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Server and storage requirements
EDITORS: Group
For Colouring Britain, we use Microsoft Azure and find that the “burstable” instances are cost-efficient because the site sees uneven usage and goes through relatively quiet periods.
For development, we use local desktops or laptops.
The current setup runs everything in a single virtual machine:
- NodeJS application
- PostgreSQL database
- Nginx reverse proxy server.
For deployment, we have a “staging” virtual machine (also B2s) which runs the latest version of the code, and can be used for testing before deploying an update to the live production site.
The Colouring Britain 'Staging' site runs on a B2s virtual machine:
- 2 cores
- 8GB RAM
- 8GB disk
The 'production' site runs on a B8ms virtual machine:
- 8 cores
- 32GB RAM
- 64GB disk
We also have an additional 256GB disk attached for local storage of backups and data extracts, before moving these to long-term blob storage.
Blob storage (Azure blob storage, Amazon S3 Simple Storage Service) is used for long-term storage of database backups and data extracts. This is a pay-what-you-use service with no need to specify storage space or bandwidth upfront, and no practical limits on storage capacity (up to 5PiB).
The Azure pricing calculator for estimates: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-gb/pricing/calculator/
A similar setup to the one described above (including the Staging and Production virtual machines) on Azure would budget at around GBP 120 per month. The virtual machines are the largest component of that cost. The smaller B2S instances should be sufficient to start with, and 40-60% discounts are available if you can commit to a contract for a year or three years.
Please note: we need further discussion on estimated monthly costs for partners. The UK has only just begun to roll out nationally.
Other cloud providers have very similar services for similar prices.