Herald blogs: Development Weblog: Completed
Server performance improvements
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I’ve spend much of the past three days making some changes on the badgerherald.com server that have sped up the site enormously. The two big changes were implementing MySQL database caching to prevent redundant database queries, especially from the advertising software we use, and implementing eAccelerator to greatly expedite PHP script processing.
The site has been very slow lately, partly due to the aforementioned setting not being in use, and partly due to web traffic increasing over the past few weeks (This chart won’t pertain any longer once this entry is a few weeks old…):
Before the updates, top reported server load averages of 1.5-2, sometimes much higher. This basically meant people trying to view the site were put in a queue and their pages were not being instantly served. Additionally, the server CPU was consistently in use, averaging more than 90 percent use.
Now I’ve got the load down to an average of 0.1 or less, so content is being served up very quickly, as it should. The MySQL database caching has reduced CPU usage drastically, and we’re now averaging less than 10 percent use. I’m going to continue improving performance around the site once more of it is converted to the new look.
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February 22, 2009 6:19 AM | Reply
Also, thanks to RimuHosting for having amazingly helpful customer service!
February 22, 2009 6:26 PM | Reply
The best laid plans of mice and men
February 22, 2009 7:29 PM | Reply
Oh Bassey. You always know what do say.
February 22, 2009 6:26 PM | Reply
Reply to random comment.
February 22, 2009 6:41 PM | Reply
This is great. Nice job.
February 25, 2009 2:25 PM | Reply
okay, the site just took a turn for the worst.
it took me an HOUR to get onto the homepage today. an HOUR.
this page took a good 5 minutes to respond as well. what is going on!?
either go back to the old format of the site or get a server that can actually handle the traffic. this is plain old annoying.
February 25, 2009 2:28 PM | Reply
I’ll post an update when the latest set of problems are straightened out. It’s almost certainly related to massive spam attacks… the joy of the Internet.
March 7, 2009 4:01 AM | Reply
That seems to have been the case. Three straight days of heavy traffic from Europe, and then peace again.
March 9, 2009 12:59 AM | Reply
yes. much, much better. danke!