2005/02/03
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IRC [11:43] <anlater> hi to all.... I want read all the input sent to an adp/tcl page.... like reading from stdin using cgi.
IRC [11:43] <anlater> I'm trying to read from stdin but with no success
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IRC [11:47] <Dossy> Right.
IRC [11:47] <Dossy> Try [ns_conn content].
IRC [11:47] <anlater> well I try :)
IRC [11:48] <Dossy> It may not be what you wanted, either ...
IRC [11:48] <Dossy> Maybe if you describe what you're trying to accomplish, there's a better way.
IRC [11:50] <anlater> Dossy: I want parse a request .... the body should be enougth
IRC [11:50] <Dossy> why do you want to parse it yourself?
IRC [11:50] <anlater> because it is not so complex
IRC [11:51] <Dossy> why not use ns_queryget ?
IRC [11:52] <anlater> and I made the same in perl... I want read every line of stdin
IRC [11:53] <Dossy> well, AOLserver doesn't use stdin to pass data to ADP requests.
IRC [11:55] <anlater> Dossy: many thanks [ns_conn content] work well
IRC [11:56] <Dossy> Great!
IRC [11:57] <anlater> I want compare the performance using aolserver ... with cgi and apache the performace was limited
IRC [12:00] <Dossy> Indeed it will be.
IRC [12:00] <Dossy> Are you testing a simple perl/CGI vs. AOLserver?
IRC [12:03] <anlater> yes, hope It is faster than mod_perl too
IRC [12:04] <Dossy> that would be interesting
IRC [12:04] <Dossy> Are you actually benchmarking these? Will you be publishing your findings anywhere?
IRC [12:11] <anlater> :) I don't know when I have time I try to test something when others simulators are not available
IRC [12:11] <anlater> I need it to do some stress test
IRC [12:12] <Dossy> Hm.
IRC [12:13] <Dossy> So how are you comparing Apache with Perl CGI vs. AOLserver then?
IRC [12:13] <Dossy> And why are you?
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IRC [12:32] <anlater> Dossy: no I enjoy to test some server.... do you know MMS?
IRC [12:33] <Dossy> MMS? text messaging?
IRC [12:33] <Dossy> or multi-media messaging?
IRC [12:33] <Dossy> or something else?
IRC [12:35] <anlater> multi media messaging
IRC [12:36] <Dossy> I know of it, but I don't know anything about implementing it. No.
IRC [12:41] <anlater> Yesterday I reached 50 per sec with apache (but I am not sure to use mod_perl). Today we reached 107 per sec with low load average :)
IRC [12:41] <anlater> we stopped before the limits
IRC [12:47] <Dossy> ?
IRC [12:47] <Dossy> with Apache Perl/CGI?
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IRC [13:18] <Dossy> Guess we'll never find out. :)
IRC [13:21] <holycow> hehe :)
IRC [13:24] <Dossy> So, how goes the AOLserver crusade at your org, holycow?
IRC [13:24] <holycow> seeing as i'm the final arbiter of the situation, great!
IRC [13:24] <holycow> ehe
IRC [13:24] <holycow> however
IRC [13:24] <holycow> the only thing i'm finding hard
IRC [13:24] <holycow> is getting time to try it out seriously
IRC [13:25] <holycow> :/
IRC [13:28] <Dossy> heh
IRC [13:32] <holycow> i may actually get a chance to test it out soon
IRC [13:32] <Dossy> cool.
IRC [13:32] <holycow> the bozos here are thinking they need to buy an application to help them with staff evaluations
IRC [13:32] <holycow> when all they need is some simple forms tracking info over time
IRC [13:32] <holycow> pefect way to try out aolserver and openacs i figure :)
IRC [13:41] <holycow> actually, now that i think about it, i may get a chance tommorrow to play around with it
IRC [13:41] <holycow> *hmmm*
IRC [13:43] <Dossy> heh.
IRC [13:43] <Dossy> go for it! :)
IRC [13:44] <Dossy> as the lotto motto goes, "you have to be in it, to win it."
IRC [13:44] <holycow> hahaha
IRC [13:45] <holycow> hey quick q, just from your experience
IRC [13:45] <holycow> how difficult is it to host multiple websites purely via aolserver?
IRC [13:45] <holycow> i've read where some people run apache as a frontend for that, but thats too hackish for my tastes
IRC [13:47] <Dossy> static sites?
IRC [13:48] <Dossy> hackish? why? it's very common to put a reverse proxy in front of a web farm.
IRC [13:48] <Dossy> most people do it with hardware-based solutions (BigIP, Foundry, etc. L4 switches)
IRC [13:48] <holycow> static or dynamic, i'm thinking that if my dev tests are successfull i'd like to host clients purely on aol server
IRC [13:48] <martinh> though, pound is better than apache. :->
IRC [13:48] <Dossy> but for people without that kind of cash, using a software-based implementation (Squid, Pound, Apache) as the reverse proxy works really well.
IRC [13:48] <holycow> *hmmm*
IRC [13:49] <Dossy> It's actually the other way around: it's less hackish solving problems with tools that specifically aim to solve them, and solve them well.
IRC [13:49] <Dossy> One-size-fits-all fits no one. That's generally the truth. :)
IRC [13:49] <martinh> and, i have to say that aolserver is designed the opposite of apache. . .it's better for putting one site on multiple hosts, rather than multiple sites on one host. :->
IRC [13:49] <holycow> lol okay i see what you are getting at
IRC [13:49] <Dossy> martinh: Exactly.
IRC [13:50] <Dossy> At AOL, the same site is served across a farm of 36 machines.
IRC [13:50] <holycow> really?
IRC [13:50] <Dossy> Not this "serve 36 sites from one machine" nonsense. :)
IRC [13:51] <holycow> although, when you have a bunch of tiny sites ... :)
IRC [13:51] * Dossy shrugs. I'd still serve them across 2 machines.
IRC [13:51] <Dossy> There's some lesson about "all your eggs in one basket" ...
IRC [13:51] <martinh> though, openacs has a slightly better solution for doing multiple sites on one host with its host map to subsite thing. . .but even that's not great.
IRC [13:51] <holycow> okay let me rephrase the question a bit
IRC [13:52] * Dossy nods at martinh - I imagine promoting a subsite to its own stand-alone site after-the-fact isn't exactly easy?
IRC [13:52] <martinh> actually, it's super easy. or at least was last time I did it. point the dns at the site and configure that hostname to point to a particular subsite.
IRC [13:52] <holycow> i ralise that aolserver is designed for huge workloads ...
IRC [13:52] <holycow> but
IRC [13:52] <holycow> from what i can tell so far its also great for small workloads
IRC [13:52] <Dossy> martinh: Oh, interesting.
IRC [13:53] <Dossy> holycow: Sure.
IRC [13:53] <holycow> i can see even small sites benefiting from aolserver
IRC [13:53] <Dossy> Well, there's no inherent benefit in using AOLserver vs. any other technology at the low-to-medium end.
IRC [13:53] <holycow> particularly if i build some type of admin thing
IRC [13:53] <martinh> i use aolserver for my small personal stuff.
IRC [13:53] <martinh> like my family's site.
IRC [13:53] <Dossy> martinh: But, for that scale, PHP or Perl/CGI would be equally adequate.
IRC [13:54] <holycow> Dossy, there is if say i want a single development platform
IRC [13:54] <martinh> yea. but, no where near as easy to do stuff with.
IRC [13:54] <Dossy> I've said this before -- at the low-to-medium scale, any technology will suffice, generally.
IRC [13:54] <holycow> the whole tcl thing i think is wonderfull
IRC [13:54] <Dossy> martinh: If all you knew was Perl and not Tcl, then I'm sure Perl/CGI or mod_perl would be easy and AOLserver would be "nowhere near as easy to do stuff with" -- it's perspective.
IRC [13:54] <holycow> what if one did want to put together a 'mambo server' type of templating hosting solution on aolserver?
IRC [13:55] <martinh> anyway, yea, openacs still has the host-node map feature.
IRC [13:55] <Dossy> holycow: AOLserver is NOT good for hosting third-party sites, unless they're 100% static.
IRC [13:55] <holycow> which invariably would end up hosting a number of independent sites per server regardless?
IRC [13:55] <holycow> ah!
IRC [13:55] <holycow> okay
IRC [13:55] <martinh> [to Dossy]: i've seen most of the php & perl apps out there. . .I think you're better off learning tcl from scratch than attempting to work on those things. :->
IRC [13:55] <Dossy> holycow: Since AOLserver is multi-threaded and not multi-process, you have no per-process privilege isolation as you do in multi-process designs.
IRC [13:56] <holycow> right
IRC [13:56] <Dossy> So, for static content, AOLserver is fine - you're just serving static content. For dynamic, server-side functionality, to get the level of privilege separation necessary, you'd have to run a separate nsd per "customer" to ensure that one customer can't access the content/data of another's. There are apparently some folks out there who have set up AOLserver just this way and are doing just this.
IRC [13:57] <holycow> martinh, thats exactly it
IRC [14:01] <holycow> Dossy, okay i think i see the 'value' propsition here
IRC [14:02] <holycow> i think your right, there may be no inherent gain for small sites, my aesthetic preferences would love to be able to run everything on one server
IRC [14:02] <holycow> hehe
IRC [14:05] <holycow> allright, i'm going to split the small stuff from the big stuff, the problem with the small stuff is ...
IRC [14:05] <holycow> that sometimes it grows into big stuff
IRC [14:05] <holycow> and having to start over at some point is a pain
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IRC [14:06] <Dossy> holycow: Exactly.
IRC [14:07] <Dossy> The idea here is if you know your requirements and your scope is fairly stable and you feel comfortable you can predict the future, and if all signs point to the app. remaining small-to-medium in usage/traffic, then pick whatever you like the best.
IRC [14:07] <holycow> yeah
IRC [14:07] <holycow> my goal is to replace our domino server
IRC [14:08] <Dossy> But, if you think that it's a very real possibility you'll need to scale up, possibly indefinitely, then yes, the hidden cost of re-architecting or migrating to a different technology can be a killer when you have to use the words "sunk cost" :)
IRC [14:08] <holycow> it's great in one way, but too expensive
IRC [14:08] <holycow> *nod* right
IRC [14:09] <holycow> and as you point out, for most projects its obvious if they will be small sites or large
IRC [14:10] <Dossy> holycow: BTW, I'm copying my answers to your questions onto the wiki -- great way to get some good copy-text! thanks.
IRC [14:10] <Dossy> http://panoptic.com/wiki/aolserver/FAQ
IRC [14:10] <holycow> lol
IRC [14:10] <holycow> no worries :)
IRC [14:11] <Dossy> I'm updating the "Where is AOLserver appropriate? Where is it not?" section.
IRC [14:13] <holycow> hehe
IRC [14:13] <holycow> neat :) glad to help
IRC [14:15] <holycow> i could very easily see aol server as an 'application server'
IRC [14:15] <holycow> for an entire company
IRC [14:15] <holycow> theoretically, we could replicate any of the big crm systems on it
IRC [14:15] <Dossy> Sure, in the same space as BEA Weblogic, IBM Websphere, etc.
IRC [14:15] <holycow> right
IRC [14:15] <Dossy> Sure. Tcl's Turing complete, so you could implement anything on it. :)
IRC [14:15] <holycow> and for that... it's perfect to start off with aol server
IRC [14:16] <holycow> and merge apps into aol server as available
IRC [14:16] <holycow> *nod*
IRC [14:16] <holycow> neat
IRC [14:16] <holycow> thats a very exciting thought btw
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IRC [14:19] <Dossy> rehi, anlater :)
IRC [14:19] <anlater> Dossy: hy
IRC [14:21] <anlater> tomorrow I will implement the whole scenario :) and at the end maybe compare with mod_perl
IRC [14:21] <Dossy> Geert: I am the project manager :)
IRC [14:22] <Dossy> oops, wrong window.
IRC [14:22] <Dossy> So, anlater, can you better describe in more detail exactly what you're doing?
IRC [14:23] <anlater> I was not able to activate the tcl... so I'm using tcl inside adp
IRC [14:23] <anlater> however, the MMS have basically 4 phases. submit, push, get, ack
IRC [14:24] <Dossy> have you looked at ... what's it called ... OpenSMS?
IRC [14:24] <Dossy> someone a while back was doing SMS/MMS stuff on AOLserver
IRC [14:24] <Dossy> don't recall what it was called, and they seem to be gone these days
IRC [14:25] <anlater> No, because we are testing the nokia one. I simulate the mobile phone
IRC [14:25] <anlater> and try to stress the MMS server
IRC [14:25] <Dossy> is there a difference between phones? I thought MMS was a standard.
IRC [14:26] <holycow> anlater, your using aolserver for mms?
IRC [14:26] <holycow> wow!
IRC [14:26] <anlater> I simulate the traffic... more submit .... more dowload and see if the server work well
IRC [14:27] <anlater> holycow: no, sorry :)
IRC [14:27] <Dossy> No? Then what are you using it for?
IRC [14:27] <anlater> as stresser
IRC [14:27] <Dossy> to generate MMS messages?
IRC [14:27] <Dossy> huh?
IRC [14:28] <anlater> yes to submit to MMS server.... then take the PUSH and download the message .... but generally we use LoadRunner
IRC [14:28] <Dossy> Ahh, so why use AOLserver?
IRC [14:29] <anlater> but sometimes LoadRunner is not available, so I realized some scripts...
IRC [14:29] <Dossy> Ahh!
IRC [14:29] <Dossy> Cool. AOLserver as a load generator/test runner. Cool.
IRC [14:29] <anlater> and I was using inetd to receve the message
IRC [14:29] <Dossy> Because you can easily create many threads in it. Heh.
IRC [14:29] <Dossy> Ah, don't use inetd! Heh
IRC [14:29] <Dossy> [ns_socklistencallback]!
IRC [14:32] <anlater> so we abbandon inetd and tryied with apache.... but maybe I was not able to use mod_perl.... the I tought to aolserver... :)
IRC [14:33] <anlater> and today I tryed the first part.... maybe tomorrow I will complete the porting .... and see what happen
IRC [14:34] <Dossy> cool
IRC [14:36] <anlater> Dossy: bye... see you later.. or tomorrow
IRC [14:36] <Dossy> take care! good luck!
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IRC [15:49] <Dossy> Hi.
IRC [15:50] <holycow> Dossy, you mage a great project representative :)
IRC [15:54] <Dossy> I try.
IRC [15:54] <Dossy> I wonder if siddfinch is watching this window or not. :-)
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IRC [16:12] <siddfinch> I am now ...
IRC [16:12] <siddfinch> :)
IRC [16:19] <Dossy> Cool. Welcome to the chat. :)
IRC [16:20] <siddfinch> thank you ....
IRC [16:20] <siddfinch> Where is the bar? :->
IRC [16:20] <Dossy> Depends on how far you're willing to go. :-)
IRC [16:21] <siddfinch> I like it to be in walking distance! :)
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IRC [16:22] <siddfinch> Hmm, interesting :)
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