[tor-relays] minimum ram

[Gordon Morehouse]

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I:
> To see if it was possible just now I set up an obfsproxy bridge as
> best I could but it failed to download properly.

Can you be more specific about what this means?  What exactly happened?

> The instructions say set up Tor then the obfsproxy software which
> seemed to use up the ram. (I've reinstalled the OS from Ubuntu 11..
> to Quantal)

I generally use Debian for very low-end servers as it's pretty easy to
have a pared-down install that uses very little RAM for the OS.

When you first boot your VPS and don't have *anything* else running -
no Tor, no obfsproxy - what is the output of 'free -m'?

> Have I misunderstood something? Is there an easier way to set up a
> bridge like the Amazon ECC ones on a 256mB VPS that ab initio Linux
> people can try?

Not yet, although it's a worthy project - the difference is that
bridges need to be long-lived - you want it to be up for months or
years, which AFAIK is not the case with the "free" Amazon EC2
instances, they're temporary relays unless you decide to pay for EC2.
 (The free usage amount on EC2 does not allow you to operate even for
a whole month, fine for relays in some sense, sort of, not good for
bridges).

> If the Tor Project wants to be really big it would seem to be
> better to be easier to provide resources such as your idea of a box
> anyone can plug in.

Well, they only have a few really smart people working on the core
anonymity and crypto problems that people like me could never hope to
understand, so it's up to me and you and other people who understand
the importance of Tor to help provide those solutions.  :)

A plug-and-forget bridge package with a list of "known good" microVPS
providers would be a great thing, though.

My Raspberry Pi/single-board-computer project will definitely end up
in more bridges if I complete it, because it will urge the user to be
a bridge if they're really too slow to be a relay (and automatically
reconfigure itself if their link becomes too slow and stays that way
for a long time - at least, that's the plan).

Best,
- -Gordon M.


> 
> Robert
> 
> 
> 
>> -----Original Message----- From: gordon at morehouse.me Sent: Sun,
>> 20 Oct 2013 19:37:11 -0700 To: tor-relays at lists.torproject.org 
>> Subject: Re: [tor-relays] minimum ram
>> 
> I:
>>>> Gordon,
>>>> 
>>>> It seems useful to run obfsproxy bridges on $1 a month VPSs
>>>> then. Can weather.torproject.org be used to monitor whether
>>>> they're running or not?
> 
> That's a very good question - I hadn't tried monitoring my bridges 
> with it because I had other means.  Fortunately, a reboot to a
> bridge doesn't set it back like it would a relay.  Users of the
> bridge are inconvenienced (maybe) while it's offline, but cheap
> VPSes are *great* for dedicated bridges, and 128MB RAM is currently
> enough.
> 
> Best, -Gordon M.
> 
> 
>>>> 
>>>>>>> Is there any utility in the very cheap VPSs with 128mb
>>>>>>> of ram?
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> I did some testing quite a while ago and found that 256MB
>>>>>> was the minimum amount of RAM for a relay. It works for
>>>>>> some time with 128MB, but it then runs out of memory, and
>>>>>> it is not very good to have it restart all the time.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> I say "was" because currently, with more than 3 million
>>>>>> clients in the network, a relay might even run out of
>>>>>> memory with 256MB RAM. I don't have any current data on
>>>>>> that though.
>>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> A 128MB VPS can comfortably support an obfsproxy bridge -
>>>>> just get a provider that doesn't reboot you a ton.  I've
>>>>> run a number of such bridges.
>>>>> 
>>>>> I would not go below 512MB RAM for a relay that is going
>>>>> to handle more than 2Mbps (about 200KB/sec) - you will
>>>>> eventually run out of RAM and Tor will be killed, and
>>>>> that's not great for the network.
>>>>> 
>>>>> My source for the above is a lot of blood, sweat and tears
>>>>> with Tor on the Raspberry Pi model B.  :)
>>>>> 
>>>>> Best, - -Gordon M.
>>>> 
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