On Sunday 29 April 2001 02:55, you wrote:
I'm planning on setting up a web server and was wondering how much memory TwistedPython uses up compared to Apache, especially since my RAM is limited.
RAM usage is hard to measure on UNIX, but if you can run Python on your limited-RAM machine (e.g. it's not an embedded system with sub-megabyte hard allocation requirements), you ought to be able to bring up a basic Twisted Web server; it doesn't have many requirements in excess of just a standard python interpreter. As far as how it measures up to Apache; it depends on what you configure each of them to do :). I would guess that in the average case, twisted web would be lighter, memory-wise, than apache, but that apache can be configured to take up much less RAM if you know what you're doing. Here is some sample output of PS, indicating what a bunch of average users do with twisted web: USER PID %CPU %MEM VSZ RSS TTY STAT START TIME COMMAND jh 17110 0.0 1.8 6312 2372 ? S Mar10 3:38 python2.0 shae 24700 0.0 1.4 3708 1796 ? S Mar15 0:02 python glyph 22519 0.0 2.1 5380 2804 ? S Mar27 0:44 python carmstro 19275 0.0 1.7 4568 2280 ? S Apr03 0:22 python matsaleh 8402 0.0 1.6 3804 2096 ? S Apr06 0:01 python washort 27718 0.1 1.4 5052 1816 ? S Apr12 28:52 python det 3675 0.0 1.9 4160 2464 ? S Apr20 0:01 python www-data 30020 0.0 3.7 5568 4760 ? S Apr26 0:39 python rikyu 12063 0.0 2.8 4480 3676 ? S Apr27 0:01 python By contrast, here's my single-user testing machine with a single instance of Apache running (debian's default config) USER PID %CPU %MEM VSZ RSS TTY STAT START TIME COMMAND root 435 0.0 0.9 2840 1164 ? S Apr04 0:00 apache www-data 14321 0.0 0.8 2900 1044 ? S 07:35 0:00 apache www-data 14322 0.0 0.8 2888 1076 ? S 07:35 0:00 apache www-data 14323 0.0 0.8 2888 1060 ? S 07:35 0:00 apache www-data 14324 0.0 0.8 2900 1064 ? S 07:35 0:00 apache www-data 14325 0.0 0.8 2900 1060 ? S 07:35 0:00 apache www-data 14733 0.0 0.5 2852 764 ? S 10:17 0:00 apache www-data 14738 0.0 0.6 2852 776 ? S 10:17 0:00 apache www-data 14739 0.0 0.9 2852 1212 ? S 10:17 0:00 apache www-data 14740 0.0 0.9 2852 1212 ? S 10:17 0:00 apache www-data 14741 0.0 0.9 2852 1212 ? S 10:17 0:00 apache (Note, also, that "root" is not one of the users in that first list! ^_^)
I would also like to know is TwistedPython supports virtual hosts at this time,
While at the time that you sent the message that wasn't true, named virtual host is such a trivial feature that I added it: it took 7 minutes to add and 5 minutes to test. Also, the implementation is 29 lines, which includes 11 lines of API documentation and 4 blank lines. Other features are just as easy to add :)
and whether there's any way to have a persistant interpreter like mod_perl and mod_php.
Twisted Python *is* a persistent interpreter. There are a number of different ways to run code in it, depending on your preferred modality of thinking about web servers. However, it only supports Python (obviously). It wouldn't be too hard to implement a filtered process which talked to a persistent interpreter of some other language, but I don't see the point, since python is more than good enough for me :)
Oh, and while I'm asking questions, how does one create a multi-user interactive fiction? Strikes me as an odd concept as I've never seen one, but an interesting possibility.
Good question! I've been hacking away trying to solve it for years, and I'm still not sure it can be done :). When we get something good done, I'll tell you... :)
Python is in some ways similar to TADS (text adventure development system)'s scripting language, but TADS is geared towards a single user. Wouldn't a multiplayer IF game be like a singleplayer IF game except there's only one set of objects for the players to fight over?
Yes, and that's a tough nut to crack. The idea being that you create LOTS of objects to fight over. Then you make it hard to fight...
By the way, there's a MUD base derived from LPC called MudOS that tried to accomplish some of the same goals as TwistedPython, like network services including HTTP, FTP, Intermud Chat, etc, and providing sort of an internal shell with programs.
I'm familiar with MudOS. It's certainly older and more established than TPy, but I think you'll find the integration of services in TPy somewhat more ... streamlined.
And another quick question: What's the GTK stuff for?
I am a very lazy person and I am highly resistant to change. So I have these crazy ideas, like writing servers should be about the same as writing clients on the network level. The GTK stuff allows me to do that, by integrating the network layer API (twisted net) with a GUI API (gtk). This means, for example, you can run a webserver inside a PyGTK application with almost no extra work; the glue code will be on the order of 3 lines. Not only that, but it'll be a relatively high-performance webserver, that you could handle a decent amount of traffic on, and one that won't hang your UI while doing stuff, rather than the standard "joke" blocking webserver included with Python. If it still works, the map "editor" should demonstrate this :)
Anyways: Thank you in advance for any help you can provide,
And you're welcome. Happy twisting. -- ______ __ __ _____ _ _ | ____ | \_/ |_____] |_____| |_____| |_____ | | | | @ t w i s t e d m a t r i x . c o m http://twistedmatrix.com/users/glyph