Comments on: Online businesses need for Speed http://brettdargan.com/blog/2005/06/02/online-businesses-need-for-speed/ λ Thoughts and rants Mon, 28 Nov 2011 14:13:39 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: Robert http://brettdargan.com/blog/2005/06/02/online-businesses-need-for-speed/comment-page-1/#comment-6 Robert Tue, 21 Jun 2005 10:00:55 +0000 http://brettdargan.com/blog/?p=47#comment-6 The problem with dealing with spikes is the fact that you need to over-resource for them. It's usually not cost-effective to have sufficent computing power to handle the load. What you _really_ need is an efficient way to scale your system dynamically, _plus_ a pool of resources shared with other systems that have different usage patterns. This shared pool can then be drawn on to deal with spikes as needed. Sun, for example, is offering such a service to certain sites, and IBM can do similar stuff (which is why IBM handles the major sporting events, for example). However, this is all highly non-trivial. The problem with dealing with spikes is the fact that you need to over-resource for them. It’s usually not cost-effective to have sufficent computing power to handle the load.

What you _really_ need is an efficient way to scale your system dynamically, _plus_ a pool of resources shared with other systems that have different usage patterns. This shared pool can then be drawn on to deal with spikes as needed. Sun, for example, is offering such a service to certain sites, and IBM can do similar stuff (which is why IBM handles the major sporting events, for example). However, this is all highly non-trivial.

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