What do you do when the server absolutely, positively CANNOT go down.

M

MrBarrington

New Member
Hey all,
I have a site I've recently made, and it's going to get used for 3 days.
The problem is, the server cannot go down during those 3 days, I literally cannot lose a minute's worth of data.

Knownhost have been great for uptime, but that doesn't make me any less nervous.

Is there any software solution to stop me turning grey with worry?
 
Software solution to ensure 100% uptime? No.
You'd need to set up redundant EVERYTHING (hardware and software) to ensure 100% uptime, and honestly even then there really is not a 100% uptime guarantee, it's just getting you as close to that 100% as possible. Even Facebook, Google, Microsoft, etc. have experienced downtime at some point. The more redundant networks and servers you set up will help get you as close to that 100% mark as possible.

If the 3 days you're referring to is very close you really don't have a leg to stand on at this point, but if you have enough time, could take you a day, a week, or a year, depending on the amount of data and complexity of your site that you need to mirror; you can work on setting up a second server at a separate KH location and split the nameserver IPs between the two. To understand this redundant setup have a look at http://www.wight-hat.com/guides/hosting6.html
This would ensure better uptime but if the primary system does in fact fail you'd end up having inconsistent data between the two servers and this may cause you more problems than just being down momentarily. But, also remember there's a 99.999% unlikely chance of that happening. To use this arrangement without creating inconsistent data you would need to program your system to mirror data between the two when both servers are back online. This is just one redundancy scheme and if you were to begin setting up your own servers and networks you could have access to many more schemes just like Facebook and Google, but then you're talking huge $$$.
 
The answer is pretty much @phpAddict and you're more or less at a crossroad of how much you want to spend and how much does downtime really cost. To reach a theoretical 100% is insanely expensive and as mentioned even though that spend to try and achieve it fail. Everyone has downtime at some point - Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft, Rackspace.

You mention not being able to lose a minutes worth of data - gives us a few more details about what you're doing during this three days and maybe we can give you some creative ways to minimize liabilities.
 
Thanks for the replies guys, I've been with known host for a while and it's a great service; this post is in no way a reflection on them!

The software I've written is a tournament manager - that's why it's 3 days and mission critical, 600 people in a room relying on it, and if it goes down; bad times.

The only thing that changes is the database - if I could back that up on a timer or after every transaction, it may be enough safety.
 
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