6 ms·

I'm going to throw a possibly unpopular view on the table here: sticking all this on Linux is purely about cutting costs but saves nothing. The administrative

by meaty 14y ago

I'm going to throw a possibly unpopular view on the table here: sticking all this on Linux is purely about cutting costs but saves nothing. The administrative overhead of deploying all this stuff is incredible as are the disparate infrastructure and software models. You might be saving 11x on an Azure instance, but your ops time and staffing requirements will cost more than that. Throwing something on Azure is really cheap with respect to time and effort. If you need to scale past that or cost becomes a limitation, you might as well fish out for a Rackspace or other dedicated package. We're at the £50k hosting budget a month mark now (1x production DC, 1x hot spare DC, 2x packed 42U racks in each) and 2 meat based products to manage it all. Not much of that cost is software licenses. Note: I have nothing against servicestack - in fact it's rather good (we use servicestack.text) For ref, I turned down a position at 7digital a couple of years ago as I though they were smoking crack when stuff like this was mentioned.

mythz 14y ago
Unless you're new to the web, you'll be surprised to learn that most of the Internet runs on Linux. It runs because it's a commodity server, because it has first-class support for most NoSQL data stores, caches, proxies, etc. because its highly configurable, because it's much more automatable where everything is scriptable with simple unix commands. Going to call BS on Azure being cheaper. All of ServiceStack's live demos are deployed using simple bash scripts. There's none of these admin overhead costs, I check-in on my dev box and run a remote script to deploy straight from the Git repo. The projects are also un-touched ASP.NET or stand-alone Console hosts (which I host behind an nginx reverse proxy). I've no doubt that it would be at least 11x more expensive if I decided to host servicestack.net on Azure, even more if I decided to use SQL Server (PostgreSQL/MySQL is free to use on Linux). And I'll also miss out on cool linux utils like rsync which is how we migrated GB's of content onto the new vServer.
- meaty 14y ago
  The indexable "world wide web" of startups, big tech brands, VC, video sites, porn and blogs about cats falling out of windows, yes. When it comes to the deep web i.e. corporate applications, business tools etc, it's just not seen at all. These are the things that produce a lot of value and solve a lot of problems. I'd argue they are cumulatively more valuable than the above. EsEnt, AppFabric, IIS7 ARR, PowerShell cover your concerns above all of which are scriptable and automatable. When you consolidate your time across the year spent on developing a backup methodology for your server, managing updates etc, monitoring, testing, where does that leave you? I know Linux inside out (I've been a professional user on and off since 1998) and I know you hit the same number of roadblocks as windows along the way. Also your deployment model sounds odd. Do you check in your production artifacts/dlls and configuration? Do you build on your production boxes? Also your demonstration applications are tiny. A single deployment we throw out has 95Mb of release compiled DLLs across 48 assemblies... We use NHibernate and have a test harness for MySQL already so we're not bothered about SQL pricing (anyway it's still plenty affordable as our product is valuable and pays for the licensing). I was using rsync on Windows 2000 back in 2002 to sync press image libraries so that's a moot point really. Azure cuts it for the ramp up phase of your product if you factor in the above. We did a proper cost analysis.
  - jbrechtel 14y ago
    Are you seriously claiming that Linux is "not seen at all" in the "deep web" (in-house corporate development) ? Hyperbole aside, obviously. Or am I misunderstanding you? BTW, if your experience is mostly in the UK then that might explain this viewpoint. It's much less true in the US in my experience.
  - mythz 14y ago
    >> I'd argue they are cumulatively more valuable than the above. If you're trying to suggest Windows Enterprise applications have more cumulative value than everything else that's running on Linux than I think this is more telling of your limited world view than any kind of reality. Java ranks nearly 3x higher than .NET on the latest TIOBE Programming Community Index http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.... and that doesn't include all the other languages running on the JVM platform. In the Open Source space, .NET doesn't even make it on the top 10. How you've concluded Windows provides more cumulative value should provide great content for a MS Facts whitepaper. >> EsEnt, AppFabric, IIS7 ARR, PowerShell cover your concerns above all of which are scriptable and automatable. These options pales in comparison to what's available on Unix, which are much more popular and require much less tooling and are more scriptable. Big tooling falls down when you need to do something that's not supported out of the box. Let's identify big companies that rely on Windows? and I'll come up with a few names that host on Linux. We can start with the worlds most valuable companies and work our way down. >> Also your deployment model sounds odd. Do you check in your production artifacts/dlls and configuration? Do you build on your production boxes? We use the repos as they are on Git, every project on Git is self-hosting either in NuGet /packages or contained in the top-level /lib folder (we're moving to NuGet for all future projects). We're currently building with xbuild on our servicestack.net server but as we've recently got Mono/Windows TeamCity CI Builds for ServiceStack's projects, we'll be switching to CI deployments. Also unless it's not perfectly clear, because we deploy from Git only the delta's are pulled in each deployment, so libs that don't change aren't pulled. >> Azure cuts it for the ramp up phase of your product if you factor in the above. We did a proper cost analysis. I'm still not buying it. Maybe it makes sense for a Windows-only .NET dev team, but factoring all costs Azure would still cost us at least 11x more.
smiler 14y ago
A UK .NET developer? A rarity on here... are you looking to hire anyone?
- meaty 14y ago
  We're a pretty quiet bunch. There are lots of us - if not thousands. We're not hiring at the minute unfortunately. I've got your email address - will drop you an email if an opportunity comes up.
  - smiler 14y ago
    Can you e-mail me where you work - I'd just be interested to see what you're doing...
- EnderMB 14y ago
  Really? I've seen quite a few on here, and there is a ton of .NET work out there in the UK. If anything, in Bristol we're crying out for developers.
  - smiler 14y ago
    Yes I know there's plenty of work in the UK but you don't find many .NET devs based in the UK on here. Well, I can't move to Bristol and I don't want to work full time for anyone - are you hiring remote freelances and do you pay decent rates?
dscrd 14y ago
"You might be saving 11x on an Azure instance, but your ops time and staffing requirements will cost more than that." Could you elaborate on why you think this is true? It seems to me like Microsoft baseless propaganda from last decade.

by meaty 14y ago

mythz 14y ago

Unless you're new to the web, you'll be surprised to learn that most of the Internet runs on Linux. It runs because it's a commodity server, because it has first-class support for most NoSQL data stores, caches, proxies, etc. because its highly configurable, because it's much more automatable where everything is scriptable with simple unix commands. Going to call BS on Azure being cheaper. All of ServiceStack's live demos are deployed using simple bash scripts. There's none of these admin overhead costs, I check-in on my dev box and run a remote script to deploy straight from the Git repo. The projects are also un-touched ASP.NET or stand-alone Console hosts (which I host behind an nginx reverse proxy). I've no doubt that it would be at least 11x more expensive if I decided to host servicestack.net on Azure, even more if I decided to use SQL Server (PostgreSQL/MySQL is free to use on Linux). And I'll also miss out on cool linux utils like rsync which is how we migrated GB's of content onto the new vServer.

meaty 14y ago
The indexable "world wide web" of startups, big tech brands, VC, video sites, porn and blogs about cats falling out of windows, yes. When it comes to the deep web i.e. corporate applications, business tools etc, it's just not seen at all. These are the things that produce a lot of value and solve a lot of problems. I'd argue they are cumulatively more valuable than the above. EsEnt, AppFabric, IIS7 ARR, PowerShell cover your concerns above all of which are scriptable and automatable. When you consolidate your time across the year spent on developing a backup methodology for your server, managing updates etc, monitoring, testing, where does that leave you? I know Linux inside out (I've been a professional user on and off since 1998) and I know you hit the same number of roadblocks as windows along the way. Also your deployment model sounds odd. Do you check in your production artifacts/dlls and configuration? Do you build on your production boxes? Also your demonstration applications are tiny. A single deployment we throw out has 95Mb of release compiled DLLs across 48 assemblies... We use NHibernate and have a test harness for MySQL already so we're not bothered about SQL pricing (anyway it's still plenty affordable as our product is valuable and pays for the licensing). I was using rsync on Windows 2000 back in 2002 to sync press image libraries so that's a moot point really. Azure cuts it for the ramp up phase of your product if you factor in the above. We did a proper cost analysis.
- jbrechtel 14y ago
  Are you seriously claiming that Linux is "not seen at all" in the "deep web" (in-house corporate development) ? Hyperbole aside, obviously. Or am I misunderstanding you? BTW, if your experience is mostly in the UK then that might explain this viewpoint. It's much less true in the US in my experience.
- mythz 14y ago
  >> I'd argue they are cumulatively more valuable than the above. If you're trying to suggest Windows Enterprise applications have more cumulative value than everything else that's running on Linux than I think this is more telling of your limited world view than any kind of reality. Java ranks nearly 3x higher than .NET on the latest TIOBE Programming Community Index http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.... and that doesn't include all the other languages running on the JVM platform. In the Open Source space, .NET doesn't even make it on the top 10. How you've concluded Windows provides more cumulative value should provide great content for a MS Facts whitepaper. >> EsEnt, AppFabric, IIS7 ARR, PowerShell cover your concerns above all of which are scriptable and automatable. These options pales in comparison to what's available on Unix, which are much more popular and require much less tooling and are more scriptable. Big tooling falls down when you need to do something that's not supported out of the box. Let's identify big companies that rely on Windows? and I'll come up with a few names that host on Linux. We can start with the worlds most valuable companies and work our way down. >> Also your deployment model sounds odd. Do you check in your production artifacts/dlls and configuration? Do you build on your production boxes? We use the repos as they are on Git, every project on Git is self-hosting either in NuGet /packages or contained in the top-level /lib folder (we're moving to NuGet for all future projects). We're currently building with xbuild on our servicestack.net server but as we've recently got Mono/Windows TeamCity CI Builds for ServiceStack's projects, we'll be switching to CI deployments. Also unless it's not perfectly clear, because we deploy from Git only the delta's are pulled in each deployment, so libs that don't change aren't pulled. >> Azure cuts it for the ramp up phase of your product if you factor in the above. We did a proper cost analysis. I'm still not buying it. Maybe it makes sense for a Windows-only .NET dev team, but factoring all costs Azure would still cost us at least 11x more.

smiler 14y ago

A UK .NET developer? A rarity on here... are you looking to hire anyone?

meaty 14y ago
We're a pretty quiet bunch. There are lots of us - if not thousands. We're not hiring at the minute unfortunately. I've got your email address - will drop you an email if an opportunity comes up.
- smiler 14y ago
  Can you e-mail me where you work - I'd just be interested to see what you're doing...
EnderMB 14y ago
Really? I've seen quite a few on here, and there is a ton of .NET work out there in the UK. If anything, in Bristol we're crying out for developers.
- smiler 14y ago
  Yes I know there's plenty of work in the UK but you don't find many .NET devs based in the UK on here. Well, I can't move to Bristol and I don't want to work full time for anyone - are you hiring remote freelances and do you pay decent rates?

dscrd 14y ago

"You might be saving 11x on an Azure instance, but your ops time and staffing requirements will cost more than that." Could you elaborate on why you think this is true? It seems to me like Microsoft baseless propaganda from last decade.