Geograph BlogRecently updated Blog Entries on Geograph British Isles
http://www.geograph.ie/blog/
2024-03-29T00:13:27+00:00text/html2017-08-11T16:37:07+00:00Barry HunterBeauty of Outdoor Places of London
https://www.geograph.org.uk/blog/272
Many moons ago, My Society created ScenicOrNot, an online project to rate images sourced from Geograph. Asking users to rate them for subjective beauty, collecting over 1.5 Million votes. <span class="nowrap"><a title="http://scenicornot.datasciencelab.co.uk/" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" href="http://scenicornot.datasciencelab.co.uk/">Link</a><img style="margin-left:2px;" alt="External link" title="External link - shift click to open in new window" src="http://s1.geograph.org.uk/img/external.png" width="10" height="10"/></span><br />
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Fast forward to 2017 and 'Artificial Intelligence' systems have progressed, so much so that researchers at University of Warwick have trained a computer algorithm to do something similar <span class="nowrap"><a title="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/technology-40805739/algorithm-learns-to-understand-natural-beauty" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/technology-40805739/algorithm-learns-to-understand-natural-beauty">Link</a><img style="margin-left:2px;" alt="External link" title="External link - shift click to open in new window" src="http://s1.geograph.org.uk/img/external.png" width="10" height="10"/></span> . Trained with data from ScenicOrNot, the algorithm can estimate a scenicness rating of its own. Can read the paper here: <span class="nowrap"><a title="http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.170170" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.170170">Link</a><img style="margin-left:2px;" alt="External link" title="External link - shift click to open in new window" src="http://s1.geograph.org.uk/img/external.png" width="10" height="10"/></span> (no idea the sum total of computing power it took!) <br />
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... so to test it out the same researchers then ran the algorithm on a large batch of images from Geograph in the London area; producing a interesting dataset of the 'beauty' of London (Because geograph has many photos, over 240,000 when processed, offers a highly granular breakdown. Available here: <span class="nowrap"><a title="http://dx.doi.org/10.5061/dryad.rq4s3" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" href="http://dx.doi.org/10.5061/dryad.rq4s3">Link</a><img style="margin-left:2px;" alt="External link" title="External link - shift click to open in new window" src="http://s1.geograph.org.uk/img/external.png" width="10" height="10"/></span> ) <br />
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To that end we have produced a map plotting these predictions, available here: <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/mapper/scenicness.php" href="https://www.geograph.ie/mapper/scenicness.php">Link</a> .<br />
shows the aggregate prediction on scale of 1-10, getting more detailed as zoom in. <br />
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We also have a map of just the most scenic photos: <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/search.php?i=75622014&displayclass=map" href="https://www.geograph.ie/search.php?i=75622014&displayclass=map">Link</a><br />
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Finally some images from the thousands processed with high predicted 'Beauty': <br />
<a href="https://www.geograph.ie/photo/4100609" target="_blank" title="TQ0889 : Low Water in the Lido by Des Blenkinsopp"><img alt="TQ0889 : Low Water in the Lido by Des Blenkinsopp" src="https://s1.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/04/10/06/4100609_4311ec60_120x120.jpg" width="120" height="90" /></a> <a href="https://www.geograph.ie/photo/4447610" target="_blank" title="TQ0960 : The lakes, Painshill Park by Alan Hunt"><img alt="TQ0960 : The lakes, Painshill Park by Alan Hunt" src="https://s2.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/04/44/76/4447610_68cdddef_120x120.jpg" width="120" height="90" /></a> <a href="https://www.geograph.ie/photo/1115252" target="_blank" title="TQ2782 : Oranamental Lake Regent's Park by Sheila Madhvani"><img alt="TQ2782 : Oranamental Lake Regent's Park by Sheila Madhvani" src="https://s0.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/01/11/52/1115252_74f0244e_120x120.jpg" width="120" height="90" /></a> <a href="https://www.geograph.ie/photo/1454123" target="_blank" title="TQ2877 : Lake in Battersea Park by Peter S"><img alt="TQ2877 : Lake in Battersea Park by Peter S" src="https://s3.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/01/45/41/1454123_4d91030d_120x120.jpg" width="120" height="90" /></a> <br />
<a href="https://www.geograph.ie/photo/1952415" target="_blank" title="TQ2176 : River Thames at Barnes by Marathon"><img alt="TQ2176 : River Thames at Barnes by Marathon" src="https://s3.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/01/95/24/1952415_ff5d386c_120x120.jpg" width="120" height="90" /></a> <a href="https://www.geograph.ie/photo/2871108" target="_blank" title="TQ2074 : Richmond Park by East Sheen Gate by Christine Johnstone"><img alt="TQ2074 : Richmond Park by East Sheen Gate by Christine Johnstone" src="https://s0.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/02/87/11/2871108_f4bf8a5d_120x120.jpg" width="120" height="90" /></a> <a href="https://www.geograph.ie/photo/2670988" target="_blank" title="TQ2680 : The Long Water and Kensington Gardens by Jim Osley"><img alt="TQ2680 : The Long Water and Kensington Gardens by Jim Osley" src="https://s0.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/02/67/09/2670988_b9d1e62a_120x120.jpg" width="120" height="68" /></a> <a href="https://www.geograph.ie/photo/1097952" target="_blank" title="TQ4179 : Sunrise over The Thames Barrier by Ian Dalgliesh"><img alt="TQ4179 : Sunrise over The Thames Barrier by Ian Dalgliesh" src="https://s0.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/01/09/79/1097952_4d6ddc5b_120x120.jpg" width="120" height="95" /></a>text/html2015-07-17T17:10:55+00:00Barry HunterJob Posting - Filesystem Monitor
https://www.geograph.org.uk/blog/232
Geograph Project Limited has a technical position available for a Photo Archivist, look after the photos submitted to <span class="nowrap"><a title="www.geograph.org.uk" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" href="http://www.geograph.org.uk">Link</a><img style="margin-left:2px;" alt="External link" title="External link - shift click to open in new window" src="http://s1.geograph.org.uk/img/external.png" width="10" height="10"/></span>. This is ideally suited to anyone of a detail oriented and conscientious nature, and enjoys seeing their work enjoyed by thousands of visitors daily. <br />
<br />
This position requires self-motivation and dedication. Will often need to take the initiative in seeking out and dealing with issues. Will work closely with other System and Database Administrators as part of the overall community. <br />
<br />
We have a bespoke hosting solution, dedicated to preserving the 4.5Million+ photo collection, to preserve the integrity and longevity of the collection we seek to make sure that the entire collection is replicated to multiple physical servers, as well as a number of offsite backup locations. Furthermore we seek to ensure the archive is faithfully preserved in the British Library via webarchive.org.uk . <br />
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Due to the size and growth of the collection (generally 1.5k daily), this replication process is non-trivial, and takes occasional monitoring and maintenance. <br />
<br />
Responsibilities:<br />
* Ongoing monitoring of various statistics to ensure images are being successfully maintained in each separate system. <br />
* Liaising with various parties should an issue arise.<br />
* Writing new replication rules and/or strategies to copy images. <br />
* Proactive seeking out of issues, before they become a major issue<br />
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Requirements: <br />
* Head for statistics and figures<br />
* Use a web-browser<br />
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Hours: 1 hour a week (normally, can be variable). Flexi-Time, work when suits you. <br />
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Location: Remote working. A computer (or mobile phone!) with internet connection is all that is needed. (Using a web-browser, and potentially a SSH-Client) <br />
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Pay: Voluntary basis, but includes the warm glow of knowing you are helping to safeguard the work of thousands of contributors, over nearly 10 years, to the Geograph Project website. <br />
<br />
Contact us now: <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/contact.php" href="https://www.geograph.ie/contact.php">Link</a> or see other positions <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/blog/?tag=job+posting" href="https://www.geograph.ie/blog/?tag=job+posting">Link</a>text/html2015-07-17T16:30:17+00:00Barry HunterJob Posting - Database Backup Administrator
https://www.geograph.org.uk/blog/230
Geograph Project Limited has a position available for Backup Administrator, to look after ongoing Database backups. This is ideally suited to anyone of a detail oriented and conscientious nature. Backups are a highly critical but often neglected (out of sight) part of an overall system.<br />
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This position requires self motivation and dedication. Will often need to take the initiative in seeking out and dealing with issues. Will work closely with other System and Database administrators as part of the online community.<br />
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We have a number of large MySQL production databases (40Gb+, with hundreds of tables), that needs backing up to prevent the possibility of data loss.<br />
<br />
Responsibilities:<br />
* Ongoing monitoring of automated backups, ensuring files are being written and in-tact<br />
* Occasional audits to make sure everything that should be backed up IS being backed up<br />
* Writing (or assisting with creating) new scripts to backup new types of data<br />
* Synchronizing large quantities of data between servers and external backup services<br />
* Auditing rotation policies - automated or manual deleting of the old, no longer required backups<br />
<br />
Requirements (optional - can learn on the job):<br />
* Linux command-line experience (specifically Ubuntu)<br />
* Basic scripting ability (shell/perl/php in particular)<br />
* Familiarity with multi-server hosting environments<br />
* Amazon AWS - S3/Glacier experience<br />
* MySQL Database experience (in particular mysqldump and replication)<br />
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Hours: 1-2 hours a week (normally, can be variable). Flexi-Time, work when suits you.<br />
<br />
Location: Remote working. A computer with a internet connection is all that is needed. (to run a SSH-Client)<br />
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Pay:<br />
Voluntary basis, but includes the warm glow of knowing you are helping to safeguard the work of thousands of contributors, over nearly 10 years, to the Geograph Project website.<br />
<br />
Interested?<br />
Contact Us now: <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/contact.php" href="https://www.geograph.ie/contact.php">Link</a> or see other positions <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/blog/?tag=job+posting" href="https://www.geograph.ie/blog/?tag=job+posting">Link</a>text/html2015-07-17T16:49:52+00:00Barry HunterJob Posting - System Administrator
https://www.geograph.org.uk/blog/231
Geograph Project Limited has a position available for a General System Administrator, to look after our dedicated servers hosting <span class="nowrap"><a title="www.geograph.org.uk" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" href="http://www.geograph.org.uk">Link</a><img style="margin-left:2px;" alt="External link" title="External link - shift click to open in new window" src="http://s1.geograph.org.uk/img/external.png" width="10" height="10"/></span>. This is ideally suited to anyone of a detail oriented and conscientious nature, and enjoys seeing their work appreciated by thousands of visitors daily. <br />
<br />
This position requires self-motivation and dedication. Will often need to take the initiative in seeking out and dealing with issues. Will work closely with other System and Database Administrators as part of the overall community. <br />
<br />
We currently have 7 servers, with 20TB’s of storage, providing online access to over 4.5Million photos, serving about 15k visitors a day.<br />
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Responsibilities:<br />
* Ongoing monitoring of a cluster of linux dedicated servers<br />
* Occasional audits to make sure everything that is running satisfactorily<br />
* Proactive seeking out of issues, before they become a major issue<br />
* Keeping abreast of security issues and applying patches as needed<br />
* Writing (or assisting with) new scripts to monitor and maintain servers<br />
* Writing/maintaining documentation to assist others in finding their way around<br />
* Being on call as much as practical to deal with unexpected outages<br />
<br />
Requirements (optional - can learn on the job): <br />
* Linux command-line experience (specifically Ubuntu)<br />
* Basic scripting ability (shell/perl/php in particular)<br />
* Familiarity with multi-server hosting environments <br />
* Technologies like Apache, PHP, MySQL, NFS and SphinxSearch<br />
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Hours: 3-4 hours a week (normally, can be variable). Flexi-Time, work when suits you. <br />
<br />
Location: Remote working. A computer with a internet connection is all that is needed. (to run a SSH-Client) <br />
<br />
Pay: Voluntary basis, but includes the warm glow of knowing you are helping to safeguard the work of thousands of contributors, over nearly 10 years, to the Geograph Project website. <br />
<br />
Contact us now: <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/contact.php" href="https://www.geograph.ie/contact.php">Link</a> or see other positions <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/blog/?tag=job+posting" href="https://www.geograph.ie/blog/?tag=job+posting">Link</a>text/html2015-07-17T17:45:45+00:00Barry HunterJob Posting - Server Log Archivist
https://www.geograph.org.uk/blog/234
Geograph Project Limited has a technical position available for a Log Archivist, look after the the logs generated on our servers. This is ideally suited to anyone of a detail oriented and conscientious nature, and enjoys seeing their work enjoyed by thousands of visitors daily. <br />
<br />
This position requires self-motivation and dedication. Will often need to take the initiative in seeking out and dealing with issues. Will work closely with other System and Database Administrators as part of the overall community. <br />
<br />
We have many systems generating large quantities of logs. Under the general principle of throw nothing away, these need archiving in centralized storage. These includes logs from systems like Apache, Varnish, MySQL, SphinxSearch and external CDN providers. <br />
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If the logs were all centralized and consistently stored it would make processing them much more practical to spot issues, and/or develop new functionalities. <br />
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Responsibilities:<br />
* Documenting and tracking the various systems producing<br />
* Developing scripts/procedures for archiving the log files<br />
* Define rotation policies for disposing old log files<br />
* Investigate technologies that could ingest this data, for new and interesting output<br />
<br />
Requirements (optional - can learn on the job): <br />
* Basic scripting ability (shell/perl/php in particular)<br />
* Familiarity with multi-server hosting environments <br />
* Technologies like Apache, PHP, MySQL, NFS and SphinxSearch<br />
<br />
Hours: 1 hour a week (normally, can be variable). Flexi-Time, work when suits you. <br />
<br />
Location: Remote working. A computer (or mobile phone!) with internet connection is all that is needed. (to run a SSH-Client) <br />
<br />
Pay: Voluntary basis, but includes the warm glow of knowing you are helping to safeguard the work of thousands of contributors, over nearly 10 years, to the Geograph Project website. <br />
<br />
Contact us now: <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/contact.php" href="https://www.geograph.ie/contact.php">Link</a> or see other positions <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/blog/?tag=job+posting" href="https://www.geograph.ie/blog/?tag=job+posting">Link</a><br />
text/html2015-07-17T17:59:48+00:00Barry HunterJob Posting - Process Nanny
https://www.geograph.org.uk/blog/235
Geograph Project Limited has a position available for a Server Nanny, to monitor and maintain long term stability of system. This is ideally suited to anyone of a detail oriented and conscientious nature, and enjoys seeing their work enjoyed by thousands of visitors daily. <br />
<br />
This position requires self-motivation and dedication. Will often need to take the initiative in seeking out and dealing with issues. Will work closely with other System and Database Administrators as part of the overall community. <br />
<br />
The geograph website, uses a large number of automated systems to keep the site running. These systems occasionally break down, and need fixing. There is the need for someone to keep an eye on the high-level health of these systems, and proactively enlist assistance in rectifying issues. <br />
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Responsibilities:<br />
* Ongoing monitoring of <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/project/systemtask.php" href="https://www.geograph.ie/project/systemtask.php">Link</a> and enlist the assistance of others in ensuring all systems are running and being checked regularly. <br />
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Requirements : <br />
* Good communication skills. <br />
* Desire to assist the geograph website in running smoothly. <br />
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Hours: 1 hour a week (normally, can be variable). Flexi-Time, work when suits you. <br />
<br />
Location: Remote working. A computer (or mobile phone!) with internet connection is all that is needed. (To use a web-browser, and email client) <br />
<br />
Pay: Voluntary basis, but includes the warm glow of knowing you are helping to safeguard the work of thousands of contributors, over nearly 10 years, to the Geograph Project website. <br />
<br />
Contact us now: <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/contact.php" href="https://www.geograph.ie/contact.php">Link</a><br />
<br />
<br />
For other positions, see <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/blog/?tag=job+posting" href="https://www.geograph.ie/blog/?tag=job+posting">Link</a>text/html2015-07-17T17:35:38+00:00Barry HunterJob Posting - Webmaster and SEO
https://www.geograph.org.uk/blog/233
Geograph Project Limited has a position available for a Webmaster, to look after our sites <span class="nowrap"><a title="www.geograph.org.uk" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" href="http://www.geograph.org.uk">Link</a><img style="margin-left:2px;" alt="External link" title="External link - shift click to open in new window" src="http://s1.geograph.org.uk/img/external.png" width="10" height="10"/></span> and <span class="nowrap"><a title="www.geograph.ie" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" href="https://www.geograph.ie">Link</a><img style="margin-left:2px;" alt="External link" title="External link - shift click to open in new window" src="http://s1.geograph.org.uk/img/external.png" width="10" height="10"/></span> . <br />
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This position requires self-motivation and dedication. Will often need to take the initiative in seeking out and dealing with issues. Will work closely with other System and Database Administrators as part of the overall community. <br />
<br />
Geograph publishes a collection of 4.5M photos (growing daily), available to the public via the web. With leads to many pages listed in search engines, which takes careful curation to keep working well.<br />
<br />
Responsibilities:<br />
* Monitoring Search Engine consoles for issues (Google/ Bing etc) <br />
* Tweaking server rules/html pages for optimum performance<br />
* Monitoring Sitemap generation <br />
* Seeking out low value pages and removing them from ‘search’<br />
* making sure high value pages are represented<br />
* monitoring server access logs for robots<br />
<br />
Requirements (optional - can learn on the job): <br />
* URL and content canonicalization issues <br />
* Apache ‘htaccess’ rules, and basic HTML<br />
* Optimization techniques. <br />
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Hours: 1-2 hours a week (normally, can be variable). Flexi-Time, work when suits you. <br />
<br />
Location: Remote working. A computer with an internet connection is all that is needed. (occasionally may need to run a SSH-Client) <br />
<br />
Pay: Voluntary basis, but includes the warm glow of knowing you are helping to safeguard the work of thousands of contributors, over nearly 10 years, to the Geograph Project website. <br />
<br />
Contact us now: <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/contact.php" href="https://www.geograph.ie/contact.php">Link</a> or see other positions <a title="https://www.geograph.ie/blog/?tag=job+posting" href="https://www.geograph.ie/blog/?tag=job+posting">Link</a><br />
text/html2012-03-03T21:27:19+00:00Barry HunterGeograph blocks pinterest.com pinning
https://www.geograph.org.uk/blog/105
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<br />
Update, Sept 2012: <br />
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We have since removed the block. As Pinterest now credits geograph images properly. A link to the photo page, and the contributors name and profile appear on the "Pin" page. <br />
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============================<br />
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Geograph have just instigated a policy of blocking pinning on <span class="nowrap"><a title="http://pinterest.com/" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" href="http://pinterest.com/">Link</a><img style="margin-left:2px;" alt="External link" title="External link - shift click to open in new window" src="http://s1.geograph.org.uk/img/external.png" width="10" height="10"/></span> This means users of the service will not be able to directly pin images from the Geograph websites. <br />
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This is motivated by the fact that the method of copying images that pinterest uses, does not promote honouring the Creative Commons licence. <br />
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The Creative Commons licences exists to actively promote and allow responsible reuse of content - in exchange for attribution. From a technical standpoint pinterest could automatically pickup and maintain this attribution on content copied to its servers. <br />
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True they do ask users to "Credit Your Sources" - but lots of users clearly don't take notice of this - the result is that a large amount of content on the site is not credited - and therefore contravenes the original creators copyright. <br />
<br />
I'm writing this blog post, as a point of reference - hopefully you can join is in lobbying pinterest to be responsible, and take technical measures to help their users actually honour Copyright. text/html2012-06-05T19:19:23+00:00Barry HunterJam lives again
https://www.geograph.org.uk/blog/133
(Jam is the name of one of our servers. Which following a forum contest have been named along a Tea set theme. So it helps power the site along with Toast, Scone, Milk and Cream) <br />
<br />
Jam has been in operation 24 hours a day, since mid 2006. For the first 5 years, it faithfully held the primary copy of the photographs. It had 1.5TB of disk space in a Raid 5 SATA array. <br />
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By the beginning of last year, it was getting noticeably slow, and also the available disk space was beginning to fill (the slowness was contributed to by the fullness of the disk). So a long term plan was hatched to get faster disks and more space. <br />
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The first part of the plan, was to move images to a new server - cream. This has faster SAS disks, as well as better hardware controller. Unfortunately at our price point we couldn't give it much more disk space - so Cream didn't relieve the disk space issue. So cream is/was just a temporally stopgap solution. <br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.nearby.org.uk/geograph/media/files/c81e728d9d4c2f636f067f89cc14862c/IMG_20120522_202247.jpg"><img src="http://www.nearby.org.uk/geograph/media/files/c81e728d9d4c2f636f067f89cc14862c/IMG_20120522_202247.jpg" align="right" width="250"/></a>Now we had cream, jam, could be rebuilt. Its the same physical server but has more memory, bigger disks, and a new faster SATA controller. Its still not quite as fast as Cream, but by splitting files between servers - thumbnails and main images remain on cream, with the high resolution uploads being stored on Jam - we get best of both worlds (lots of space, and fast disks where required). <br />
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(at this point should take a moment out to mention World of Computers in Cambridge, they supply all our servers, and did the upgrade work on jam - which was far from straightforward - in part now due to its age. If looking for hardworking servers, do have a look at <span class="nowrap"><a title="http://www.woc.co.uk/" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" href="http://www.woc.co.uk/">Link</a><img style="margin-left:2px;" alt="External link" title="External link - shift click to open in new window" src="http://s1.geograph.org.uk/img/external.png" width="10" height="10"/></span> )<br />
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So, for the first year of the project, we got by on 80GB of disks. The next 5 on 1.5TB. And now moving forward we have 6TB of primary storage. At current submission rates, thats enought for 6 years, but who can tell what submission rates will be even a week from now!text/html2010-11-28T23:07:00+00:00Barry HunterWelcome to the new Blog section
https://www.geograph.org.uk/blog/1
This is strictly experimental and not finished. Feedback welcome.