Open Source or Commercial WWWBoard Software?

BluSkreen asks: "I've got a site that runs Matt's WWWBoard, with most of the available mods added, the counter file lock sub routine, and most of the other hacks various people have done. The site regularly serves 60,000 plus requests a day, sometimes more. There are generally 100 or so posts a day. The last two months we have served about a million pages a month." The gist of it is that he's now having problems and looking for alternatives. Click below for more.

"Aside from the security concerns of the script, we are having problems with the script supporting that many users (up to 30 to 50 concurent, during peak times). During peak times, we can get 3 to 6 requests a second, which is fine for veiwing static pages with our configuration, but when multiple people try to post, the script can't support it. It sits on a T-1 all by itself on a Cobalt RAQ2, with 256 MB RAM. I like the "slash" package, but I've not been able to make it run on the RAQ2 just yet.

I'd like to "Ask Slashdot", what software/ hardware combination would you recommend? Is there a way to modify Slash so that the main articles are generated by the users, instead of submitted by the moderators? And lastly, has anyone been able to get Slash to run on a Cobalt box."

Anyone have other alternatives for WWWBoard software? I'm sure there are plenty out there, but how well do these packages work (especially under heavy loads)?

Comments

Reply from one of the team

[Matts]

I'm on the O'Reilly WebBoard team. I wrote the NNTP component. Glad to hear you found it scalable. Personally I don't know much about the web interface, having joined only to do the NNTP component, but it looks like a good product.

However there are a couple of things to consider:

1. The web interface is single threaded. This hasn't affected the performance for most people, but it is an issue (one that is being thought about for the next release).

2. It uses 3 horrible components (not my choice): VB for WebBoard web interface, MS SQL server (5 user edition) - bad because it means I can't properly cache statements and do some nice things I'd like to, and finally - NT. However I developed the NNTP component on Linux so there's no reason you can't run that separately on a Linux box.

However I would very much like to hear back from anyone using WebBoard (as would the rest of the team - we're a very small group), especially feedback on the NNTP component.

Matt.

Because it works

[Matts]

A lot of people like something that just works out of the box and doesn't give them a lot of trouble. Obviously that wasn't the case with the free solution that the original poster was trying, although I can't speak for all free systems.

It's the same reason some people still pay for O'Reilly's WebSite Pro - unlike IIS (and other free NT web servers) it just plain works.

Re:web board failed our test.......

[Matts]

I did buy a copy of Web Board earlier this year. The performance on a dual PII 233 with 512MB RAM (Dell Poweredge 2200) was horrible. There was a nasty issue where Web Board virtually locked up one of the processors. There were also other issues relating to performance.

OK. I don't know if that was Web Board 3, but it probably was since 4 is very recent. One of the major reasons for WB4 was performance improvement and ability to do load distribution across multiple servers. However it's sadly still NT and still VB and still single threaded - I don't have a control over those issues.

Support at the ORA site was anything but but helpful, denying any problems, until some other posts meticulously detailed the issue. Then there was no comment. It's a classic case for Open Source, as there were several on the forum with the chops to take a look and fix what was wrong, but the nature of closed software prohibited such.

I can't argue with this. It is unfortunately the nature of closed s/w. I wish I were in a position to change it. However I'd still like to be paid for the work :)

I'm probably not the only one with whom the irony is not lost on the fact the Tim O'Reilly, while lately pushing OSS models, still has Web
Board under an commercial license, for a single platform.

I see the irony there too. It's not just WB either - ORA have WebSite Pro too. One of the key things I had to keep fighting was support for the NNTP server on "alternative" platforms too - it's developed on Linux - I don't have a single NT box. It's also developed on a Sybase backend rather than the stinky MSDE they deliver on. But hey - maybe they'll see the error of their ways soon enough :) (I'm trying, OK :))

The real problem now, is how to deal with the nearly 30,000 messages in the archive since January.

If you decide to try out the latest WB, contact me directly (matt @ sergeant.org - minus the spaces) 'cos we're working on a WWWBoard->WebBoard conversion script (there are a number of people in your shoes).

Good Luck with your search.

Thoughts

[jd]

There is a general rule for this kind of work that more memory works better than a faster processer, so for user overload, the first thing I'd look at is whether there is sufficient memory to handle the number of users.

Secondly, Slash should serve well as a BBS program. Actually, why would you want the main topics to be entered by the user? If you treat each "topic" as being a section on the board, and the "comments" area as the actual BBS itself, it is much more natural, the way it is.

Thirdly, Squishdot is starting to shape up nicely. That might be worth a squint.

Lastly, optimise EVERYTHING as best you can. There is no point in upgrading the software and/or hardware, if you end up running only just about as well as you did to start with. Free up as much RAM as you physically can, and squash any compiled code into as small a space as you can, whilst keeping the speed optimisation as high as possible.

RPGBoard - A GPL WWWBoard, and it's good!

[thefatz]

RPGBoard is THE WWWBoard-style message board script. Actually, comparing it to WWWBoard is a gross understatement. RPGBoard has so many features, I can't think of any more! These include:

Multiple forum support
Completely new code (now under the GPL)
New file format with an auto-archive/compress/delete function and file locking
A message previewer/editor, complete with a spell checker
Highly configurable with the web-based RPGBoard Configurator
Selectable backgrounds
Configurable message tags, including a "No Text" tag
Default options and bios for the regulars
Different header styles, including UBB/WWWThreads, WebBBS, the old traditional WWWBoard, and "collapsed threads" mode
Ability to collate replies to simulate a non-threaded look (and for easier browsing)
A message search engine
Name/password detection via cookies
Interactive date/time stamps with timezone capability and recent message color coding
Ability for users (and admins) to delete (or undelete) messages
Partial messages can be saved (good for those really long posts that you don't want to lose)
A complete stats utility
A hidden spoiler message box
Ability to have replies e-mailed to you
Ability to ban IP addresses as well as an Ignore List for users to use
Word filter to block cuss words
IP address/number lookups with proxy detection
Browser/OS detection
Year 2000 compliant (unlike WWWBoard)

Best of all, it's free (and GPL)! I'm not out to make any profit from this. It's simply my part in helping the Internet community have access to a really good message board script. It's really easy to install, too. Just follow the instructions.

http://www.resonatorsoft.com/softwa re/rpgboard/

The Message Board War.