Date: Thu, 27 May 1999 02:14:56 +1000 From: Andrew <mynet@uq.net.au> To: Alex Heiphetz <heiphetz@cvzoom.net> Cc: "freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG" <freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: 100% dependability/failsafe/security/hardware Message-ID: <374C1E00.3980FFF1@uq.net.au> References: <374AC435.15C6C178@echidna.com> <3.0.6.32.19990526100019.00920c20@cvzoom.net>
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Those "fault tolerant" computers generally run custom unix variants made by the manufacturer of the system. As for firewall software I would be inclined to use ipfw rather than some commercial one. At least that way you know its probably going to work well and not have many bugs or loopholes. While the commercial ones may sound great with heaps of bells and whistles you don't really know how good they really are?. In saying that I haven't actually used any of the commercial ones so I may be wrong. Raid 1 would be a good idea that way if a hard drive dies then its not a problem. I think Mylex would be a good choice for a raid manufacturer as they specialize in them and wcarchive uses one. As for "acceptable downtime" well I guess it comes down to budget and staff. Obviously the answer would be as little as possible. But not many people can afford fault tolerant systems like the one at the german weather center or having a whole team of support staff siting in a server room 24/7 watching the servers. The best solution I can see would be to have total duplication where you have a hot standby server that can take over automatically if the main one has a problem. Andrew Alex Heiphetz wrote: > Thanks to all who replied to my original post. > Please, see below.... > At 01:46 AM 5/26/99 +0200, Juergen Nickelsen wrote: > >--On Die, 25. Mai 1999 11:39 -0400 Graeme Tait <graeme@echidna.com> > >wrote: > >The goal should be, as you said, "acceptable downtime". > > That's part of the question. What would be "acceptable downtime" > for a financial service that, say, processes credit cards for other > web sites in real time? Honestly, I don't know. What are failsafe > requirements for this type of service? I probably should have > mentioned it beforehand, but that's what I'm looking for. > Also, nobody mentioned another part of the question: > "brand-name" firewall software vs. ipfw. I know ipfw, but have > no idea what "brand-name" firewall software offer that would > assure better security. > Also, any recommendations on RAID manufacturers? > Juergen Nickelsen in his first post mentioned that FreeBSD > won't run on that fantastic computer in the weather center. > What do they run? I have experience with SCO, HP-UX, Sun and > Linux :-) and I won't say that any of those is more robust or secure > than FreeBSD (given equal hardware "horsepower"). > > Thanks, I do appreciate your advice. > A.Heiphetz > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org > with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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