Moving to New Servers

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Posted on January 12, 2013

By Daniel Morrison

We’re ready to move fully to our new infrastructure. We’ve been moving sites over and are running about 20% of our traffic on the new setup. We’re extremely happy with how it has been going, and want to share it with everyone.

Depending on your DNS configuration, you may need to change your DNS settings but even if you do, we have set it up for a zero-downtime, seamless transition.

Quick Summary

Today we’re running both new and old servers concurrently. Both use the same database underneath, so there are no data consistency issues. We recommend changing your DNS with the instructions below as soon as you can.

February 1, we will switch the old server into “proxy mode” meaning any remaining traffic will be proxied to our new servers. If you haven’t updated your DNS by this date, your site will continue to work.

March 1, we will switch off our old infrastructure. Expect lots of emails from us if you haven’t switched your DNS by this date.

The Details

This week, we are switching DNS for *.harmonyapp.com to point to the new servers. We already have about half of this traffic pointing to the new servers, so you’re possibly reading this off the new setup.


simplified view of our servers today

If you’re using our recommended setup of pointing your www (or another) subdomain to harmonyapp.com, then you are already set! If you have your “apex” or “root” domain (example.com) pointed to our old IP address (216.180.248.111) then you need to update your DNS before March 1.

Instructions for setting your DNS can be found, as always, in our documentation. We recommend using CNAME records instead of A Records. CNAME records allow us to take proactive measures to keep your site up, running, and fast in adverse conditions. If you do need A Records, we currently have two static IP addresses, so you’ll need 2 A Records instead of 1: 54.235.208.208 and 54.235.208.220.


simplified view of our servers after February 1

Both server setups point to the same database, so the transition will be seamless. You can change your DNS at any time, and there will be no downtime or data inconsistency as your visitors transition. We’ve worked hard to make this as easy as possible.

When should I change my DNS?

We recommending you change your DNS today. Our new servers are faster, and we have more tools to prevent downtime. On February 1, we will change our old servers from serving pages to “proxy mode” which will simply proxy traffic to our new servers. If you haven’t moved your DNS your site will work, but may be slightly slowed as it grabs the data from the new servers. We plan to turn off the proxy on March 1.

If your DNS needs to be changed, expect an email from us (we know everyone doesn’t read this blog). As we get closer to both the February 1 and March 1 deadlines, you’ll get more and more. We’ll make sure everyone gets moved over.

We know changing DNS can be a pain, which is why we take this very seriously. We won’t ask you to make changes unless we have a good reason. Our new infrastructure is truly a step forward for Harmony, and we’re excited for you to join us!

7 Comments

  1. Bashkar Bashkar

    cool

  2. Lois McManus Lois McManus

    It’s a good initiative to move to new servers for better performance and https://luckypennsylvania.com/sports-betting/sugarhouse-sportsbook is quite concerned about the same matter. How it can be done in less time by the way?

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