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Administrators (DNAs) - Best Practices
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Department Network Administrators (DNAs)
The role of the DNA, Department Network Administrator, is extremely important to the smooth functioning of the campus network. DNAs serve as the primary contact point with OIT, which has the responsibility of maintaining the campus backbone and other core services. As the point of contact for the Department or Unit, it is important that the local administrator communicate with Enterprise Networking on topics such as network security, DHCP, DNS and IP space utilization so that we can address your needs.
DNAs are also often the first to notice when network problems occur. If it is suspected that such problems are attributable to the campus (vs. building) network, they should be reported immediately to 688-HELP(or 8help@osu.edu).
When resolving network issues it is important to contact the help desk instead of Enterprise Networking directly, when a help ticket is created it allows us to track the issue internally along with making our call center aware in the event that your end users calls about the problem.
For anyone interested in the results of the recent DNA survey, the results are now online.
Reporting Afterhours Network Issues
We offer an afterhours network engineer on call option. However, the after hours number is only provided to DNAs and secondary contacts and the number is to be used to report network issues only during the hours that the IT Service Desk is not open (as of August 1, 2004 avaialble hours are 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday through Friday and 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. Sunday).
Before responding to a call made to the after hours on-call telephone number, the Enterprise Networking staff member who is on-call will verify that the call is from a Departmental Network Administrator or secondary contact. Calls made to this number by anyone other than the DNA or secondary contact will not receive a response.
NOTE- Enterprise Networking reserves the right to bill customers for any problem determined to be the result of a failure in the customers network or equipment. Billing will be based on the current OIT hourly charge for a network engineer (http://oit.osu.edu/rates.html). To reduce the likelihood of being billed, it is strongly recommended that the DNA and/or other departmental support personnel perform first level trouble shooting before reporting an issue.
Differences between primary and secondary DNAs
The primary and secondary DNAs are treated slightly differently. By default all new primary DNAs are granted access to the "OSU People Registry" a service that provides the e-mail forwarding information for users. This information, which can be useful in diagnosing e-mail problems, is only available to primary DNAs and those sponsored by a primary DNA. Secondary DNAs do not automatically have access to the service but can be sponsored by their primary DNA to receive an account.
In the case of network outages, planned or unplanned, the primary DNA is notified. Unless the primary is unreachable the secondary DNA will not be notified.
We send reminder e-mail's of unregistered IPs that are active to the primary DNA for the subnet. When requesting DNS changes a secondary DNA is required to copy the primary DNA on the request - otherwise, the request will not be processed.
Departments are responsible for maintaining their own local computer infrastructure. DNAs should be familiar with basic networking concepts and system administration. When reporting a network outage you need to verify that the problem is not within your local network before contacting the OIT Help desk at 688-HELP.
In the event that one of your computer systems is compromised, you must inform the CIO Security Group at security@osu.edu. They need to know so that they can attempt to determine whether there were other computers that were compromised that need to be fixed. They can also assist you in determining how the intrusion occurred, where it came from, and how to secure your computers against further attacks.
If the CIO Security Group receives a complaint of abuse or about compromised system in your allocated IP space, all DNAs for the subnet, along with any security related department group e-mail accounts on file, will be contacted. Computers that have been compromised will usually be blocked at the router to prevent the intruders from causing further damage to them and to prevent compromised computers from being used to attack others.
You can determine whether or not one of your machines have been blocked by consulting.
http://www.net.ohio-state.edu/security/restricted/BH/blackhole.cgi
If you receive notification that a computer in your address space has been blocked, you need to correct the problem and notify the CIO Security Group before it will be unblocked. If the computer is in your address space but not under your direct control, you need to pass the notification on to the proper administrators.
As part of the agreement to use the campus network departments agree to follow the Sonnet Network Policy. Included in the policy is that all devices on the network need to be registered in the campus Domain Name Service (DNS) servers. If you need to request a domain for your department or unit review the request process in the Domain Policy.
If you need to register a device a plain text e-mail to the University hostmaster@osu.edu, including the host name you would like along with it's IP address.
Additional resources for DNAs:
Department Information:
The Office of Information Technology
The Enterprise Networking site contains links to FAQ's, best practices,along with network policies and request forms.
The Office of the CIO Security Group
The IT Service Desk handles questions, problem reports, service requests, and inquiries from faculty, staff, and students regarding computer hardware and software, Internet connectivity, and related topics. Live support is available Mondays through Fridays 7:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. You can call us at 688-HELP (TDD: 688-8743) or e-mail us at 8help@osu.edu.
OSU People Registry:
OIT realizes there are members of the university community who, for support purposes, need to know additional information, such as where e-mail sent to name.n@osu.edu forwards or whether an individual has activated their OSU Internet Username. Therefore, OIT created the means for authorized individuals to make direct queries to the OIT database.
To be authorized to access this tool you need to be registered as a primary Departmental Network Administrator (DNA) in our records(and are assumed to need additional information to handle support issues in your area). Primary DNAs may sponsor additional appropriate support staff within their area, but we ask that you be conservative in your sponsorships. Sponsorship requests should be sent to 8help@osu.edu.
To access the tool, go to:
Authenticate using your OSU Internet Username(lastname.n) and kerberos password. Please accept the certificate. (The longer range plans involve moving this to a production server). To look up a user, you will need their name.n or OSU Internet username (kerberos principal). Queries are not case sensitive.
If you need assistance or have questions, please send e-mail to hostmaster@osu.edu or 8help@osu.edu.
User Groups:
MacForum: A group for Macintosh users.
NETWOG, the NETwork WOrking Group, meets the second Thursday of every odd numbered month from 2 to 3 p.m. in 120 Baker Systems Engineering. Meetings are open to the entire University and cover various topics concerning the University Network.
Ohio Windows Professionals: A group for anyone using Windows operating systems.
SECWOG: The SECurity WOrking Group holds monthly meetings in Baker Systems Engineering room 120 on the 1st Thursday of the month from 3 p.m. - 5 p.m. This meeting is open to all who are interested in network security, including participants from OSU and off campus, and usually follows a somewhat informal lecture format.
Mailing Lists:
Distcons: Is the "Distributed Consultants" mailing list for computer support staff throughout campus,along with the OIT staff who work with them.
dna-private: Is a listserve that is limited to DNAs and Offices of the CIO staff that is used to inform DNAs and through them their departments about planned network outages, planned fiber moves and other network related notices, topics posted from the membership should be network related, policy related, and topics specifically related to DNAs.
Dnetadmin: Is a listserve that is for network administrators
MacForum: A group for Macintosh users.
Ohio Windows Professionals: A special interest group for Windows users on campus.
Security-public: The security-public mailing list. This is a general mailing list for members of the OSU community to receive announcements about the monthly SECWOG meetings and other security announcements of general interest.
World Wide Web Interest Group: A group for those creating and maintaining Web sites and pages.
Newsgroups:
osu.general,osu.network,osu.faculty,osu.staff,osu.www
OIT servers:
Directory Server: directory.service.ohio-state.edu
Domain Name Servers: 128.146.1.7 and 128.146.48.7
Kerberos server kerberos.service.ohio-state.edu
News server: nntp.service.ohio-state.edu
POP3 mail server: pop.service.ohio-state.edu
SMTP mail server smtp.service.ohio-state.edu
