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IRIS

Instructional & Research Information Systems

WINS

WINS (Windows Internet Name Service)

Retiring Windows Internet Naming Service (WINS)

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Windows Internet Name Service (WINS) is a legacy computer name registration and resolution service from Microsoft that maps computer NetBIOS names to IP addresses, and is implemented on our network with the machines wins1.eecs.berkeley.edu and wins2.eecs.berkeley.edu. Computers generally use DNS (Domain Name System) now, and most organizations stopped using WINS years ago.

We are planning to (finally) retire this legacy service on the following schedule:

  • Tuesday, August 8: remove configuration of WINS servers from EECS Domain Controllers, and from our NetApp fileservers. We don’t think any clients should notice this change, but we’ll be on the lookout for any issues that come up.
  • Tuesday, August 15: update DHCP to no longer specify WINS servers to DHCP clients. DHCP clients should have their network info updated over the next day or so, but will continue to resolve hostnames via DNS. So in general, we expect clients should notice no change. However, if your Windows client is relying on a shared Windows resource from a machine without a fixed IP name (for example, a shared lab printer attached to a Windows PC), you may lose access to that resource. Access to home.eecs, project.eecs, and printers on print.eecs will not be affected.
  • September 1-30: We will monitor any remaining WINS client traffic to wins1.eecs and wins2.eecs, and attempt to notify registered sysadmins to update clients accordingly.
  • Tuesday, October 3: turn off WINS.

We expect few people to be affected by the retirement of WINS, but if you do have a problem after one of the changes, feel free to contact the Helpdesk with any details.

Moving wins1.eecs, March 27 9pm

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Windows Internet Name Service (WINS) is used for name resolution, typically by Microsoft clients, to map hostnames to IP addresses. It allows clients to find machines by name even if they don’t have fixed IP addresses in DNS. In EECS, we have two WINS servers for redundancy, wins1.eecs.berkeley.edu and wins2.eecs.berkeley.edu.

On Monday night at 9pm, in an effort to simplify network routing architecture, we will be replacing the current wins1.eecs with a machine in Cory Hall. Service from wins1.eecs may be unavailable for about an hour.

Because of WINS redundancy, most clients should not notice the downtime.

WINS is a relatively old Microsoft service, and in the coming year we will be examining WINS usage to see if we can plan for retirement of WINS in EECS.

Resolved as of 2017-03-27 22:15:00

Cory Hall Network Maintenance, 9/15/16

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We will be reconfiguring one of the transit links out of Cory Hall tonight at 5PM. There will be no general network or service outages, but some services will have a brief interruption in connectivity:

* Private networks which transit between Cory and Soda Halls (TIER, CEC, Viper)
* Machines in Cory Hall on the 169.229.59.0/26 and 128.32.38.0/23 networks (not including EECS-PSK wireless clients)
* The primary departmental WINS (Windows Name Service) server, but the secondary will remain online
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December 28th Shutdown

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IMAP/mail, home/project, Windows services (AD/WINS/printing), LDAP/NIS/DNS, DHCP and most other IDSG and IMG services will be affected. We will try to keep some basic network services running (DHCP, DNS/NIS), possibly in a reduced capacity.

While EECS-Secure, EECS-Guest and EECS-Open wireless LANS will be out of service during this time, the EECS and AirBears wireless LANS will remain operational during the outage.

The reason for this extended downtime is multi fold. The first is to repair the UPS that failed a couple of weeks back. The repaired unit will be placed back on line and extensive testing must be done to ensure it’s operation before we can depend on the UPS again. The second is to move data around which will allow us to remove from service a piece of software used to manage storage. This software is no longer under development and we need to remove our dependency on it. Lastly, some routine maintenance will be done which can only be done when systems are down. These are the kind of things that can only be done between semesters and we ask for you understanding during this disruption in service.

While the stated outage is from 10:00AM to 9:00PM, it may not take that long. This is a worst case scenario. If possible, services will be brought up sooner than 9:00 PM.
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PRINT, RIS, and WINSWW Scheduled Patching

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Microsoft will release their patches for the month on *Tuesday, March 11th*.

**PRINT**, **RIS** and **WINSWW** will automatically patch and reboot **Wednesday, March 12th**, at **3:00 am**.

**HERMES** and **macserver.eecs** will be down for patching and maintenance **Wednesday, March 12th**, from **6:00 a.m. – 7:00 a.m**.
[Read more…] about PRINT, RIS, and WINSWW Scheduled Patching