Back in April, I decided to freshen up on my Socket Communication skills in C and C++ and in the process I got motivated to work on a simple Web Server design that I called Hostess. Livepad was supposed to be an encapsulation of everything that’s needed to deploy the backend of a new social networking site. Unfortunately, since I usually have more on my plate than I can ever consume, I had to halt any further development to a later time.
Well, since it’s the end of the year, I thought it’d be nice to get others involved who have a similar inclination in everything programming (C based that is) and want to contribute to an unofficial open source project. The hope is to find a small group of developers to help build the foundation of the web server. It’s nothing fancy, right now, and I’m sure those who are pessimistic about the intention of such a project, would quickly point out that several other leading enterprise software on the market already fulfill the specification outlined here http://koru.github.com/Livepad/ and would easily quash any futile attempt to build something far less mature and primitive in design. However, taking that argument into consideration, one must also believe that there never exists just “one” of anything. There never was one brand of car, or one brand of cereal. Multiple flavors exists to satisfy varying niches, and that’s where Livepad comes in. I want to create a web server that satisfies the demands placed by Social Networking sites. Ambitious? VERY, but if it weren’t then what’s the point in doing it right? 
So the work is more involved than just writing some code and kicking back to watch this whole process come to fruition. It involves proper research of current trends in social networking, understanding the needs of developers who might stick with default server deployments that host their application and never really consider alternatives. It’s also imperative to hear what I.T. thinks, because after all, they’re the ones who have to fan the flames, right?
Consideration for code optimization of the core is tantamount to increasing overall throughput. Therefore to prove that Livepad meets or exceeds it’s requirements, proper benchmarking in the following fields should be processed and compared with current market solutions:
- Resource Utilization (i.e. Processor Time/Memory Footprint)
- Power Consumption (a function of Resource Utilization on the node)
- Throughput and Latency under non-uniform traffic patterns
Kor
