FreeBSD for webserver?
Paul Schmehl
pschmehl_lists at tx.rr.com
Tue Jul 22 21:51:08 UTC 2008
--On Tuesday, July 22, 2008 22:05:26 +0200 VeeJay <maanjee at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi there
>
> I am going to make 2 Webserver at my work going to handle 50 mil hits per
> month... They are using Linux already. But being a FreeBSD fan, I have
> proposed FreeBSD to my Boss convincing him that FreeBSD is more Fast and
> Secure solution for his needs... And now I want to show the results...
> *Hardware:*
> Dell PowerEdge 2950 III having 2 x CPU 3,0 GHz Intel Xeon L5450 Quad-Core
> 2x6MB cache WITH 16 GB RAM.
>
> *Tools:*
> 1. FreeBSD 7 Production Release
> 2. Apache 2.2.9
> 3. MySQL 5.1.26
> 4. PHP 5.2.6
>
> My question is, "*To get the speed, performance and security*":
>
> Should I use Ports or Packages to install all these tools One by One?
>
> *OR*
> Should I use TAR files and compile them manually. For example giving command
> line arguments and commands like
>
This seems to be a common misperception about ports. Ports aren't something
magical. They do exactly what you would do from the commandline (i.e.
./configure, make, make install), except they come with several bonuses.
1) The port maintainer has already worked out all the quirks to make it compile
and install properly on FreeBSD. 2) The port maintainer has already supplied
patches that allow the software to build correctly on FreeBSD. 3) All the
dependencies are already taken care of. 4) Upgrading is quite simple and
straightforward. 5) The software is now architechture-independent (in most
cases), meaning you can move from Intel to AMD (for example) without having to
worry that the software will no longer build and you'll have to start from
scratch again.
For example, I decided today that I wanted to try out some software named
"arguseye". So I downloaded and untarred the program. I looked at the
dependencies. It requires a number of perl modules, some of which are not in
ports. So, I just created three new perl ports to satisfy those dependencies
and submitted them this afternoon.
Once those are accepted into the tree, I'll create the arguseye port and submit
it as well. Then, when someone else wants to install arguseye, all they will
have to do is type "make install clean" in the port directory and everything
that they need will be installed for them.
Unless you're a glutton for punishment, why would you do all that yourself?
And spend hours googling for solutions, writing your own patches when required,
etc., etc.? And figuring out how to get the modules installed in the right
place, remembering where you put them when you decide to uninstall or upgrade
them, updating @INC so they can be found when you run your scripts, etc., etc.,
etc.?
Some people enjoy doing that. Most people just want the software to work, be
easy to maintain and upgrade and then stay out of their way.
--
Paul Schmehl
As if it wasn't already obvious,
my opinions are my own and not
those of my employer.
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