The Great Tree

Durin Mephit · Posted: Thu Sep 16, 2010 5:28 pm Post subject: Project Mirror Sites

It looks like I may need to host the new videos (and the old ones) off of my FIOS connection. The server that currently hosts the episodes will be going offline within a few weeks! (I've been enjoying free hosting from a friend for years, and he has finally decided to stop that. So I cannot complain.)

Anyway - it looks like the topic of mirror servers should be considered again. Ideas?
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Durin Mephit * Member of Guild of Messengers - Unless otherwise stated, opinions are mine only and not Guild endorsed.
rel.to | Marten KI: 59474 | Durin M KI: 11883768

janaba1 · Posted: Fri Sep 17, 2010 12:53 am Post subject:

What about Rel.to?... Another suggestion I could think of would be
MediaFire, though I don't know how reliable they are in the long run...

As of my own experiences for a few years I can say that I had no
problems by now... Also the download was always quite fast which
of course depends on one's own connection/broadband speed ...

I just had a look and found out that they increased the size of an
uploaded file in case of a free account up to 200 MB per file...
The amount of uploads and downloads is unlimited... So, maybe
worth a look and try... Here's the MediaFire... Very Happy

Erik · Posted: Fri Sep 17, 2010 3:08 am Post subject:

I have 2 GB of free space on my webhosting and I have around 9 GB of bandwidth left every month. That sounds like it should be enough, but if some 100 people will download an episode of 100 MB (which isn't unlikely with a new episode), I will be over the limit. Do you have any download statistics?

Any way, I think I will offer my webspace as a mirror and watch my stats closely. Razz

janaba1 · Posted: Fri Sep 17, 2010 3:47 am Post subject:

That sounds great, Erik, but to always having to monitor the bandwith usage... Razz

With that MediaFire account you have no problems with everything at all...
And, if anybody likes to have a look into the offers for a MediaFire Pro
account (see link below), you can have everything you might think of
and not be thinking of for $9/month only already... Please check this out...

As of the download/upload statistics I have only my own ones as I've
just uploaded and downloaded two episodes to and from my account to
see if that'd be a real option and it looks great... Ok, the upload took a
considerable higher amount of time (double), but that's quite usual as
far as I remember... But hey, it's free... initiate a bulk upload in the night,
go to sleep and you're done when you wake up with all videos at once lol...
------------------------------------

I've uploaded the biggest and a half that size one:

I've downloaded Episode Six with 102 MB from your server Marten which
took me about 13 minutes with 120 KB/s on the average...

I've uploaded that one afterwards which took me about 20/25 minutes
with ~503 kbps... The download then took me ~13 minutes with the same
KB as from yours on the average...

And for the Episode Four with half that size the same values apply resp...

Ok, this is the Great Tree Episodes folder on my MediaFire account,
where you can test the downloads yourselves, maybe my connection
from Germany is considerably slower than one from the US or NL...

I've also added all the rest of the chatlogs from the episodes you cannot
retrieve here anymore. I don't have all but about ten more, Erik, just look
what you're missing maybe if at all...

Yeah, that's it for now... Very Happy

Durin Mephit · Posted: Fri Sep 17, 2010 3:46 pm Post subject:

I don't have download stats, but I'm not sure any present status will help predict what will happen. When a new episode comes out, you'll see a burst of activity both in people downloading the new episode, but also as a few new people look at the previous videos. But the biggest worry I have is that some people might say "Oh hey, I remember these.... I don't remember where I saved these videos... I should make a new complete copy of the set right now." Wink

The average episode size is currently 60MB. The remaining episodes may be a bit larger than that.

rel.to has a 5 GB per month cap. It averages about 300 MB per month. I can double the bandwidth for $12/year, and double it again for another $12/year. So, I have some options available to me.

MediaFire is an option, though I would prefer to keep that as an emergency plan. I find that MediaFire and similar advertising-supported free services are confusing to use. After selecting a file to download from the folder of files, the resulting download page is cluttered, it contains flash advertisements, and it can be difficult to identify which part of the page to click on to download the video.

Another option is Dropbox. A basic free account (2 GB) could probably hold the remaining episodes, and I can create direct, public links to my files in Dropbox that people can access without any advertising at all. Although... this is not really what Dropbox is intended for, so maybe I would only put the latest episode there, as each episode comes out.

Example: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/7341146/Ep9Teaser.jpg

EDIT

By the way, if anyone reading this wants to get a Dropbox account, don't just sign up - please let me know and I'll have an invitation sent to you. It will give you an additional 250 MB of space!
_________________
Durin Mephit * Member of Guild of Messengers - Unless otherwise stated, opinions are mine only and not Guild endorsed.
rel.to | Marten KI: 59474 | Durin M KI: 11883768

Leonardo · Explorer Joined: 03 Nov 2006 Posts: 29 Location: italy

All the videos together (considering the double format and the 5 languages, with a 60MB avg dimension) would occupy more than 6GBs. I think that 6GBs is beyond of what the average Webspace Provider offers. Let alone the bandwidth.

Another free solution probably can be Microsoft SkyDrive: whoever has a Microsoft Passport.NET account (all the emails that can be used to login on Microsoft websites and Windows Live Messengers) has 25GB of free space on uncle Bill's servers Laughing

25GB should be enough to host 4 full sets of the GT Episodes Laughing

Microsoft puts advertisements on the pages but they are well placed and it's easy to spot the right place to click on, but it doesn't provide a direct URL to the file.
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Unless otherwise stated, opinions are mine only and not Guild endorsed.

janaba1 · Posted: Sat Sep 18, 2010 1:11 pm Post subject:

I considered this as well, Leonardo, but as far as I could figure out this is
more intended for personal use with a 50 MB limit per file and the linking
systems seem to be quite uncomfortable as you already mentioned, at least
if you want to share your files for an indefinite period of time to an unlimited
number of people etc... Razz

The dropbox as you've already stated, Marten, isn't really intended for the
purpose it'd be needed, but it is a wonderful facility for anyone needing the
provided services... Thanks for the offer nonetheless... I'm sure someone
would like and will come up to you on this if they're not using this already... Very Happy