Mirror.ac.uk to Scale Back Operations

KingDaveRa writes "It would seem that the UK's Joint Information Systems Committee (www.jisc.ac.uk) have decided to withdraw funding from the www.mirror.ac.uk service. They still want to run a service, but '...perhaps on a smaller scale, and limited to the most popular mirrors. This would, however, depend upon securing sponsorship or alternative funding very quickly, and the approval of our host institutions.' This could turn out to be quite an inconvenience for the UK, as the mirror.ac.uk service has proven itself very fast and reliable."

Comments

Well, bugger.

[Doomrat]

See, that's just irritating. That's going to have quite a knock-on effect to all of the software hosted there, particularly a lot of the free stuff (something a lot of people here would likely be devastated about).

Re:Well, bugger.

[pacman on prozac]

Nah I don't see it.

For one thing its just a mirror, all that software is available on hundreds of other sites.

For another the only people who will noticed the difference between mirror.ac.uk and any european FTP site are those on janet (joint academic network). I'll be quite annoyed at getting 800kb/sec instead of 2MB/sec at uni but I'm sure I'll cope :)

Strange though, I'd have thought at the end of the day this is just going to cost JANET more as they're now going to have to pay someone external for the bandwidth for all those linux isos the students leech.

Re:Well, bugger.

[Tet]

For one thing its just a mirror, all that software is available on hundreds of other sites.

It's not just a mirror. It's a particularly fast and comprehensive mirror. It's always up, and has everything you need. OK, so I don't get the full benefit, but it's still much better than the alternatives, and I still get 3.5MB/s downloads, even without being on JANET. This is not a good day for those in the UK.

Re:Well, bugger.

[SamBC]

Here, here.

Until very recently, I worked at mirror.ac.uk part-time (I'm even still on staff page, if you know where to find it).

I don't think many people realise how much effort has gone into developing and improving the mirror service. The service has always been a love of much of the staff, and we're all sad to see it go (and not just because it's costing us jobs). Like any lover, it's been a painful journey - intractible hardware, elusive bugs, the JANET core network doing strange things - but it's all be fun.

Most of my work was stuff you didn't see - helping work on backend stability, hardware maintenance, the indexer for the search engine (yes, blame me, but the engine itself was someone else's), and reporting data to the funders.

Another often-overlooked point is the fact that we are so much more than a mirror service - a customised and effective search engine, a browsing interface that lets you look inside many archive and package formats (including RPMs and DEBs), and e even offer users support and assistance.

So I for one will be sad to see it go, and will hold a wake on the day of shutdown (I'll be inviting my former workmates).

Sam

Re:Well, bugger.

[SamBC]

And here's more from the horse's mouth...

I'm frankly amazed they bid cheaper, but we don't know all the details. We already have the kit (that belongs to Lancaster and Kent unis), and the software (that too), and the mirroring agreements and existing data (they don't get copies of that, either).

However, AIUI (I wasn't involved in the tendering), we wanted to continue adding value to the mirror service, make it more reliable, more easy to use, offering more advanced access systems, and lots of cool features. I believe the winning tender was single-site, bare-bones service, from a JISC 'Strategic Partner'.

Oh, and tenders don't have to go to the lowest bidder. When UKMS formed, it had a slightly more expensive bid than the competition, but the promise of added-value and dual-site operation won us the day. I wasn't there then, either, but I've been told by the folks that were.

SamBC

Dupe

[avij]

Dupe ...

Email address

[elvum]

If you want to register your disapproval, try their "general enquiries" email address: info@jisc.ac.uk.

Was this..

[IainMH]

Was this Piers Morgan's fault too?

Re:Was this..

[Maddog Batty]

Oh I do hope so. He needs as much stick as possible at the moment. To my knowledge he still hasn't admitted he is at fault.

For those outside the UK, you may want to take a look at the front page of todays Mirror

Re:Was this..

[AllUsernamesAreGone]

He fucked up by publishing photos taken by British Army personnel apparently doing things that the Red Cross and Amnesty International have been telling the government about for some time (and the government has admitted this) only for it to be show (by the Military police...) that the photos are faked (apparently by matching scratches on vehicles no less.)

So instead of it being soldiers engaged in acts that have been reported to the government already, it is solders faking sick and degrading behaviour and passing these off as real to a newspaper. Either because they are mentally disturbed psychotics who get a kick out that sort of behaviour or in an attempt to set up the newspaper.

Now call me picky, but one is confirmation that the army has some sick and twisted soldiers while the other is confirmation that the army has some sick and twisted soldiers. The only difference is that the mirror has paid for its opposition to the war by being set up - in either event it shows that there is something fundamentally broken in the discipline and behaviour of British soldiers.

Yes, Morgan isn't a nice man, I can't stand the guy, but what is going on here stinks of an attempt to midirect the public away from the very real and serious allegations that respectable organisations have been making about British behaviour in the gulf towards a mud-slinging match against a paper that has been a thorn in the side of the government since the start of last year.

Re:Was this..

[Zaiff Urgulbunger]

Appologies to non-UK folks -- this is completely off-topic. But its also an absolutely red hot topic for UKer's, so please don't mod as OT!!

<snip>...only for it to be show (by the Military police...) that the photos are faked (apparently by matching scratches on vehicles no less.)..<snip>

Going on the "by Military police" bit I'm guessing you doubt this. From what I've heard, the evidence is also the kit the solidiers in the photo where using and the type of vehicle in which photos were take were both incorrect -- not they stuff that was shipped to Iraq. This where some of the initial, fairly obvious (to those in the know... which *doesn't* include me btw!), errors. From this they've found the actual vehicle used... which I must admit to being suprised they could do... but given that all this evidence has been independantly corroborated *AND* the Mirror has agreed with it, I think we can be sure that *the photos WERE fake*!

So instead of it being soldiers engaged in acts that have been reported to the government already, it is solders faking sick and degrading behaviour and passing these off as real to a newspaper. Either because they are mentally disturbed psychotics who get a kick out that sort of behaviour or in an attempt to set up the newspaper.

Or perhaps because the paper *paid* for the photos? Maybe? Or perhaps there was political motivation? (I haven't heard this mentioned... yet... but it is another possibility)

Now call me picky, but one is confirmation that the army has some sick and twisted soldiers while the other is confirmation that the army has some sick and twisted soldiers.

LOL.. point taken, although *aledgedly* it might've perhaps been TA's who staged the pictures. Aledgedely. You might argue that they're essentially the same... but I suspect that a full time Soldier might disagree!

The only difference is that the mirror has paid for its opposition to the war by being set up - in either event it shows that there is something fundamentally broken in the discipline and behaviour of British soldiers.
In the case of the Mirror, thats the way these things go. It isn't the first time and it isn't the last, and although I detest Piers Morgan, he has simply screwed up. Largely, he's been unlucky, but it all goes with the territory; when this kind of stuff up happens, someone has to go. But on the plus side, *everyone* hates him, so no problems there!! :)

As for this bit about "something fundamentally broken in the discipline and behaviour of British solidiers", I think you're way out of line there. In any organisation there *are* going to be bad apples and you know there's some horrible shit going on over there. But this "news" report blatantly smeared the good name of the British solidiers and it was compeltely wrong to do that and has put lives at risk. There fact that "this is the type of thing that might also be going on" is besides the point... it implied that this kind of behaviour was rife, when it clearly isn't (even the reports of abuses that do exist do make this point).

The Mirror "report" was fundamentally flawed news reporting, and had very serious repercusions. Reporting on actual events is fine, but the Mirror report didn't do that. It used made up, false information.

Misleading post?

[Sits]

My understanding is that the *Universities of Kent and Lancaster* are no longer providing a mirroring service. There will be some sort of mirroring service provided to JANET users by a different third party. I think there was a tendering process and JANET decided to go with someone else this year.

However, I'm not sure that it's clear whether the new mirror will:

• Carry all the mirrors the old mirror.ac.uk service did
• Provide the variety of protocols the old mirror did (http/ftp/rsync)
• Will be accessible to non JANET connections

The last point is the real sticking issue. Can anyone else clarify things? Either way mirror.ac.uk (as it is currently) will be sorely missed. It's provided an extremely useful service over the years and I'm sure it's saved Swansea Uni a lot of transatlantic traffic over the years :)

Re:Misleading post?

[neilmoore67]

I think there will be a new mirror sponsored by the same organisation. However mirror.ac.uk are deleting all their content as we speak I believe, which isn't a problem in itself but some of that content cannot be found elsewhere easily.

It's a shame that they couldn't have been a little more organised in order to change providers seamlessly. It seems that the only people who _don't_ have access to the current mirror are going to be the new mirror providers!

It seems only fair to me

[fr0dicus]

Much of the software hosted here is now big business, where in the past it was of purely academic/enthusiast interest. Linux in particular (I bet linux .iso and kernel source downloads make up a fair percentage of their bandwidth) is now firmly established and on companies' roadmaps. Why should University budgets foot the bill for distributing Red Hat/Mandrake/SuSE's software? A local mirror for student access only would seem more appropriate, with mirror.ac.uk providing mirrors of new and highly active projects.

Re:It seems only fair to me

[evilviper]

Why should University budgets foot the bill for distributing Red Hat/Mandrake/SuSE's software?

Just because they don't survive on donations, does that make it bad?

They may sell a product, but what is mirrored is not something they make money on. They are giving their ISOs away for free, and what they are giving away is benefitial to the public.

It's pretty much the same for OpenOffice... Should it not be mirrored just because it is headed by Sun?

Re:It seems only fair to me

[TheRaven64]

How about because it saves them money? My university pays quite a lot for transatlantic bandwidth, but it does not pay anything (beyond the flat rate connection charge) for bandwidth between sites on JANET. If I download the latest release of Fedora (for example) that's 2GB (or more if I get the source CDs as well) which either comes from mirror.ac.uk (at 2MB/s) or from an external source. If it comes from mirror.ac.uk, they don't pay for it. If it comes from anywhere else, they do.

Find a use for mydoom-infected machines?

[CdBee]

If one were particularly unethical, one might use the remote exploits in unpatched, infected Windows machines to install FTP servers and make a distributed download network for mirroring opensource software

It'd be illegal but it has a certain karmic appeal.

Site's getting slow...

[nacturation]

Anybody got a mirror? :)

Freecache, Mirror services

[tronicum]

I wonder why mirror business seems to be such a big problem. All the university mirrors and they seem to competiting about having mirros. What about a dedicated cluster from a group of universities in each network? Or something like a proxy group.

Beside the universities large IP network operators should have mirrors at least for their own customers as this would reduce their bandwith.

See also at the /. article about freecache, an project from archive.org

Will someone tell the uk government

[pagaman]

www.mirror.ac.uk != www.mirror.co.uk

Sad news

[orbitalia]

I used to go to Lancaster Uni where the physical mirror was located and knew some of the guys involved in it when it was known as hensa). It was a valuable service back then in the early internet days and still is, fantastic bandwidth, and a well structured archive of only decent software, no fluff, it was alot more than just a mirror. I can't really understand how they are going to save money or resources this way either, as someone pointed out all its going to do is put pressure on the SuperJanet interconnects.

Obligatory Rocky Horror Joke...

[elleomea]

Dammit, JANET!

sunsite.org.uk

[TarpaKungs]

You could do worse...

Now a new server (as of this year) with kind thanks to [well earned plugs]:

Sun Microsystems - hardware
Thus (Demon) - Network feed
Veritas - Software
Brocade - Hardware
for their contunuing sponsorship.

and of course, the Department of Computing, Imperial College London for
housing and feeding it.

Currently it has 1.8 TB of publicly accessible mirrors and supports the following access mechanisms:

http://www.sunsite.org.uk/ [See here for full details]
ftp://ftp.sunsite.org.uk/
rsync://rsync .sunsite.org.uk/

If its fast and reliable

[CptChipJew]

Then it wasn't being hit as hard it should have been anyways. A smart operation is going to put out every bit of that pipe they're pating for.

funding

[curator_thew]

This sort of funding should come from the people that it's relevant for: i.e. the owners of intercontinential links, or it should be cooperatively funded, say to be co-located at a large interconnect -- as these people wear the costs of non-mirrors.

It's not relevant for the academic community to fund these things: doing so is a historical throwback to when the networks were largely academic, and most of the users were too. That's not how it is now, and personally I'd rather see the money used to support academic concerns, not a service increasingly used by non-academic.

I think if anyone is upset about this: direct complaints to people that should be doing something about it (i.e. exchanges/interconnects, international link providers).

In Other News...

[wan-fu]

Slashdot announces that it will help ease the burden on mirror.ac.uk by mirroring its own posts.

JISC has announced the replacement provider

[fdobbie]

JISC announced on the 17th April that they have awarded the contract to Eduserv.

The most interesting bit of the blurb is:

From an end user perspective, the most significant change to the service will be that it will only offer freely available technical software resources. Scholarly and Academic resources will no longer be mirrored. It is expected that the current portfolio of technical resources will continue to be mirrored and that any inconvenience to users during the changeover of service will be kept to an absolute minimum.

Having said that, I'm somewhat sceptical awarding the contract based on cost won't lead to a degradation of service. Whatever happened to "if it ain't broke, don't fix it"?

Re:Who cares?

[dipipanone]

Actually this is a good example of "free" - someone was actually paying for this so it actually wasn't free, it was more like a social service.

Not really. This was hosted by the UK academic network, so it was paid for by a combination of tuition fees and UK taxes.

The primary beneficiaries would be people studying or working at UK universities, or people living in the UK -- ie, the very people who are paying for it, albeit indirectly. Yes, other people can also make use of it, but that's part of the principle of reciprocity that the whole of the internet was originally based on. That's the basis on which the content was provided that is populating the mirrors.

Why would anyone feel upset about this

Because it's an inconvenience? Because it's short sighted? Because it's a poor use of resources? Because it's yet another example of bean counters who don't understand the value of the thing that they are cutting?