Am 28.06.2005 schrieb Colm MacCarthaigh: > On Tue, Jun 28, 2005 at 02:46:18PM +0200, Anders Henke wrote: > > Package: apticron > > Version: 1.1.12 > > Severity: wishlist
[...] > So, instead what I'd like to propose is that at install time, I'll have > the install scripts do a one-time calculation of some random numbers > and produce an /etc/cron.d/apticron file. Ie: > > rand(60) rand(24) * * * test -x /usr/sbin/apticron && /usr/sbin/apticron > > Since those random numbers are calculated only once, at install time, > the update will be scheduled for the same time every day. However > accross a large number of servers, there should still be a good even > distribution of requests. > > Would this be o.k.? For me: certainly; well, most :) We're setting up our servers by extracting a pre-configured tarball onto a freshly partitioned and mkfs'd disk. Of course, we might change our installations procedures in a way to re-calculate those random numbers automatically,but I'd rather like to avoid that (as there are already too many things to alter after extracting the tarball). But on the other hand, as there are already so many things which require a change ... > Any problems I'm not seeing? You're likely to receive tons of bug reports "make apticron run in the night", as most people assume that some regular maintenance is being done "during the night" and has to be completed in the morning. Maybe there are also other people who don't wish to have any maintenance jobs in the night (e.g. typical "bedroom servers"). I think that adding both explaining texts as well as a good sample of choices to such a configure dialogue would be a good idea: "Apticron automatically runs once a day. You shouldn't run apticron e.g. "at midnight", as at such prominent times there are already too many tools who wish to do so and in turn create load peaks on mirror sites. So it's usually a good idea to let apticron choose the time when to check packages for you. You can choose from either anytime, during the night or manually choose when to run apticron. Please tell apticron when to run: (*) anytime ( ) during the night (midnight to 6 AM) ( ) manually enter hour and minute to run on" Of course, the second option would take the hour from rand(6) and help those ones who do regularly schedule all cronjobs for @midnight even they only need the results at 9 AM :-) > > Like cron-apt, apticron is also run via cron. If you're running dozens > > of servers (or take a look at "debian worldwide"), all those servers are > > about to hammer on your local debian mirror on 6:25am - to prevent such > > a situation, cron-apt has a feature which delays the check a random > > amount of seconds, but limits this to an hour. > > I run ftp.ie.debian.org, I know all about the peaks from such things :) > It's not a huge problem (we certainly don't have any issues from it) - > but it is still worth fixing and to be honest, it's a bug rather than a > wishlist item. If it's a bug for apticron, there are far more packages where this is also supposed to be a bug. > Thanks for this, and your other bug report. I'll get on em! Thank you for so actively maintaining your package :-) Anders -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
