Re: Kannel not load balancing after restart and messages get stuck inqueue

[Nikos Balkanas]

Hi Alan,

I must be the one thanking you for the discussion. You see I am a wap guy, 
and don't know of many of the issues that sms people face.

The only concern is at startup. After it has bbox has started succesfully, 
and therefore sms_router, started as well, it doesn't matter. You can take 
all the smscs you want offline to service them. sms_router will work with 
the rest of them.

The only issue is for startup. I cannot test the scenario you describe, 
because i don't have real smsc connections. However, if both connections are 
active the minute kannel starts (1st case0, there should be no problem. In 
the second case, the unavailable smsc should be commented out the 
configuration.

I guess the only question is: Under what circumstances bbox will start, if 
the 2nd smsc is not responding?

BR,
Nikos
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Alan McNatty" <a...@catalyst.net.nz>
To: "Nikos Balkanas" <nbalka...@gmail.com>
Cc: "Alvaro Cornejo" <cornejo.alv...@gmail.com>; <devel@kannel.org>
Sent: Wednesday, June 10, 2009 6:14 AM
Subject: Re: Kannel not load balancing after restart and messages get stuck 
inqueue


Hi Nikos,

OK, yeah I'm not about failure at start-up time. If an SMSC is off-line
(SMPP timeout/retry during bind) kannel will start (simply config a
bogus IP address for SMPP to test this out). An example is lets say we
have 2 connections for load balancing. Now consider 1 smsc being taken
offline (no tcp connection) as it is upgraded, we can still send through
the other (this is also useful for DR - disaster recover, etc).

So from my example above only 1 connection would be active the other in
bind retry loop (wait X seconds, etc) - no tcp connection is established
to smsc. If we re-started kannel it wouldn't be a good idea to wait for
both links to become active before pushing messages out - this would
mean waiting for the upgraded smsc to come back online, no?

Again sorry if I'm talking at cross purposes here.

Cheers,
Alan

Nikos Balkanas wrote:
Hi Alan,

If even 1 SMSc in configuration file fails to start, bearerbox will
panic. There are several states to any SMSc, like connecting, going
down, etc. Bearerbox expects all SMScs to be available on startup. The
operative word is "available". If a configured modem is not connected,
that's a failure and you would have to take it off configuration to
startup.

After it starts, SMScs can go up or down. Isolated mode still needs
SMScs for outgoing messages. The only mode that doesn't is Suspended.
But i don't think that even this will startup without all SMScs 
available.

Available is different than Active. Available means anything but Failed
(Dead,etc.). An available SMSc could be down, or coming up or connecting.

In this patch, router will wait to start until all SMScs become active.

What is DR?

BR,
Nikos
----- Original Message ----- From: "Alan McNatty" <a...@catalyst.net.nz>
To: "Nikos Balkanas" <nbalka...@gmail.com>
Cc: "Alvaro Cornejo" <cornejo.alv...@gmail.com>; <devel@kannel.org>
Sent: Wednesday, June 10, 2009 1:22 AM
Subject: Re: Kannel not load balancing after restart and messages get
stuck inqueue


Hi Nikos,

Sorry I haven't reviewed this whole thread in detail but was caught by
.. "bearerbox will not start unless all smscs are available." .. this
worried me a bit.

I'm concerned that in a DR scenario if 1 connection is down (and not
coming up just yet) then I would like to be able to (re)start no problem
(the other connections would start with this one remaining down ..
trying to bind, etc). Is there not an alternative option in terms of
(from init.d/startup perspective) start isolated, allowing some time
(seconds) for the available connections to bind then setting the
connections to active. Or have I missed the point here.

Apologies if I'm muddying the water. I will try and follow more closely.

Cheers,
Alan


Nikos Balkanas wrote:
Dear Alvaro,

I just managed to finish with my responsibilities, not on April 10, as 
I
was hoping. Meanwhile, I haven't heard from you in a while, and I hope
you are enjoying your vacations.

Here is a patch to gw/bearerbox.c and gw/bb_smscconn.c, that doesn't
start the sms_router, until all smscs (except the FAKE) are ACTIVE. If 
I
am not mistaken, bearerbox will not start unless all smscs are
available. So this is inline with this philosophy.

I have tested it to the extend that it doesn't break anything, please
let me know if it solves your problem.

BR,
Nikos
----- Original Message ----- From: "Alvaro Cornejo"
<cornejo.alv...@gmail.com>
To: "Nikos Balkanas" <nbalka...@gmail.com>
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2009 4:56 PM
Subject: Re: Kannel not load balancing after restart and messages get
stuck inqueue


Hi Nikos

No problem. I undestand we are on a "best effort support XD" and this
is not a critical issue.

Thanks

Alvaro


|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|


Env��­e y Reciba Datos y mensajes de Texto (SMS) hacia y desde
cualquier
celular y Nextel
en el Per����, M��©xico y en mas de 180 paises. Use 
aplicaciones 2
vias via
SMS y GPRS online
             Visitenos en www.perusms.NET www.smsglobal.com.mx y
www.pravcom.com



2009/3/31 Nikos Balkanas <nbalka...@gmail.com>:
Hi Alvaro,

Thanx for reminding me. Unfortunately I am still working very hard
on my
project. I will be finished by the 10th of April. Sorry about that
and I
hope I am not causing you trouble. I put a reminder on my PC not to
forget.

BR,
Nikos

----- Original Message ----- From: "Alvaro Cornejo"
<cornejo.alv...@gmail.com>
To: "Nikos Balkanas" <nbalka...@gmail.com>; "kannel users"
<us...@kannel.org>
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2009 10:17 AM
Subject: Re: Kannel not load balancing after restart and messages get
stuck
inqueue


Hi Nikos

Had you chance to review this?

Regards

Alvaro
|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|


Env��β€��’Β­e y Reciba Datos y mensajes de Texto (SMS) 
hacia y desde
cualquier
celular y Nextel
en el Per��β€���ο�½, M��β€��’Β©xico y en 
mas de 180 paises. Use
aplicaciones 2
vias via
SMS y GPRS online
�’ �’ �’ �’ �’ �’ Visitenos en www.perusms.NET 
www.smsglobal.com.mx y
www.pravcom.com



2009/3/10 Nikos Balkanas <nbalka...@gmail.com>:

Hi,

I am working on something very important right now. Could you give
me a
ping
in 2 weeks or so, if no one has addressed it?

Thanx,
Nikos
----- Original Message ----- From: "Alvaro Cornejo"
<cornejo.alv...@gmail.com>
To: "Nikos Balkanas" <nbalka...@gmail.com>
Cc: "seikath" <seik...@gmail.com>; "kannel users" <us...@kannel.org>
Sent: Wednesday, March 11, 2009 5:29 AM
Subject: Re: Kannel not load balancing after restart and messages get
stuck
inqueue


Hi Nikos

for 1... still looking at data/logs... nothing so far.

for 2... You are right:

SMSC connections:
id1 ��’ ��’ AT2[id1] (online 323s, rcvd 48, sent 
48, failed 0,
queued 265
msgs)
id2 ��’ ��’ AT2[id2] (online 314s, rcvd 0, sent 
0, failed 0,
queued 0
msgs)
id3 ��’ ��’ AT2[id3] (online 314s, rcvd 0, sent 
0, failed 0,
queued 0
msgs)
id4 ��’ ��’ AT2[id4] (online 314s, rcvd 0, sent 
0, failed 0,
queued 0
msgs)
id5 ��’ ��’ AT2[id5] (online 314s, rcvd 0, sent 
0, failed 0,
queued 0
msgs)

All messages in queue for smsc-id "id_op1" were asigned to the 1st
available smsc that has allowed-smsc=id_op1

I'm not developer but think this behavior shall be modified so kannel
will be able to maximize/optimize its resources available. Some sort
of "recalculation of ��’ the better route" for messages 
each x time

Regards

Alvaro



|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|


Env��ο�½�²β�¬ο�½��’�’Β­e y Reciba Datos 
y mensajes de Texto (SMS)
hacia y desde
cualquier
celular y Nextel
en el Per��ο�½�²β�¬ο�½��ο�½ , 
M��ο�½�²β�¬ο�½��’�’Β©xico y en mas
de 180 paises. Use
aplicaciones 2 vias
via
SMS y GPRS online
��’ ��’ ��’ ��’ ��’ 
��’ Visitenos en www.perusms.NET
www.smsglobal.com.mx y
www.pravcom.com



On Tue, Mar 10, 2009 at 8:57 PM, Nikos Balkanas <nbalka...@gmail.com>
wrote:

Hi,

These are some heavy questions dude.

(1) SMS shoudn't get stuck like that so that they require restart.
Anything
in the logs?

(2) I could speculate why this happens, but without looking at the
source
code it would be guesswork. My guess would be that it involves the
timing
needed at startup to designate SMScs as active. Probably this is
done by
way
of configuration order (i.e. id1, id2, etc.). The first active one
gets
the
queue. Bearerbox router checks in every 30".

BR,
Nikos

----- Original Message ----- From: "Alvaro Cornejo"
<cornejo.alv...@gmail.com>
To: "seikath" <seik...@gmail.com>
Cc: "kannel users" <us...@kannel.org>
Sent: Wednesday, March 11, 2009 3:41 AM
Subject: Re: Kannel not load balancing after restart and messages 
get
stuck
inqueue


No, I'm using mysql for dlr storage since otherwise dlr are lost on
kannel restart



|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|


Env��ο�½ ��’�’Β½e y Reciba Datos y mensajes de 
Texto (SMS) hacia
y desde
cualquier
celular y Nextel
en el Per��ο�½ �’ , M��ο�½ ��ο�½�²β�¬Β°xico 
y en mas de 180
paises. Use
aplicaciones 2 vias
via
SMS y GPRS online
��ο�½�²β�¬β�Ά ��ο�½�²β�¬β�Ά 
��ο�½�²β�¬β�Ά ��ο�½�²β�¬β�Ά
��ο�½�²β�¬β�Ά ��ο�½�²β�¬β�Ά 
Visitenos en www.perusms.NET
www.smsglobal.com.mx y
www.pravcom.com



On Tue, Mar 10, 2009 at 8:15 PM, seikath <seik...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi,

I am not aware of the store_tools.
Anyway, I assume you use default kannel store file
instead of db dlr storage, correct ?



Alvaro Cornejo wrote:

Hi List


I've found the following 2 isues:

1) I have several modems for the same operators 10 for op1 and 5
for
op2. For some reason, some messages get stuck into kannel queue 
and
are not sent to smsc without restarting kannel. I've used Alex
store_tools and verify messages are in queue. All messages are 
sent
using the same code and use AT-SMSCs.

2) When I restart kannel QUEUED messages are sent through only one
at-smsc even if messages have a destination smsc-id specified in
sendsms url call

This is an snippet of the config I have:

smsc-id = id1
allowed-smsc = id1,id_op1

smsc-id = id2
allowed-smsc = id2,id_op1

smsc-id = id3
allowed-smsc = id3,id_op1

smsc-id = id4
allowed-smsc = id4,id_op2

smsc-id = id5
allowed-smsc = id5,id_op2

etc...

Note there is no smsc defined with smsc-id=id_op1 nor id_op2 in
config
file.

When sending the messages I use &smsc-id=id_op1 or id_op2 into
url so
kannel load-balance through the smsc of corresponding operator and
send the message. This works fine until I restart kannel.

After kannel reset, All QUEUED messages are sent through ONLY
ONE of
the smsc without load-balancing between smsc even though there are
hundreds of queued messages; however if, at the same time, I send
messages to any of the id_op1 or id_op2, this new messages are
correctly load-balanced between smsc-at

I use:

Kannel bearerbox version `1.4.3'. Build `Feb 13 2009 17:32:59',
compiler `4.1.2 20070626 (Red Hat 4.1.2-13)'. System Linux, 
release
2.6.20-1.2962.fc6, version #1 SMP Tue Jun 19 19:27:14 EDT 2007,
machine i686. IP 10.10.5.2. Libxml version 2.6.29. Using OpenSSL
0.9.8b 04 May 2006. Compiled with MySQL 5.0.27, using MySQL 
5.0.27.
Using native malloc.


Any ideas?


Regards

Alvaro















|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|


Env��ο�½ ��’�’Β½e y Reciba Datos y mensajes 
de Texto (SMS)
hacia y desde
cualquier
celular y Nextel
en el Per��ο�½ �’ , M��ο�½ ��ο�½�²β�¬Β°xico 
y en mas de 180
paises. Use
aplicaciones 2 vias
via
SMS y GPRS online
Visitenos en www.perusms.NET www.smsglobal.com.mx y
www.pravcom.com













--
Alan McNatty, Wellington, New Zealand
Catalyst IT Limited <http://www.catalyst.net.nz/>
DDI: +64 4 8032201



--
Alan McNatty, Wellington, New Zealand
Catalyst IT Limited <http://www.catalyst.net.nz/>
DDI: +64 4 8032201