Medusa is written in Python, a high-level object-oriented language that is particularly well suited to building powerful, extensible servers. Medusa can be extended and modified at run-time, even by the end-user. User 'scripts' can be used to completely change the behavior of the server, and even add in completely new server types.
The vast majority of Internet servers are I/O bound - for any one process, the CPU is sitting idle 99.9% of the time, usually waiting for input from an external device (in the case of an Internet server, it is waiting for input from the network). This problem is exacerbated by the imbalance between server and client bandwidth: most clients are connecting at relatively low bandwidths (28.8 kbits/sec or less, with network delays and inefficiencies it can be far lower). To a typical server CPU, the time between bytes for such a client seems like an eternity! (Consider that a 200 Mhz CPU can perform roughly 50,000 operations for each byte received from such a client).
A simple metaphor for a 'forking' server is that of a supermarket: for every 'customer' being processed [at a cash register], another 'person' must be created to handle each client session. But what if your checkout clerks were so fast they could each individually handle hundreds of customers per second? Since these clerks are almost always waiting for a customer to come through their line, you have a very large staff, sitting around idle 99.9% of the time! Why not replace this staff with a single super-clerk ?
This is exactly how Medusa works!
The most obvious advantage to a single long-running server process is a dramatic improvement in performance. There are two types of overhead involved in the forking model:
Starting up a new process is an expensive operation on any operating system. Virtual memory must be allocated, libraries must be initialized, and the operating system now has yet another task to keep track of. This start-up cost is so high that it is actually noticeable to people! For example, the first time you pull up a web page with 15 inline images, while you are waiting for the page to load you may have created and destroyed at least 16 processes on the web server.
Each process also requires a certain amount of virtual memory space to be allocated on its behalf. Even though most operating systems implement a 'copy-on-write' strategy that makes this much less costly than it could be, the end result is still very wasteful. A 100-user FTP server can still easily require hundreds of megabytes of real memory in order to avoid thrashing (excess paging activity due to lack of real memory).
Another major advantage to the single-process model is persistence. Often it is necessary to maintain some sort of state information that is available to each and every client, i.e., a database connection or file pointer. Forking-model servers that need such shared state must arrange some method of getting it - usually via an IPC (inter-process communication) mechanism such as sockets or named pipes. IPC itself adds yet another significant and needless overhead - single-process servers can share such information within a single address space.
Implementing persistence in Medusa is easy - the address space of its process (and thus its open database handles, variables, etc...) is available to each and every client.
Threads are required in only a limited number of situations. In many cases where threads seem appropriate, an asynchronous solution can actually be written with less work, and will perform better. Avoiding the use of threads also makes access to shared resources (like database connections) easier to manage, since multi-user locking is not necessary.
Note: In the rare case where threads are actually necessary, Medusa can of course use them, if the host operating system supports them.
Another solution (used by many current HTTP servers on Unix) is to 'pre-spawn' a large number of processes - clients are attached to each server in turn. Although this alleviates the performance problem up to that number of users, it still does not scale well. To reliably and efficiently handle [n] users, [n] processes are still necessary.
Since Medusa is written in Python, it is easily extensible. No separate compilation is necessary. New facilities can be loaded and unloaded into the server without any recompilation or linking, even while the server is running. [For example, Medusa can be configured to automatically upgrade itself to the latest version every so often].
Many of the most popular security holes (popular, at least, among the mischievous) exploit the fact that servers are usually written in a low-level language. Unless such languages are used with extreme care, weaknesses can be introduced that are very difficult to predict and control. One of the favorite loop-holes is the 'memory buffer overflow', used by the Internet Worm (and many others) to gain unwarranted access to Internet servers.
Such problems are virtually non-existent when working in a high-level language like Python, where for example all access to variables and their components are checked at run-time for valid range operations. Even unforseen errors and operating system bugs can be caught - Python includes a full exception-handling system which promotes the construction of 'highly available' servers. Rather than crashing the entire server, Medusa will often inform the user, log the error, and keep right on running.
The currently available version of Medusa includes integrated World Wide Web (HTTP) and file transfer (FTP) servers. This combined server can solve a major performance problem at any high-load site, by replacing two forking servers with a single non-forking, non-threading server. Multiple servers of each type can also be instantiated.
Also included is a secure 'remote-control' capability, called a monitor server. With this server enabled, authorized users can 'log in' to the running server, and control, manipulate, and examine the server while it is running .
Several extensions are available for the HTTP server, and more will become available over time. Each of these extensions can be loaded/unloaded into the server dynamically.
An API is evolving for users to extend not just the HTTP server but Medusa as a whole, mixing in other server types and new capabilities into existing servers. I am actively encouraging other developers to produce (and if they wish, to market) Medusa extensions. The underlying socket library (and thus the core networking technology of Medusa) is very stable, and has been running virtually unchanged since 1995.
Medusa is available from http://www.nightmare.com/medusa
Feedback, both positive and negative, is much appreciated; please send email to rushing@nightmare.com.