From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Nov 15 14:34:27 2010 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 10D1E1065679 for ; Mon, 15 Nov 2010 14:34:27 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from fsb@thefsb.org) Received: from smtp144.iad.emailsrvr.com (smtp144.iad.emailsrvr.com [207.97.245.144]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D6E5C8FC14 for ; Mon, 15 Nov 2010 14:34:26 +0000 (UTC) Received: from localhost (localhost.localdomain [127.0.0.1]) by smtp34.relay.iad1a.emailsrvr.com (SMTP Server) with ESMTP id 2A50738022E; Mon, 15 Nov 2010 09:34:26 -0500 (EST) X-Virus-Scanned: OK Received: by smtp34.relay.iad1a.emailsrvr.com (Authenticated sender: fsb-AT-thefsb.org) with ESMTPSA id 660753800D5; Mon, 15 Nov 2010 09:34:25 -0500 (EST) User-Agent: Microsoft-MacOutlook/14.1.0.101012 Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2010 09:34:21 -0500 From: Tom Worster To: Message-ID: Thread-Topic: FreeBSD on Rackspace Could In-Reply-To: <350357563-1289691142-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-189470517-@bda115.bisx.prod.on.blackberry> Mime-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Cc: FreeBSD Subject: Re: FreeBSD on Rackspace Could X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2010 14:34:27 -0000 On 11/13/10 6:32 PM, "dalescott@shaw.ca" wrote: >> but dedicated/vps does not offer what cloud computing does. > >What do feel are the advantages of the cloud? i haven't used one yet but, as far as i can tell, the interesting differences derive from how the could platform implements network, storage and compute elements in a distributed hardware system meshed up with a mesh interconnect (presumably of the high-performance computing type). the resulting advantages for me: the storage arrays are raid 10 and all their responsibility not mine; shared file systems are part of the platform so i don't need to mess around with nfs; load balancing (which i currently can't afford) is part of the network platform; so is the address juggling needed for high availability (failover and restoration); and the price for each vm seems to allow me maybe 2 or 3x as many hosts as i get with dedicated servers so i can separate the db servers from the rest of the app and assign no more memory than i need to each vm. in summary, it seems i can get the high-availability, load-sharing architecture i want at a price that's beyond my budget with dedicated hosts. and it looks like there's a bunch of other nice aspects that aren't radical but will be time savers: backups, standby images, simpler sysadmin (there's a lot less to a cloud server "slice" than a whole computer), monitoring, persistence. does this begin to answer your question? this weekend i tried out gentoo on a wee celeron box i have. (someone here said gentoo was the linux most like freebsd and rackspace cloud offers it). it's the first linux experience i've had in which i didn't feel like a clumsy incompetent. the similarities and differences relative to freebsd are interesting. maybe i'll write up my initial impressions.