Cables: to label or not to label....that is the flamewar

Mon Aug 26 14:30:17 PDT 2002

Quoting Dave (dlc-bl at halibut.com):
> We're having an, ahem, "discussion" with an internal customer (lab user) 
> over whether or not my group (sysadmins) should be labeling patch cables 
> in her (software QA) lab.  We've found that as often as not, the users 
> of these very loosely-controlled software development and QA labs move 
> any cables we've labeled to other equipment without re-labeling, and 
> it sends us (and them) on wild goose chases when troubleshooting.
> 
> We've proposed a compromise of putting a unique cable serial number 
> on both ends of each (new) patch cable.

PROPERLY and done RIGHT:

Machines have CAT5 networking going to a patch panel near the
hubs/switchs.  Consoles go via to another (perhaps cheaper)
patch panel (CAT3 is ok for 9600Kb serial :) near the terminal
server.

You have labels on the patch panel and on the end of the cable.
E.G. panel A might have, at the computer end:  A1 and A2 (port
1 and port 2, on panel A)

Very short CAT5 cables go from panel to hub or terminal server.

Have also adapters so that a Terminal Servers or panels can
be plugged into a laptop (or psion or Wyse50).

When a machine goes it, it's attached to the patch panels (and
perhaps labelled by name at the panel).  Nobody gets to mess
with it then.

It takes a little more effort to start, but I'm at a place that
didn't spend that effort and we've been spending it over and over
to deal with that not being setup.

Setting up a panel at the end of a row of machines with a plethora
of cables dropped where machines go means it's easier to do it
right than to do it wrong.

Done well, it's not an effort to add a machine and it won't be shortcut.

(Oh, I'm a stickler for serial consoles - even on Intel boxes.  Being
able to see and LOG what goes on on the console is ALWAYS a win. Perhaps
you have a KVM with a couple long "floater" cables for those times you
need BIOS, and perhaps that KVM handles the 2 windows machines you allow
in the lab :)

------------------------------------------------------------

Otherwise, gangs of different colored cables with SOME label on
each end, but not machine names - cables roam.