Re: High-volume shop uses PostgreSQL

On Wed, 2003-09-17 at 17:50, Ben wrote:
> high: mainframe
> wide: web server farm

These explanations are too limiting.
vertical: large box that can hold lots of CPUs that all the same
          instance of the same OS.  IBM (mainframe and Power),
          Sun, HP (PA-RISC, Alpha) & SGI all offer these systems,
          and they cost a lot.
horizontal: distributed systems (SETI@Home is the classic example
            or clusters (of the VMS [and Oracle 9i RAC] or Beowulf
            variety).

PostgreSQL does not do horizontal scaling at all, since the postmaster
can only run on 1 CPU, but it's good at vertical scaling, since it
can make use of all of the CPUs in a box.  (Well, there's sure to
be a point at which there is so much activity that the postmaster
can't handle it all...)

> On Wed, 17 Sep 2003, Andrew L. Gould wrote:
>
> > On Wednesday 17 September 2003 04:56 pm, Ron Johnson wrote:
> > > http://www.computerworld.com.au/index.php?id=1482975508&fp=16&fpid=0
> >
> > I do not understand what people mean when they differentiate between scaling
> > vertically versus scaling horizontally.
> >
> > Would someone provide a brief explanation?

--
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Ron Johnson, Jr. ron.l.johnson@cox.net
Jefferson, LA USA

"Fair is where you take your cows to be judged."
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