Upgrading storage on bordeaux.guix.gnu.org

[Ludovic Courtès]

Hello!

(+Cc: Andreas.)

Ricardo Wurmus <rekado@elephly.net> skribis:

> [space is running out on bayfront, so I wrote:]
>
>> Remember that I’ve got three 256G SSDs here that I could send to
>> wherever bayfront now sits.  With LVM or a RAID configuration these
>> could just be added to the storage pool — if bayfront has
>> sufficient slots for three more disks.
>
> You wrote in response:
>
>> Good to know.  In that case we’d need to come up with (1) an updated
>> Guix System config with LVM, and (2) a way to copy the existing
>> store
>> over to the new storage, which sounds tricky if the existing disk is
>> to
>> be kept.
>
> We could first install Guix System with the adjusted bayfront config
> on a separate machine (e.g. on a build node at the MDC), onto a volume
> with LVM (using as many of the SSDs as needed). Copy signing keys etc
> from bayfront.  Then we’d pretty much export/import the bayfront store
> over the network.  Once everything has been copied, we turn off
> bayfront, swap the disks, boot it up again.  If everything works all
> right we add the original disk (and any unused left-over disks) to the
> LVM volume to extend the storage pool.

Sounds like a plan.  But note that there’s the store and there’s the
cached nars, though maybe we can tolerate missing, say, a week or two of
nars.

It would be more convenient to do that with a machine already in the
vicinity of bayfront though, so we can more easily move the disks there
when we’re ready.  Maybe we could use a machine at Inria or the math
institute next door.  Andreas, WDYT?  (We can work out the details
off-list.)

>> (Also I think we’re down to 1.5 person who could go on
>> site. :-/)
>
> Not great :-/

Here’s a call: if you’re in the whereabouts of Bordeaux, France, and
would like to help, please get in touch with Andreas and myself!  We
need to increase our tramway factor.

Cheers,
Ludo’.