Monkey Theory• LMS has many features

You Can’t Know Them All You Have to Know the Other Stuff You Can Figure it Out

5. Tools – Use Them• Macho Men Use The Command Line• Meanwhile, for the rest of us:

PhpMyAdmin Nagios Firewall frontends/builders

• Google; Stack Overflow; Server Fault; SuperUser

• Somebody else was Lazy

6. Permissions • Ugh.• New “Users” for Servers• New User Accounts in Servers• IP Blocking• Real User permissions

7. Network Security • Firewall• Internal Routing• Hard Coding

8. Backup• VM• Packages• Raw

Source/Configs DB (Not Files) Data

9. Test Backups• Restore VM• Move to other platform

10. Monitor & Tune• Nagios• Atop• Windows Admin Tools