Athena Services Description

This document describes the major cross-platform user-visible services offered by Athena, and how they are implemented on the various platforms.

Summary of Services

The following table summarizes the Athena services. A green cell or "Y" indicates that the service is supported and in operation; a yellow cell or "L" indicates that the service is provided in a limited capacity (web access only, or client but not server); a red cell or "N" indicates that the service is not current provided or does not work acceptably on the given environment; a black cell or "N/A" indicates that the service does not apply to the given environment.

Description of Services

Network Services

The following Athena services can be used from any machine with appropriate software installed on it:

• Shared Filesystem
  Athena provides a rich filesystem containing user home directories, course materials, and software. This filesystem can be accessed for reading via the WWW server web.mit.edu, or for read/write via the Unix "scp" or Windows FileZilla or Macintosh Fetch commands using ftp.dialup.mit.edu.


• File Transfer
  Users can transfer files between machines with the Kerberized FTP client, with the Unix "scp" command, or with the aforementioned Windows FileZilla and Macintosh Fetch programs.


• Email Access
  The MIT mail infrastructure can be accessed via WebMail or any SSL or Kerberos 4-enabled IMAP or POP client. On Athena Unix platform machines, we provide and recommend the Evolution and Pine IMAP clients. On other platforms, we provide and recommend Eudora or Netscape.


• Instant Messaging
  Athena has an internal instant messaging service called Zephyr. Users of Athena Unix workstations run Zephyr automatically on login. Clients are also available for Windows and Mac. There are no current plans for interoperability with popular instant messaging systems in the world at large; opportunities for such interoperation may arise in the future as standard mature.


• Web Browsing
  MIT and Athena provide Netscape 6 for web browsing.


• Conferencing and Archiving
  Athena has a legacy conferencing and mail archiving system called Discuss. Discuss meetings can be accessed via accessed via the web at diswww.mit.edu, or via the "discuss" command line client on Athena Unix clients.


• List Management
  Athena provides a system called Moira for managing mit.edu mailing lists as well as many other MIT resources. Moira can be accessed on Athenized machines via a command-line client, or from other machines via the web.


• Electronic Turn-in
  Athena has a legacy home-grown electronic turn-in system called NEOS. It is only accessible from Athena Unix systems. An effort is underway to develop a web-based service called Stellar.


• Printing
  Athena clusters and dormitories contain network printers. The Athena Unix platform uses the LPRng software package to provide access to these printers. KLPR printing clients are also available for Mac and Windows; WinAthena will be delivering an LPRng client soon.


• User Support
  Athena Unix users are supported by the OLC (On-Line Consulting) service. Athena Unix machines have a special command-line client for this service, though users can also ask questions by phone or email or on the web or in person. The WinAthena support infrastructure is still evolving. Users of other machines are supported via the help desk.


• Backup
  Contents of the Athena shared filesystem are backed up nightly; users can easily access these backups, though they are only kept for one day. The shared filesystem and the mail servers are also backed up to tape; those backups are available for sufficiently important restores through the operational staff. MIT provides backup service for computers through Tivoli Storage Manager, on a fee basis.

• Single Sign-On
  An Athena user has the same password on all Athena machines, and can access most services without re-typing their password, using Kerberos or certificate-based authentication. (Certificate-based services may require re-typing the password in order to acquire certificates.)


• Transparent Shared Filesystem Access
  On Athenized machines, the shared filesystem is transparently visible to all applications via AFS client software, so that a user does not have to manually transfer files back and forth between the local machine and the shared area. The AFS client also allows some software to be run directly from AFS without needing to be first installed locally.


• Desktop Environment
  Athena Unix machines provide a somewhat friendly desktop interface using GNOME. WinAthena uses the native desktop interface, of course.


• Document Preparation
  The Athena release for Unix provides two advanced (but not very friendly) document preparation tools: the text editor Emacs and the typesetting system LaTeX. The third-party software team also provides a variety of friendly (but not always robust) productivity suites for Athena Unix machines including Applixware, Star Office, and Framemaker. Other platforms rely on Microsoft Office for document preparation.


• Time Synchronization
  A subtle but useful service is that all Athena machines have the correct time, ideally to within very precise bounds. On the Athena Unix platform, we use the NTP software package to accomplish this synchronization.

• Automated Install and Update
  Athena workstations can be installed over the network using a short manual process involving a floppy or network boot. Once installed, an Athena workstation will automatically and transparently update to newer versions of Athena unless it is configured not to (in which case it can be updated with a simple manual procedure).


• Serial Reusability
  Cluster machines or Quickstations may be used by scores of different users per day and still require no manual maintenance beyond a very occasional reinstall. The Athena Unix and WinAthena platforms have a collection of small pieces of software which work together to clean up systems between uses.


• Remote Access
  Athena Unix machines can be made remotely accessible via the ssh protocol or via the Kerberos telnet or rlogin protocols. Clients for these protocols are available for Athena Unix using the "ssh" or "telnet" or "rlogin" commands, for the Macintosh via the BetterTelnet program, and for Windows via the HostExplorer and FiSSH programs. The Athena dialups can also be accessed via the web using the MindTerm SSH Java client.


• Remote Management
  Athena Unix and WinAthena machines can be remotely queried for various information via the home-grown (and very simple) "athinfo" command. These machines are also configured to remotely log significant events (administrator logins, reboots, some kinds of error) to a central server. Athena cluster machines are also monitored by the Larvnet service, which allows users to find out which clusters on campus have free machines.