How medium-sized servers are connected to the internet?

Andrei Cristea

10/25/22, 8:15 PM

I'm curious about how the servers are connected to the internet. Suppose I develop a web application that requires multiple machines to provide services. For example, I want to host the frontend on a machine, and for the backend I want a pool of machines, something like load balancing, and also a machine for my database. I want to start this project in my apartment. It will be a good idea to pay an internet subscription for each of these machine? Which is the recommended method for medium-sized servers to connect to the Internet? Thank you!

107

1 + 4

networking

internet

load-balancing

isp

Jonas

10/25/22, 8:45 PM

Start with some cheap cloud service instead, e.g. Google Cloud Run or AWS Lambda

peterh

10/25/22, 8:47 PM

Unlikely that you would need this multi-backend system for a pilot project.

ceejayoz

10/25/22, 8:54 PM

Any project requiring multiple servers likely justifies a proper hosting provider, not a personal connection from your apartment. Look into colocation.

Paul

10/26/22, 3:50 AM

You should start with just how to set up one server to do what you want it to do. Learn from there why you would even want more servers. Unfortunately, this question is not a good fit for a Q&A site like Server Fault, so you will do better to get started then come back when you have specific questions.

Score:0

Server

duct_tape_coder

10/25/22, 9:41 PM

If you're just starting out on the project, you can run those machines locally in your lab environment and access the internet with your normal home NAT. Most home ISP solutions have a single public IP address that is shared by the internal devices connected to the router (hard wired or WiFi). There are unique internal IPs for each machine but they use NAT (Network Address Translation) and all talk to the internet with a single public IP.

If you don't already have a lab, you can set up a simple lab using tools like virtualization (e.g. VMware ESXi or Workstation or Player) to run VMs or containerization (e.g. Docker) with each application running in a container. Or if you have the hardware, you can run dedicated physical machines for each component. Depending on the application components, you may be able to run everything on one machine.

If you don't have a feasible local lab environment, seek out a cloud provider like MS Azure, Amazon AWS, or Google GCP. They usually provide some free (or cheap) trials to get you started.

It sounds like you have a lot of research ahead of you. Make sure to start small with your project and don't bite off more than you can chew at one time.

0 + 0

Elon Musk

I sit in a Tesla and translated this thread with Ai:

EN: How medium-sized servers are connected to the internet?

TH: เซิร์ฟเวอร์ขนาดกลางเชื่อมต่อกับอินเทอร์เน็ตอย่างไร

RO: Cum sunt conectate serverele de dimensiuni medii la internet?

RU: Как серверы среднего размера подключены к Интернету?

VI: Làm thế nào các máy chủ cỡ trung bình được kết nối với internet?

Post an answer

Most people don’t grasp that asking a lot of questions unlocks learning and improves interpersonal bonding. In Alison’s studies, for example, though people could accurately recall how many questions had been asked in their conversations, they didn’t intuit the link between questions and liking. Across four studies, in which participants were engaged in conversations themselves or read transcripts of others’ conversations, people tended not to realize that question asking would influence—or had influenced—the level of amity between the conversationalists.