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Re: Re: setting up mirrors
Pavan,
mirrors (or high output bandwidth sites) are expensive
for individuals to set up, anywhere in the world and
not just in india .
that's why putting up a mirror site by a LIG member on
his own does not make sense, 'cos he'll have to pay
through his nose, without making any money.
i guess that's what led to the politics that Atul mentions,
although it's praiseworthy that someone actually tried this.
it's good to have had that experience in our backpack.
that's why it is important to utilize the resources
of universities, big companies, ISPs, STPs etc since these
people have bandwidth thrown at them at cheap rates.
that's the way the thousands of ftp sites all over the world
are supported. i think this is likely to succeed, if we give
it a shot.
failing that, we can approach the government on setting up
free servers. if they are paying billions of rupees building
a national backbone, they might as well spend a few lakhs
in setting up servers to host free software content so people,
especially students actually can make immediate use of the backbone.
IT for all is the government's stated mission, so why not take
them to task on it
peer-to-peer should definitely also be explored as it insulates
you from availability of ftp sites.
there is a project called OpenNap which is opensource Naptser.
the server and client are available for download from
sourceforge (about 350kb). if you (or anyone else) are interested
and if you have trouble downloading it, i can mail it to you.
there is also an opensource Napster protocol available, which can be
a starting point for you to write your own file-sharing software.
both are essential in my opinion. we need lots of local mirrors
as Suresh pointed out. and we need peer-to-peer transfers
to increase the bandwidth throughput even further.
the important thing is that the job gets done and in as short
a time as possible. i hope that we will collectively focus on
achieving that goal.
cheers,
- Ruchir
From: Pavan K Balellugari
Reply-To: linux-india-general@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
To: linux-india-general@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [LIG] Re: setting up mirrors
I guess, that we could use peer-to-peer downloads
instead of having dedicated servers for mirrors.
Mirrors are cool but in indian situation i guess they
are expensive.
Pavan
--- Atul Chitnis wrote:
[Ignoring Suresh "MalletHead"'s personal attacks completely, since they
have nothing to do with this discussion]
Ruchir:
> What exactly are you trying to say. If anybody decides to host > a
server, they are doing you a service. Why and how would they > themselves
misuse it ?
OK, let me give you an example:
Let's say someone sponsors a colocated server at VSNL.
[Aside - someone mentioned "costs" - it costs just 2 lakhs a year to
colocate at VSNL with a really fat pipe backing it, while it costs 4.25
lakhs a year plus about 4 lakhs of equipment to set up a miserable 64k
leased line - which seems the easier/cheaper/more_effective thing to do?]
Let's say that the person who runs the server and the site is called "X".
Now, X has at his disposal a huge resource - one that very few people can
afford. X makes sure that the mirror is updated [another aside - *one*
mirror for all of India????] and functions properly.
Now X belongs to ILUG Timbuktoo. ILUG-T itself has nothing to do with the
functioning of the resource, but that doesn't change the fact that X is a
member of ILUG-T.
After a while, several ILUGs start muttering and complaining. "Why does
ILUG-T have control over this national resource? Is ILUG-T all of Linux
India? We too should have control over this resource."
Fair enough. So it is decided that every ILUG will have an
elected/nominated representative sysadmin working along with X to maintain
the server.
Now, we have dozens of ILUGs......
At some point, the finger-pointing starts. "X is downloading MP3s for
himself!" "Y is providing email addresses to his friends on that server!"
"Z has started a break-away LUG in his city and *also* wants to have
access".
This in itself is not misuse - it is implied misuse. OK, so we need to form
a committee to supervise the functioning of the resource. Naturally, the
committee needs to have elected/nominated members, which is another ball of
wool....
Ho hum - welcome to the world of LI politics.
Feel free to disagree with me - I am just speaking from experience.
Atul
--
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Atul Chitnis | achitnis@xxxxxxxxxxx (PGP:6011BCB8) Exocore Consulting |
http://www.exocore.com Bangalore, India | +91 (80) 3440397 Fax +91 (80)
3341137
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