No more hiding in the server room
What naming conventions do you use for your equipment?
What do you name your servers, desktops, etc?
In the past we named our servers after characters from MST3K but as we acquired more and more servers we ran out of “good” names. Plus it was kind of awkward when the names came during conversations with people outside of IT. Once I got some flak from one of our execs because the exec felt that the name “princeofspace” was unprofessional. The biggest issue was that the names didn’t mean anything; if you have a server named diabolik then what does that tell you about the box? Nothing, that’s what.
So now we name our serves after site/building code then function then internal server number. So for instance our 15th windows terminal server at our 3rd building in Santa Fe would be SAF03MSTS15. SAF03 being the site/building number, MSTS being MicroSoft Terminal Server and 15 meaning that this is the 15th TS box. We use this system for everything now … servers, storage, network gear … everything.
But I don’t feel that this is the best possible system and I’m interested in what other people are doing. What are you naming your equipment?
In the past we named our servers after characters from MST3K but as we acquired more and more servers we ran out of “good” names. Plus it was kind of awkward when the names came during conversations with people outside of IT. Once I got some flak from one of our execs because the exec felt that the name “princeofspace” was unprofessional. The biggest issue was that the names didn’t mean anything; if you have a server named diabolik then what does that tell you about the box? Nothing, that’s what.
So now we name our serves after site/building code then function then internal server number. So for instance our 15th windows terminal server at our 3rd building in Santa Fe would be SAF03MSTS15. SAF03 being the site/building number, MSTS being MicroSoft Terminal Server and 15 meaning that this is the 15th TS box. We use this system for everything now … servers, storage, network gear … everything.
But I don’t feel that this is the best possible system and I’m interested in what other people are doing. What are you naming your equipment?
Views: 275
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Graycat on -
We've recently had to change our naming convention as it was getting too difficult to manage what related to what with regards to the servers. We used to have servers A through X (ie: aserver, bserver, cserver) etc in one city and the rest were Office_Number (ie: Leeds_1, Man_5 for the fifth server in Manchester etc) but unfortunately this came to a head when I got back from three weeks leave to find we'd had an incident in a comms room where it got flooded and servers had been replaced .... but named exactly the same as their predecessor! As you can imagine this turned into a complete nightmare trying to track hardware to support packs etc (eg: so is this Bserver1, 2 or 3 coz it just says Bserver here!!!).
Since then we've readdressed naming conventions and whilst naming after location and role was a good method we found we swap servers around too much as projects and support requirements change. In the end we've gone for names of gods and use www.godchecker.com for suggestions.
On the desktop and laptop side of things we use a simple Group_TypeNumber method, ie: LDS_LTP05 would be the fifth laptop in the LDS or Leeds group.
Whichever route we use we have made it policy that a machine is given one name for life and that's it unless there is a HUGELY overriding reason to deviate....... well until I go on holiday again, huh? ;o)
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Permalink Reply by Richard Holloway on -
At work we use names of astronauts; Neil, Buzz etc. This was already in place when I started.
The location, OS, etc is stored in documentation referenced by this name, so it is not important to me for the name to convey any detail.
Besides, I like servers with personable names.
Where I used to work I was once accused of referring to the servers as if they we my kids, when I said something along the lines of "Jack has been playing up again".
I explained "You'll understand when you have servers of your own" :)
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Permalink Reply by Wesley "Nonapeptide" on
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Thanks to GrayCat for zombifying this old thread. I can't believe I missed this one as I looked at old topics. Server / device naming is an interesting topic that seems to have a very narrow tipping point when it comes to the practicality of friendly names vs utilitarian names. One day it all seems to work fine and the next day your being called into a board meeting to explain why your file server is named "MmmmDonuts". It seems that both the number of servers as well as the number of sites are the biggest factors in this issue. For places with less than 30 or so servers and fewer than 3 or 4 sites, it seems that having friendly names can be better to remember which servers have which functions. However, I find that it can be a good thing to always mark your virtual servers no matter how many servers you have. I usually preface them with a 'v'.
At one place they chose any Bible name that started with the letter "A" for servers. Servers deprecated but yet not completely mothballed were renamed a "Z" bible name and kept around until it was certain that they were no longer used in any way.
Another place had only two servers... the second of which I installed. The first was named "Alpha" so I named the second "Omega". That might be their last server ever. =) However, it's easy to keep names like that in people's minds. If a third server is added, I might choose "Gamma" (since "Beta" has negative connotations).
In the end, this is my ideas on the matter: For smaller places (based on my ballpark numbers above), I would choose friendly names, meaning: something that wasn't some ghastly site/building/office/ code unless there was a compelling reason to do so. It's hard to keep track of what services are running on what servers if it's not a memorable name. In larger companies where servers are likely do be dedicate to one role and this the name can reflect that role, then it's fine. However, I would choose friendly names that would not cause a raised eyebrow. Examples include the last names of scientists, planets, Greek letters, Greek/Roman/[insert-favorite-ancient-culture] mythology (sans the icky ones like Oedipus and Priapus), flowers, or trees.
Another option is to use CNAMES in your DNS. Make your servers have ugly and functional names and then use CNAMES for users' and your clarification.
Finally, have a look at this large and ongoing ServerFault thread concerning this topic.
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Permalink Reply by Will Enestvedt on -
Years ago we used fun names, but there's some much proliferation that we had to switch to something boring-but-functional. We made sure to make the convention flexible enough to extend later, which is good. It's three characters for the city, three letters representing the function (database vs. web server), and a two-digit arbitrary number.
However, many of our hostnames had dashes in them, and when we switched from *nix DNS servers to Windows, the Windows guys dropped all the hyphens from their hostnames. *shrug* The Solaris servers retained them: why change? (They don't get anything from Active Directory.)
There's another convention for naming network printers. The difficulty of that one is admins who replace printers but recycle the old-style queue name because it would be too hard to change user's Printers settings. This one os three characters for the city, three characters for building, two digits for the floor, two digits for the type of printer [mostly "lz" for laser printers, though there is still one "lp" left], and two digits for differentiation.
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Permalink Reply by Ray Holtz on -
At home I used to use Honda Motorcycles for my systems: Aero, Spirit, Goldwing.
My Church has servers named after books of the Bible.
At my office we go the boring/functional route and name them after office site&service.
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