Re: [Pharo-dev] CMS status

2014-02-17 Thread p...@highoctane.be
Ha, this ease of hosting question.

1- Ease of hosting

Thing is that mod_php and PHP itself are easy to compile for almost any
distro.

With Pharo that's not so easy (64-bit platforms requiring 32-bit libs and
some dark tricks to get right [e.g. using experimental debian repos for
libc, which no sane hosting company would allow].

We need to come to par with this platform ubiquity if we want to be wider
spread.

2- Process vs on-request

PHP-based solutions mostly have the request->apache->mod_php->scripts->db
and back roundtrip. When there is no client, there is no CPU, no nothing
used. This allows to pile on users in a shared hosting as there is usually
not that much traffic.

With the current Pharo+Seaside combo for example, we do have an always
running pharo process taking away CPU cycles. That's not too good for
shared hosting and platforms like EC2 where we pay based on that.


As my thinking goes, I find interesting to have a FastCGI interface for
pure Pharo (until we possibly have a mod_pharo) so that pharo becomes a
first class scripting option for simple web applications. With the new
command line and environment access, that's not that hard to do.

Is there anyone using pharo in such a configuration?

Phil





On Mon, Feb 17, 2014 at 9:38 AM, Yuriy Tymchuk  wrote:

> Hi guys,
>
> this weekend I was unlucky enough to work with WordPress and all it's
> shitty php. Now obvious question is what is the status of Pharo-based CMSes
> and how they can be hosted. Right now I'm looking for a free solution. Yes,
> I know that developers also want to eat, but, usually people use (for
> example) WordPress, because they can put it on a free php hosting, and I
> cannot promote Pharo-based solutions if you have to py for them in a first
> place. Also from CMS point of view, I'm aware of Pier, but is it the best
> thing that I should look into?
>
> Uko
>


Re: [Pharo-dev] CMS status

2014-02-17 Thread Norbert Hartl

Am 17.02.2014 um 10:13 schrieb p...@highoctane.be:

> With the current Pharo+Seaside combo for example, we do have an always 
> running pharo process taking away CPU cycles. That's not too good for shared 
> hosting and platforms like EC2 where we pay based on that.
> 
Amazons ec2 is paid based on running machine hours not on cpu cycles. 

Norbert



Re: [Pharo-dev] CMS status

2014-02-17 Thread Sven Van Caekenberghe
Phil,

On 17 Feb 2014, at 10:13, p...@highoctane.be wrote:

> 2- Process vs on-request
> 
> PHP-based solutions mostly have the request->apache->mod_php->scripts->db and 
> back roundtrip. When there is no client, there is no CPU, no nothing used. 
> This allows to pile on users in a shared hosting as there is usually not that 
> much traffic.
> 
> With the current Pharo+Seaside combo for example, we do have an always 
> running pharo process taking away CPU cycles. That's not too good for shared 
> hosting and platforms like EC2 where we pay based on that.
> 
> 
> As my thinking goes, I find interesting to have a FastCGI interface for pure 
> Pharo (until we possibly have a mod_pharo) so that pharo becomes a first 
> class scripting option for simple web applications. With the new command line 
> and environment access, that's not that hard to do.

FastCGI is a long running process as well, right ?

It would not be unthinkable to boot a new image when needed and shut it down 
when it is idle for some time. It takes less then half a second:

root@stfx:~# time ./pharo Pharo.image printVersion
[version] 3.0 #30203

real0m0.379s
user0m0.148s
sys 0m0.028s

Lots of intelligent things could be done, I am just not sure we should compete 
in this space as I doubt there is any money to be made.

Sven




Re: [Pharo-dev] CMS status

2014-02-17 Thread Norbert Hartl

Am 17.02.2014 um 11:17 schrieb Sven Van Caekenberghe :

> Phil,
> 
> On 17 Feb 2014, at 10:13, p...@highoctane.be wrote:
> 
>> 2- Process vs on-request
>> 
>> PHP-based solutions mostly have the request->apache->mod_php->scripts->db 
>> and back roundtrip. When there is no client, there is no CPU, no nothing 
>> used. This allows to pile on users in a shared hosting as there is usually 
>> not that much traffic.
>> 
>> With the current Pharo+Seaside combo for example, we do have an always 
>> running pharo process taking away CPU cycles. That's not too good for shared 
>> hosting and platforms like EC2 where we pay based on that.
>> 
>> 
>> As my thinking goes, I find interesting to have a FastCGI interface for pure 
>> Pharo (until we possibly have a mod_pharo) so that pharo becomes a first 
>> class scripting option for simple web applications. With the new command 
>> line and environment access, that's not that hard to do.
> 
> FastCGI is a long running process as well, right ?
> 
> It would not be unthinkable to boot a new image when needed and shut it down 
> when it is idle for some time. It takes less then half a second:
> 
> root@stfx:~# time ./pharo Pharo.image printVersion
> [version] 3.0 #30203
> 
> real  0m0.379s
> user  0m0.148s
> sys   0m0.028s
> 
> Lots of intelligent things could be done, I am just not sure we should 
> compete in this space as I doubt there is any money to be made.
> 
There can always be done a lot. But let’s face it. Amazon is offering different 
sizes of machines that are charged differently. The smallest one is quite a 
pain when it comes to latency. Sometimes you will experience half a second or 
more as latency for a running image. And starting an image on those machines 
will take a lot longer. 
What we are talking about are really small projects. If you do the cost 
calculation then you might see that amazon is not a good fit for these types of 
applications. The business of amazon works this way because the cloud buzz 
makes you believe it is cheap but in most situations it is not. S3 being one of 
the exceptions.
Small projects only consume memory and machine/cpu time but not much cycles. So 
how clever can your approach be if try to make it fit into a business that 
calculates its cost based on time and memory? :)

Norbert