By Michael Cooney
Network World, 07/23/01
From the moment you enter the Kennedy
Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Fla., you're struck by the
enormity of it all.
After all, the first things you see are a 209-foot—by—110—foot
painting of the U.S. flag — each star stretches 6 feet across
- adorning one wall of a 525-foot—high space shuttle storage
facility and a full-size model space shuttle jutting into the
sky at the nearby visitors
center.
As you might expect, enthusiasm for the space program is also
supersized on this 6,000-acre facility. And 41-year-old network manager Steve
Kerney exudes that spirit as much as anyone.
"I can't begin to tell you how great it is to be part
of the team that puts that bird [the space shuttle] into space," says Kerney,
pointing toward the two massive 437-foot launch pads rising up from the surrounding
wilderness.
Kerney works at Kennedy Space Center for NASA contractor United
Space Alliance, currently with the four-man systems and network engineering
group that runs the Enterprise Management System (EMS) at the Launch Control
Center. EMS is critical in keeping the systems supporting shuttle launch operations
up and running. A loss of service from a downed system would limit the launch
team's ability to monitor the shuttle's health and make it impossible
to review historical data needed for troubleshooting.
Kerney has worked in network-related capacities at Kennedy
for 13 years, the last three in the networks section of the space center's
Systems Engineering and Integration Department.
Involvement in the space program is a childhood dream come
true, Kerney says. "Being able to step outside my office building to watch
and feel the space shuttle thunderously rise into the heavens! It's an awesome
experience."
While Kerney always knew he wanted to be a big part
of a space program, he didn't always have this one in mind. First
came a passion for 'Star Trek'.
"I didn't want to be like Captain Kirk on 'Star
Trek', I wanted to be Captain Kirk," Kerney remembers. He
even lists "Star Trek" among the main influences in
his life, along with his parents, his four daughters and his church.
'Star Trek' really planted the seed of adventure in me."
Down to earth
While Kerney's passion for the space program is huge, his
office is a cramped cube full of books, toys, network diagrams and training
manuals. It's in a low-slung building that sits quite literally in the shadow
of the monstrous space shuttle storage facility. From here, Kerney and his
teammates develop system and network monitoring and management applications
as well as provide technical support for the Central Operations Facility.
At this facility, housed at Launch Control Center, a variety
of space shuttle processing systems run. These include the Shuttle Data Center,
an ensemble of more than 100 powerful Unix computers that store data generated
by the processing and launching of each shuttle mission.
When Kerney's not in his office, he's usually at the Launch
Control Center, which is replete with a floor-to-ceiling mural showing different
aspects of space flight and a wall dedicated to flight insignia patches and
plaques commemorating the space program from Apollo to the current space shuttle
missions. This facility is also home to a new United Space Alliance data center
that houses the computers and personnel that monitor and manage the enterprise
network that helps launch the space shuttle. That data center is a sparkling,
state-of-the-art 10,000-square-foot facility.
Specifically, Kerney and his team support 500 developers
and scientists working on applications used for the space shuttle.
They work on 150 Unix servers and 500 Unix, Windows and NT workstations,
all of which are tied to the center's IP backbone by 10 Cisco
and 3Com routers and several dozen LAN switches. The network is
primarily made up of copper and fiber links supporting 10M and
100M bit/sec Ethernet, and 802.1Q virtual LAN trunking.
Hewlett-Packard's OpenView is the primary management platform.
Kerney uses HP's IT/Operations 5.3 for systems management and Network Node
Manager 6.1 for discovering LAN devices. But he also uses Agilent Technologies'
NetMetrix, Cisco's CiscoWorks, and Spectrum applications for router and
switch monitoring and management.
Naturally, Kerney says, one of his challenges is getting these
multiple management applications and vendors to work together.
However, an even bigger challenge is figuring out how to do
more with less, Kerney says. For example, Kerney's group must use commercial
off-the-shelf (COTS) software and hardware per terms of an agreement United
Space Alliance struck with HP and other vendors a few years ago. That means
no customized equipment or applications, Kerney says.
"COTS saves money, but causes interesting challenges,"
he notes. "We are expected to make COTS products work together."
Integration of people - engineers, operations and maintenance
folks - is also an overarching and perhaps even larger goal, Kerney says.
"There are no Lone Rangers here," he says.
"I was a network engineer before I became part of this team
so I know what those guys need. I also work well with the folks in systems
maintenance and the system administrators," Kerney says. "If I didn't
understand their requirements, I don't know how I could be an effective
network manager."
And only stars will do when it comes to getting those space
shuttles launched.
