Hello,
I have done an regular install on my fedora Core 4 box. I have to run Moodle on my home box though, and while I have a decent connection, its no t1 even. My school has a nice server I can access, but it is retarded and doesn't even have php.
So I got to thinking, my server should be good unless people are getting larger files and such from me, and I think most files are stored in moodledata. So could I just try and point the moodledata directory somehow to point to a moodledata that I can place on the school server. That way it just dishes out larger files and such, hopefully saving my computer space and bandwidth.
Don't know if it would work, but I though it was worth asking.
mrjohnston
No, sorry.
The issue is authentication - Moodle protects files to make sure the right people are accessing them. So even if you get NFS access so that you can mount the school drive at home then a request will suck the file from school to home and then out to the user. No good.
However, if you are referencing large files that you don't mind being on an open server then you can certainly just refer to them using normal direct URLs. You can do this in resources, links, objects etc
The issue is authentication - Moodle protects files to make sure the right people are accessing them. So even if you get NFS access so that you can mount the school drive at home then a request will suck the file from school to home and then out to the user. No good.
However, if you are referencing large files that you don't mind being on an open server then you can certainly just refer to them using normal direct URLs. You can do this in resources, links, objects etc
You could have one copy of moodledata on your home box and another one (synchronized) on the school server. The synchronization could be done using rsync or any other simmilar tool.
Then, the file.php could recognize big/confidential/unsynchronized/whatsoever files and make conditional 301 redirects to your school server. Home bandwith saved, confidential files kept secret, students' download being faster, everyone is happy
.
Then, the file.php could recognize big/confidential/unsynchronized/whatsoever files and make conditional 301 redirects to your school server. Home bandwith saved, confidential files kept secret, students' download being faster, everyone is happy
Has anyone worked on this concept at all?
I'm sure it has to be possible... just may need a lot of work?
I run a Moodle installation for my School that only has a 1500/256K link.
Plain html pages load fine over this connection (using apache gzip compression) but files are terribly slow. I have 300G of space on shared hosting that I would like to put a copy of the moodle data on.
I'm happy to work out the rsync split horizon dns etc issues.
What is stopping this solution from being viable?
I'm sure it has to be possible... just may need a lot of work?
I run a Moodle installation for my School that only has a 1500/256K link.
Plain html pages load fine over this connection (using apache gzip compression) but files are terribly slow. I have 300G of space on shared hosting that I would like to put a copy of the moodle data on.
I'm happy to work out the rsync split horizon dns etc issues.
What is stopping this solution from being viable?
hi Amiel,
I don't think that this is quite the solution you're looking for.
The point about moodledata is that it's not stored in public web space. It's off the webroot and we use Moodle's security+authentication etc. to provide access to the appropriate files. Moodle data needs to be somewhere on your local network/system with the lowest latency setup you can provide.
What _might_ work to lower bandwidth issues is for you to have some large media files hosted externally, linking to them as simply external resources, although this wouldn't keep them private or controlled via Moodle.
Good luck sorting out the issue.
MC
I don't think that this is quite the solution you're looking for.
The point about moodledata is that it's not stored in public web space. It's off the webroot and we use Moodle's security+authentication etc. to provide access to the appropriate files. Moodle data needs to be somewhere on your local network/system with the lowest latency setup you can provide.
What _might_ work to lower bandwidth issues is for you to have some large media files hosted externally, linking to them as simply external resources, although this wouldn't keep them private or controlled via Moodle.
Good luck sorting out the issue.
MC
1. try a php accelerator (such as eAccelerator)
2. don't link to large files nor link to large complex pages (such as flash or others that aren't optimized) - it's your external access that has the limits; internally I'm assuming your 10/100 or even 10/100/1000. Your internal server is going to be way faster than your external access. Download any large files or pages and host them internally.
It'd help to know the version your using, and hardware. It might be worth changing to a different version. I've been waiting for the bugs to be worked out of 1.9 and to see how responsive it is.
I've been servicing roughly 100 endusers, between 30 - 60 simultaneously on an old PIII 800MHz with 256MB ram and a 40 gig HD, running Moodle 1.6.2, LAMP (Edubuntu 6.06LTS) and eAccelerator. I recently updated the hardware to a dual core AMD 3000 X2 processor with 4 GB dual channel ram and dual 300 gig HDs running Moodle 1.8.3 and a LAMP Edubuntu 7.10 box. Both boxes have operated over an ADSL 6Mbs/400Kbs connection. Our machines internally are on DHCP, but might as well be on a fixed IP network as the leases were set to never expire ... so I place and link to large files internally, but having said that, so far there haven't been any issues with 20 students loading a 6 meg pdf at the same time ... other issues that might impact you is the types of media you system is permitted to download - if there's a dozen media streams while your attempting to use Moodle I can only imagine the limits of the 1200/256 connection might pose.
2. don't link to large files nor link to large complex pages (such as flash or others that aren't optimized) - it's your external access that has the limits; internally I'm assuming your 10/100 or even 10/100/1000. Your internal server is going to be way faster than your external access. Download any large files or pages and host them internally.
It'd help to know the version your using, and hardware. It might be worth changing to a different version. I've been waiting for the bugs to be worked out of 1.9 and to see how responsive it is.
I've been servicing roughly 100 endusers, between 30 - 60 simultaneously on an old PIII 800MHz with 256MB ram and a 40 gig HD, running Moodle 1.6.2, LAMP (Edubuntu 6.06LTS) and eAccelerator. I recently updated the hardware to a dual core AMD 3000 X2 processor with 4 GB dual channel ram and dual 300 gig HDs running Moodle 1.8.3 and a LAMP Edubuntu 7.10 box. Both boxes have operated over an ADSL 6Mbs/400Kbs connection. Our machines internally are on DHCP, but might as well be on a fixed IP network as the leases were set to never expire ... so I place and link to large files internally, but having said that, so far there haven't been any issues with 20 students loading a 6 meg pdf at the same time ... other issues that might impact you is the types of media you system is permitted to download - if there's a dozen media streams while your attempting to use Moodle I can only imagine the limits of the 1200/256 connection might pose.