Topic: Contribs.org recent downtime

[PCs4ever]

I have seen it, but I never would have believed it.
I mean the options of:

1) selling the distro to support the contribs.org website?
2) selling the contribs.org off?

3) bailing out?

NEVER!!!

What about the fourth and best option available?

Instead of paying with money, pay with hardware?
With every distro installed, use 1% maximum bandwidth 1% maximum harddrive, and 1% maximum CPU & RAM of each server to use a clustered approach for hosting contribs.org?
(1% * 28K dial-up * 1000 servers =280K broadband)
(1% * 4GB HD * 1000 servers = 40GB HD)
(1% * 64MB RAM * 1000 servers = 640MB RAM)
(1% * 133 MHz CPU * 1000 servers = 1.3GHz HT CPU)
I purposely used very low hardware stats for these examples, I mean who is going to run the newest distro on a Pentium 133 with 64MB RAM, 4 GB HardDrive, and use a 28K dial-up modem?
I am certain there are more than 1000 servers out there using SME in it's various forms, and as for the hardware just plug in the higher stats for the average server and then you make the call.
I would be glad to donate 1% of each of my servers to the cause, hmmmm P2-400, 640MB, 20GB, T-1 @ 1% = P-4, 6.4MB, 200MB, 15K times 1000 other servers = P-4000 w/HT, 6.4GB RAM, 200GB Hard Drive, 15M broadband =
Welcome to the age of Distributed Super-Computing.

That way, every one who uses the distro, gets to contribute, not just those with wads money.

(A real Contribution Organization)

It would be slick, absolutely no denial of service ever, unless the entire internet went down.

There are enough broadband connections out there that even if all of the dial-ups were off there would be no performance degredation.

(You can't kill a swarm of bees with a flyswatter)

Every SME server would be a node of contribs.org, and every security update or upgrade could happen on every server at the same time.

No need to host the files on a different website, and for those of you who operate contibs.org all you would need is an administration console, not mega-watts of air-conditioning. Like was posted elsewhere, then you can spend your time managing content not hardware and save $$$.

Replies are encouraged.
PC

[PhilV]

I too was thinking about this, personally I think it would be a good idea, but could have a few issues.

1) Those users who use SME only on a LAN, i.e. with no internet connection will not be able to contribute.

2) It may take some careful scripting if we wish to include those users who do have an internet connection on their lan, but which is not controlled by SME.

3) Limited bandwidth. Some ISP's limit the amount of up/down traffic a user account can have per period of time. For example I may set up an SME server, just for my home networks few e-mails, and to share family photos. This would normally not take me near to my traffic limit, but if suddenyl i was hosting part of the contribs.org site, my trafic allowance may trickle away without me even using it.

These are jsut a few of the issues I could think of. In theory this would be a very good method, but in practice these issues would have to be resolved first.

Phil

[schirrms]

Hi,

I personnaly think that the PCs4ever 'plan' if really of great interrest.

And, evenwith all points set by PhilV, I still think that this could be a great way.
Anyway, I personnaly can set much more than 1 % of my resources.

The big deal in this case is the data distribution.

Saying that all SME server in this ring allow 20 GBytes of data (playing with very small disk area could be unrealistic) how can we do to :
1) Have enough redundant servers for the data.
2) Have a distribution way fast enough to have the data on the good server at the good time.
3) How can we deal with the necessary 'super servers' who know where to find the datas ?

But if there is a solution for that, I would personally be happy to play in this system !

[cydonia]

Great idea!  i didn't even know it was possible...  I've heard of distributed computing, just thought it was for scientists and military....

[PhilV]

cydonia,
If you are interested try googling for "beowulf cluster" (without the quotes).

Phil

[wyron]

1) Have enough redundant servers for the data.
2) Have a distribution way fast enough to have the data on the good server at the good time.
3) How can we deal with the necessary 'super servers' who know where to find the datas ?
But if there is a solution for that, I would personally be happy to play in this system !

Me too !!!!

[schirrms]

Great idea!  i didn't even know it was possible...  I've heard of distributed computing, just thought it was for scientists and military....

Great, I don't know (i'm rosing ), but for sure it's only an idea.

Dunno if we can setup something like that.

Regards,