I should probably write a bit about Diggers, seeing as that's the only thing I've been doing for the last few days...

I was here last year, and at the end of day one we were exhausted. The network had been patched here and there, people couldn't use VPNs and at about 3PM the Telstra ADSL died meaning tha twe routed everything out through Curtin's 64kbit/sec IDSN line. Considering they have 500 people on that link already, it was painfully slow to the point that it just didn't work at all.

With this memory in mind, we planned well ahead what services we were going to deliver, and how we were going to do it. Even still, I've learnt things that I'd do differently next time. For example, the first time I came up here, I pre-uilt the servers. This time I installed Debian on them when I was onsite in Kalgoorlie. This took too long, not because it is a tiresome process, but it had ramifications on other tasks; we needed the Internet up before we could do most things.

The same goes for the switches and access points. These could all have been preconfigured before we shipped them here which would have meant we deployed them and let them do their thing.

Also, there's a few scripts I'd like to have written, like those that monitor (with SNMP) a port on the switch, and when it is activated (indicating a client has arraived and connected into the network) it could have fired off an e-mail to me. This means that within 5 monute of connecting they get me at their doorstep saying "hi, we saw you connected to the network and wanted to check everything is working." Customer service++.

Also, a script that monitors the number of DHCP leases we have issued would ahve been handy. Not only does this give us an actual count that we can provide the organising staff, but it would show us just how popular the LAN vs. wireless really is. I have a feeling we've come close to filling up an entire /24 range, with the 4 APs being used heavily, and over LAN connections active.

Later I'll write more about what we did right because this year has been a much bigger success than last year. Stay tuned...