Eric on 11 Jul 2006 14:06:44 -0000


[Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Date Index] [Thread Index]

Re: [PLUG] perplexing file transfer problem


It turned out that the provider had their firewall ports closed... 
opening that up fixed the problem... the transfer rate is about 
1 mByte/second.... sweet!

Thanks for the suggestions.

Eric

On Monday 10 July 2006 10:02 am, Eric wrote:
> I've encountered a file transfer problem that is quite perplexing - 
> and I'm at a loss to identify the cause.  Part of the problem is 
> that it's random and it's complex (a number of variables are 
> involved) and therefore hard to narrow down to a single failure
> point.
> 
> The basic scenario is this: I have a shell script that uses curl 
> commands to retrieve multiple files from two ftp servers.  The 
> host for this is a rented box that I do not have root or physical 
> access to.  I do not have root or physical access to the ftp 
> server either for that matter... I'm just a user/developer 
> tryin' to bring the data home :-)
> 
> The script ran on a shared box for several months but was moved to 
> it's own box with a new IP on Thursday.  On Friday the random 
> failures began.. some initial portion of the file would download at 
> normal speed then the rate would drop to zero bytes per second and 
> stay there.  If the script is re-run it may download that file just 
> fine only to fail on the next download.  Also, the size of the 
> initial download appears random too - one was 292 kB, the next was 1.9 
> Meg... etc.  There is a log fragment at the bottom of this email 
> showing the relevant part (the output of the curl command).  
> 
> Other factors I've considered:
> 
>    The transfer randomly fails if we use ftp from the command line too
>      - it's not just curl
> 
>    For security reasons, the ftp server must have the IP of the 
>       requestor on file - and it does.  Otherwise, we could not 
>       even log it.
> 
>    The failure can be from either of the ftp servers - although they
>       are on the same domain they are separate host names.
> 
> Now if anybody has seen something similar or has any ideas on how to 
> further troubleshoot this I'd be very grateful.  Keep in mind that it's
> been working like clockwork since March or April so it's not the 
> programmer's fault :-D
> 
> Thanks.
> Eric
> 
> Our host:
> 
> # uname -a
> Linux host.xxxxxxxxx.com 2.6.9-34.EL #1 Wed Mar 8 00:07:35 CST 2006 
>   i686 athlon i386 GNU/Linux
> 
> Log fragment showing how it fails:
> 
> -----
> curl -n $DATAURL1 > $DATAFILE1
>  retrieving BR_20060710_013000__dat_full_.zip
>  % Total    % Received % Xferd  Average Speed   Time    Time     Time  
Current
>                                  Dload  Upload   Total   Spent    Left  
Speed
>  0 24.1M    0  1460    0     0   1283      0  5:29:00  0:00:01  5:28:59  
1283
>  0 24.1M    0  168k    0     0   106k      0  0:03:53  0:00:01  0:03:52  
371k
>  2 24.1M    2  684k    0     0   264k      0  0:01:33  0:00:02  0:01:31  
470k
>  4 24.1M    4 1166k    0     0   319k      0  0:01:17  0:00:03  0:01:14  
462k
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0   219k      0  0:01:52  0:00:05  0:01:47  
277k
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0   185k      0  0:02:13  0:00:06  0:02:07  
225k
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0   160k      0  0:02:33  0:00:07  0:02:26  
175k
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0   141k      0  0:02:54  0:00:08  0:02:46 
89742
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0   126k      0  0:03:15  0:00:09  0:03:06  
5781
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0   114k      0  0:03:35  0:00:10  0:03:25     
0
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0   104k      0  0:03:56  0:00:11  0:03:45     
0
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0  98511      0  0:04:17  0:00:12  0:04:05     
0
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0  91188      0  0:04:37  0:00:13  0:04:24     
0
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0  84879      0  0:04:58  0:00:14  0:04:44     
0
>  .
>  .   [five hours later we see.... Current Speed is stuck at zero]
>  .
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0     67      0   4d 09h  5:03:55 99:56:12     
0
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0     67      0   4d 09h  5:03:56 99:56:11     
0
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0     67      0   4d 09h  5:03:57 99:56:10     
0
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0     67      0   4d 09h  5:03:58 99:56:09     
0
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0     67      0   4d 09h  5:03:59 99:56:08     
0
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0     67      0   4d 09h  5:04:00 99:56:07     
0
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0     67      0   4d 09h  5:04:01 99:56:06     
0
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0     67      0   4d 09h  5:04:02 99:56:05     
0
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0     67      0   4d 09h  5:04:03 99:56:04     
0
>  4 24.1M    4 1199k    0     0     67      0   4d 09h  5:04:04 99:56:03     
0
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> #  Eric A Lucas
> #  ------------
> #   "Oh, I have slipped the surly bond of earth
> #    and danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings... 
> #        -- John Gillespie Magee Jr.
> ___________________________________________________________________________
> Philadelphia Linux Users Group         --        http://www.phillylinux.org
> Announcements - http://lists.phillylinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug-announce
> General Discussion  --   http://lists.phillylinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
> 
> 
> 

-- 
------------------------------------------------------------------------
#  Eric A Lucas
#  ------------
#   "Oh, I have slipped the surly bond of earth
#    and danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings... 
#        -- John Gillespie Magee Jr.
___________________________________________________________________________
Philadelphia Linux Users Group         --        http://www.phillylinux.org
Announcements - http://lists.phillylinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug-announce
General Discussion  --   http://lists.phillylinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug