Gluster users - Dec 2016 - Very slow writes through Samba mount to Gluster with crypt on

Hi,

We have Glusterfs 3.8.7 with the crypt translator enabled on Ubuntu 16.04
with Samba 4.3.11. With or without the VFS module enabled, files dropped
through an SMB mount from a Windows workstation are painfully slow -- a
minute for a file that transfers in several seconds through a
similarly-configured Samba to a plain filesystem. 

Glusterfs mounts accept file transfers far more quickly. But with Samba, the
response of staff has been "We can't use this." There's no
speed advantage
in this use for the VFS module either, surprisingly. 

Is there some known formula for getting performance out of this stack, or is
Samba with Glusterfs with encryption-at-rest just not that workable a
proposition for now?

Thanks,
Whit

> Is there some known formula for getting performance out of this stack, or
is
> Samba with Glusterfs with encryption-at-rest just not that workable a
> proposition for now?
I think it's very likely that the combination you describe is not workable.
The crypt translator became an orphan years ago, when the author left a
highly idiosyncratic blob of code and practically no tests behind.  Nobody
has tried to promote it since then, and "at your own risk" has been
the
answer for anyone who asks.  If you found it in the source tree and
decided to give it a try, I'm sorry.  Even though it's based in large
part
on work I had done for HekaFS, I personally wouldn't trust it to keep my
data correctly let alone securely.

On Tue, Dec 20, 2016 at 10:32:17AM -0500, Jeff Darcy
wrote:
> > Is there some known formula for getting performance out of this stack,
or is
> > Samba with Glusterfs with encryption-at-rest just not that workable a
> > proposition for now?
> 
> I think it's very likely that the combination you describe is not
workable.
> The crypt translator became an orphan years ago, when the author left a
> highly idiosyncratic blob of code and practically no tests behind.  Nobody
> has tried to promote it since then, and "at your own risk" has
been the
> answer for anyone who asks.  If you found it in the source tree and
> decided to give it a try, I'm sorry.  Even though it's based in
large part
> on work I had done for HekaFS, I personally wouldn't trust it to keep
my
> data correctly let alone securely.
Jeff,

Thanks for straightening me out. I didn't find it in the source tree. I
happened on documentation here, which seemed to imply this was a current
project as of 2015:

https://github.com/gluster/glusterfs-specs/blob/master/done/GlusterFS%203.5/Disk%20Encryption.md

And those instructions work for Gluster as provide from the Ubuntu PPA at 

https://launchpad.net/~gluster/+archive/ubuntu/glusterfs-3.8

which is of course an "unsupported" version -- if commonly used with
Ubuntu.
Curious that it includes an orphan translator.

Best,
Whit