Mongrel users - May 2006 - Output Compression in Mongrel?

I''d like to implement output compression in Mongrel (ala
Apache''s
mod_deflate). I have found a Rails plugin that, with minor modification,
works.

Is there even an advantage to moving the output compression from the Rails
app to a Mongrel handler?

Unless, of course, someone knows how to configure mod_proxy_balancer with
mod_deflate...

=Will Green
Web Developer & IT Coordinator, URS Creative Imaging
http://www.urscreativeimaging.com/

On May 10, 2006, at 2:52 PM, Will_Green at URSCorp.com
wrote:
> I''d like to implement output compression in Mongrel (ala
Apache''s
> mod_deflate). I have found a Rails plugin that, with minor  
> modification,
> works.
>
> Is there even an advantage to moving the output compression from  
> the Rails
> app to a Mongrel handler?
>
> Unless, of course, someone knows how to configure  
> mod_proxy_balancer with
> mod_deflate...
I don''t know of an issue with mod_deflate and mod_proxy_balancer.

http://pipeboost.com/getreport.asp?URL=https://jason.strongspace.com/ 
login/

How are you configuring it now?

Regards, J

??????????????????????????????
Jason A. Hoffman, PhD
Founder, CTO, Joyent Inc.

Email: jason at joyent.com
Email: jason at textdrive.com
Mobile: (858)342-2179
AIM: jxh at mac.com
??????????????????????????????

> I don''t know of an issue with mod_deflate and mod_proxy_balancer.
> http://pipeboost.com/getreport.asp?URL=https://jason.strongspace.com/
> login/
> How are you configuring it now?
I have mod_deflate loaded for the entire server.  I then have the
following:

  <Proxy balancer://cyapm>
    BalancerMember http://127.0.0.1:8100
    BalancerMember http://127.0.0.1:8101
    BalancerMember http://127.0.0.1:8102
    BalancerMember http://127.0.0.1:8103
    BalancerMember http://127.0.0.1:8104
  </Proxy>

  RewriteEngine On
  RewriteLog "logs/rewrite_log"

  RewriteRule ^/timesheets$ balancer://cyapm/timesheets/   [proxy]

  RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME}
(engine_files|images|javascripts|stylesheets)/(.*)$
  RewriteRule ^/timesheets/(.*)$ balancer://cyapm/$1   [proxy]

  # Punt any pontential 404s to the proxy
  RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} ^/timesheets/.*
  RewriteCond %{DOCUMENT_ROOT}/%{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
  RewriteRule ^/(.*)$ balancer://cyapm/$1   [proxy]


If I access one of the mongrels directly, I get compressed output (4k),
with the "Content-Encoding: gzip" and "Vary:
Accept-Encoding" headers set .
Accessing the app through Apache gets me zero compression (40k), with no
"Content-Encoding" header, and "Vary:
Accept-Encoding,User-Agent" . I use
LiveHTTPHeaders in Firefox to see this. I suspect that Apache is not
passing the "Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate" headers through the
balancer to
the mongrels, thus the compression is not kicking in.

Any thoughts?

=Will Green
Web Developer & IT Coordinator, URS Creative Imaging
http://www.urscreativeimaging.com/
7650 West Courtney Campbell Causeway
Suite 700
Tampa, FL 33607
813.675.6849 (direct)
813.286.1711 (main)

                                                                              
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