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Rob Tweed · Nov 26, 2020

Thanks Vic. Yes that was my conclusion too - it seems to be for AWS EC2 ARM Graviton processors.  The question is whether it ought to work on other ARM chips too? 

As far as ARM support for IRIS is concerned, Raspberry Pi would be really handy to have as it's a very low cost but extremely potent platform, and out there in huge numbers (eg you should see how many I have! :-).  I know some work on an RPi/ARM port was done a while ago by an ISC intern but don't know what, if anything, became of it.

Apple M1 would be the other obvious ARM platform of course :-)

Rob Tweed · Oct 29, 2020

A quick update:  

I've modified our WebComponent-based wc-conduit RealWorld Client to optionally use the alternative WebSocket API interfaces supported by the qewd-conduit back-end. 

Furthermore, to make it easy for you to try out the wc-conduit front end and compare the REST and WebSocket APIs,  a copy of the wc-conduit front-end is integrated into the qewd-conduit repository.  I've updated the documentation to explain how to use the WebSocket version of wc-conduit  if you want to try it out.  It's very simple - just load a different URL to launch the wc-conduit front-end and it will automatically do the rest (no pun intended!).

  http:xx.xx.xx.xx:8080/conduit-wc  (REST)

  http:xx.xx.xx.xx:8080/conduit-wc/index-ws.html  (WebSockets)

See if you notice any performance difference between the WebSocket and REST APIs.  The back-end literally runs the same handler code regardless of the interface you choose, and the front-end WebComponents operate identically, so any difference in performance you see is network overheads of HTTP versus WebSockets, and the back-end interface overheads of HTTP (handled by the Node.js Express module) versus WebSockets (handled by the Node.js socket.io module).

REST or WebSocket APIs with an IRIS back-end. What's not to like?

Rob Tweed · Oct 21, 2020

So, step 2 along the road for qewd-conduit: this time focusing on the front-end.  If you've noticed, most of the available front-ends for the RealWorld Conduit application are a real pain to install and configure.  So, courtesy of the WebComponents and Module support that is now built-into modern browsers, I've created a version using my mg-webComponents framework.  No bundled JavaScript, no heavy-weight frameworks like React, Angular, Vue etc.  And a very simple configuration allowing you to change the Conduit back-end location in a matter of seconds.

Read all about it and try it out here:

https://github.com/robtweed/wc-conduit

Let me know if you have any issues / questions / comments etc.

Rob Tweed · Oct 11, 2020

I've updated the repository on Github to include files for IRIS running on Mac OS X.  Here's how to get it working:

- replace the /package.json file with /package.json.iris-osx (ie rename it to package.json)

- replace the /configuration/config.json file with /configuration/config.json.iris.osx

- Edit the /configuration/config.json file to ensure the database connection parameters are correct for your IRIS system.  In particular you'll need to change the database.path property

Then just follow the same instructions as provided for Windows in the README.

HOWEVER!!  IMPORTANT:  When you start QEWD for the second (or subsequent) time, you need to have root privileges, so you need to do this:

  sudo npm start

This is due to the root permissions needed to connect to IRIS's C interface

It should then work according to the instructions I've provided for Windows.

Rob Tweed · Oct 9, 2020

I'd need information on how you're supposed to customise the IRIS Docker container.  From past experience it's a pretty complex process, but perhaps that's changed?  To summarise what's needed for qewd-conduit, I'd need to be able to install Node.js on the running container, install a C++ compiler to its Linux environment, pull in the qewd-conduit repo files and modify the package.json and config.json files, then invoke npm install and npm start.  The listener port used by the QEWD process would also need to be mapped via the Docker container's run command -p directive. 

Rob Tweed · Oct 9, 2020

For these to be "bonuses", they imply that there is something better about using them than doing the equivalent in other ways and using other technologies.  They therefore rig the competition to favour solutions that use what's built-in to IRIS, and penalise systems that still use IRIS but use other technologies for achieving the same results just as effectively.  So, for example, since qewd-conduit's logic is all in Node.js and not inside the IRIS programming environment, things like ZPM are not relevant, but I'm penalised for not using it.  Ditto the REST API within the IRIS programming environment.

And no, QEWD doesn't use the Native API for Node.js which is provided within IRIS, but uses the Open Source mg-dbx interface and the APIs it provides, so I guess that means qewd-conduit will be further penalised and lose that bonus too! :-)

I suppose it comes down to what is trying to be demonstrated and promoted in the competition, but it doesn't seem to me to be a level playing field for demonstrating what's possible in terms of a full-stack application that makes use of IRIS for data storage.

Rob Tweed · Oct 9, 2020

qewd-conduit could easily be set up to run in the Dockerised version of IRIS.  For simplicity, the version I shipped assume you'd be running on a Windows machine on which IRIS was installed - the commonest set-up out there in my experience.  

It's somewhat mean to deny qewd-conduit a bonus for not using IRIS's built-in REST APIs - it clearly implements REST APIs against an IRIS system, just not using the proprietary IRIS-specific APIs.  I'm not sure why their use warrants a bonus if REST APIs can be implemented just as effectively by other means.

Rob Tweed · Oct 9, 2020

QEWD-Conduit is a QEWD application, which means it's a Node.js application - 100% JavaScript.  As a QEWD application, it means it uses the mg-dbx connector to attach to an instance of IRIS or Cache.  For simplicity and to make it easy and convenient for readers to try out, the version I've made available for the competition assumes it's going to be run on a Windows machine on which IRIS is installed - that's the most common set up out there.

However, as a Node.js application, qewd-conduit is capable of running on any machine on which Node.js can be installed and run - so that means Linux, Unix, Mac OS and Windows.  Since the Dockerised version of IRIS is based on a Linux OS, then yes, of course, qewd-conduit could be installed and run on it, eg by modifying the Dockerfiles setup, or simply shelling into the running container, installing Node.js, copying in the qewd-conduit repo files, running npm install and npm start.

The key to modifying how/where qewd-conduit runs is just 2 configuration files:

- the Node.js-specific package.json file.  For Linux, Unix and MacOS systems, add "mg-dbx" as a dependency and make sure that the OS has a C++ compiler installed, since mg-dbx needs to be built from source during the npm install.  For Windows, leave mg-dbx out as a dependency - QEWD will automatically download and install a pre-built Windows binary of mg-dbx when it is first run.

- the QEWD-specific /configuration/config.json file which is used by QEWD to configure itself.  In particular, the "database" section defines how the connection is to be made to IRIS or Cache, so that's where you define the path, namespace etc as appropriate for the instance of IRIS you want to connect.

Note that the config.json file I've shipped assumes that you'll run qewd-conduit on the same physical machine as your instance of IRIS.  However, you can change the settings to tell mg-dbx to connect to a separate IRIS (or Cache) instance via a network connection.

Just explore the QEWD and mg-dbx documentation and you'll discover how to run qewd-conduit in any configuration you like on anything you like.  It's a shame there's no publicly-available version of IRIS for a Raspberry Pi, because you could run qewd-conduit there too.  You *could*, of course, run qewd-conduit on a Raspberry Pi and change the config.json to make a network connection to an IRIS system on a separate machine.

QEWD really does provide the ultimate in flexibility for implementing IRIS/Cache REST services

Rob Tweed · Oct 6, 2020

Yes, it would be possible to do so - it would be a simple matter of writing a process that invoked the appropriate Conduit REST APIs to create the articles, comments and links to authors/users from your data export.  The one thing that might be tricky would be the user password property, which would be required for a user to log in and view/edit their own articles, and to follow other users and/or favourite their articles.

Rob Tweed · Apr 14, 2020

That depends on your definition of "REST API on the Intersystems IRIS side".  That Intersystems IRIS provides the HTTP interface?  and/or the code that does the work of the API is within IRIS and therefore ObjectScript?  As far as QEWD is concerned, Intersystems IRIS is simply a persistent JSON store with no other role (though you still can invoke ObjectScript methods and access classes if you want), so a REST API is implemented in JavaScript and handled by Node.js/QEWD.  

Rob Tweed · Mar 24, 2020

These APIs appear to be synchronous, and therefore will not be usable in a standard production Node.js environment where all concurrent users coexist in the same physical process.

This is precisely the reason why QEWD was created - ie to allow the safe use of synchronous APIs, but, then again, if you use QEWD, you won't need or use the APIs described here