4 ms·

Out of interest, why not just PXE boot prebuilt images (buildroot/etc) that run from memory as your OS? That would save you the hassle of maintaining a stateful

Out of interest, why not just PXE boot prebuilt images (buildroot/etc) that run from memory as your OS? That would save you the hassle of maintaining a stateful server, installing an OS, ensuring configuration is up to date, etc.

Imustaskforhelp 2y ago
Probably because it isn't memory efficient ? I am not sure , please take what I am saying is with a grain of salt. I may be wrong , I usually am. But even if that's the case , couldn't they use something like vram if they are running out of memory of are we back to square one?
- Nextgrid 2y ago
  I mean yes, you are sacrificing some RAM. But a typical Linux OS to run VMs/containers could fit in a couple gigs. For the amount of RAM these servers have, this is peanuts and would save a lot of headaches dealing with statefulness.
  - Imustaskforhelp 2y ago
    Hmm seems really interesting and even simple! How does this really work , can you please tell me the workflow , seems really simple and effective and i am just interested
  - Imustaskforhelp 2y ago
    Could this be an issue that ram can cause issues where a server can shut down and it would lose it causing data backup issues
    - bananapub 2y ago
      no
      - Imustaskforhelp 2y ago
        then I don't understand the issue ! this seems really great imo.
  - ca508 2y ago
    Author here; RAM is so much more expensive than disk though. Two 500G M.2 NVMes for a RootFS in RAID1 are basically max ~$150 which is I think much cheaper than a single 64G DDR5 ECC RAM module [I don't have exact numbers on me, but ECC RAM is pricey]. It's also a lot harder to debug when things go wrong because you lose the machines state if everything was ephemeral. We run a thin base OS on the boxes and then VMs on top which we consider more ephemeral. The frequency of needing to update that base OS is v. low. I think there's a case for building a custom PXE booted RAMdisk image to replace the install though; something like what Equinix Metal (formerly Packet) do with Tinkerbell (https://github.com/tinkerbell https://github.com/tinkerbell); they call it an OS Install Environment, but the idea is a small lightweight linux install agent that can DD a golden image onto the disk (vs. an install each time).
    - Nextgrid 2y ago
      Are you guys still hiring? Would be keen to have a chat about this and see if anything comes out. Sent one of you guys a LinkedIn invite but no response yet.
      - ca508 2y ago
        Yep! We have two roles open https://railway.com/careers#open-positions https://railway.com/careers#open-positions - Datacenters and Infra that might be of interest to you. Idk if many of us use LinkedIn so not the best way to get in touch. Can I share the email on your HN profile link with our in-house recruiter?
        Nextgrid 2y ago
        Yes please. The reason I wanted to informally reach out by LinkedIn is that I'm more interested in a chat to see if my skills align and if there's potential, even for short-term work - what you guys are doing sounds cool and I've played around with some of it in the past (thus the Buildroot suggestion - that was my approach to a similar requirement).
orev 2y ago
As a general rule, a statement that starts with “why don’t you just…” typically leans far too heavily on the “just” to handwave away the reasons why the next part of the statement isn’t going to be helpful. In this case, you’re assuming a huge number of things like infrastructure and other requirements are in place, and all of those things take a lot of time and work, if they’re even appropriate at all.

Imustaskforhelp 2y ago

Probably because it isn't memory efficient ? I am not sure , please take what I am saying is with a grain of salt. I may be wrong , I usually am. But even if that's the case , couldn't they use something like vram if they are running out of memory of are we back to square one?

Nextgrid 2y ago
I mean yes, you are sacrificing some RAM. But a typical Linux OS to run VMs/containers could fit in a couple gigs. For the amount of RAM these servers have, this is peanuts and would save a lot of headaches dealing with statefulness.
- Imustaskforhelp 2y ago
  Hmm seems really interesting and even simple! How does this really work , can you please tell me the workflow , seems really simple and effective and i am just interested
- Imustaskforhelp 2y ago
  Could this be an issue that ram can cause issues where a server can shut down and it would lose it causing data backup issues
  - bananapub 2y ago
    no
    - Imustaskforhelp 2y ago
      then I don't understand the issue ! this seems really great imo.
- ca508 2y ago
  Author here; RAM is so much more expensive than disk though. Two 500G M.2 NVMes for a RootFS in RAID1 are basically max ~$150 which is I think much cheaper than a single 64G DDR5 ECC RAM module [I don't have exact numbers on me, but ECC RAM is pricey]. It's also a lot harder to debug when things go wrong because you lose the machines state if everything was ephemeral. We run a thin base OS on the boxes and then VMs on top which we consider more ephemeral. The frequency of needing to update that base OS is v. low. I think there's a case for building a custom PXE booted RAMdisk image to replace the install though; something like what Equinix Metal (formerly Packet) do with Tinkerbell (https://github.com/tinkerbell https://github.com/tinkerbell); they call it an OS Install Environment, but the idea is a small lightweight linux install agent that can DD a golden image onto the disk (vs. an install each time).
  - Nextgrid 2y ago
    Are you guys still hiring? Would be keen to have a chat about this and see if anything comes out. Sent one of you guys a LinkedIn invite but no response yet.
    - ca508 2y ago
      Yep! We have two roles open https://railway.com/careers#open-positions https://railway.com/careers#open-positions - Datacenters and Infra that might be of interest to you. Idk if many of us use LinkedIn so not the best way to get in touch. Can I share the email on your HN profile link with our in-house recruiter?
      - Nextgrid 2y ago
        Yes please. The reason I wanted to informally reach out by LinkedIn is that I'm more interested in a chat to see if my skills align and if there's potential, even for short-term work - what you guys are doing sounds cool and I've played around with some of it in the past (thus the Buildroot suggestion - that was my approach to a similar requirement).

orev 2y ago

As a general rule, a statement that starts with “why don’t you just…” typically leans far too heavily on the “just” to handwave away the reasons why the next part of the statement isn’t going to be helpful. In this case, you’re assuming a huge number of things like infrastructure and other requirements are in place, and all of those things take a lot of time and work, if they’re even appropriate at all.