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Poll: What web server do you use?

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Re: Poll: What web server do you use?

#61

Post by sirn »

dagw wrote: post #59
sirn wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Basically I was running CherryPy with supervisord+memmon since the application is a bit faulty. uWSGI alone can replace the whole stack: it comes with its own process manager, memory monitor and has Harakiri mode to monitor a process that is taking too long to response. Initial setup was super tricky (Nginx in FreeBSD port doesn't ship with uWSGI support and XML config somehow doesn't work, so I have to use Python co…

Thanks. Installing the AUR package as I'm typing this.

Ah, I didn't mentioned in the AUR, but you will still need to install python-uwsgi for uwsgi binary.

Re: Poll: What web server do you use?

#62

Post by tlack »

SwellJoe wrote: post #50
percept wrote: post #42

I was surprised to see more Apache usage here vs. nginx (and on the other poll, more MySQL compared to Postgres).

Why? Apache is, by far, the most popular web server. And, there is very little to complain about, compared to other servers. It isn't like you're missing any functionality in choosing Apache (Apache does more than nginx), or that Apache performance or resource usage is particularly bad. And, most applications simply aren't being limited by the web server. A Ruby, Python, or Perl application, or the database, is going…

I'd suggest that most people who switched to nginx from Apache did, in fact, notice a huge decrease in load. Otherwise why would anyone make the switch and stay with nginx? It's a risky proposition.

Personal anecdote: on a very popular blog that I run, experienced massive performance boost switching from Apache to Lighttpd, and load dropped as well.

Re: Poll: What web server do you use?

#63

Post by AdamN »

bmelton wrote: post #20
pavs wrote: post #13

I am currently using Apache and its the only web server I ever used, I have looked in to Lighttpd and Nginx but never actually used it. Can anyone tell me why I should use the other two over Apache? The main reason I am using Apache because it has a large user base, community and documentation that I can rely on if I ever need any help.

The main reason I switched to Nginx is that it uses dramatically less memory than Apache. Running a semi-popular message board, I was eating through 4Gb of memory between Apache and MySQL on Ubuntu, and simply switching over to Nginx was faster and freed up over 1Gb of allocated memory immediately. Since then, I've grown to dramatically prefer its configuration file syntax and usability.

The configuration file for Nginx is much simpler.

Re: Poll: What web server do you use?

#65

Post by JoachimSchipper »

bmelton wrote: post #20
pavs wrote: post #13

I am currently using Apache and its the only web server I ever used, I have looked in to Lighttpd and Nginx but never actually used it. Can anyone tell me why I should use the other two over Apache? The main reason I am using Apache because it has a large user base, community and documentation that I can rely on if I ever need any help.

The main reason I switched to Nginx is that it uses dramatically less memory than Apache. Running a semi-popular message board, I was eating through 4Gb of memory between Apache and MySQL on Ubuntu, and simply switching over to Nginx was faster and freed up over 1Gb of allocated memory immediately. Since then, I've grown to dramatically prefer its configuration file syntax and usability.

But note that Apache's memory use (and overal slowness) depends a lot on what modules you use. mod_{php,perl,...} embeds a whole interpreter in each Apache process, which causes lots of overhead, but you don't have to use these.

Re: Poll: What web server do you use?

#67

Post by barrydahlberg »

kogir wrote: post #53

I use IIS 7.5 for http, tcp, and message queue serving. It's fast and simple. If the last IIS you saw was 6, take another look. It can even host PHP and Python apps (we run trac in it) with fastcgi.

IIS definately became a whole lot less awful between 6 and 7.

Re: Poll: What web server do you use?

#69

Post by SwellJoe »

tlack wrote: post #62
SwellJoe wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why? Apache is, by far, the most popular web server. And, there is very little to complain about, compared to other servers. It isn't like you're missing any functionality in choosing Apache (Apache does more than nginx), or that Apache performance or resource usage is particularly bad. And, most applications simply aren't being limited by the web server. A Ruby, Python, or Perl application, or the database, is going…

I'd suggest that most people who switched to nginx from Apache did, in fact, notice a huge decrease in load. Otherwise why would anyone make the switch and stay with nginx? It's a risky proposition. Personal anecdote: on a very popular blog that I run, experienced massive performance boost switching from Apache to Lighttpd, and load dropped as well.

That would surprise me greatly. I've seen Apache side-by-side with nginx. In a similar configuration, Apache isn't much slower, and doesn't use a "huge" amount of additional resources. Yes, it's bigger per-process by a few MB (which admittedly does add up, in very high load environments), and it's a little slower, but unless you've configured Apache in a dramatically different way (such as running mod_php in Apache vs. an fcgi configuration under nginx) the differences simply aren't "huge" or "massive".

So, is nginx faster and smaller, in general, than Apache? Yes. But, by a "huge" or "massive" margin? Unlikely. Unless, of course, you've got a pathological configuration or one that is tuned for other priorities (like security in a shared hosting environment, for example, or other areas where Apache clearly outclasses nginx in terms of capabilities).

I'm just saying it's not a big deal that Apache is as popular as it is, and if anyone is suggesting changing web servers as the first, second, third, or fourth area to tackle when performance is an issue, it's probably bad advice. The application or the database are almost certainly where your attention should go first.

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