[isf-wifidog] Server Capacity Question

[Benoit Grégoire]

On 24 January 2008, Andrew wrote:
> Hi List-
>
> I have about 160 active nodes running on a dedicated server (P3, 1G RAM,
> Fedora 6). I keep running out of RAM and Apache seems to spawn many
> processes during peak usage. Does anyone have a rule of thumb or a
> recommendation on the amount of server resources required by 1, 10, 100
> nodes?

The main performance impacting factor is the content you deliver.  Second is 
the number  of concurrent users, not nodes.  But the actual authentication 
requiremets are pretty minimal and quite optimized.

Before you check anything else, make sure you read "My auth server used to be 
fast, but now it's slower and slower, even under no load" in the FAQ.  More 
often than not that's the explanation to performance problems.  But if your 
server has going on a long time without proper VACUUMING, even VACUUM FULL 
may not cut it.  In that case, you may want to shutdown apache, and run the 
vacuum_last_resort_backup_restore_database.sh in the SQL folder.

If that's not your problem, you may need a bigger machine.  If the problem is 
that your content delivery scenario is too complex, you'll likely benefit 
mostly from more CPU.  If your content delivery scenario is simple, RAM and 
faster disks is likely to help you most.


-- 
Benoit Grégoire
Technologies Coeus inc.