Mark S. Miller wrote:
>
> At 11:19 AM 1/7/99 , Bill Frantz wrote:
> >MarkM asked me over dinner last night where we could bring up a Vat
> >Location Service (VLS). The basic requirements are a 24/7 Internet
> >connected machine capable of running a Java virtual machine.
> >
> >Well, on the way home, my wife Peri mentioned the magic word, HTTP. It
> >occurs to me that if we implemented a HTTP/CGI based VLS, then we could put
> >up a VLS on any ISP that supported user CGIs. Doing this would require
> >some changes in DataComm to recognize a URL for the search path and run the
> >VLS under HTTP protocol, but I think that is quite doable.
> >
> >Reactions?
>
> [?] Does this fall out?
> Once your http-tunnelling code is completed, could we use it to trivially
> layer the VLS protocol on top of HTTP? Flipping it around, might your HTTP
> tunnelling work enable people to inefficiently put persistent Vat-based
> services up at their ISPs as CGIs?
>
> With what permissions do ISPs normally run CGIs?
The general answer is that they do one of two things:
> Would they enable a
Yes.
> Can it establish its own TCP/IP communications, and can these stick around?
> Vat/CGI to checkpoint itself between requests? Note that the checkpoint
> file contains secrets that must remain inaccessible to other unprivileged
> users of the ISP.
>
> Can a process spawned by a CGI stay around after the CGI request is done?
Yes.
> For the moment, we have VLS code that should work, and descends from VLS
> code that worked very well under difficult real world conditions (EC
> Habitats (aka Microcosm) beta). However, we aren't running any VLSs
> anywhere, so the standard E install contains no default search path. Until
> this is fixed, we cannot begin to do E-based distributed computing. (It's
> like an internet without anything filling the role of DNS, and without
> stable IP addresses!) We need a small number of volunteer machines. The
> VLS is a java process that must be restarted automatically, and must be
> able to listen on a stable TCP/IP port accessible from the open internet.
> Assuming we can get these volunteers, I'd rather go with the protocol we've
> got for now, rather that worry about HTTP.
>
> Eric Messick has generously volunteered to host a persistent VLS on one of
> his machines. Thanks! We just need a few more. Sites outside the US, but
> with low latency connection into the US, would be especially nice. High
> bandwidth is *not* needed.
We might be persuaded to run one at The Bunker - but I'd need to know what was involved, security/segregation requirements, etc. first.
Cheers,
Ben.
--
http://www.apache-ssl.org/ben.html
"My grandfather once told me that there are two kinds of people: those
who work and those who take the credit. He told me to try to be in the
first group; there was less competition there."
- Indira Gandhi