The Web100 Project: Frequently Asked Questions


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1. Introduction and General Information

1.1 What is Web100?: The Web100 project is aimed at producing a complete host-software environment that will run common Web applications at 100% of the available bandwidth, regardless of the magnitude of a network's capability.
1.2 Why is it called Web100?: When a typical academic researcher attempts to transfer large datasets using conventional vendor-supplied FTP-based programs on high performance LAN or WAN networks that are purported to provide 100-Mbps (megabits/second) performance, the researcher is often lucky to see 10-Mbps actual transfer rates. Therefore Web100 aims to produce a complete host-software environment that will run common Web applications at 100% of the available bandwith, regardless of the magnitude of a network's capability. Therefore, Web100 seemed to be an appropriate name.
1.3 What is autotuning?: Autotuning is the ability to automatically tune TCP to simultaneously achieve maximum throughput across all connections for all applications within the resource limits of the host. For more information visit this link on Documents section for more information.
1.4 Who is involved with Web100?: The Web100 Project is funded primarily by the National Science Foundation, with an additional grant from Cisco Systems, Inc.

The project development is a collaborative effort between the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center (PSC), the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA), and the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR).

2. Software

2.1 Is the Web100 software available?: Yes! The Web100 software was released to the public on February 6, 2002. Please see the download page for more information.
2.2 Which platforms does Web100 support?: Web100 software at this point is for Linux only, due to its kernel-specific nature. Most hardware platforms are supported. This includes Intel x86, Itanium, Opteron/Athlon64, Alpha, and PPC.
2.3 Do you support other operating system besides Linux (i.e. Windows): We currently only support Linux. We hope that owners of proprietary operating systems take notice and endeavor to implement these improvements in their products. We are looking for volunteers to port Web100 to other opensource operating systems!

3. Troubleshooting

3.1 I am trying to patch kernel X, but it does not work!: The Web100 kernel patch is for a specific version of the Linux kernel. Please see the README document for which kernel version is supported. We do not support older kernels.

4. Development Information

4.1 Where can I learn about the Web100 API?: Please check out the Developers Guide which can be found in the Userland release.
4.2 Is the Web100 work done on earlier versions of the Linux kernel portable to the newer versions?: Definitely! Web100 plans to keep up with the official production Linux kernel releases as they occur. Our intent is to be relatively timely about this.
4.3 Is there a way to find out the CID for a connection without sequentially searching through all the directories in /proc/web100?: If you have connected socket, use web100_connection_from_socket(). If you know the local port/address and remote port/address, fill in a struct web100_connection_spec and use web100_connection_find().

5. Other Information

5.1 My question is not in this FAQ! What do I do?: Do not worry! Try joining the discussion mailing list and ask your question there.

Last Modified: 06/8/05 07:11AM

This material is based in whole or in part on work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 0083285. Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation (NSF).