Date: Mon, 20 Sep 1999 14:04:50 -0700 (PDT) From: Doug <Doug@gorean.org> To: Kip Macy <kip@lyris.com> Cc: Dag-Erling Smorgrav <des@flood.ping.uio.no>, Joao Carlos <jcarlos@bahianet.com.br>, hitech@bahianet.com.br, chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Out of mbuf clusters Message-ID: <Pine.BSF.4.10.9909201353360.5712-100000@dt014nb6.san.rr.com> In-Reply-To: <Pine.SOL.4.05.9909201137450.25063-100000@luna>
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[Re-directed to -chat since none of the 3(!) lists were appropriate]
On Mon, 20 Sep 1999, Kip Macy wrote:
> Here is where your philosophy diverges from many others -- I and I believe
> many others think that a server operating system should at least be robust
> out of the box.
You have a fundamental flaw in your logic here, and in most of the
other sentences in this post. Namely, you fail to adequately define the
problem domain that you're proposing freebsd as a solution for. More
precisely, a server OS should be robust _for what application_ out of the
box?
> Neither Linux nor Solaris is vulnerable to running out of
> mbufs as a result of malicious code. I don't think FreeBSD should be
> either.
So, how many mbuf clusters should freebsd assign in a default
configuration, and how will you justify the massive amount of ram (massive
relative to other kernel structures) that they will consume? Before you
answer, keep in mind that I can direct an attack against your box that
will easily consume more than 15,000 mbuf's without even breathing hard.
(BTW, you're also wrong about linux and solaris not being vulnerable to
high server load problems out of the box.)
> This is in no way a rant against FreeBSD, but rather a rant against the
> attitude that one needs to know about OS internals to run a lightweight
> server.
As someone else already pointed out, you don't need to know the OS
internals to run a lightweight server. You DO need to know them to run a
heavyweight server, or in the case of the original poster to run a clone
flooding script designed to take down a heavyweight server. You cannot
define a default configuration that will be perfect for every use. It's
simply not possible.
> If all of core insisted that Joe User had to know about internals
> to use FreeBSD as a server, FreeBSD would be little more than a hobbyist
> OS,
But -core has stated explicitly that freebsd IS a hobbyist OS. I
believe Jordan's exact words were that, "FreeBSD is a vanity OS by and for
the developers." The fact that it's also useful for doing productive
things is purely an accident, resulting from the fact that the hobbyists
involved like to spend their time doing productive things.
> rather than what it is -- the best OS currently available.
Once again, this whole thesis is just plain silly. FreeBSD is not
the best OS available for every possible application. It happens to be a
really good OS for a lot of things, in fact I ran what was at the time the
largest IRC server in the world on a freebsd machine. However my success
came from long hours of learning about how the OS works, combined with a
lot of help from knowledgeable people. A lot of what we learned is in the
base system now, but I can pretty much guarantee you that it won't set any
records for high performance servers "out of the box."
Doug
--
"My mama told me, my mama said, 'don't cry.' She said, 'you're too young a man
to have as many women you got.' I looked at my mother dear and didn't even
crack a smile. I said, 'If women kill me, I don't mind dyin!'"
- John Belushi as "Joliet" Jake Blues, "I Don't Know"
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