Re: [Wonder-disc] Dropping Apache on Cloud computer - good idea?

[Miguel A. <ar...@gu...>]

Hi,

  Just my 2 cents on this... I never really looked into how much RAM apache was taking on my servers. The reason for this is that I consider it to be irrelevant, compared to what the WO apps consume. If you have a service whose usage is low enough that you're able to run the entire stack (DB+App+WebServer) on a single machine, i highly doubt that your memory problems will come from Apache. I'm not going to comment on Apache vs other web servers since I have no experience at all with non-apache web servers, so it's possible that you can find a more efficient server, in performance and memory consumption. My question is, does it matter? For most apps, if you hit the situation of memory starvation on a server, the big fat pigs will probably be the Java apps. Web server should be a very small percentage of it.

  Regards,

Miguel Arroz

On 2012-02-15, at 7:31 PM, Aaron Rosenzweig wrote:

> Hello WOrriors,
> 
> Thank you all who have spent time developing solutions to host WO  
> apps. From the early days of "WOLastic" for EC2 to the latest  
> presentations by Pascal, Miguel, and David LeBer.
> 
> Cut to the chase:
> ====================
> Should we stop using Apache and use Nginx with a FastCGI adaptor for  
> all our servers?
> 
> A bit more detail:
> ====================
> Nginx is a webserver that has been around a while and is very memory  
> efficient. Sounds like a better choice for not only VPS (virtual  
> private servers / cloud computers) but also for any server. This being  
> said, I bet 98% of us use Apache, most likely because it is installed  
> already on OS X... but these are post Xserve day perhaps we should  
> reconsider our web server.
> 
> Drinking from fire hose amount of detail:
> ====================
> I enjoyed the screencasts presented at the last WOWODC regarding  
> Xserve alternatives which discussed various choices in getting your  
> apps out and deployed for the world to use. [I missed seeing you guys  
> in person] I was shocked to see the amount of Ram we tended to use. Do  
> we really need 2 gigs of Ram to run a WO server. Really? What about  
> the good old days when Chrysler financial ran on machines with  
> probably 128 megs of Ram or less.
> 
> Part of the problem appears to be Linux. From what I've read, running  
> the same services will take one third the amount of Ram if run on  
> FreeBSD.
> 
> I don't know if this is still the case but back in the day when dual  
> CPU motherboards first came out and operating systems struggled to  
> provide SMP (Symmetric Multi Processing), FreeBSD and OSX used in- 
> process-threads to run on multiple cpus. In contrast, Linux simply  
> "forked" a new process level thread in Java. We're talking "p-threads"  
> vs. "k-threads" here. This "worked" and allowed usage of all your cpu  
> cores but was rather heavy. Do you really need a new OS process for  
> each thread?
> 
> Finally, Apache seems a bit "fat". It too will fork a new process for  
> each incoming connection. If too many people connect to your webserver  
> at the same time Apache will fall over due to lack of Ram. In  
> contrast, nginx will sip Ram and happily munch on each connection  
> quickly with its internal event driven nature.
> 
> I realize Apache has been on Mac OS X forever and we are all comfy  
> with it. If for no other reason, "we know it works" is the best  
> argument I can see to not play with nginx. I just don't want to  
> purchase a 2 gig VPS for that reason alone... I'd rather experiment.
> 
> Can anyone tell me why I should *not* try Nginx with the FastCGI  
> adaptor? I read rumblings that it was broken with multi-part mime  
> binary form submission but later fixed. Did this ever make it into the  
> Wonder code base FastCGI adaptor? Does anyone happily run nginx with  
> the FastCGI adaptor today?
> 
> Many thanks,
> -- Aaron
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Virtualization & Cloud Management Using Capacity Planning
> Cloud computing makes use of virtualization - but cloud computing 
> also focuses on allowing computing to be delivered as a service.
> http://www.accelacomm.com/jaw/sfnl/114/51521223/
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