[development] No suitable nodes available at RackspaceCloud (Mosso)

Thu Feb 18 17:11:32 UTC 2010

There was an excellent writeup about this set of issues here:
http://mavergames.net/content/drupal-rackspace-clouds-cloud-sites-platform-some-tips-our-experiences

I should mention that it's Rackspace Cloud Sites that is the problem -
Rackspace Cloud Servers are quite good, aside from the fact that their
network seems to get more than its share of DDOS attacks. There should be
*no* password-controlled shell access to one of the servers though, as
they're constantly under attack (as all wide-open VPSs on the internet are).

I certainly agree that hosting without shell access is a non-starter in any
environment, and for that reason never even experimented with Cloud Sites.

-Randy

On Thu, Feb 18, 2010 at 10:08 AM, Matt Chapman <matt at ninjitsuweb.com> wrote:

> Anyone who buys hosting without shell access is gonna get what they pay
> for...
>
> However, I do want to draw attention to the fact that the CloudSITES
> services is being discussed here. I have been using the Rackspace
> CloudSERVERS (similar to Amazon EC2, in concept) offering for a few
> months now, and I love it. It has not been plagued by the recent
> security issues, or any of the complaints I head about
> CloudSites/Mosso.
>
> My only problem has been a corrupted backup on one occasion, so as
> always, never trust someone else's backup of your data. That applies
> to any hosting service, so I highly recommend Rackspace CloudServers.
>
> All the Best,
>
> Matt Chapman
> Ninjitsu Web Development
>
> --
> The contents of this message should be assumed to be Confidential, and
> may not be disclosed without permission of the sender.
>
>
>
> On Thu, Feb 18, 2010 at 8:38 AM, Tomáš Fülöpp (vacilando.org)
> <tomi at vacilando.org> wrote:
> > (Interesting, Brian; I also were promised shell pretty soon about a year
> > ago. It's a shame - MediaTemple has shell and also a breakdown of compute
> > cycles per script...)
> >
> > Anyway -- Victor's note about shortening PHP timeout brought me to
> thinking
> > about measuring the time since the start of the execution and issuing
> > flush() each time the process might time out.
> >
> > Two questions:
> >
> > what is the most suitable Drupal function for this -- it needs to be
> > something that runs regularly and for all kind of pages
> > for Drupal, is it enough to issue flush() or is ob_end_flush() also
> needed,
> > or something else
> >
> > Thanks a million for any ideas;
> >
> > Tomáš / Vacilando
> >
> >
> >
> > On Thu, Feb 18, 2010 at 15:46, Brian Vuyk <brian at brianvuyk.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> I've run into this with a few of my client sites, but they haven't even
> >> been high-traffic sites.
> >>
> >> Personally, I just don't think the RS Cloud is a good match for Drupal.
> >> Combine that with the recent security issues they've had, occasional
> >> inexplicable downtime, the 'no suitable nodes' and the lack of a shell,
> and
> >> I am moving my sites away as quick as I can.
> >>
> >> The shell issue is really sensitive for me - about 14 months ago, my
> >> previous host ran into... issues... and could no longer offer hosting.
> So, I
> >> was in a pinch and Rackspace (then Mosso) looked very good apart from
> the
> >> lack of a shell. I talked to their customer service reps, and was
> informed
> >> that shell access for the cloud was in pre-release testing, and was
> >> scheduled to go live the next week.
> >>
> >> In a burst of poor judgement, I decided that the package they offered
> was
> >> good enough to do without shell access for a week, so I bought in, and
> >> transferred my sites. 14 months later, shell access still hasn't been
> >> released, and I've had to move all my more critical  /
> development-intensive
> >> sites off of their service in the meantime.
> >>
> >> Brian
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Tomáš Fülöpp (vacilando.org) wrote:
> >>
> >> Hi,
> >>
> >> At RackspaceCloud (former Mosso) I've been plagued with a very
> unfortunate
> >> problem that i crippling both my work and the work of my clients --
> namely
> >> the infamous error message "Unfortunately there were no suitable nodes
> >> available to serve this request." Those of you at RS Cloud must have
> bumped
> >> into it. It is cryptic and happens unpredictably. The cloud is very
> stable
> >> and scalable, but for any a little bit heavier Drupal installation
> people do
> >> start getting these errors.
> >>
> >> Basically, it is a generic error thrown by load balanced systems that
> >> occurs as a result of a script exceeding a maximum timeout value (not
> the
> >> PHP timeout value!) If a client connection does not receive a response
> from
> >> the server after approximately 30 to 60 seconds the load balancer will
> close
> >> the connection and the client will immediately receive the error
> message. In
> >> most cases, the script will continue to execute until it reaches
> completion,
> >> throws an error, or times out on the server, but the client will not see
> the
> >> page load as expected and will instead receive this error.
> >>
> >> I've used Boost for anonymous pages, Parallel, Memcache, etc., all of
> >> which helped and anonymous users usually don't get this error. The
> problem
> >> is with admin or any other a bit heavier work of logged in users. Even
> for
> >> basic Drupal websites with not too many modules! Pages like the list of
> >> modules, or the status page, i.e. heavy database or file requests, or
> API
> >> calls in PHP, are very likely to time out.
> >>
> >> Over the past year I've had a number of discussions with techs and
> admins
> >> at that cloud, but the situation is unresolved. They recognize the
> problem
> >> but maintain this is due to the special/unusual setup they use for their
> >> cloud. It is not a problem for some other CMS / frameworks. E.g. a very
> >> heavy MediaWiki installation runs just fine. Drupal seems to be less
> >> compatible with their system, somehow, somewhere.
> >>
> >> Now, why do I mention all this in the development list? I've been
> >> intrigued by one little ray of hope in their words: "if a client
> connection
> >> does not receive a response from the server after approximately 30 to 60
> >> seconds the load balancer will close the connection and the client will
> >> immediately receive the error message". Their techs said if I were able
> to
> >> emit any kind of intermediary response to the client during rendering of
> the
> >> page, then this would be solved.
> >> Indeed, a bit like the Batch API works in Drupal (with that I often run
> >> night-long scripts without problems). I wonder, maybe this is a more
> generic
> >> problem for any system that employs load balancers?
> >>
> >> So my questions to you, colleagues, is -- do you see any place in Drupal
> >> processing chain that could be used, and approximately how, to make sure
> >> that the load balancer keeps the connection opened. If you have any
> ideas,
> >> wild or proven, I will be happy to test and develop them further and
> bring
> >> them back to the community, of course. If this succeeds, I think many of
> us
> >> will be relieved (and able to focus on development again!)
> >>
> >> Thank you for any ideas - on and off this list.
> >>
> >> Best regards,
> >>
> >> Tomáš / Vacilando
> >>
> >>
> >
> >
>

-- 
Randy Fay
Drupal Development, troubleshooting, and debugging
randy at randyfay.com
+1  970.462.7450
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.drupal.org/pipermail/development/attachments/20100218/60f67f69/attachment.html 