# Seeking opinions on cluster platforms **URL:** \ **Category:** Elasticsearch\ **Created:** [September 12, 2014, 5:16pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/seeking-opinions-on-cluster-platforms/19762 "2014-09-12T17:16:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![jackpark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5f8ce5/32.png) [@jackpark](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/jackpark)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2014, 5:16pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/seeking-opinions-on-cluster-platforms/19762/1 "2014-09-12T17:16:58Z")
Let me pose a question by suggesting two extremes for hardware to create and maintain a growing ElasticSearch cluster datacenter (not in the cloud). One extreme places redundancy at the server hardware level, by which I mean: dual power supplies, RAID hard drives Another extreme places redundancy in a multitude of backup servers: commodity servers, single power supply, no RAID on the disks, low cost, with a cluster monitor that can advise of a failed master or backup, and can rebuild the replacement I would love to learn how others see or implement within the boundaries of those extremes, with the understanding that the two poles are just suggestions, there may be other ways to slice this space. Many thanks in advance Jack ps: documents I read based on a broad query: > **[aphyr/partitions-post](https://github.com/aphyr/partitions-post)** > > partitions-post - A blog post on network partitions in practice [http://www.elasticsearch.org/case-study/maptimize/](http://www.elasticsearch.org/case-study/maptimize/) [http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/modules-gateway.html](http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/modules-gateway.html) > **[Scaling real-time search and analytics with Elasticsearch](https://www.slideshare.net/clintongormley/scaling-realtime-search-and-analytics-with-elasticsearch)** > > See the video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6lSeNatVFM A look at the elements required by Elasticsearch to turn a simple inverted index into an auto-c… -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "elasticsearch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com](mailto:elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com). To view this discussion on the web visit [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com). For more options, visit [https://groups.google.com/d/optout](https://groups.google.com/d/optout). ---
**Author:** ![warkolm](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/warkolm/32/39224_2.png) [@warkolm](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/warkolm)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2014, 10:37pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/seeking-opinions-on-cluster-platforms/19762/2 "2014-09-12T22:37:16Z")
Personally, I'd go with the latter and then let the software handle all the redundancy. You can get super cheap 1RU pizza boxes from Quanta or the like and save yourself a bundle in that area and then leverage automation and configuration using The Foreman and Puppet. Tie a bit more smarts into it and you would have an awesome elastic compute platform. Or just use something like OpenStack, though it might be a bit heavy. Regards, Mark Walkom Infrastructure Engineer Campaign Monitor email: [markw@campaignmonitor.com](mailto:markw@campaignmonitor.com) web: [www.campaignmonitor.com](http://www.campaignmonitor.com) On 13 September 2014 03:16, Jack Park [jackpark@topicquests.org](mailto:jackpark@topicquests.org) wrote: > Let me pose a question by suggesting two extremes for hardware to create > and maintain a growing Elasticsearch cluster datacenter (not in the cloud). > > One extreme places redundancy at the server hardware level, by which I > mean: > dual power supplies, RAID hard drives > > Another extreme places redundancy in a multitude of backup servers: > commodity servers, single power supply, no RAID on the disks, low cost, > with a cluster monitor that can advise of a failed master or backup, and > can rebuild the replacement > > I would love to learn how others see or implement within the boundaries of > those extremes, with the understanding that the two poles are just > suggestions, there may be other ways to slice this space. > > Many thanks in advance > Jack > ps: documents I read based on a broad query: > [GitHub - aphyr/partitions-post: A blog post on network partitions in practice](https://github.com/aphyr/partitions-post) > [Elasticsearch Platform — Find real-time answers at scale | Elastic](http://www.elasticsearch.org/case-study/maptimize/) > > [Elasticsearch Platform — Find real-time answers at scale | Elastic](http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/modules-gateway.html) > > [Scaling real-time search and analytics with Elasticsearch | PPT](http://www.slideshare.net/clintongormley/scaling-realtime-search-and-analytics-with-elasticsearch) > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "elasticsearch" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com](mailto:elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com). > To view this discussion on the web visit > [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com) > [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com?utm\_medium=email&utm\_source=footer](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer) > . > For more options, visit [https://groups.google.com/d/optout](https://groups.google.com/d/optout). -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "elasticsearch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com](mailto:elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com). To view this discussion on the web visit [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAEM624bho%2BcJStsAAMvx5ZMApNEqCSz3a4oEofrU7VfEeuVX%2Bg%40mail.gmail.com](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAEM624bho%2BcJStsAAMvx5ZMApNEqCSz3a4oEofrU7VfEeuVX%2Bg%40mail.gmail.com). For more options, visit [https://groups.google.com/d/optout](https://groups.google.com/d/optout). ---
**Author:** ![jprante](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/jprante/32/44941_2.png) [@jprante](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/jprante)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2014, 11:00pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/seeking-opinions-on-cluster-platforms/19762/3 "2014-09-12T23:00:33Z")
Not sure what is "extreme". The design of ES may be a surprise for those who are not familiar with distributed system architecture. ES can handle faults in software. I pile up cheap 1U rack servers with 32 cores, 64G RAM, ~1TB RAID 0. All nodes are equally provisioned. If a server fails, mostly spindle drives or fans, it is decommissioned and repaired. No need to monitor for master failure or making backups. Master is switched over automatically by ES, and replica level 1 (or higher) is a must. Jörg On Sat, Sep 13, 2014 at 12:37 AM, Mark Walkom [markw@campaignmonitor.com](mailto:markw@campaignmonitor.com) wrote: > Personally, I'd go with the latter and then let the software handle all > the redundancy. You can get super cheap 1RU pizza boxes from Quanta or the > like and save yourself a bundle in that area and then leverage automation > and configuration using The Foreman and Puppet. > > Tie a bit more smarts into it and you would have an awesome elastic > compute platform. Or just use something like OpenStack, though it might be > a bit heavy. > > Regards, > Mark Walkom > > Infrastructure Engineer > Campaign Monitor > email: [markw@campaignmonitor.com](mailto:markw@campaignmonitor.com) > web: [www.campaignmonitor.com](http://www.campaignmonitor.com) > > On 13 September 2014 03:16, Jack Park [jackpark@topicquests.org](mailto:jackpark@topicquests.org) wrote: > > > Let me pose a question by suggesting two extremes for hardware to create > > and maintain a growing Elasticsearch cluster datacenter (not in the cloud). > > > > One extreme places redundancy at the server hardware level, by which I > > mean: > > dual power supplies, RAID hard drives > > > > Another extreme places redundancy in a multitude of backup servers: > > commodity servers, single power supply, no RAID on the disks, low cost, > > with a cluster monitor that can advise of a failed master or backup, and > > can rebuild the replacement > > > > I would love to learn how others see or implement within the boundaries > > of those extremes, with the understanding that the two poles are just > > suggestions, there may be other ways to slice this space. > > > > Many thanks in advance > > Jack > > ps: documents I read based on a broad query: > > [GitHub - aphyr/partitions-post: A blog post on network partitions in practice](https://github.com/aphyr/partitions-post) > > [Elasticsearch Platform — Find real-time answers at scale | Elastic](http://www.elasticsearch.org/case-study/maptimize/) > > > > [Elasticsearch Platform — Find real-time answers at scale | Elastic](http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/modules-gateway.html) > > > > [Scaling real-time search and analytics with Elasticsearch | PPT](http://www.slideshare.net/clintongormley/scaling-realtime-search-and-analytics-with-elasticsearch) > > > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > > "elasticsearch" group. > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > > email to [elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com](mailto:elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com). > > To view this discussion on the web visit > > [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com) > > [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com?utm\_medium=email&utm\_source=footer](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer) > > . > > For more options, visit [https://groups.google.com/d/optout](https://groups.google.com/d/optout). > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "elasticsearch" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com](mailto:elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com). > To view this discussion on the web visit > [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAEM624bho%2BcJStsAAMvx5ZMApNEqCSz3a4oEofrU7VfEeuVX%2Bg%40mail.gmail.com](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAEM624bho%2BcJStsAAMvx5ZMApNEqCSz3a4oEofrU7VfEeuVX%2Bg%40mail.gmail.com) > [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAEM624bho%2BcJStsAAMvx5ZMApNEqCSz3a4oEofrU7VfEeuVX%2Bg%40mail.gmail.com?utm\_medium=email&utm\_source=footer](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAEM624bho%2BcJStsAAMvx5ZMApNEqCSz3a4oEofrU7VfEeuVX%2Bg%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer) > . > > For more options, visit [https://groups.google.com/d/optout](https://groups.google.com/d/optout). -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "elasticsearch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com](mailto:elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com). To view this discussion on the web visit [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAKdsXoFuXTUVQrhKpueJWKPT2ws4CtXm6mB-4rGLB-0DFkC37w%40mail.gmail.com](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAKdsXoFuXTUVQrhKpueJWKPT2ws4CtXm6mB-4rGLB-0DFkC37w%40mail.gmail.com). For more options, visit [https://groups.google.com/d/optout](https://groups.google.com/d/optout). ---
**Author:** ![jackpark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5f8ce5/32.png) [@jackpark](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/jackpark)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2014, 1:55pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/seeking-opinions-on-cluster-platforms/19762/4 "2014-09-15T13:55:48Z")
Mark and Jörg Many thanks for these comments. In a large sense, they confirm my intuitions. Cheers, Jack On Fri, Sep 12, 2014 at 4:00 PM, [joergprante@gmail.com](mailto:joergprante@gmail.com) \< [joergprante@gmail.com](mailto:joergprante@gmail.com)\> wrote: > Not sure what is "extreme". The design of ES may be a surprise for those > who are not familiar with distributed system architecture. > > ES can handle faults in software. I pile up cheap 1U rack servers with 32 > cores, 64G RAM, ~1TB RAID 0. All nodes are equally provisioned. > > If a server fails, mostly spindle drives or fans, it is decommissioned and > repaired. > > No need to monitor for master failure or making backups. Master is > switched over automatically by ES, and replica level 1 (or higher) is a > must. > > Jörg > > On Sat, Sep 13, 2014 at 12:37 AM, Mark Walkom [markw@campaignmonitor.com](mailto:markw@campaignmonitor.com) > wrote: > > > Personally, I'd go with the latter and then let the software handle all > > the redundancy. You can get super cheap 1RU pizza boxes from Quanta or the > > like and save yourself a bundle in that area and then leverage automation > > and configuration using The Foreman and Puppet. > > > > Tie a bit more smarts into it and you would have an awesome elastic > > compute platform. Or just use something like OpenStack, though it might be > > a bit heavy. > > > > Regards, > > Mark Walkom > > > > Infrastructure Engineer > > Campaign Monitor > > email: [markw@campaignmonitor.com](mailto:markw@campaignmonitor.com) > > web: [www.campaignmonitor.com](http://www.campaignmonitor.com) > > > > On 13 September 2014 03:16, Jack Park [jackpark@topicquests.org](mailto:jackpark@topicquests.org) wrote: > > > > > Let me pose a question by suggesting two extremes for hardware to create > > > and maintain a growing Elasticsearch cluster datacenter (not in the cloud). > > > > > > One extreme places redundancy at the server hardware level, by which I > > > mean: > > > dual power supplies, RAID hard drives > > > > > > Another extreme places redundancy in a multitude of backup servers: > > > commodity servers, single power supply, no RAID on the disks, low cost, > > > with a cluster monitor that can advise of a failed master or backup, and > > > can rebuild the replacement > > > > > > I would love to learn how others see or implement within the boundaries > > > of those extremes, with the understanding that the two poles are just > > > suggestions, there may be other ways to slice this space. > > > > > > Many thanks in advance > > > Jack > > > ps: documents I read based on a broad query: > > > [GitHub - aphyr/partitions-post: A blog post on network partitions in practice](https://github.com/aphyr/partitions-post) > > > [Elasticsearch Platform — Find real-time answers at scale | Elastic](http://www.elasticsearch.org/case-study/maptimize/) > > > > > > [Elasticsearch Platform — Find real-time answers at scale | Elastic](http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/en/elasticsearch/reference/current/modules-gateway.html) > > > > > > [Scaling real-time search and analytics with Elasticsearch | PPT](http://www.slideshare.net/clintongormley/scaling-realtime-search-and-analytics-with-elasticsearch) > > > > > > -- > > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google > > > Groups "elasticsearch" group. > > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send > > > an email to [elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com](mailto:elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com). > > > To view this discussion on the web visit > > > [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com) > > > [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com?utm\_medium=email&utm\_source=footer](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAH6s0fyHDhB9N8rOCwuf%2B3GR1E8xQ4aqSoQD8cYKZwo72bHw7A%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer) > > > . > > > For more options, visit [https://groups.google.com/d/optout](https://groups.google.com/d/optout). > > > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > > "elasticsearch" group. > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > > email to [elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com](mailto:elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com). > > To view this discussion on the web visit > > [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAEM624bho%2BcJStsAAMvx5ZMApNEqCSz3a4oEofrU7VfEeuVX%2Bg%40mail.gmail.com](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAEM624bho%2BcJStsAAMvx5ZMApNEqCSz3a4oEofrU7VfEeuVX%2Bg%40mail.gmail.com) > > [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAEM624bho%2BcJStsAAMvx5ZMApNEqCSz3a4oEofrU7VfEeuVX%2Bg%40mail.gmail.com?utm\_medium=email&utm\_source=footer](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAEM624bho%2BcJStsAAMvx5ZMApNEqCSz3a4oEofrU7VfEeuVX%2Bg%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer) > > . > > > > For more options, visit [https://groups.google.com/d/optout](https://groups.google.com/d/optout). > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "elasticsearch" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com](mailto:elasticsearch+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com). > To view this discussion on the web visit > [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAKdsXoFuXTUVQrhKpueJWKPT2ws4CtXm6mB-4rGLB-0DFkC37w%40mail.gmail.com](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAKdsXoFuXTUVQrhKpueJWKPT2ws4CtXm6mB-4rGLB-0DFkC37w%40mail.gmail.com) > [https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAKdsXoFuXTUVQrhKpueJWKPT2ws4CtXm6mB-4rGLB-0DFkC37w%40mail.gmail.com?utm\_medium=email&utm\_source=footer](https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/elasticsearch/CAKdsXoFuXTUVQrhKpueJWKPT2ws4CtXm6mB-4rGLB-0DFkC37w%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer) > . > > For more options, visit [https://groups.google.com/d/optout](https://groups.google.com/d/optout). -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "elasticsearch" group. 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**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2017, 1:02am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/seeking-opinions-on-cluster-platforms/19762/5 "2017-07-06T01:02:19Z")