freebsd announce - Dec 1995 - Second appeal for sup, CTM, mail and www servers. Please help!

First the good news:

We've decided, after much internal debate, to re-open general read
access to the CVS repository.  Yes, you heard that correctly - no more
access lists for getting at the CVS bits, we're opening the doors.

Not only will we open the doors, in fact, but we will also probably
deploy a few extra services for getting at this information in various
interesting ways, including the clever little "check out over anon
FTP" feature that OpenBSD is using and probably a few other WWW based
search/diff tools as well (contributions welcome here, BTW).


Now the bad news:

We don't have the resources to actually deploy any of these services
from freefall.freebsd.org.

We're truly maxed out here folks.  Not only is our poor machine
handling almost hallucinogenic amounts of mail these days, but it is
also dealing with the load of many thousands of web hits, 10 sup
clients pounding it almost continuously and a CTM delta generation job
from hell that causes the lights in the machine room to dim noticeably
whenever it runs.

Now if this machine were just sitting in a corner beating its brains
out, nobody would actually even care.  Unfortunately, it's instead
supposed to be our main development box, an as such is used by many
interactive users.  When CVS operations and such are slow on it, all
FreeBSD development is adversely impacted.

Therefore, in order to continue to offer even the existing level of
services, we are simply going to have to start looking at how to
offload some of this stuff from our machine.  We can't go on like this
and still offer any kind of reasonable service to our users.

What we most desperately need are sup servers who can provide:

	a) At least 300-400MB of free space.
	b) A reasonably fast (and uncongested) internet connection
	c) Connectivity for *at least* 20 sup clients.

That last clause is actually important only if you will be supping
directly from freefall.  Since it would obviously defeat the purpose
to see freefall sink under the load of dozens of mirrors, we'd like to
limit the number of direct mirrors to 6 sites.  This will allow us to
service the mirrors and the core team directly from freefall without
going beyond our current limit of 10 (and hopefully not see them maxed
out all the time!).  If a sup server decides to export bits to some
other sup server, that's fine just so long as they're well connected
and won't end up with some server offering out-of-date bits to an
unsuspecting user base.

We'd also be happy if a site providing sup access for CVS could at
least be NFS mountable (if not the same machine) for a WWW server
which could, at some point, provide the same fancy lookup tools as
provided on freefall.freebsd.org.

Sits willing to do CTM delta generation as well would also probably be
a big help, though you'll have to ask Poul-Henning Kamp
<phk@freebsd.org> for more direct assistance in setting up such
mirrors.  If we could move the CTM delta generation off of freefall
entirely at some point then that would be another big load reduction.

Please don't misunderstand me: This is a fairly big committment, and
it would not be honest of me if I failed to point out that sup and CTM
services WILL impose a significant overhead on any machine assigned to
the task!  I'm primarily looking for people at universities or ISPs
who have the hardware and network bandwidth to spare, not someone for
whom the service will quickly become a significant hardship.


Again, we're very close to being able to make the CVS repository
available for generally access again, but we just can't do it from
freefall.  We don't have the resources!

Thanks very much in advance to anyone willing to help us out here..

					Jordan

Apparently, "Jordan K. Hubbard" scribbled:
> First the good news:
> 
> We've decided, after much internal debate, to re-open general read
> access to the CVS repository.  Yes, you heard that correctly - no more
> access lists for getting at the CVS bits, we're opening the doors.
Cool!
> Now the bad news:
>
> We don't have the resources to actually deploy any of these services
> from freefall.freebsd.org.
Stupid question:  Is this just a matter of "donated machine" or
is it more than that (bandwidth) too?  Would another machine next
door to freefall be a valid approach?  In particular, freely speaking
for some of us (:-), I'd say many of us would be willing to chip in,
say, $20 to $100 (each!) towards a dedicated machine.  Would this
approach work to give freefall a buddy?

jdl

Hi,
We would like to help, I will consult the proper authorities on our 
campus, the main idea is that a computer reseller could offer us a big PC 
to build a public site. The cost for the computer company (Compaq, for 
example ) would be the same as a commercial banner, but it would be an 
interesting publicity, much like SUNSITEs.

We currently don`t have the bandwith to offer that type of services, but 
next year we expect to have a much better connection and an internal ATM 
network.

Keep up the faith, FreeBSD replicates very easily.

regards,
Pedro.
Universidad Nacional de Colombia

> First the good news:
> 
> We've decided, after much internal debate, to re-open general read
> access to the CVS repository.  Yes, you heard that correctly - no more
> access lists for getting at the CVS bits, we're opening the doors.
Yaay!
> Not only will we open the doors, in fact, but we will also probably
> deploy a few extra services for getting at this information in various
> interesting ways, including the clever little "check out over anon
> FTP" feature that OpenBSD is using and probably a few other WWW based
> search/diff tools as well (contributions welcome here, BTW).
Yaay!
> We don't have the resources to actually deploy any of these services
> from freefall.freebsd.org.
I can help here.
> We're truly maxed out here folks.  Not only is our poor machine
> handling almost hallucinogenic amounts of mail these days, but it is
> also dealing with the load of many thousands of web hits, 10 sup
> clients pounding it almost continuously and a CTM delta generation job
> from hell that causes the lights in the machine room to dim noticeably
> whenever it runs.
I have offered to do this on ftp.internat.freebsd.org and volunteer
it again. I have a volunteer with a "well-connected" machine who
can remail this for me. I suspect, though, that I will need more
remailers to make this work properly.  More volunteers? (Preferably
representing a country/region). The problem is internat.freebsd.org
does not have the bandwidth to mega-mail the world!
> Now if this machine were just sitting in a corner beating its brains
> out, nobody would actually even care.  Unfortunately, it's instead
> supposed to be our main development box, an as such is used by many
> interactive users.  When CVS operations and such are slow on it, all
> FreeBSD development is adversely impacted.
See above. ftp.internat.freebsd.org is your friend :-). The machine is
modest by your standards, (50MHZ 486 w/ 16MB RAM) but is idle 99% of the
time.
> Therefore, in order to continue to offer even the existing level of
> services, we are simply going to have to start looking at how to
> offload some of this stuff from our machine.  We can't go on like this
> and still offer any kind of reasonable service to our users.
> 
> What we most desperately need are sup servers who can provide:
> 
> 	a) At least 300-400MB of free space.
2GB? I've got it!
> 	b) A reasonably fast (and uncongested) internet connection
Through proxy remailers and ftp mirrors, should be OK.
> 	c) Connectivity for *at least* 20 sup clients.
Er, help?! The "well-connected" site I ewas referring to may be able
to
help here, but the line latency to ZA plays hell with SUP. Brings out the
worst in it. Any chances of doing some kind of FSP mirroring?
> That last clause is actually important only if you will be supping
> directly from freefall.  Since it would obviously defeat the purpose
> to see freefall sink under the load of dozens of mirrors, we'd like to
> limit the number of direct mirrors to 6 sites.  This will allow us to
> service the mirrors and the core team directly from freefall without
> going beyond our current limit of 10 (and hopefully not see them maxed
> out all the time!).  If a sup server decides to export bits to some
> other sup server, that's fine just so long as they're well
connected
> and won't end up with some server offering out-of-date bits to an
> unsuspecting user base.
Oh, right! I could probably take over ZA, and serve all of _that_ with
not too much of a problem!! :-)
> We'd also be happy if a site providing sup access for CVS could at
> least be NFS mountable (if not the same machine) for a WWW server
> which could, at some point, provide the same fancy lookup tools as
> provided on freefall.freebsd.org.
Hmm... I'll look around...
> Sits willing to do CTM delta generation as well would also probably be
> a big help, though you'll have to ask Poul-Henning Kamp
> <phk@freebsd.org> for more direct assistance in setting up such
> mirrors.  If we could move the CTM delta generation off of freefall
> entirely at some point then that would be another big load reduction.
I can do these. I am already doing these for the international
crypto code.  Remailers would be a massive help.
> Please don't misunderstand me: This is a fairly big committment, and
> it would not be honest of me if I failed to point out that sup and CTM
> services WILL impose a significant overhead on any machine assigned to
> the task!  I'm primarily looking for people at universities or ISPs
> who have the hardware and network bandwidth to spare, not someone for
> whom the service will quickly become a significant hardship.
I am a nework engineer for an ISP, and I have contacts at a couple of sites,
including a univerity or two. I'll ask around for those that I have not
already offered.
> Again, we're very close to being able to make the CVS repository
> available for generally access again, but we just can't do it from
> freefall.  We don't have the resources!
Count me in!
> Thanks very much in advance to anyone willing to help us out here..
:-) :-) :-)

M
--
Mark Murray
46 Harvey Rd, Claremont, Cape Town 7700, South Africa
+27 21 61-3768 GMT+0200
Finger mark@grumble.grondar.za for PGP key

Says Jordan:
> > First the good news:
> > We've decided, after much internal debate, to re-open general read
access
> > We don't have the resources to actually deploy any of these
services
> > from freefall.freebsd.org.
Says Mark Murray:
> I suspect, though, that I will need more
> remailers to make this work properly.  More volunteers? 
...
> Any chances of doing some kind of FSP mirroring?
I have an ISP willing to donate space and cpu-time on a machine (he's
sitting on a T1 off MCI backbone). Problem is that I do not have the
time to do the setup. If anyone out there can donate the time to get this
site set up, then we can get rolling.

Email me.

-coranth

------------------------------------------+------------------------+
Coranth Gryphon <gryphon@healer.com>      |  "Faith Manages."   
|
                                          |       - Satai Delenn   |
Phone: 603-598-3440   Fax: 603-598-0797   +------------------------+
USMail: 3 Hansom Drive, Merrimack, NH  03054
Disclaimer: All these words are yours, except Europa...

> Says Jordan:
> > > First the good news:
> > > We've decided, after much internal debate, to re-open general
read access
> 
> > > We don't have the resources to actually deploy any of these
services
> > > from freefall.freebsd.org.
> 
> Says Mark Murray:
> > I suspect, though, that I will need more
> > remailers to make this work properly.  More volunteers? 
> ...
> > Any chances of doing some kind of FSP mirroring?
> 
> I have an ISP willing to donate space and cpu-time on a machine (he's
> sitting on a T1 off MCI backbone). Problem is that I do not have the
> time to do the setup. If anyone out there can donate the time to get this
> site set up, then we can get rolling.
I have ZERO experience in setting up mail exploders. Here is a volunteer
offering his site. What next? Jordan - Who is FreeBSD's expert? Justin?

M
--
Mark Murray
46 Harvey Rd, Claremont, Cape Town 7700, South Africa
+27 21 61-3768 GMT+0200
Finger mark@grumble.grondar.za for PGP key

> > I have offered to do this on ftp.internat.freebsd.org and volunteer
> > it again. I have a volunteer with a "well-connected" machine
who
> > can remail this for me. I suspect, though, that I will need more
> > remailers to make this work properly.  More volunteers? (Preferably
> > representing a country/region). The problem is internat.freebsd.org
> > does not have the bandwidth to mega-mail the world!
> 
> I think that I can use one of my mail gateways as a remailer for some
> of the lists.  Let me know...  I'd be happy to represent the Penn State
> region of the world.  :-)
Cool! I will most likely only have one or two lists, serving CTM binaries.
Thanks a ton!

M
--
Mark Murray
46 Harvey Rd, Claremont, Cape Town 7700, South Africa
+27 21 61-3768 GMT+0200
Finger mark@grumble.grondar.za for PGP key