這個功能在 ELB Classic 年代時有跟 AWS 提過,到 ALB 支援了 (總算...):「Application Load Balancer Announces Slow Start Support for its Load Balancing Algorithm」。
Application Load Balancers now support a slow start mode that allows you to add new targets without overwhelming them with a flood of requests. With the slow start mode, targets warm up before accepting their fair share of requests based on a ramp-up period that you specify.
然後時間可以設定,從 30 秒到 15 分鐘:
Slow start mode can be enabled by target group and can be configured for a duration of 30 seconds to 15 minutes. The load balancer linearly increases the number of requests sent to a new target in a target group up to its fair share during the slow start ramp-up window.
就之前的經驗來說,這在跑 PHP 的時候會很需要這個功能 (之前是在 F5 的設備上設定)。其他的語言因為性質不太一樣,可能不會這麼吃這個功能。
主要是因為 PHP 是在 request 進來時 compile 並且 cache。所以在機器剛起來時,儘量將 CPU 留給 opcache,把常用的頁面 compile 完並且放進 cache,而不是讓大量的連線灌進來,這樣對使用體驗不會太好... (要避免 CPU 吃滿 100% 很久,造成每個連線都很慢才跑完)
AWS 推出 Slow Start 後對 auto scaling 時的順暢度會好不少...