[Eagle-i-admins] June 30, 2015 leap second adjustment

[Cherry, Michael]

Hi all,

Anyone responsible for an eagle-i installation should be aware that there will be a leap second added to the calendar at midnight tonight.  This can potentially cause issues with both the OS and also with Java.

Information about checking and patching the OS:
  http://www.datastax.com/dev/blog/preparing-for-the-leap-second
  https://access.redhat.com/articles/15145
  (RedHat's testing utility also works on CentOS)

Time-zone updater tool for Java installations:
  http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/tzupdater-readme-136440.html
  (look for "Java Time Zone Updater Tool" near the bottom of the page)

Background information about timezone data in Java:
  http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/timezones-137583.html

Note that to be completely safe, both the OS and Java need to be able to handle the leap second.  The consequences of not patching can apparently include (but are not limited to) high CPU loads for no apparent reason, and potentially other aberrant behavior.  If your installation is not patched and experiences any odd symptoms after midnight tonight, your best/only recourse may be to stop the application server (Tomcat) and reboot the underlying operating system.

regards,
- Michael Cherry
Sr. Release Operations Engineer
Harrvard Catalyst | Center for Biomedical Informatics
Harvard Medical School