Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not?

Re:Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not? by cperciva on Tuesday May 31, 2016 @03:06AM (#11805144)

By the way, when are you going to come to a BSD conference and talk about running HN? We love "view from the trenches" talks, and I'm sure Arc makes things interesting in unusual ways.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not? by kogir on Thursday June 02, 2016 @10:53PM (#11827978)

Back when HN was still running with millions of files in one directory on UFS, maybe there was something to talk about (not much more than sysctl tweaks). Oh, and UFS snapshots (for tarsnap to reference) sometimes panic'd the box.

When I left we'd added nginx in a jail and switched to ZFS, which solved most of the problems we had been having. There were a few ZFS deadlocks, but I never got to the bottom of it and FreeBSD 10 seemed to fix them. I'd imagine things are even less notable now.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not? by cperciva on Thursday June 02, 2016 @11:19PM (#11828081)

UFS snapshots (for tarsnap to reference) sometimes panic'd the box.

Ick. Yeah, UFS snapshots had issues for a while... had I known you were using them I would have encouraged you to switch to ZFS sooner.

There were a few ZFS deadlocks, but I never got to the bottom of it and FreeBSD 10 seemed to fix them.

Yes, FreeBSD 10 definitely fixed a bunch of ZFS deadlocks.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not? by dang on Tuesday May 31, 2016 @03:28AM (#11805218)

It would be a boring talk. It just works and that's about it.

Arc does make things interesting in unusual ways, but not on an OS level.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not? by i_feel_great on Tuesday May 31, 2016 @02:03AM (#11804908)

If you don't mind, can you list HNs entire stack: OS, external web server, app language, db?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not? by paloaltokid on Tuesday May 31, 2016 @02:08AM (#11804928)

The OS is BSD. Everything else is Arc IIRC.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not? by jsmthrowaway on Tuesday May 31, 2016 @02:09AM (#11804929)

I've seen nginx failures recently, so there might be a nginx reverse proxy hanging out in front of Arc (the whole stack noticeably behind CloudFlare, too, but that's sort of beyond the original question).

That'd be how I'd build it, if I'm right. Doing webby things without nginx is like forgetting pants, to me.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not? by kinkdr on Tuesday May 31, 2016 @02:27AM (#11805011)

Excuse my ignorance, but what is "Arc"?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not? by e12e on Tuesday May 31, 2016 @02:34AM (#11805041)

Arc is a lisp variant: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arc_(programming_language)

The current[1] distribution comes with a hn clone, that as far as I know, is mostly equivalent to the code that used to power hn at some point in the not too distant past.

[1] current might not be the best name for it, but as far as I can tell it a) works, b) has been ported to Racket (as opposed to being trapped on some ancient version of PLT Scheme), and c) is maintained (ish): https://github.com/arclanguage/anarki

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not? by jsmthrowaway on Tuesday May 31, 2016 @02:30AM (#11805022)

A Lisp. (The nerdy kind. Not the verbal kind.)

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arc_(programming_language)

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not? by kinkdr on Tuesday May 31, 2016 @02:33AM (#11805037)

Cool, thanks. for some reason I always thought HN was using github.com/reddit/reddit

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not? by mixedCase on Tuesday May 31, 2016 @02:24AM (#11804992)

Isn't CloudFlare the one using nginx?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: Do you use FreeBSD as web server? Why or why not? by jsmthrowaway on Tuesday May 31, 2016 @02:27AM (#11805010)

The nginx errors I recall being unstyled and I think CloudFlare hides or styles theirs. I consider CF tossing an unstyled nginx error fairly unlikely anyway, but that's a gut feeling. Might be wrong.

[ Parent | on HN ]