Comments on: Filer down - causing high machine loads on our spunky cluster.

By: doubledutch

doubledutch — Wed, 16 May 2007 07:00:53 +0000

and agian site is down :-((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((

By: Mike

Mike — Mon, 14 May 2007 05:12:05 +0000

@whiner:

You weren’t the first person to bring up redundancy–and it hasn’t all been directed at the panel.

But… I have yet to see a case where someone here said the panel was down, where it actually was. So, where’s the problem that requires panel redundancy?

Example of the panel not being down:

Person 1: The panel is down!
Person 2: No it’s not. I’m logged in right now and it’s fine.
Person 1: If I can’t get to it, then it’s down. Duh!

And why would the panel be more important than sites? I’d be much more concerned about site uptime than panel uptime. Site downtime can equal loss of money for some people, but a little bit of panel downtime is just the inconvenience of rescheduling certain tasks.

Anyway, the panel could be mirrored in 5 different data centers, and as soon as someone was having problems with their ISP, they’d be here claiming that all 5 data centers were down.

By: whiner

whiner — Sun, 13 May 2007 18:03:06 +0000

Mike: DID YOU *READ* the message I posted? I don’t give a rat’s buttock if my sites are redundant. What I have and do does not need 99.9% uptime and for the price I surely don’t expect it.

BUT - and this is what I was REALLY discussing - the DH Panel needs to be fully redundant with good failover. There are, I’m guessing, conservatively between 7500 and 10000 customers of DH and any one of them could/might need access to the panel at any time - especially when things aren’t working on their sites. It is important that the panel be up and available and not use “gee-whiz” technology to accomplish simple basic stuff.

By: James

James — Sun, 13 May 2007 03:57:27 +0000

At Mike: The choice doesn’t make a difference. first time their ISP’s route to their new host breaks they’ll cry about it being down and be back at DH.

By: Mike

Mike — Sun, 13 May 2007 02:54:04 +0000

The spammers promoting their new hosts here clearly didn’t do much research if they feel they made good choices.

By: Mike

Mike — Sun, 13 May 2007 02:52:37 +0000

You shouldn’t be complaining about lack of redundancy, unless someone is holding a gun to your head and telling you not to handle your own redundancy.

A few people complaining about it isn’t a reason for DH to buy two of everything and double the prices for everyone.

Get a second hosting account. Get an account at dnsmadeeasy.com for about $20/year. There you go… redundancy.

If you’re not willing to pay that little amount, it’s not important to you. But, as cheap as it is, I’m not willing to pay double for my hosting plan because someone else wants it.

Also, some of you are complaining about it like all other hosts offer it. They don’t. Many don’t even offer a nice backup system like DH.

For true redundancy, not only are you asking DH to buy two of everything, but you’re asking them to run two different data centers.

Like backups, there’s no reason to push redundancy off on your host.

By: whiner

whiner — Sun, 13 May 2007 00:48:50 +0000

Matthew and Matt (if you’re not the same guy) - Dude(s) - the panel is REQUIRED. DH needs it to do their work so of all the systems hosted by DH it is the one that should be clustered and configured with failover. It’s their LIFEBLOOD. It’s how people sign up and how customers stay happy. Especially when there is NO ALTERNATIVE WAY TO CONTACT SUPPORT.

My statement that the panel was not available had not a damn thing to do with customer sites and if I can’t retrieve information because a DB’s borked (see newly posted message by DH), dood - that qualifies as DOWN. I NEVER report an issue until I’ve duplicated it multiple times (it’s the software QA background in me).

For 8$ a month, I’m happy that it’s up MOST of the time. But the panel had better be available as much as possible (and I KNOW that DH wants the panel up 2x more than I do).

No need to protect DH from me - what we need to do is make sure to protect DH from itself. It’d be a shame for the whole thing to implode on itself. We’d all be stuck on windows boxes. Yech.

By: Matt Van Dusen

Matt Van Dusen — Sun, 13 May 2007 00:37:50 +0000

Those of you whining about lack of redundancy: Think about this.

Suppose you wanted to set up a webserver with similar capabilities as DreamHost currently provides for it’s L1 customers (7.95/mo.). Well, I suppose first you’d have to plunk down a few g’s for redundant OC-3 lines. Then you’d need to hook those into redundant routers (and I’m not talking about the Linksys routers ya get for 50 bucks at Target, now). Then you’d have to build a server, give it redundant EVERYTHING. Then of course you need another one. Probably need offsite DNS and email servers. Maybe you even build yourself a redundant international high-speed internet backbone, in case your provider goes down. Of course redundant UPS and redundant generators are a must-have.

This does not come at $7.95/mo for your sites.

By: Justin S

Justin S — Sun, 13 May 2007 00:24:40 +0000

it worked for about 10 seconds, 1/2 an hour ago, and then went back to timing out, and still has not been fixed! aaa i need my website! please fix!

By: Matthew

Matthew — Sun, 13 May 2007 00:15:42 +0000

The panel is not down.

A cluster does not imply redundancy.. it implies a group of servers which are independant of other clusters. You don’t seem to understand that to have duplication of every single machine that DH owns would at the very least DOUBLE your fees.

Machines go down. Hardware failures are not the fault of DH. Their response times to fix said broken hardware is excellent.

If you are basing what host to choose based on this blog then it should be a positive part of DH; being fully open and forward about failures and system status’s. It’s been less than 20 minutes from this post being created to the second update being made