Pawel,

I think you've wandered into a real disconnect between how we communicate Riak 
replication, and how it actually works.

Although we say that N="nodes to replicate to", in reality, N="vnodes 
replicated to with every attempt to ensure they are different nodes with no 
guarantee". This is why you can have 3 nodes with 64 vnodes, and still set N>3.

Now W is just the number of successful responses for a write to be considered a 
success. W can be any number less than or equal to N, but the difference will 
still be replicated as well, just asynchronously. For example, if N=3, W=2, 
once two nodes (well, vnodes) have responded, your write is considered a 
success. In the background, Riak will still ensure that third node is 
replicated to, giving you three total replicas.

Hope that helps,
Eric



On Nov 12, 2012, at 3:01 PM, kamiseq <[email protected]> wrote:

> this is funny but recently I started to think again about how riak works and 
> I thought I know more or less the basics ;]
> 
> but I start digging and again I read 
> http://docs.basho.com/riak/latest/tutorials/fast-track/Tunable-CAP-Controls-in-Riak/
>  and then made few tests with riak bucket configured as follows
> 
> N = 3
> W = 3
> 
> I have 2 nodes running in my cluster so far (only 2 are connected) for test 
> and I can still write with hinted handoff. I updated the data and I wrote 
> again with same key - I got success. 
> 
> I changed properties on per request basis and I set w=1 I stopped first node 
> (so I had only one running) and put new key and value. I started first node 
> and query for the key and I got data from both nodes. I did the same with new 
> key again this time with w=3. and again it was successful.
> 
> what is the real difference between N and W. if hinted handoff always save 
> data for later synchronisation can write ever fail. are there any differences 
> between first write and later updates.
> 
> I hope it is not really stupid question
> 
> pozdrawiam
> Paweł Kamiński
> 
> [email protected]
> [email protected]
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