Managing Self-Hosted Open Source Systems with Virtual Machine Test Environments
- Conference Year
- Online Northwest 2018
- Session
- 3
- Type
- Breakout Session
- Presenters
- Jeremiah Kellogg, Eastern Oregon University
- Abstract
Open source software and applications can provide a cost effective solution for implementing important library services, but it can also be intimidating to administer without having vendor support. It’s possible for the simplest of component updates to result in extended periods of downtime. Building virtual systems that mirror production systems using a hypervisor like VirtualBox allows administrators to test updates and upgrades before applying them to a production environment. This presentation will outline how such test environments have been built and used at Eastern Oregon University for self-hosted open source systems like Omeka and Guide-on-the-Side. It focuses particularly on systems built on other common open source components like Linux, Apache2, MySQL and PHP.
- Learning Outcomes
Participants will learn:
- best practices for building a virtual test environment
- strategies for building test environments that mirror systems built on legacy software
- Links