Recommended server layout/architecture for Rails application

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Recommended server layout/architecture for Rails application

What is the recommended server layout for a production Rails application that is expected to receive medium (not heavy, but not light either) traffic? I'm thinking of a setup running Apache and Passenger (mod_rails). How many application servers, web servers, and database servers make sense? How should they be set up to provide redundancy, failover, reliability, etc.?

I know this is a broad question that depends on a lot of factors, but I'm just looking for general advice and suggestions for how this should be approached.

+1 A:

I highly recommend going with Heroku. Let it host the app for you and turn up the dial when you need more workers.

Jesse Wolgamott 2010-09-23 19:53:35

If you can make your application fit into the restrictions imposed by services like heroku/EY I would highly recommend it.

David Lyod 2010-09-23 19:57:43

Cool service. I'm looking at something that needs to be hosted locally, though.

jrdioko 2010-09-23 21:23:17

@jrdioko: Do you mean you are going to host it in your own machine?

jpartogi 2010-09-23 22:03:38

@jpartogi: Sorry for the ambiguity. I'm thinking of a case where an application that serves a business function needs to be hosted on the business's servers as opposed to with a third-party.

jrdioko 2010-09-24 17:40:52

+1 A:

Passenger and Apache or Nginx are great starting points.

The rest basically depends on your budget and requirements and are essentially impossible to give a canned response on.

A single server is a good place to start, and you will probably be surprised by the volume of traffic a single decently spec'd box with the right tuning can turn over.

If you have budget for two servers, a splitting the web server and database is the next logical step.

Toby Hede 2010-09-23 23:08:26

I see. You wouldn't happen to have any hard numbers on "the volume of traffic a single decently spec'd box with the right tuning can turn over," would you (in terms of real-world examples)?

jrdioko 2010-09-24 17:48:58

Again, that's totally going to depend on you app. Install RPM, do some tests. Last year I had an app on a 1gb slice doing up to 40 req/sec without really trying. Some more complex areas of the site took that down to about 20-30 req/sec but that was more than enough for our expected load.

Toby Hede 2010-09-25 05:08:18

ansaurus

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Recommended server layout/architecture for Rails application

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