Using v8 web server general questions

[legacym]

I am an experienced developer but with no alpha five expertise (yet). I am planning to re-develop an old legacy application in alpha five v8.

I would appreciate it if someone could answer any or all of the questions below. I know its impossible but I have tried to phrase the questions so that a simple answer will suffice.

1. I want the final application to run on web server. Is there a �best� hardware/software platform for the alpha five web-server. It will be running on an internal intra-net.
2. The final application will need to support a minimum of ten, an average of 15, and a max of 20 users � is this a problem.
3. Are there any pros to using alpha�s own dbf rather than say SQL server via alpha DAO. The database is not particularly big but there will be a high percentage of inserts and updates.
4. Are there advantages to holding the db on a separate box other than resiliency. I do not need to keep web-server running 24/7 so I can stop it all to backup db.
5. I want to keep a separate test environment, which will hold a copy of the live db from say 24 hours ago. How do I set up � do I need two boxes, two web-servers as well as two databases?
6. Does any one have a feel for how many concurrent users alpha five web-server will support before it starts to slow up � for the purposes of the question you can assume that there is little or no database activity � I can factor that in myself; also can buy/use any hardware.
7. My reading of the documentation seems to indicate that there is no way to add/remove users in the security model other than through alpha five � is this right?

Sorry this is so long but could not find this by searching forum.

I am UK based btw.

[Steve Wood]

Re: Using v8 web server general questions

1. I want the final application to run on web server. Is there a �best� hardware/software platform for the alpha five web-server. It will be running on an internal intra-net.

People have used everything from high-grade servers and server OS to Windows XP. The "best" or most common server arrangement seems to be Windows 2003 Server (not 2003 Web) with at least 2GB of memory. From my experience, Alpha performs poorly on a VPS.

2. The final application will need to support a minimum of ten, an average of 15, and a max of 20 users � is this a problem.

No problem at all.

3. Are there any pros to using alpha�s own dbf rather than say SQL server via alpha DAO. The database is not particularly big but there will be a high percentage of inserts and updates.

Most are using the native dbf's on large and small installations.

4. Are there advantages to holding the db on a separate box other than resiliency. I do not need to keep web-server running 24/7 so I can stop it all to backup db.

The db can go anywhere on your LAN. I can't see any advantage unless you were running on the Internet, where it would be an extra layer of protection for your database.

5. I want to keep a separate test environment, which will hold a copy of the live db from say 24 hours ago. How do I set up � do I need two boxes, two web-servers as well as two databases?

The "Alpha database", as in the development environment you open in order to create your application, the ".ADB" file if you will, is NOT required to run the web application. So you don't need to copy the "Alpha database". If you just want a copy of the data (not the web application), do a test Publish where you publish the database. See what gets published - that's what you need to copy from your master.

Where the database resides has no impact on licensing.

But if you want to run the web application itself on a different computer or outside of the given Document Root on the first computer, you would need a seperate license. If you created your seperate copy 'inside' of the Document Root (e.g.: //myserver/documentroot/app1, //myserver/documentroot/app2) there is no licnese issue.

6. Does any one have a feel for how many concurrent users alpha five web-server will support before it starts to slow up � for the purposes of the question you can assume that there is little or no database activity � I can factor that in myself; also can buy/use any hardware.

Database activity and pages submitted are the most important. If that number is small, then no problem. Actually, if that number is reasonably big, still no problem. Under 'average' conditions, hundreds of users would not be a problem. That's an unqualified statement, I have no hard statistics.

7. My reading of the documentation seems to indicate that there is no way to add/remove users in the security model other than through alpha five � is this right?

Yes, but you should explain what you want to do. It's quite possible to process a userlist from some other source, but it does have to end up in Alpha's Security Framework, and you do have to use Alpha functions to do that. And even though I said that, you can, if you know what you are doing, and at your own risk, update the Security Framework files from outside of Alpha.

[legacym]

Re: Using v8 web server general questions

Steve

Thank you very much for your prompt reply - I did not expect one over the weekend!

I will take your answers and plan around them.

One thing I am not quite sure about.

If I use the same alpha "code" and publish to myserver\a5webroot\livesystem and myserver\a5webroot\testsystem and each of these looks at a test and a live database respectively, what code changes if any do I need to make to the test and live versions.

[cy_uab2007]

Re: Using v8 web server general questions

I'm still a newbie at this, but in my experience there is no need for any code change, just a profile change (assuming both versions are using the same tables, etc.). Make sure that your profiles both post to the same root directory, of course. The Alpha 5 publish method seems to be pretty good at handling any path mangling that needs to happen.

I'd try going in to detail, but I'd probably get it wrong. It took me awhile to get two versions of the same project working and I can't remember every little thing I had to mess with, but it is possible. :)

Like Steve said, you will need to make a manual (or scripted) effort to copy the data files from your "live" to "test". I had a few problems with that as well, and finally just deleted every database related file in my "test" area before copying to it.

Hopefully, someone with more experience can give you a good run down. You might try looking in the Documentation area, as that's where I got most of my pointers.

[legacym]

Re: Using v8 web server general questions

Steve

On reading your reply a bit more closely:

"Alpha performs poorly on VPS" - what is a VPS?

On point 7 - I think what I am asking is "what would I need to do on a live system if my customer rings me and asks for a new user to be added".

Thanks again

Mike

[Pat Bremkamp]

Re: Using v8 web server general questions

A VPS is a Virtual Private Server. This means that one server is set up as a number of different servers, but to the user each one runs like an independent server.

In a VPS, just like any other server, performance in a web application depends on available ram and processor speed. The Alpha Web Application Server needs more ram that a conventional web site...I first started with 320 and performance was very poor. Going to 640 made a lightly loaded site acceptable. In fact, I just had a client who tested going from 640 to 1 meg, and decided the performance gain was not sufficient to justify the extra cost and went back to 640. If your site uses large tables or complex Xbasic scripts, I would spec a minimum of 960.

In your environment, the intranet, I would recommend, as Steve did, a 2 Gig machine.

Alpha, however, does not benefit from multiple processors, so if I was recommending a machine, I would suggest a single processor, lots of ram and very fast hard disks set up in raid 5.

As for adding users, there are two methods, and you can use one or both. You can add users throgh the A5V8 Pro (or enterprise) system on your development machine and publish the users to the web. Or, you can add users directly through web components. The risk in using both is that the two web security tables get out of synch and, when you publish the desktop, you overwrite the web data, losing some users added through the web. If users will not be signing themselves up, then just using the desktop version should suffice.

Pat

[legacym]

Re: Using v8 web server general questions

Thanks for all of your prompt replies - I think I understand now.

The problem with "publishing" to create new users is that alpha will publish the whole of my development environment if I am not very careful - guess I will just have to watch carefully what is published.