From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Apr 16 13:49:46 2003 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8E50B37B401 for ; Wed, 16 Apr 2003 13:49:46 -0700 (PDT) Received: from postal3.es.net (postoffice3.gridpma.com [198.128.3.207]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D018A43FB1 for ; Wed, 16 Apr 2003 13:49:45 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from oberman@es.net) Received: from ptavv.es.net ([198.128.4.29]) by postal3.es.net (Postal Node 3) with ESMTP id MUA74016; Wed, 16 Apr 2003 13:49:44 -0700 Received: from ptavv (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by ptavv.es.net (Tachyon Server) with ESMTP id A2ABB5D04; Wed, 16 Apr 2003 13:49:43 -0700 (PDT) To: Dan Nelson In-Reply-To: Message from Dan Nelson <20030415211509.GB6846@dan.emsphone.com> Date: Wed, 16 Apr 2003 13:49:43 -0700 From: "Kevin Oberman" Message-Id: <20030416204943.A2ABB5D04@ptavv.es.net> cc: questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: FreeBSD clustering X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 16 Apr 2003 20:49:46 -0000 > Date: Tue, 15 Apr 2003 16:15:11 -0500 > From: Dan Nelson > > In the last episode (Apr 15), Kevin Oberman said: > > > > Is there any FreeBSD support for clustering? I know several > > > > companies make cluster controllers for Linux systems, but I have > > > > no idea if anyone has looked into whether these could be used > > > > with FreeBSD. > > > > > > What exactly do you mean by "clustering"? > > > > > > There are different resource available, depening on what network > > > service you need to cluster. mod_backhand for Apache allows > > > multiple web servers to act as one (for example) > > > > > > Last I looked, everything that I found available for Linux was also > > > available for FreeBSD, but it's been a little while since I've > > > explored the concept of "processing farms". > > > > > > If you state what you're trying to accomplish, it will give folks a > > > better idea of how to answer. > > > > We are looking at cluster as a high availability compute box for > > statistical analysis. Our stats guy thinks having a cluster that he > > can send different bits of the data analysis would be an excellent > > solution as his operations are quite atomic. > > Take a look at ports/net/mpich or net/pvm, which are libraries that let > you coordinate programs running on different machines. They're mainly > meant for parallel computing as opposed to fault tolerant clusters > though. > > > My boss has also suggested that is might be suitable for our DNS > > servers as they need to be very high availability, but this would be > > of secondary importance. > > DNS is already "clustered"; just set up multiple slave servers. Thanks, Dan. But I guess what I am looking for is MOSIX-like capability to move processes between systems to balance the load. As far as I know nothing like this is available for FreeBSD. I was hoping someone else knew better, a distinct possibility since I'm a routing guy and my knowledge of this stuff is limited. (I hope this explains my poor explanation of what I was looking for.) As far as I can tell, doing anything like this would require kernel mods, one reason I thought it a bit unlikely. R. Kevin Oberman, Network Engineer Energy Sciences Network (ESnet) Ernest O. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) E-mail: oberman@es.net Phone: +1 510 486-8634