How many Services in a Network
reddit / irc

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QuietClocks · 2022-01-02 12:35

In a network of multiple linked IRC servers, how many instamces of a
"Services" server like anope would there be?  One per irdcd, or just
one shared anope?  The latter would seem to be a fragile
configuration.

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CannedDeath · 2022-01-02 13:37

Just one. There's no way to make multiple services servers work with
each other simultaneously. A big reason for this is that a nickname
like ChanServ can only be used by one user on the network at a time.

You could write an ircd to handle services functionality and treat the
services users differently so that they aren't shared with the rear of
the network, but then you have to synchronize the data across all of
the servers, and distributed databases aren't easy to implement.

For reliability, large networks often keep backups of the services
installation on several servers so that one of them can take over as
the services server if the services server goes down.

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Semisol · 2022-01-02 16:23

You can change the services nicknames in config.

Multiple servers are possible. But there's no purpose for multiple, as
most IRC networks run fine with one service server with easy migration
of the services if it's a big one.

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ValwareUK · 2022-01-02 16:24

Okay, so!

You can definitely run multiple services packages, even off one
server. It's not recommended to do this, as if you designate the one
services package to be a uline on all the servers configuration, your
one services package can serve the whole network, however;

If you want to run multiple services packages, you must make sure that
the Serv's (NickServ, ChanServ etc) have different nicks. you'd need
to at least completely change the nicks on **one** services package
(NickServ2, ChanServ2 etc) to avoid nick collisions.

also you would have to specifically message the second package, such
like "/msg NickServ2 identify blah" if you wished for it to work.

Your services may also fight with each other, for example I think with
atheme, if a user is logged in with an account not registered on the
first NickServ, atheme will log that person straight out.

Generally speaking, it is advised, and common practice, to run only
one services package per network, unless you're testing something.

Good luck.

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[deleted] · 2022-01-02 16:34

[deleted]

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QuietClocks · 2022-01-02 21:10

I understand.  I was just thinking that with multiple servers in an
IRC network, spreading the load and acting as backups, it seems
strange to have a single point of failure in the Services.  But as the
Services software actually connects as a *client*, it is
understandable.

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wagu666 · 2022-01-03 09:02

No, services connects as a server (using the server to server
protocol) and presents the nicknames as clients on that server to the
rest of the network, but they're not really clients.

These days networks like DALnet (that invented modern services) have a
hot spare that automatically connects if main services goes down