On Tue, 27 Nov 2012, Joel Reicher wrote:
All this time, I've been using it on Linux. Now, I'm building a Solaris
server, and I'd like to put it on it. I ran across a post the other day on
the internet saying that it doesn't work very well on Solaris due to file
locking problems, and that the cause is really an underlying problem with
Unix.
Is there any truth to this? Or more appropriately, am I likely to run into
more headaches than what it is worth if I try to use it on Solaris?
Can you give more details of the post?
There is a known problem with NFS for the simple reason that NFS doesn't
support locking, and it is possible that the post confused NFS with
SunOS/Solaris.
Cheers,
- Joel
In the UW-Imap kit there's a directory called "docs". Read the file in that
directory called "locking.txt" to get the run-down on Sys-V style locking
(both for NFS & local filesystems) compared to BSD style locking.
Mark has a couple of gripes about the way Sys-V locking works and alludes to
having to work around them in UW-Imap (tricks like double-forking)
(also search the archives of this list for posts by Mark about this issue).
I ran UW-Imap on HP-UX boxen for many years (which, like Solaris, is a Sys-V
derivative). Didn't notice any overt locking issues but now that we've switched
to Linux based systems have noticed that it's faster.
Bottom line, if you want to support large numbers of simultaneous users
(thousands of them) doing lots of mail ops, you'll get better performance
out of a BSD style box than a Sys-V style box (flock vs fnctl locking).
All of this is predicated on a local filesystem, NFS not recommended.
--
Dave Funk University of Iowa
<dbfunk (at) engineering.uiowa.edu> College of Engineering
319/335-5751 FAX: 319/384-0549 1256 Seamans Center
Sys_admin/Postmaster/cell_admin Iowa City, IA 52242-1527
#include <std_disclaimer.h>
Better is not better, 'standard' is better. B{
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