[Caml-list] Ensemble (English sense)

[Caml-list] Ensemble (English sense)

[Aaron Roth]

Hi, all. I'm thinking of developing a client-server application using
O'Caml. The choices at this point seem to be CORBA (through C) or SOAP, both
of which would entail quite a bit of work to use in O'Caml, I think. But
looking around yesterday, I came across Ensemble, from Cornell, which seems
like an excellent framework for all manner of network programming, including
client-server. But checking through the Ensemble CVS logs, it doesn't seem
that the code's been touched in nearly 2 years. Does this mean that it's
reached a state of perfection or of total disuse? Is anyone out there using
Ensemble for large-scale (say, > 500 clients) applications? Will anyone
argue for or against it vis-a-vis CORBA or SOAP? Broadly, my requirements
are to run that many clients with some decent security, possibly involving a
3rd party VPN solution but preferably with (at least some aspects of)
security integrated right into the networking code (e.g. CORBA/SSL, SOAP
over HTTPS). And the servers would be some flavor of UNIX, so no DCOM (as
far as I know). Particularly appealing about Ensemble is the possibility of
later adding more peer-to-peer style messaging between clients in a part of
the application separate from the client-server part. Thank you for your
thoughts.

Best,
Aaron Roth
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Re: [Caml-list] Ensemble (English sense)

[Gerd Stolpmann]

On Tue, 24 Jul 2001, Aaron Roth wrote:
>Hi, all. I'm thinking of developing a client-server application using
>O'Caml. The choices at this point seem to be CORBA (through C) or SOAP, both
>of which would entail quite a bit of work to use in O'Caml, I think. But
>looking around yesterday, I came across Ensemble, from Cornell, which seems
>like an excellent framework for all manner of network programming, including
>client-server. But checking through the Ensemble CVS logs, it doesn't seem
>that the code's been touched in nearly 2 years. Does this mean that it's
>reached a state of perfection or of total disuse? Is anyone out there using
>Ensemble for large-scale (say, > 500 clients) applications? Will anyone
>argue for or against it vis-a-vis CORBA or SOAP? Broadly, my requirements
>are to run that many clients with some decent security, possibly involving a
>3rd party VPN solution but preferably with (at least some aspects of)
>security integrated right into the networking code (e.g. CORBA/SSL, SOAP
>over HTTPS). And the servers would be some flavor of UNIX, so no DCOM (as
>far as I know). Particularly appealing about Ensemble is the possibility of
>later adding more peer-to-peer style messaging between clients in a part of
>the application separate from the client-server part. Thank you for your
>thoughts.

There is a fourth alternative: Some times ago, I've written a Sun RPC module in
O'caml. It includes an rpcgen tool, and is quite simple to use. Unlike other
RPC implementations, it is event-driven, and can handle multiple connections at
the same time. Both servers and clients can do this, and an application can be
server and client, so peer-to-peer messages are possible.

However, I don't know if it is able to handle >500 connections. This will be a
problem if the connections are TCP-based, because you will have Unix.select
with >500 file descriptors. This may be a performance bottleneck. In this case,
I would recommend UDP which is possible, too.

The RPC module does not include any security. You could either add some code to
encrypt the messages yourself (I could give you some hints), or you could
connect it with a VPN.

The advantage of using Sun RPC is that it is possible to have mixed-language
solutions. You can access the services from C, and from every other language
that has a foreign function interface. Furthermore, it is a lightweight
protocol that transfers data in a very compact manner.

You can find it at:
http://www.ocaml-programming.de/packages/documentation/rpc/

Gerd
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Re: [Caml-list] Ensemble (English sense)

[Ohad Rodeh]

Aaron,
      I'm the Ensemble maintainer, so I can give you some answers. Ensmeble
has been released in its version 1.00
 about a year ago by Cornell, and it is very stable. Work is now focused
mainly on stabilizing, cleanup, porting to new OSes, etc.
Actually, I'm finishing up a new distribution these days.

     If you are interested in writing ML code, then Ensemble is a good
choice. Security is integrated into the group-communication aspect
of the system, and not to the TCP style connections. However, this could be
added if you'll ask.

    IF you pick up the system, you can send me mail with any questions,

     All the best,
         Ohad.


"Aaron Roth" <aaron.roth@lexys.com> on 07/24/2001 17:32:40

Please respond to "Aaron Roth" <aaron.roth@lexys.com>

To:
cc:
Subject:  [Caml-list] Ensemble (English sense)




Hi, all. I'm thinking of developing a client-server application using
O'Caml. The choices at this point seem to be CORBA (through C) or SOAP,
both
of which would entail quite a bit of work to use in O'Caml, I think. But
looking around yesterday, I came across Ensemble, from Cornell, which seems
like an excellent framework for all manner of network programming,
including
client-server. But checking through the Ensemble CVS logs, it doesn't seem
that the code's been touched in nearly 2 years. Does this mean that it's
reached a state of perfection or of total disuse? Is anyone out there using
Ensemble for large-scale (say, > 500 clients) applications? Will anyone
argue for or against it vis-a-vis CORBA or SOAP? Broadly, my requirements
are to run that many clients with some decent security, possibly involving
a
3rd party VPN solution but preferably with (at least some aspects of)
security integrated right into the networking code (e.g. CORBA/SSL, SOAP
over HTTPS). And the servers would be some flavor of UNIX, so no DCOM (as
far as I know). Particularly appealing about Ensemble is the possibility of
later adding more peer-to-peer style messaging between clients in a part of
the application separate from the client-server part. Thank you for your
thoughts.

Best,
Aaron Roth
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Re: [Caml-list] Ensemble (English sense)

[md5i]

"Ohad Rodeh" <ORODEH@il.ibm.com> writes:

>       I'm the Ensemble maintainer, so I can give you some answers. Ensmeble
> has been released in its version 1.00
>  about a year ago by Cornell, and it is very stable. Work is now focused
> mainly on stabilizing, cleanup, porting to new OSes, etc.
> Actually, I'm finishing up a new distribution these days.

Will the new distribution work with OCaml 3.x?

-- 
Michael Welsh Duggan
(md5i@cs.cmu.edu)
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