Firebird database server virtualization

[Marianne Castel]

Hello, 

Have you experience or opinion about Firebird database server (linux) on virtual server (vmware or other) ? 

I read this 2 articles : 

- Last section "Important" from this page written in 2013 , which seems to say "don't use virtualization for database server)  : 

https://www.ibexpert.net/ibe/pmwiki.php?n=Doc.FirebirdPerformanceRecommendations

This document of 2012, which says it can be used : 

https://www.ibphoenix.com/files/conf2012/Firebird-in-VM-Heeg-2012.pdf

This 2 articles are quite old ... So i'm asking here if some of you have experienced it and are happy with virtualization of Firebird database servers.

Thanks in advance. 

Have a nice day.

Marianne 

[Dimitry Sibiryakov]

26.04.2021 14:14, Marianne Castel wrote:
> Have you experience or opinion about Firebird database server (linux) on virtual server
> (vmware or other) ?

An usual problem with such servers is a lack of administrator able to solve slow I/O
issues. If you are lucky and don't meet them - you'll be fine.

--
WBR, SD.

[Norbert Saint Georges]

Marianne Castel a écrit :

> So i'm asking here if some of you have experienced it and are happy with
> virtualization of Firebird database servers.

There are several types of VMs, VMs mounted on dedicated hardware
(processor & SSD) work like a physical machine, for all the others you
depend on your neighbors especially in terms of write availability (in
reading, this is less noticeable).

--
Norbert Saint Georges
http://tetrasys.fi

[Pablo Sánchez]

I've been using firerbird virtualized since 2010 only on linux .

As for compute power nowadays there should be no problems as you do it within your infrastructure .
If you use cloud sevices, your mileage may vary. I'd use in this case firebird 3.x .

Regards

Pablo

---

De: "Marianne Castel" <cast...@titelive.be>
Para: "firebird-support" <firebird...@googlegroups.com>
Enviados: Lunes, 26 de Abril 2021 9:14:31
Asunto: [firebird-support] Firebird database server virtualization

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[Matthias Hanft]

Marianne Castel schrieb:

>
> Have you experience or opinion about Firebird database server (linux) on virtual server (vmware or other) ? 

Yes. I have been using Firebird for years now, on a Gentoo Linux guest,
running on a VMware host located by some ISP.

It's fast, it's stable, and I never ever had any problems with it.

However, the ISP asked me to install and run "open-vm-tools". I don't
exactly know why, but presumably everything runs better with it (the
main advantage is, as far as I have understood, that they can move
my VM to another host - without any interruption!). Maybe it helps
for running databases as well.

-Matt

[Mathias Pannier (unitel)]

Hi,

we use Firebird on physical and on virtualized systems (only Windows). It works on both. 

It depends on your requirements. If You have heavy load (read/writes) I would recommend a physical server with good I/O performance. Otherwise, you are good with a virtualized environment, too.

Regards

Mathias 

---

Von: firebird...@googlegroups.com <firebird...@googlegroups.com> im Auftrag von Marianne Castel <cast...@titelive.be>
Gesendet: Montag, 26. April 2021 14:14
An: firebird-support
Betreff: [firebird-support] Firebird database server virtualization

 

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[Elmar Haneke]

> This 2 articles are quite old ... So i'm asking here if some of you
> have experienced it and are happy with virtualization of Firebird
> database servers.

In general virtualization is not an problem.

If your database does operate at heavy load an dedicated machine has
more reliable performance since no other virtual part can allocate
resources avaliable.

Elmar

[Rossen ANTONOV (mreji.info)]

Marianne, few weeks ago I was about to virtualise a physical Firebird 2.5 server. So far my observation is that:

- it would work well as virtualisation technologies are mature enough nowadays

- but it would work with reduced performance compared to the original physical server.

Since the running application have some heavy tasks performed every hour and performance is a must I decided to hold the migration until I gain more info.

This tool was mentioned recently in the group:

https://ib-aid.com/en/simple-insert-update-delete-test-for-firebird/

And I can recommend this one:

https://www.ibexpert.net/ibe/pmwiki.php?n=Main.Benchmark?from=Main.IBExpertBenchmarkTool

I will be glad If you can measure the performance of your current physical and future virtual servers and share the results. Would your results confirm that virtualisation reduces performance?

BR,

Ros

[Marianne Castel]

Thanks to all for your answeers. 

I know now on what we should to take care. 

Yes, Ros, i found that tool from ib-aid and run it on our current real servers and one virtual one... i was scared by the virtual server result. That's why i came here to ask you all.

But i don't have the hand on the servers configurations... I can just be the one who say , please guys , take care that our customers are not downgraded in performance. 

And with some arguments and information from you all , it's better. 

I'll ask what are the servers configurations before to add my perf results in the list of ib-aid. Thanks Ros.

Have a nice day