Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id ; Mon, 5 Nov 2001 07:33:40 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id ; Mon, 5 Nov 2001 07:33:30 -0500 Received: from mustard.heime.net ([194.234.65.222]:7825 "EHLO mustard.heime.net") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id ; Mon, 5 Nov 2001 07:33:21 -0500 Date: Mon, 5 Nov 2001 13:33:18 +0100 (CET) From: Roy Sigurd Karlsbakk To: , Tux mailing list Subject: Lots of questions about tux and kernel setup Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Hi all. I've started a new project where the final goal is to overload vger.kernel.org with silly questions... Well... Seriously, I'm working on a project, setting up a web server, serving large, multi-gigabyte media files (aka streaming). Below, I've set up a list of questions of things I want to know to tune the system as good as possible. Thank you all for all help :-) First of all - the plan now, is to use Tux as the web server, as I've got the impression - both by testing it, and of what's been said on the list, that it's one of the fastest solutions I can find - at least on Linux. I plan to serve some <= 250 concurrent connections, each given a maximum bandwidht (in tux) of 7 Mbps. The average bandwidth use will be somewhere between 4 and 5 Mbps, but it may peak at 7. The server I'll set up will only run Tux - no Apache. Tux will be setup not to log, and virutally all system daemons will be stopped. Some management agents (from Compaq or whoever we'll go for) may run, but that's it. I also plan to set it up without any swap partition. Q: What would the memory requirements for such a system be? I've read Tux uses sendfile(), but I don't know how Tux or sendfile() caches. Does sendfile read the file into the cache buffer before sending it? I mean - I can't keep the files in memory, so how much would do? Q: If using the bandwidth control in Tux, how much CPU overhead may I expect per stream (sizes as mentioned above)? Q: Do anyone know what SCSI and NIC (1 or 10Gb-Ethernet) that have low or high CPU overhead? I have the impression that there are quite some variations between different drivers. Is this true? Q: Tux has some way of linking IRQs directly to a specific CPU/thread (don't really remember what this was...). What should/could be used of these, or other tuning factors to speed up the server? Q: Are there ways to strip down the kernel, as to get rid of everything I don't want or don't need? Could I gain speed on this, or is it just a waste? Q: What file system would be best suitable for this? Ext[23]? ReiserFS? Xfs? FAT? :-) Q: If using iptables to block any unwanted traffic - that is - anything that's not TCP/80, how much CPU overhead could this generate? Could use of tcpwrappers or similar systems work better? (I need ssh, snmp and a some management agents available on the net, but I don't want the end users to be able to access them). Well... That's all for now... Thanks for any help Regards roy --- Computers are like air conditioners. They stop working when you open Windows. - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/