Comments on: Twitter starting to get de-Railed http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/ Thoughts on poker, programming and other stuff. Sun, 07 Sep 2008 14:35:59 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6 By: Cristian Vat http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1597 Cristian Vat Sat, 09 Jun 2007 15:29:17 +0000 http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/2007/04/14/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1597 -- Mongrel not being multi-threaded is a real hindrance. -- Sorry to contradict you there but Mongrel is multi-threaded. It's the Rails framework which is not thread-safe and therefore you need to run a cluster of mongrels. Mongrel is pretty darn fast as far as ruby apps go mostly because the url and header parsing are done in C libraries. You might want to take a look at merb which is a very stripped down framework when comparing with something like rails but it's thread-safe and can take advantage of mongrel's performance. – Mongrel not being multi-threaded is a real hindrance. –

Sorry to contradict you there but Mongrel is multi-threaded. It’s the Rails framework which is not thread-safe and therefore you need to run a cluster of mongrels.
Mongrel is pretty darn fast as far as ruby apps go mostly because the url and header parsing are done in C libraries.
You might want to take a look at merb which is a very stripped down framework when comparing with something like rails but it’s thread-safe and can take advantage of mongrel’s performance.

]]> By: Jamie Quint http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1410 Jamie Quint Tue, 22 May 2007 19:28:24 +0000 http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/2007/04/14/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1410 "There are enough people working on Rails directly though, or at least with the various containers, that someone should be on this." How about someone like Twitter?! What did Facebook do when memcached didn't meet their needs fully? They built out memcached and everyone benefitted, Twitter should be doing the same thing if multiple DB connections is their problem, I doubt they would have trouble getting a patch noticed. “There are enough people working on Rails directly though, or at least with the various containers, that someone should be on this.”

How about someone like Twitter?!

What did Facebook do when memcached didn’t meet their needs fully? They built out memcached and everyone benefitted, Twitter should be doing the same thing if multiple DB connections is their problem, I doubt they would have trouble getting a patch noticed.

]]> By: George Bailey http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1100 George Bailey Sun, 22 Apr 2007 00:01:57 +0000 http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/2007/04/14/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1100 Another thing we don't know is just how well written Twitter is. It may be reasonable to give the developers the benefit of the doubt, but then let's look at the exposed parts we can see. For instance, wen registering, the full name field is restricted to 20 characters. That right there is a big red flag that the development is not all that thoughtful. *Many* full names don't fit in 20 characters. Surely they could have spared a few more. Even if they had, say, a hundred million registrants that's not very much disk space. And the user name is not allowed to have a space in it. There's no good technical reason for that. That's another sign of an "old school" mentality of placing arbitrary restrictions on the users to make it easier on the developers. Those two things alone make me have to believe there is a lot of room for improvement in the app's code. Another thing we don’t know is just how well written Twitter is. It may be reasonable to give the developers the benefit of the doubt, but then let’s look at the exposed parts we can see. For instance, wen registering, the full name field is restricted to 20 characters. That right there is a big red flag that the development is not all that thoughtful. *Many* full names don’t fit in 20 characters. Surely they could have spared a few more. Even if they had, say, a hundred million registrants that’s not very much disk space.
And the user name is not allowed to have a space in it. There’s no good technical reason for that. That’s another sign of an “old school” mentality of placing arbitrary restrictions on the users to make it easier on the developers.
Those two things alone make me have to believe there is a lot of room for improvement in the app’s code.

]]> By: Nico http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1084 Nico Tue, 17 Apr 2007 17:31:37 +0000 http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/2007/04/14/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1084 If the issue is just about issuing and handling async DB lookups, then Ruby is hardly in trouble -- that's not a language issue (i.e., it's not that Ruby is so dynamic that it can't possibly run effeciently and so there are knees that run performance into the ground). So, yes, it's a framework issue, and if you'd be willing to write a large and complex application, then you might be willing to write async DB classes; the "it's open source, so you can fix it yourself" attitude seems appropriate in this case, IMO. If the issue is just about issuing and handling async DB lookups, then Ruby is hardly in trouble — that’s not a language issue (i.e., it’s not that Ruby is so dynamic that it can’t possibly run effeciently and so there are knees that run performance into the ground). So, yes, it’s a framework issue, and if you’d be willing to write a large and complex application, then you might be willing to write async DB classes; the “it’s open source, so you can fix it yourself” attitude seems appropriate in this case, IMO.

]]> By: Dick Davies http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1083 Dick Davies Tue, 17 Apr 2007 09:23:00 +0000 http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/2007/04/14/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1083 PHP isn't going to scale any better than Ruby. We're talking about handling multiple users by processes rather than threads - which is exactly how php works (you just have apache children rather than mongrels). Yes, with j2ee you use threads, but the efficiency of that is very dependant on your JVM/OS - it doesn't magically work better on all platforms. I believe that 'caching' in this context means memcached (i.e. DB caching, not application/page caching), which is easy to use with dynamic content (and built into rails). Whether DHH is a pillock or not shouldn't be part of this discussion. His point that you have the *option* to extend rails easily stands, however. PHP isn’t going to scale any better than Ruby. We’re talking about handling multiple users by processes rather than threads - which is exactly how php works (you just have apache children rather than mongrels).

Yes, with j2ee you use threads, but the efficiency of that is very dependant on your JVM/OS - it doesn’t magically work better on all platforms.

I believe that ‘caching’ in this context means memcached (i.e. DB caching, not application/page caching), which is easy to use with dynamic content (and built into rails).

Whether DHH is a pillock or not shouldn’t be part of this discussion. His point that you have the *option* to extend rails easily stands, however.

]]> By: Erick http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1081 Erick Mon, 16 Apr 2007 20:47:47 +0000 http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/2007/04/14/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1081 I'm in the process of going through a redesign for the web community I'm in charge of. We've been looking at Ruby. This whole discussion makes me think staying with PHP is the right way to go for now. I’m in the process of going through a redesign for the web community I’m in charge of. We’ve been looking at Ruby. This whole discussion makes me think staying with PHP is the right way to go for now.

]]> By: The Bull http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1074 The Bull Mon, 16 Apr 2007 03:06:46 +0000 http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/2007/04/14/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1074 Ismael: No, he may not personally owe anybody anything. There are enough people working on Rails directly though, or at least with the various containers, that someone should be on this. No everyone has the resources to contribute back. Besides, it can take quite a while to actually figure out how a framework really works. In this case it probably isn't so much the Rails framework itself, but the container(s). As for vendors, don't even get me started there. They are the worst with support and they won't come running to fix your problems. They will give the same excuses that everyone else does "oh just throw some more hardware at it" Ismael: No, he may not personally owe anybody anything. There are enough people working on Rails directly though, or at least with the various containers, that someone should be on this.

No everyone has the resources to contribute back. Besides, it can take quite a while to actually figure out how a framework really works. In this case it probably isn’t so much the Rails framework itself, but the container(s).

As for vendors, don’t even get me started there. They are the worst with support and they won’t come running to fix your problems. They will give the same excuses that everyone else does “oh just throw some more hardware at it”

]]> By: Warren Seen » Blog Archive » Rails, Twitter and the 800lb Gorilla in the Room… http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1073 Warren Seen » Blog Archive » Rails, Twitter and the 800lb Gorilla in the Room… Mon, 16 Apr 2007 01:24:59 +0000 http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/2007/04/14/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1073 [...] Until someone goes and pushes the boundary way beyond those who’ve come before. Suddenly, the gorilla has grabbed your girl, climbed to the top of the Empire State and is angrily swatting light aircraft left, right and centre. [...] [...] Until someone goes and pushes the boundary way beyond those who’ve come before. Suddenly, the gorilla has grabbed your girl, climbed to the top of the Empire State and is angrily swatting light aircraft left, right and centre. [...]

]]> By: Ismael http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1072 Ismael Sun, 15 Apr 2007 20:55:04 +0000 http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/2007/04/14/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1072 Dude, he (DHH) wrote Rails for you to use, for free!. Do you think he ows you fixing your particular problems? He also runs a business, he´s also busy improving other aspects of the framework. This is the sort of reasons Twitter chose to go with an Open Source framework in the first place, as opposed to a propietary solution where the vendor will, indeed, run to fix your problems in exchange for juicy bucks. You have a scalability issue with Rails? Fix it. Write a plugin or something. Share it. DHH did it with an entire framework, and he didn't really had to. Dude, he (DHH) wrote Rails for you to use, for free!. Do you think he ows you fixing your particular problems? He also runs a business, he´s also busy improving other aspects of the framework. This is the sort of reasons Twitter chose to go with an Open Source framework in the first place, as opposed to a propietary solution where the vendor will, indeed, run to fix your problems in exchange for juicy bucks. You have a scalability issue with Rails? Fix it. Write a plugin or something. Share it. DHH did it with an entire framework, and he didn’t really had to.

]]> By: Balance On Rails http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1071 Balance On Rails Sun, 15 Apr 2007 20:30:57 +0000 http://thebull.macsimumweb.com/2007/04/14/twitter-starting-to-get-de-railed/#comment-1071 [...] Twitter starting to get de-Railed » Thinking Outloud Apr 14 [...] [...] Twitter starting to get de-Railed » Thinking Outloud Apr 14 [...]

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