Hi River
firstly, i'd like to see proper integration between the OSM and WMF parts of the Toolserver. for example, someone has configured a web server on cassini, and people are already deploying tools at http://cassini.toolserver.org/~username/. it should be clear why using "cassini.toolserver.org" in a URL is a bad idea; but i don't see why cassini needs to host user tools at all.
I don't see the necessity for a tool-webserver on cassini, too. If we could connect to the postgresql-db on cassini from the other toolserver login-/webservers, it would be ok for most tools as well.
If we could set up mapnik on the login servers I don't see any reasons to login on cassini except for administrative tasks.
Atm. Cassini is only in testing phase. I have written a tool on it just to see how & if it works. Also the imports I'm currently doing are more of educational nature (I'm learning how to populate the postgis-db, keep the minutely replication running, etc.).
the Toolserver already has a web server which works quite well, and has plenty of spare resources. by putting OSM user tools there, we can combine resources and make efficient use of them; if/when the web server is full, we can add additional resources and both WMF and OSM users will immediately be able to take advantage of them.
+1
(i understand OSM needs some special Apache module for serving tiles; keeping that on cassini probably makes sense.)
I think cassini should keep running the postgis-db, the rendering stack and a dev-tileserver, where we can play with different mapnilk-styles -- nothing more.
it's also not clear to me whether cassini needs to be a login server at all; the WMF databases at the TS don't allow user login, and users connect to them remotely. is there something special about OSM tools that prevents them from running on the existing TS login servers?
No, except for a mapnik installation, that can be installed on the regular login servers as well.
secondly, in the rush to deploy cassini as quickly as possible, it seems that little planning has been done. one thing we've learnt from the Toolserver is that it's a lot less effort to plan things properly from the start, instead of deploying something, then discovering it has to be redone later. might i suggest that people take a step back, consider what exactly the "OSM Toolserver" is meant to be, and come up a plan before going any further?
Okay, here're my ideas:
Put some HD-Space from ptolemy or from a store ;) into cassini and get two databases on it: - a complete osm-clone including history - a postgis db for rendering
Ptolemy only needs the latter for serving as database-backend for the live renderer.
Connect Postgresql with LDAP and open it read-only to the regular login- & webservers.
Get regular update running on cassini, later porting this effort to ptolemy (I already wrote a task to do a complete planet update, located in /sql/planet.osm on cassini)
Get some Mapnik-Styles (the multilanguage, the hike'n'bike style and maybe others) on Cassini.
Define a procedure (like "post it on the mailing list") that allows others to put their style on cassini. Document how to access cassinis DB from the toolservers, how an when the updates take place etc.
What are yours? Peter