Amazon AWS & Mediafed Alan Williamson Director, MediaFed ltd Co-Founder, aw2.0 ltd the cloud experts

MediaFed Ltd RSS Experts Monetize feeds Track feeds Value Added feeds Feed Compliance Focused on Premium publishers

RSS Experts

Monetize feeds

Track feeds

Value Added feeds

Feed Compliance

Focused on Premium publishers

MediaFed’s work flow MediaFed Publishers MediaFed Services Millions of RSS Clients

Traditional Setup Fixed number of ‘real’ strokeable servers Professionally managed servers Costing £xxx’s per month just for one server

Fixed number of ‘real’ strokeable servers

Professionally managed servers

Costing £xxx’s per month just for one server

Then things got interesting Started to grow FAST! http://www.flickr.com/photos/lunadirimmel /

Where did MediaFed need to scale? Front end Web Servers Servicing the requests for feeds, article views, and click thru’s RSS Ad Servers Processing the ad insertion’s and click-thru’s Feed Crawlers Retrieving the feed content, cleaning and conversion Database Storage of feed data, and statistical analysis, running to TB’s of data

Front end Web Servers

Servicing the requests for feeds, article views, and click thru’s

RSS Ad Servers

Processing the ad insertion’s and click-thru’s

Feed Crawlers

Retrieving the feed content, cleaning and conversion

Database

Storage of feed data, and statistical analysis, running to TB’s of data

The current hosting company was asked for a quote It came as quite a shock to us http://www.flickr.com/photos/alemdag/2779065156/

The current hosting company was asked for a quote

It came as quite a shock to us

We needed servers FAST Time Quoted 10 working days! Need a modern approach http://www.flickr.com/photos/democzar/1729712347/

We needed servers FAST

Time Quoted 10 working days!

Need a modern approach

http://www.flickr.com/photos/nanimo/ THE BIG FLUFFY CLOUD

Which Cloud Provider … … had experience with a number of cloud providers … each one with their strengths and weaknesses … different price/performance points But …

… had experience with a number of cloud providers

… each one with their strengths and weaknesses

… different price/performance points

But …

It’s “Hug Amazon” day! http://www.flickr.com/photos/devcentre/74685966/

Amazon’s EC2 HOT features Instance start up parameter passing Instance snap shot VERY FAST instance startup Large ‘ free ’ disk space with each instance http://www.flickr.com/photos/qmnonic/554905977/

Instance start up parameter passing

Instance snap shot

VERY FAST instance startup

Large ‘ free ’ disk space with each instance

Some EC2 problems … No VLAN support No ability to turn off public IP address No reverse DNS http://www.flickr.com/photos/kimberlyfaye/2570018805/

No VLAN support

No ability to turn off public IP address

No reverse DNS

.. and instances do go down! But “ssssh” you didn’t hear it from me! http://www.flickr.com/photos/59953599@N00/2852302091/

Our Amazon Family Usage Amazon EC2 usage Runs the main infrastructure; the bread’n’butter SimpleDB Used for something quite special S3 Long term storage of log files and DB snapshots

Amazon EC2 usage

Runs the main infrastructure; the bread’n’butter

SimpleDB

Used for something quite special

S3

Long term storage of log files and DB snapshots

Usage of EC2 Instances The majority of all our services are Java based High performance custom built code; no J2EE! Load balancing provided by nginx Database provided by MySQL 5

The majority of all our services are Java based

High performance custom built code; no J2EE!

Load balancing provided by nginx

Database provided by MySQL 5

Provisioning of instances Manage our deployment as a single ‘stack’ /opt/mediafed/ All applications, scripts, binaries in there Require no external, pre-installed software Complete stack is held within SVN First thing that happens when an instance boots up is to update itself with the latest from SVN

Manage our deployment as a single ‘stack’

/opt/mediafed/

All applications, scripts, binaries in there

Require no external, pre-installed software

Complete stack is held within SVN

First thing that happens when an instance boots up is to update itself with the latest from SVN

Keep it Simple No multiple instances to worry about Any instance can do any job in the system we require Horrendously transportable! Instances are ready to work as soon as they are powered up http://www.flickr.com/photos/sylvar/31436961/

No multiple instances to worry about

Any instance can do any job in the system we require

Horrendously transportable!

Instances are ready to work as soon as they are powered up

Our goals … Over reaching goal was to make it an SSH free zone Misbehaving instances would simply be shut off and a new one powered up We viewed the “instance” as a component that could be used; not as a server that it really was

Over reaching goal was to make it an SSH free zone

Misbehaving instances would simply be shut off and a new one powered up

We viewed the “instance” as a component that could be used; not as a server that it really was

Starting up … From the time we issue the command to start up to it actually doing REAL work Usually 3 to 4 minutes!!!! http://www.flickr.com/photos/diamondjoe/1871077148/

From the time we issue the command to start up to it actually doing REAL work

Usually 3 to 4 minutes!!!!

EC2 #1 Killer Feature Parameter passing into EC2 instances We pass in a configuration string on startup that specifies what it will do: ec2-xxxx -d “TYPE=WEB,ROLE=RSSPOOL3” Instance runs a ‘boot script’ that then runs up the necessary service we require

Parameter passing into EC2 instances

We pass in a configuration string on startup that specifies what it will do:

ec2-xxxx -d “TYPE=WEB,ROLE=RSSPOOL3”

Instance runs a ‘boot script’ that then runs up the necessary service we require

But others services in the system need to know about the new instances ????? http://www.flickr.com/photos/yourdon/2770955000/

SimpleDB! We use SimpleDB as a sophisticated internal ‘DNS’ or service directory When a service is started, it registers its role with SimpleDB including all IP, Port and other information Other services keep an eye on changes in this configuration and automatically update their own configuration files accordingly

We use SimpleDB as a sophisticated internal ‘DNS’ or service directory

When a service is started, it registers its role with SimpleDB including all IP, Port and other information

Other services keep an eye on changes in this configuration and automatically update their own configuration files accordingly

Amazon SimpleDB as DNS Allow us to add in new web servers into the farm for load balancing without doing a thing except start it up Add in additional MySQL slaves/masters without touching anything And of course, we can remove and shutdown an instance as easily Big advantage, we can use the same SimpleDB technique for other cloud providers too!

Allow us to add in new web servers into the farm for load balancing without doing a thing except start it up

Add in additional MySQL slaves/masters without touching anything

And of course, we can remove and shutdown an instance as easily

Big advantage, we can use the same SimpleDB technique for other cloud providers too!

Amazon is cheap! Doubling up instances for redundancy is very cheap to do Mediafed is running an on-demand system for a fraction of the cost it would have cost to run a traditional server room Turn off servers at low points in the week, no cost, no hassle!

Doubling up instances for redundancy is very cheap to do

Mediafed is running an on-demand system for a fraction of the cost it would have cost to run a traditional server room

Turn off servers at low points in the week, no cost, no hassle!

No more hardware hassles! The previous hosting company for Mediafed DID NOT recover from a hard disk failure Fortunately Mediafed had a back up http://www.flickr.com/photos/library_mistress/540375093/

The previous hosting company for Mediafed DID NOT recover from a hard disk failure

Fortunately Mediafed had a back up

Some cloud advice … http://www.flickr.com/photos/digitalsextant/34811579

Not a cloud in sight ! Forget the marketing hype - Cloud Providers do go down http://www.flickr.com/photos/montanaraven/

… and no two providers are the same NO CLOUD STANDARD http://www.flickr.com/photos/heather-dietz/227295326/

So can you move the whole house? http://www.flickr.com/photos/seanlloyd/24764719/

Don’t buy into the hype All the usual ‘out sourcing’ rules apply Always look at the worse case scenario Plan for the worse case scenario Assume the worse case scenario will happen Practice the worse case scenario

All the usual ‘out sourcing’ rules apply

Always look at the worse case scenario

Plan for the worse case scenario

Assume the worse case scenario will happen

Practice the worse case scenario

Remember … you can’t just nip down and reboot the server http://www.flickr.com/photos/johnniewalker/

But take a moment and … Think of your servers as single use devices instead of the typical “LAMP” Managing up to 10 servers via SSH isn’t a problem is doing the same for 10, 20, 50+ servers really practical? Hold off on that purchase order to Dell and talk to your software guys to see if you can re-jig current things to work within the ‘cloud platform’, or Linux-OnDemand

Think of your servers as single use devices instead of the typical “LAMP”

Managing up to 10 servers via SSH isn’t a problem

is doing the same for 10, 20, 50+ servers really practical?

Hold off on that purchase order to Dell and talk to your software guys to see if you can re-jig current things to work within the ‘cloud platform’, or Linux-OnDemand

www.aw20.co.uk [email_address] UK +44 1556 568 103 / US +1 650 331 9758 the cloud experts – putting it to work