ODP complaints .....

[Melanie du Plessis]

Thanks Mark for raising the issue! I have been having speed problems on the site (both from a very fast office network and 3G) to the extent that I have basically stopped posting. I would like to view and comment on other member's photos, but the process is (i) too slow and (ii) not friendly on navigation. For example, I have heard tips like clicking three times on the back button to make the browser behave in a proper way. While such tips are very helpful, it simply means that the site is not intuitive. I do believe that this site presents a wonderful concept and that the ODP community is a good place to belong to. I sincerely hope that in this age of technology a proper solution will be found... soon!

[elsahoffmann]

As I am not a web fundi - I am missing some - please excuse my ignorance. Does this mean ODP doesnt have its own server on location? Is that at all possible even?

[Forgiss - Sean Nel]

As I am not a web fundi - I am missing some - please excuse my ignorance. Does this mean ODP doesnt have its own server on location? Is that at all possible even?

Not sure if I understand correctly, but if I do... The various sites ODP manages (Forum, galleries, magazine, events, etc) sits on 2 dedicated servers in Germany and one shared server in the US.

[Forgiss - Sean Nel]

... (ii) not friendly on navigation. For example, I have heard tips like clicking three times on the back button to make the browser behave in a proper way. While such tips are very helpful, it simply means that the site is not intuitive.

All that will do is go back three pages in your browser history... ??

[elsahoffmann]

Not sure if I understand correctly, but if I do... The various sites ODP manages (Forum, galleries, magazine, events, etc) sits on 2 dedicated servers in Germany and one shared server in the US.

so why not buy your own servers and park it in Menlyn?

a simple question which I suspect will have a complex answer as it is obviously not as easy as that?

[Forgiss - Sean Nel]

Question:

Who that are having problems are on MWEB? seems there might be a routing problem there as well...

The German Techs have traced back to users from the server, and have run into routing problems when it went through the nodes handled by MWEB:

8. TenGigE0-1-1-0.vic-up-2.mweb.co.za 0.0% 1194 216.0 217.7 215.2 280.2 4.5
9. 197-84-4-34.cpt.mweb.co.za 0.1% 1194 215.9 219.8 214.8 370.2 14.6
10. vlan11.cpt-hscore-1.mweb.co.za 0.0% 1194 214.5 215.1 214.2 309.9 5.2
11. Te1-1-0.92.cpt-ipc-1.mweb.co.za 0.0% 1194 214.4 214.6 214.1 246.1 2.4
12. ???
13. ???

It's the same as the traceroute we did last night, except this time it comes from the server, back to the user...

Dear Shaun

Our German colleagues could not find any problems from their side.

Since your email this morning we've actually had quite a few customers using Mweb as their ISP contact us about problems connecting to their German hosted servers....
...
...
Tests done with other customers show similar results.

It seems like there might be a routing problem on Mweb's international links.
I would suggest you escalate to them as well.

Just to keep you all in the loop...

I don't think Mweb is the overall problem, I do think we just ran into another problem on the MWEB side quite by accident

[elsahoffmann]

me on mWeb

[Forgiss - Sean Nel]

so why not buy your own servers and park it in Menlyn?

a simple question which I suspect will have a complex answer as it is obviously not as easy as that?

Telkom mainly... Telkom charges for bandwidth (depending on the link to your server, the cost changes, we were quoted about 6c per mb)

We are running at about 45-50gb per week currently so even on a slow week of lets say 30gb, that will be a weekly cost of about R1800 per week for bandwidth. + the cost of hosting a dedicated server (about R2k a pop) we are looking at a cost of R10,000pm + to keep this "free" service to the community going... (excluding the techies doing upgrades, and security upgrades, and developments on the site, and trying to track slow site responses, etc, etc) - and before anybody asks... this is completely separate from the online shop that runs a separated and secure server (server number 4)

We can go cheaper, but then the server connection "pipe" is smaller, which means you get the data slower, which means the site "seems" slow (if 50 people tries to see an image at the same time, and the image is 100kb in size, it means the server needs to push through 50mb through a 1mb line, so either a person has to wait until their turn comes or the server pushes a little bit at a time to all 50 people - both options are slow)

To put it in context: when I wrote this post there were 245 people online using the site



To stop people from waiting, we can get a bigger pipe (10mb for instance) that will drastically speed up the data transfer to the users, but the local cost also goes up then.

The servers are running at a very low load, they can handle a lot more users than we currently have, the bottleneck is almost always the "pipes"...

By hosting internationally, we can quite literally cut out most of our bandwidth charges while keeping the pipes big and fast. The cost is about 300-600millisecond lag time between your click, and the data starting to fill the screen (less than a second for a R6,000+ saving)

That is more or less why...

[Mike Wrankmore]

Sorry Shaun...if this is a "Free site"....are the premium members subsidizing the non paying members......how many premium members do you have and where does that money go to?

[elsahoffmann]

both options are slow

Meaning the 10k+ and cheaper option - both thru Telkom?
So Telkom would be the reason why it is slow in this scenario?

the cost of hosting a dedicated server

Meaning owning it and running it on your premises or just hosting it with a local company who has a dedicated server for ODP?

[elsahoffmann]

Sorry Shaun...if this is a "Free site"....are the premium members subsidizing the non paying members......how many premium members do you have and where does that money go to?

I dont think that question will be difficult to answer - the cost of running the site is far more than just paying for hosting. Hedrus funds a large portion as things are right now.

[Andrew Roos]

For the record, I think you guys do a great job. For the most part my access speeds are perfectly acceptable (I don't mind waiting a couple of seconds for a page to load). My home ISP is mweb, although I access via the iburst wireless network.

[cagenuts]

Using Openweb (Internet Solutions)

# ADDRESS RT1 RT2 RT3 STATUS
1 41.242.144.1 5ms 4ms 5ms
2 196.38.73.113 93ms 94ms 17ms
3 0.0.0.0 0ms 0ms 0ms
4 196.26.0.62 104ms 81ms 10ms
5 168.209.201.61 179ms 183ms 181ms
6 195.66.224.175 294ms 281ms 214ms
7 77.109.128.149 282ms 281ms 210ms
8 77.109.128.153 294ms 283ms 220ms
9 82.197.166.86 263ms 262ms 203ms
10 213.239.240.242 297ms 297ms 239ms
11 213.239.236.67 265ms 270ms 198ms
12 85.10.215.48 221ms 220ms 221ms

[cagenuts]

Using Webafrica unshaped

# ADDRESS RT1 RT2 RT3 STATUS
1 41.185.76.1 4ms 5ms 4ms
2 196.220.59.250 62ms 29ms 30ms
3 41.185.0.67 42ms 30ms 30ms
4 41.66.150.41 64ms 29ms 60ms
5 41.66.132.49 183ms 213ms 184ms <MPLS:L=318240,E=0>
6 195.66.225.39 215ms 182ms 183ms
7 213.95.14.2 210ms 217ms 195ms
8 213.239.242.249 207ms 194ms 240ms
9 213.239.240.242 247ms 203ms 201ms
10 213.239.236.67 232ms 202ms 204ms
11 85.10.215.48 200ms 199ms 198ms

[cagenuts]

Using rapidwave wireless (breakout is Seacom or Sat3 I think)

# ADDRESS RT1 RT2 RT3 STATUS
1 41.66.190.1 33ms 33ms 23ms
2 41.66.150.33 21ms 14ms 16ms
3 41.66.132.114 30ms 30ms 43ms <MPLS:L=301280,E=0>
4 41.66.128.225 53ms 38ms 60ms <MPLS:L=302032,E=0>
5 41.66.132.70 256ms 279ms 276ms
6 195.66.225.39 276ms 244ms 238ms
7 213.95.14.2 271ms 256ms 276ms
8 213.239.242.249 250ms 0ms 358ms
9 213.239.240.242 336ms 266ms 284ms
10 213.239.236.67 268ms 261ms 269ms
11 85.10.215.48 278ms 311ms 296ms

[cagenuts]

Using Telkom account;

# ADDRESS RT1 RT2 RT3 STATUS
1 41.242.144.1 5ms 4ms 4ms
2 196.43.35.86 4ms 5ms 5ms
3 0.0.0.0 0ms 0ms 0ms
4 0.0.0.0 0ms 0ms 0ms
5 196.43.10.130 7ms 6ms 6ms
6 196.43.33.5 6ms 6ms 6ms
7 196.43.18.121 184ms 202ms 0ms
8 213.161.92.181 186ms 185ms 185ms
9 64.125.27.157 184ms 184ms 183ms <MPLS:L=536176,E=0>
10 64.125.28.198 199ms 199ms 199ms <MPLS:L=524480,E=0>
11 64.125.26.81 197ms 197ms 197ms
12 195.69.144.210 341ms 341ms 0ms
13 77.109.128.153 352ms 353ms 363ms
14 82.197.166.86 361ms 360ms 363ms
15 213.239.240.242 382ms 379ms 380ms
16 213.239.236.67 352ms 353ms 352ms
17 85.10.215.48 350ms 350ms 351ms

[cagenuts]

Using Mweb uncapped home

# ADDRESS RT1 RT2 RT3 STATUS
1 41.133.84.1 7ms 7ms 7ms
2 41.86.107.6 8ms 8ms 8ms
3 196.22.189.2 8ms 8ms 8ms
4 196.22.169.225 69ms 80ms 49ms
5 196.22.169.210 11ms 12ms 9ms
6 196.22.175.218 230ms 231ms 247ms
7 195.66.225.39 235ms 229ms 229ms
8 213.95.14.2 250ms 243ms 249ms
9 213.239.242.249 253ms 244ms 243ms
10 213.239.240.242 279ms 249ms 268ms
11 213.239.236.67 252ms 253ms 250ms
12 85.10.215.48 247ms 253ms 264ms

[cagenuts]

Using Webafrica shaped

# ADDRESS RT1 RT2 RT3 STATUS
1 41.185.76.1 4ms 5ms 4ms
2 196.220.59.250 27ms 27ms 27ms
3 41.185.0.66 30ms 29ms 29ms
4 41.66.150.177 50ms 45ms 71ms
5 41.66.132.49 204ms 183ms 182ms <MPLS:L=318240,E=0>
6 195.66.225.39 201ms 181ms 215ms
7 213.95.14.2 229ms 225ms 208ms
8 213.239.242.249 197ms 194ms 193ms
9 213.239.240.242 206ms 233ms 216ms
10 213.239.236.67 197ms 227ms 199ms
11 85.10.215.48 224ms 197ms 197ms

[cagenuts]

Using Afrihost shaped (who I think uses IS)

# ADDRESS RT1 RT2 RT3 STATUS
1 196.210.140.1 4ms 5ms 4ms
2 196.38.73.113 60ms 62ms 18ms
3 196.38.73.9 88ms 66ms 19ms
4 168.209.1.182 77ms 70ms 6ms
5 168.209.164.99 238ms 238ms 206ms <MPLS:L=3076,E=0>
6 168.209.161.82 312ms 346ms 232ms <MPLS:L=2926,E=0>
7 168.209.164.206 300ms 333ms 263ms
8 168.209.246.66 309ms 304ms 269ms
9 195.66.226.175 253ms 248ms 206ms
10 77.109.128.149 315ms 310ms 240ms
11 77.109.128.153 321ms 315ms 251ms
12 82.197.166.86 451ms 324ms 246ms
13 213.239.240.243 319ms 316ms 254ms
14 213.239.236.115 265ms 265ms 322ms
15 85.10.215.48 251ms 251ms 251ms

[cagenuts]

Using Metronet Wireless (not Broadband)

ADDRESS STATUS
1 41.79.36.1 6ms 8ms 7ms
2 196.26.167.97 7ms 10ms 5ms
3 168.209.1.182 6ms 5ms 5ms
4 168.209.164.99 207ms 206ms 204ms
mpls-label=3076
5 168.209.161.82 206ms 206ms 205ms
mpls-label=2926
6 168.209.164.206 205ms 204ms 205ms
7 168.209.246.3 209ms 206ms 209ms
8 195.66.226.175 215ms 207ms 216ms
9 77.109.128.149 214ms 213ms 213ms
10 77.109.128.153 220ms 220ms 223ms
11 82.197.166.86 220ms 219ms 218ms
12 213.239.240.242 225ms 239ms 239ms
13 213.239.236.67 228ms 223ms 225ms
14 85.10.215.48 222ms 223ms 223ms