[thelist] multiple server configuration

[Sean]

Howdy,

I would keep production servers separate from staging and development,
including backups.  Servers always go down at the worst possible moment,
so even if you have new code in staging very rarely, you can bet that's
the time the production server is going on vacation.

I can sympathize with the need to utilize a backup server for load
balancing, but make sure you don't defeat the purpose of the backup.
For example, round-robin DNS will distribute load amongst the servers,
but will continue to distribute traffic even if one of the servers is
down.

Allaire bought a product called Bright Tiger which shipped with the Cold
Fusion server.  Bright Tiger monitored servers for load and
responsiveness, and so it could redirect traffic when a server was down
or running at a set load threshold. (v.4, at least.  I don't know if
this is still the case with the latest CF servers.)

The points being, if you're relying on the staging server for production
or backup to production, the it isn't really a staging server anymore.
And when planning for contingencies, a server down isn't the same as a
server at full load.

HTH


Sean G.


-----Original Message-----
Can someone point me to some data on preferred set up of
Apache/PHP/MySQL in a live/staging/development arrangement.

We think we want Apache/PHP and MySQL running on separate boxes for each
of the three stages. We think we also want a redundant live pair. Thus a
total of 8 machines, 4 run Apache/PHP, 4 run MySQL.