W-days

[altivo]

Door count over a thousand again. Part of it was due to a class of adult students learning English. It's a regular event every term, their teacher brings them to the library, they fill out forms to get library cards, ask us questions in broken, accented English and write down the answers for an assignment. Then they all check out videos (rarely any books) and leave, usually ten or fifteen minutes after the normal closing time. This term's class was larger than usual, over 30 of them, so we were very busy for an hour or so.

Got my bandwidth controls, in the form of queueing disciplines, loaded into that new server (that's now getting old, after a month of tinkering with it.) Then I downloaded the latest version of Limewire, and tomorrow while the library is closed I'll test my theory of what our bandwidth issues really are by downloading some motion picture while monitoring bandwidth usage and the impact on normal network operation. By isolating our problem users (those with laptop computers) on their own subnet and running all their traffic, both up and down, through a single node point, I believe I can control the upload and download speed fairly well.Tomorrow will tell.

Cooler today but it didn't rain as predicted. The clouds looked threatening in the afternoon, but nothing happened.

And so, to bed

Comments

[silver-kiden.livejournal.com]

might you not be better off using bittorrent? then you can control the upload and download speeds, and test how each level affects the whole.

[duskwuff.livejournal.com]

Yep. Also, BitTorrent uses multiple peers as a rule, which some bandwidth filters might not handle properly out of the box.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I chose Limewire because it's the software that has specifically caused our problems here. Multiple connections is certainly a feature, though, as I've seen one user node connected to over a hundred other computers at the same time. The problem in all cases has not been the bandwidth used by the download, but the bandwidth sucked up by dozens of others drawing stuff off the user's machine. He claimed not even to be aware that this was happening.

Now that I've installed the thing, I can believe that might be so. The installation default gathers up all the music and video on your hard disk and automatically offers it to the universe any time you are connected to the net. The program is like spyware, it starts automatically any time you boot the machine and runs until you shut the power down. All this is described in the blandest terms during installation, and though you get options to control some of it, I doubt that many bother. They're just in a hurry to get to the "good stuff."

I'll be putting those connections behind a single router, with only one way in or out of the subnet. I'm starting out with TBF applied to both input and output through the router, with uploads limited to half the speed of downloads and the total throughput limited to 600 Kbps regardless of the number of users or connections. This approach was approved by the library board. If we have problems, it will be about fair division of the bandwidth among that subgroup of users, and will no longer bring library operations down which has been the big problem in the past. If necessary, I'll move on to SFQ but I don't think I'll have to go so far.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

Sounds like things are proceeding nicely :)
I love accents, was there a majority accent?

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Spanish, of course. ;p

[avon-deer.livejournal.com]

That's the kind of door count that my local library DREAMS of. Wakefield is not known as a centre of educational excellence sadly. Leeds library does not much better, but then leeds have sixteen times the population of Wakefield.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

If only that door count were meaningful. Alas, circulation figures tell us the truth. We are now running a computer cafe that loans videos. Books are incidental. That's why I have to waste so much effort on controlling network usage so that the P2P file sharers don't overwhelm our catalog and circulation system.

[rustitobuck.livejournal.com]

Oh, I think I understand now. It was starting to sound like it would be a great library but for the patrons. A library full of quiet book-reading patrons would be a good thing, but instead you've got an internet cafe full of people downloading (porn?) and a video store.

Got it.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I'm happy to deal out books and other printed information as fast as we can. It doesn't happen.

The downloads may be porn, but I doubt it. They are most likely illegal copies of current Hollywood films and current popular music. Certainly that's what the user was doing the time I tracked and confronted him. He admitted that he was downloading one film while watching another. Both were copyright violations. He didn't care, and didn't understand why we should care. I agree it's not my job to enforce copyright laws, but when he uses our network connection to do this he makes us a party to the act. When he does it with P2P software, he also eats up so much bandwidth that it stops our circulation and catalog systems from serving the legitimate users.

Being an internet cafe or a video store is not our primary mission. We're stuck with it because the primary mission depends on a certain amount of public support over and above what we have in private endowments. When I have to spend 80% of my underpaid hours working to control and administer the internet cafe, we've got a problem. (And so do I. I'm not being paid the salary commensurate with a network administrator's stress levels, and I don't have the equipment and software budget for it either.)

[avon-deer.livejournal.com]

I've not been reading much (fiction) lately either. I should do it more often. I REALLY enjoyed "Bikerwolf", despite it being the least challenging read I have ever experienced. Oddly enough I used to read a lot more when I was younger.

[saythename.livejournal.com]

Bidness seems good.

We have Literacy Volunteers here too, but I've never
seen them march in a troup to the library like that.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

These students were taking a formal course provided by another agency. Yeah, literacy volunteers rarely attract more than one or two people at a time.

[saythename.livejournal.com]

That explains it, I suppose the libary, being
a public resource would a more or less natural
place to test English skills. Though probably annoying
for you and your staff.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

We're used to it, though the timing isn't ideal. They need to come earlier in the day or in smaller numbers.

The boss thinks it encourages them to read, and we do have books in Spanish as well as English. Frankly, I think it just alerts them to the fact that we have computers and videos.

[saythename.livejournal.com]

Well...I have to tell ya, when I'm in the Big House
Of Books, I do tend to notice that there are lots
less people perusing the stacks than queing up
for the last copy the library has of "Batman"

Then again, it is a libaries job to provide things
like that to its taxpayers, and if libaries are
to remain relevant, they better become as multi in
media as possible as fast as possible.

"What? You don't have Current Hit Movie on DVD? I'm
going to Amazon!"

c.c

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Yes and no. The library's mission statement and (since we are also a private foundation in this case) charter define us as a free and public educational institution. Nothing in there at all about "entertainment." XD

When Mr. Diggins left a big chunk o' cash in his will to establish a "free lending library" in the town where he grew up, he was imagining books and newspapers of course. That's all there was back in 1907. No telling what he would think about computer games, toys, videos, or rock music CDs, but I rather expect, given his life story, that he'd at least give them a sour look or two. The commingling of funds from that carefully-managed trust (still well funded after a century, though the last six months have taken a bite out of the net worth of course) and public tax dollars has never really taken place. But it's confusing now as to who owns what. As it happens, the Diggins Trust pays for our technology, and they are quite willing to apply much more severe restrictions to how it may be used than what we have in place. When people complain about "My tax dollars paid for these computers, I should be able to use them whenever I want to..." that would be a perfect answer: "No, they were purchased by a private trust and no tax dollars were used." Unfortunately, the boss doesn't like to pull that kind of ace out of her sleeve. I wouldn't hesitate myself, but then I don't want her job either. Tax dollars pay salaries and insurance, utilities, and (these days) buy most of the books and materials. The trust pays for computer equipment and software, and most of the building maintenance, though technically the building is owned by the city. The old building was completely owned by the trust, which had built it in 1909 and paid a big percentage of the cost of putting up the new building as well.