Hey guys, Since the wine.budgetdedicated.com server was down all weekend, I thought I'd offer an additional mirror location. I currently mirror several major linux distributions, and would love to contribute to something as valuable to the community as the wine project is. My site currently runs around 3500GB per month, so a few hundred GB worth of transfer shouldn't make much difference. I've never set up an apt mirror, but with some instruction and googling, I bet I can do it. At the very least, I can mirror the package archive just incase the main site goes down. Let me know how I can help. -Marty Cannon amarillolinux.com
Marty Cannon wrote:
Hey guys, Since the wine.budgetdedicated.com <http://wine.budgetdedicated.com> server was down all weekend, I thought I'd offer an additional mirror location. I currently mirror several major linux distributions, and would love to contribute to something as valuable to the community as the wine project is. My site currently runs around 3500GB per month, so a few hundred GB worth of transfer shouldn't make much difference. I've never set up an apt mirror, but with some instruction and googling, I bet I can do it. At the very least, I can mirror the package archive just incase the main site goes down. Let me know how I can help.
-Marty Cannon amarillolinux.com <http://amarillolinux.com>
It should be up for good now, so this won't be necessary. Please note that the outage was my fault rather than budgetdedicated's -- I had a cron script that kept chewing up memory without my realizing it, eventually crashing apache. I've migrated everything now and it should be taken care of. Thanks, Scott Ritchie
On Tue, Sep 1, 2009 at 2:52 PM, Scott Ritchie<scott(a)open-vote.org> wrote:
Marty Cannon wrote:
Hey guys, Since the wine.budgetdedicated.com <http://wine.budgetdedicated.com> server was down all weekend, I thought I'd offer an additional mirror location. I currently mirror several major linux distributions, and would love to contribute to something as valuable to the community as the wine project is. My site currently runs around 3500GB per month, so a few hundred GB worth of transfer shouldn't make much difference. I've never set up an apt mirror, but with some instruction and googling, I bet I can do it. At the very least, I can mirror the package archive just incase the main site goes down. Let me know how I can help.
-Marty Cannon amarillolinux.com <http://amarillolinux.com>
It should be up for good now, so this won't be necessary.
Please note that the outage was my fault rather than budgetdedicated's -- I had a cron script that kept chewing up memory without my realizing it, eventually crashing apache.
I've migrated everything now and it should be taken care of.
Thanks, Scott Ritchie
Since when is a mirror a bad thing? -- -Austin
Austin English wrote:
On Tue, Sep 1, 2009 at 2:52 PM, Scott Ritchie<scott(a)open-vote.org> wrote:
Marty Cannon wrote:
Hey guys, Since the wine.budgetdedicated.com <http://wine.budgetdedicated.com> server was down all weekend, I thought I'd offer an additional mirror location. I currently mirror several major linux distributions, and would love to contribute to something as valuable to the community as the wine project is. My site currently runs around 3500GB per month, so a few hundred GB worth of transfer shouldn't make much difference. I've never set up an apt mirror, but with some instruction and googling, I bet I can do it. At the very least, I can mirror the package archive just incase the main site goes down. Let me know how I can help.
-Marty Cannon amarillolinux.com <http://amarillolinux.com>
It should be up for good now, so this won't be necessary.
Please note that the outage was my fault rather than budgetdedicated's -- I had a cron script that kept chewing up memory without my realizing it, eventually crashing apache.
I've migrated everything now and it should be taken care of.
Thanks, Scott Ritchie
Since when is a mirror a bad thing?
It isn't, of course, however it can't replace the role of apt server (which would require users to manually alter their sources.list file). So mirror the archive page, sure, but it'll still be a big problem when it's down. Thanks, Scott Ritchie
2009/9/2 Scott Ritchie <scott(a)open-vote.org>:
Austin English wrote:
Since when is a mirror a bad thing?
It isn't, of course, however it can't replace the role of apt server (which would require users to manually alter their sources.list file).
Just like how they have to alter their sources.list to get to budgetdedicated in the first place? The point is that they have a backup solution for when the main apt server is down. Note that Debian mirrors are apt mirrors and are occasionally out of sync - c'est la vie - and the installer actually asks you what mirror you want to use so it can configure sources.list.
So mirror the archive page, sure, but it'll still be a big problem when it's down.
Apt mirror is the way to go.
Ben Klein wrote:
2009/9/2 Scott Ritchie <scott(a)open-vote.org>:
Austin English wrote:
Since when is a mirror a bad thing?
It isn't, of course, however it can't replace the role of apt server (which would require users to manually alter their sources.list file).
Just like how they have to alter their sources.list to get to budgetdedicated in the first place? The point is that they have a backup solution for when the main apt server is down.
Note that Debian mirrors are apt mirrors and are occasionally out of sync - c'est la vie - and the installer actually asks you what mirror you want to use so it can configure sources.list.
The budgetdedicated actually was mirrored for a while (using nslookup round-robin redirection) and it created a bunch of problems. It's more reliable to just have a mirror of the archive page and let people install manually in the case that it's offline, since I seriously don't expect another outage like this again. Then the manual install will be updated automagically on the next release when the server comes back up. It was only offline for the whole weekend because I was physically out of town away from the internet and genuinely unaware of it. I should probably give someone my phone number so they can text me if needed. Thanks, Scott Ritchie
2009/9/2 Scott Ritchie <scott(a)open-vote.org>:
Ben Klein wrote:
2009/9/2 Scott Ritchie <scott(a)open-vote.org>:
Austin English wrote:
Since when is a mirror a bad thing?
It isn't, of course, however it can't replace the role of apt server (which would require users to manually alter their sources.list file).
Just like how they have to alter their sources.list to get to budgetdedicated in the first place? The point is that they have a backup solution for when the main apt server is down.
Note that Debian mirrors are apt mirrors and are occasionally out of sync - c'est la vie - and the installer actually asks you what mirror you want to use so it can configure sources.list.
The budgetdedicated actually was mirrored for a while (using nslookup round-robin redirection) and it created a bunch of problems.
So don't do nslookup round-robin redirection. It's silly for mirrors. The point of a mirror is you have a completely distinct server somewhere else that provides the same data, thus creating data security. If the main server is down, the mirror can be accessed - but yes, it has to be explicitly accessed (by a modified sources.list in an apt mirror).
It's more reliable to just have a mirror of the archive page and let people install manually in the case that it's offline, since I seriously don't expect another outage like this again. Then the manual install will be updated automagically on the next release when the server comes back up.
You don't need to tell me about versioning in apt :P but it won't be more reliable to mirror only the archives and not the apt server. If you mirror the full apt repository, then you get load sharing. If you only mirror the archives, then the mirror is only used by people who know and can be bothered to install manually.
It was only offline for the whole weekend because I was physically out of town away from the internet and genuinely unaware of it. I should probably give someone my phone number so they can text me if needed.
I don't mean to offend, but you seem a bit possessive about the apt repository.
Ben Klein wrote:
2009/9/2 Scott Ritchie <scott(a)open-vote.org>:
Ben Klein wrote:
2009/9/2 Scott Ritchie <scott(a)open-vote.org>:
Austin English wrote:
Since when is a mirror a bad thing?
It isn't, of course, however it can't replace the role of apt server (which would require users to manually alter their sources.list file). Just like how they have to alter their sources.list to get to budgetdedicated in the first place? The point is that they have a backup solution for when the main apt server is down.
Note that Debian mirrors are apt mirrors and are occasionally out of sync - c'est la vie - and the installer actually asks you what mirror you want to use so it can configure sources.list.
The budgetdedicated actually was mirrored for a while (using nslookup round-robin redirection) and it created a bunch of problems.
So don't do nslookup round-robin redirection. It's silly for mirrors. The point of a mirror is you have a completely distinct server somewhere else that provides the same data, thus creating data security. If the main server is down, the mirror can be accessed - but yes, it has to be explicitly accessed (by a modified sources.list in an apt mirror).
I do keep a local mirror of all the content, and as of now I actually have two separate budgetdedicated servers hosting the data (wine.budgetdedicated.com and wineold.budgetdedicated.com). More doesn't hurt, of course.
It's more reliable to just have a mirror of the archive page and let people install manually in the case that it's offline, since I seriously don't expect another outage like this again. Then the manual install will be updated automagically on the next release when the server comes back up.
You don't need to tell me about versioning in apt :P but it won't be more reliable to mirror only the archives and not the apt server. If you mirror the full apt repository, then you get load sharing. If you only mirror the archives, then the mirror is only used by people who know and can be bothered to install manually.
Sure, it doesn't hurt to mirror the apt archive too, but I'm not sure how much actual load balancing is going to happen at this point since it will require a manual change on each user. Once Karmic comes out in 2 months, new users will be pointed to the PPA instead. I could also point Jaunty and earlier users there as well, albeit with longer instructions.
It was only offline for the whole weekend because I was physically out of town away from the internet and genuinely unaware of it. I should probably give someone my phone number so they can text me if needed.
I don't mean to offend, but you seem a bit possessive about the apt repository.
I want to phase it out and get rid of it. Funny kind of possessiveness ;) Thanks, Scott Ritchie
Scott Ritchie wrote:
Marty Cannon wrote:
Hey guys, Since the wine.budgetdedicated.com <http://wine.budgetdedicated.com> server was down all weekend, I thought I'd offer an additional mirror location.
It should be up for good now, so this won't be necessary. Isn't that what you said last time? <g>
That's why it's called a mirror not the primary distribution point. More mirrors - less load on one server, less chances we'll have lots of unhappy users because they can't get the best software in the world <g> My understanding there isn't anything special about apt repository mirroring, they are just files & directories under some URI. Vitaliy.
Vitaliy Margolen wrote:
Scott Ritchie wrote:
Marty Cannon wrote:
Hey guys, Since the wine.budgetdedicated.com <http://wine.budgetdedicated.com> server was down all weekend, I thought I'd offer an additional mirror location. It should be up for good now, so this won't be necessary. Isn't that what you said last time? <g>
That's why it's called a mirror not the primary distribution point. More mirrors - less load on one server, less chances we'll have lots of unhappy users because they can't get the best software in the world <g>
My understanding there isn't anything special about apt repository mirroring, they are just files & directories under some URI.
It is, however smartly directing traffic between the two servers is a problem. If some requests go to one server and some to the other, then they have to be in sync all the time (even a few minutes for rsync to catch up will result in lots of scary "invalid signature" errors for users). This means you need a smart load balancing server at the front end that knows when each mirror behind it is up or down and redirects traffic accordingly. I don't think it's worth bothering to set that up, as my medium term plan is to migrate users to a real Launchpad PPA for Ubuntu 9.10. In 9.10, it'll actually be much easier to add PPAs (and their unique key), so I can cut the instructions on the download page dramatically. Launchpad has that sophisticated mirroring infrastructure already. Thanks, Scott Ritchie
2009/9/2 Scott Ritchie <scott(a)open-vote.org>:
I don't think it's worth bothering to set that up, as my medium term plan is to migrate users to a real Launchpad PPA for Ubuntu 9.10. In 9.10, it'll actually be much easier to add PPAs (and their unique key), so I can cut the instructions on the download page dramatically. Launchpad has that sophisticated mirroring infrastructure already.
Oh yes,that's the obvious answer :-) I assume you'll still be putting Debian builds on wine.budgetdedicated.com? (Or can Debian feed from an Ubuntu PPA as well?) - d.
2009/9/2 David Gerard <dgerard(a)gmail.com>:
2009/9/2 Scott Ritchie <scott(a)open-vote.org>:
I don't think it's worth bothering to set that up, as my medium term plan is to migrate users to a real Launchpad PPA for Ubuntu 9.10. In 9.10, it'll actually be much easier to add PPAs (and their unique key), so I can cut the instructions on the download page dramatically. Launchpad has that sophisticated mirroring infrastructure already.
Oh yes,that's the obvious answer :-) I assume you'll still be putting Debian builds on wine.budgetdedicated.com? (Or can Debian feed from an Ubuntu PPA as well?)
Scott's not doing the Debian packages any more; that's my job (with Maurilio providing the space for the repository and archives). I'd welcome a Debian package apt mirror, but I don't think Debian likes PPA.
participants (6)
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Austin English -
Ben Klein -
David Gerard -
Marty Cannon -
Scott Ritchie -
Vitaliy Margolen