Dolphin Cluster?

Hey Guys,

Im wondering if the following setup will work for load balancing my doplhin install or if i need something else. My web host does not offer a managed service to load balance traffic for me, but i get free usage between servers in their datacenter. Ok onto the point

What id like top know is, can i have 3 servers. 1 as a database server (lets call it db1.xyz.com) and 2 front end web servers using Round robin DNS. lets call them ws1 and ws2.xyz.com. They both have dolphin installed and are connected to the database server on db1.xyz.com using MySQL. All servers are running Centos fully patched. 

I do have mods in dolphin, if i copy the contents of all web files to both servers, setup rsync between them and point both servers to the database on db1.xyz.com. Will it work to load balance traffic, or does dolphin not allow for this setup. If they dont, can anyone procide some examples of the best way to achieve load balancing in this situation. All servers are in the same Data Center and all servers are dedicated servers runniong xeon cores. 

Thanks all!

I have not been using this software long however, I do believe you can have the following, 
 
 
 
WEBSERVER1 = Dolphin installed and running 
 
Then you can have, 
 
DATABASE Server = Running webserver 1 database 
 
 
 
Maybe someone else can provide a better solution however, I do believe your going around this the wrong way. 
 
 
 
For example, Everyone in these communities just like joomla etc... is always trying to get the software to spread among other servers due to load etc... 
 
 
 
I would suggest you make the servers act around the software for example, Cloud-Computing and Vitalization. 
 
 
 
This would be a more prolonged solution so when your site does get extremely busy you can just add more servers to your cloud. I won't lie to you it's a big job, but this is how we have things setup. 
 
 
 
Best Regards, 
 
Lee 

When I first started using Dolphin way back when, I remember them talking about their "clustering architecture" - which was supposed to help with scalability.  I didn't really understand it technically that well, but it sounded like a good idea, but I have never heard about it since.   Is this something Dolphin does?

You can take a look this: http://www.boonex.com/trac/dolphin/wiki/DolphinCluster

I believe those cluster instructions are for D6. The paths to all the media storage directories are different for D7.

Yes, I see it is for D6, can he just rewrite the paths for D7?

Hi all, 

Thanks for that page, i have looked over it, however i dont think it is really the best option for me.

I could see its potential with many web servers, i only need 2. So my question still stands but i will modify slightly. Is it possible to install dolphin on one server, then copy the contents of the web accessible directory to the other, rsync them nightly so they are up to date as things change (all changes being made to the same server that the install took place on) and have both connected to a common database on db1.xyz.com

Thanks all

It is better to determine most loaded part. In most cases it is database. So most probably you need one webserver and several database servers. Or two powerful servers - database server and webserver.

The main issue is keeping files in sync as close to real time as possible. If all the servers have access to the same virtual disk on a SAN then that part is easy. If not, then you have your work cut out for you.

What happens is when someone uploads a photo, video, sound, or file to sever2, then a bunch of people try accessing those files from server1. The database says the files are there, but unless you have some kind of shared file system, or sync system they will not be.

Some thing that may be of value, would to redirect stuff like:

/flash/XML.php

/member_menu_queries.php

/modules/?r=simple_messenger/get_operation/new_messages

To a 'Status Server' that could have a MySQL Slave that copies the Master database in near realtime. The main idea behind this is you are only READING information. This would lower the load on the Master, and be able so serve frequently accessed files that require database access without having to deal with real time file replication. Also, if this server is really, really busy the worst that happens (not counting a server crash) is your new mail notifications take some extra time, and simple chat replies may be delayed a little longer then usual.

~

Who is your web host?

Hello again,

So, will this work with the current version of dolphin (7) http://www.boonex.com/trac/dolphin/wiki/DolphinCluster

Im confused, why WOULDNT my method work? Can you explain because on paper, i think it would work

UPDATE:

i think we have strayed away slightly. let me redfine what we are after.  

What I would like to do is know, -Can Dolphin be "Load balanced" over more than 1 sever?   

I ask you this, because I highly doubt that 1 server can handle say 200.000 users. That's why I would like to have more than 1 server, possibly 2 or 3 in total. 1 for the DB and 2 for the website it self to handle all the hard stuff, like Images etc.   

We would like to have the db on 1 server, then 2 front end web servers. The web servers will link to the DB server. Some people have mentioned that we will have issues with uploads. Can we resolve this by sharing a folder on teh DB server and pointing all uploads to that?  

I know its messy, but can it be done?

...

yes, it can be done.

As long as each web server has access to the same files. See my first post as to why.