Architecture FAQ


Tutorials and Reference Material:

Does ]project-open[ work with Apache?

No, and it probably will never work with Apache. ]project-open[ is based on AOLServer  and the OpenACS  platform. AOLServer is "the backbone of the largest and busiest production environments in the world".AOLServer is easy to install, easy to understand, fast, reliable and little know to hackers and worm writers. We haven't had a single (successful) attack in more then 5 years.

Using AOLServer does not interfere with an already existing Apache installation. Reverse proxy servers like Pound  are able to redirect requests to the desired web server.

Do you support PHP?

Not yet... We've chosen the OpenACS platform (written in TCL ) as a base for different reasons. A system developed based on OpenACS is less vulnerable, easier to maintain and more scaleable.

You can learn TCL in a few hours if you know already PHP or another script language. 

Which databases do you Support?

The default database for most ]po[ installations is PostgreSQL . PostgreSQL is the "big brother" of MySQL. It features high performance and is easy to install.

For very large system (> 2.000 active users) we offer a commercial option to run ]po[ on Oracle. Please contact us for details on this option.

Does ]project-open[ work with MySQL?

No, and it probably won't in the near future. MySQL has improved in the last years, but still doesn't offer all features frequently used in ]project-open[ and required by the OpenACS framework. Also, MySQL still has difficulties with incremental and online backups etc., which limits its usefulness for a system like ]project-open[. 

Is it possible to run po in a high availability/failover cluster?

]project-open[ is a build on a very stable Application Framework. In more than 5 years of ]po[ implementations we had very few incidences in which availability of the applications suffered due to a severe software issue. This is due to the fact that all components used by ]po[ such as AOL Server, Postgres and OpenACS are build with high stability needs in mind as it is a necessity in enterprise environments. The cause of a system failure is usually rapidly discovered and comes down in many cases to missing disk space or Hardware failures. The latter can be addressed with RAID set ups that allow hot-swaps of HD's. However, this can lead in mal-configured or less powerful HW setups to a lower overall performance.

Since web framework and webserver are static components that can be easily synced on a file level.

There are several options to achieve high availability for the database component. For an overview please refer to http://developer.postgresql.org/pgdocs/postgres/high-availability.html. A widely used form with little administrative overhead is the Warm-Standby option which is further explained here: http://www.postgresql.org/docs/8.3/interactive/warm-standby.html . On top of that there are several commercial products available in the market allowing to set up database mirroring and failover clustering.

  Contact Us
  Project Open Business Solutions S.L.

Calle Aprestadora 19, 12o-2a

08902 Hospitalet de Llobregat (Barcelona)

Spain

 Tel Europe: +34 609 953 751
 Tel US: +1 415 200 2465
 Mail: info@project-open.com