Clustering & Load balanced servers?

[Mikalee]

I did a search on this here and found some topics that suggest that JagPC *may* offer clustering & load balanced options, but I wasn't sure.

So, do they?

Is it only for dedicated server customers or is there some kind of 'grid hosting' (scalable shared hosting) also available?

Is anyone currently running a dedicated or shared clustered servers or load balanced Mysql DB servers? (which I *think* can only be done in mysql 5 - is that supported?).

[jason]

The jaguarpc.com domain may still be on a cluster (it was for a while), but I don't think they've opened clustering up to clients yet. OF course if you wnat to cluster multiple dedicated servers then I'm sure JPC would be happy to help you set up.

--Jason

[JPC-Masood]

Clustering solution provided by interworx is available for dedicated clients:

http://www.interworx.com/products/iw...ustering/index

[Mikalee]

Clustering solution provided by interworx is available for dedicated clients:

http://www.interworx.com/products/iw...ustering/index

Thanks Masood...forgive my ignorance on the subject, but does that solution include managing both web server nodes and DB nodes? I.e. Can you have a clustered set of MySQL nodes with the said solution as well as a load balanced set of web servers?

(again, I'm not sure if I'm using the right terms, but I'm hopefully getting my question across).

[Gwaihir]

Only webserver nodes. It offers a managed load balanced solution workable for a (small) set of web server nodes. It doesn't offer clustering for the database; the image in the middle lists the DB server as running on the cluster's central (management) node.

[Mikalee]

Only webserver nodes. It offers a managed load balanced solution workable for a (small) set of web server nodes. It doesn't offer clustering for the database; the image in the middle lists the DB server as running on the cluster's central (management) node.

That was my impression too...thank you.

So, the question is, *can* one set up clustered DB's on Jags servers? Has anyone done this here? What's involved as far as software/hardware needed? (very high level view)

[JPC-Nick]

I was actually working on a project related to this, I was able to successfully setup a cpanel server, with remote mysql and remote file storage The next phase was to duplicate it all onto another server, but time began to run short and for no better explanation the project has come to a halt, I will have to speak with greg again about requisitioning some hardware to do it again.

Ive been able to do load balancing via apache and php on the vps level but have tried much higher than that.

FYI cPanel is not very friendly to cluster with I would say interworx defiantly for this purpose.

[JPC-Les]

It can be done. To my knowledge we do not have any clients running clustered databases. There is a long running thread at the cpanel forums about cpanel high availability here (http://forums.cpanel.net/showthread.php?t=34925) though that you'd probably like to look at.

Yes iworx is cluster friendly for load balancing but not so much for failover as you know with the CM housing the mysql databases. A future release should be overcoming that however.

[Gwaihir]

What are you looking for, Mikalee? It seems a bit conflicting to me: such a high performance solution managed in such a "generalistic" way. IMHO that sort of setup gets finetuned for the application(s) that run on it and the applications for the setup.

To 'begin' with, you can run a seriously sizeable operation with just one dedicated database server behind such a set of loadbalancers and webservers. This site is basically split in two halves: news site and forum, with one big database server for each. IIRC their traffic is well above 2 TB/day, with the news site probably responsible for slightly over half. It gets you more than a rack full of hardware, but no cluster yet..

Next step up the ladder, you'll find yourself thinking A LOT about what goes where / how to get an efficient cluster, as "just throwing things together" will only get you a system that keeps itself busy replicating everthing between all the nodes, rather than on the gives you extra performance to serve your customers. Brian Moon of dealnews has a posted several interesting hands on articles about that on his blog, such as this one.

[Mikalee]

Hey Gwaihir, I agree, it's odd to ask these questions without specifications of the app it's needed for. The reason is I just wanted to get educated on the topic and know what the options are in case (the distant, yet possible) need arises. I'm sure I'll be fine for a long time without a cluster, or even a load balanced set of servers, but I believe the possibility is there for something I'm working on so I was wondering what my choices are...

Thanks for all the responses.

Mike

[Ron]

ummm, the business requirements rulez the app and hardware requirements.

Funny nobody bothered to ask about the business requirements, nor the expected split between read and write operations and if write operations could be sent to a single server. The answers to those questions would likely determine nearly everything.

I've replicated data with multi-million dollar hardware across fiber networks between data centers 35 miles apart, both syncronously (ick) and asynchronously, and I've run dual ported fault tolerant DASD between dual huge multi CPU machines.

I've also run butt nekkid with backups.

If you ever feel the need to upgrade to serious hardware for a serious business model, please don't hire someone over at hackersRus. Go get yourself a real (and expensive) business systems analyst and a real systems analyst to complement your dreamers and get a system that is well designed and built on established solutions -- nothing trendy nor bleeding edge (unless that is your business model -- in which case you REALLY need the help of those pros).

Down the road you will be very thankful you did.

/Soap Box