Tweaking Under The Hood
Lincoln Adams | September 8, 2008 @ 6:46 pmGot bored last weekend, so I’ve been making some tweaks here and there to improve the speed and performance of my site. The biggest change was dropping the ad server that’s been serving my ads, and hard coding it into my blog instead. No matter what, I could never get it to execute fast enough, which I’m guessing is partly a limitation of using a shared hosting account. If I ever go dedicated though, I’ll probably give it another shot, but that might be a while (a dedicated account would cost me almost $200 a month!)
If you’re wondering what the flip I’m talking about, using an ad server basically allows me carte blanche control over how ads are served, so if someone outside my current ad networks wanted to book an ad, I could easily set up an account for them and then temporarily disable the ads that were already running. Unfortunately now I won’t be able to do this, but I don’t think it will be an issue until I get far more traffic to my site, at which point I should have enough of a budget to get an ad server running again.
And what’s a dedicated account you ask? Well right now I’m using a shared account at $10 a month, which means I’m sharing a server with a bazillion other users, and thus am only alloted a fraction of the server’s power. If I get a dedicated account however, I’ll have a server all to myself to do as I please, which means a LOT more computing power and significantly better performance for my site as well. It may be another year though before I can afford such a solution, if ever. If you want to help me achieve this goal though, spread the word and link to my blog, dangit. Bunch of stingy freeloaders, y’all. 
Anyhoo, I also darkened the background a little and dropped the MyBlogLog and Blog Catalog widgets. Seriously, I’m fed up with both services. It’s like I’m advertising their networks on my blog and in return I’m getting, well, nothing. It’s nice that my blog is registered in their directories so people can find me, but I could count on one hand how much traffic I’ve gotten from either network as a result. Not enough to justify the 1-2 second lag they were adding to my blog’s load times. And besides, both networks are getting bogged down in spam too. I can’t tell you how many contacts I have now that live in China. Evidently I’m a pretty popular guy over there. 
But most disappointedly, I was hoping surfing these networks would help me find like-minded hot babes that I could play love snuggles with. Sad to say though, I find that I am such a unique individual that it is yea nigh impossible to find someone who thinks just like me. 
But anyways, do me a favor and let me know if you’ve noticed any improvement in load times and performance. I’ve definitely noticed a difference, but I want to make sure others are seeing it as well. 
Related Posts:
Tags: blog, blog catalog, coding, lag, load time, mybloglog, network, performance, server, service, spam, traffic, tweaking, widgets
Categories: Blog Fog
( 
Print This Post
| | 63 views )
(No Ratings Yet)
Loading ...
Loading ...
12 Responses to “Tweaking Under The Hood”
Quote
Oh noes! I can’t see the sidebar anymore, but good news! Without the sidebar it is a LOT faster.
Seriously, I need to do something about the performance of my blog too and I think those Blog Catalog widgets slow it down. I may try to test it without the code and see what happens.
Good suggestions.
Quote
You just wanna get spanked don’t you.
Really, the only thing those widgets did for me was provide a visual notification of when someone visited my blog, but the tradeoff just isn’t worth it. One widget by itself might not seem like a lot, but you figure it takes half a second to load a widget, so a widget there and a widget here and before you know it your blog takes double the time it usually takes to load.
Quote
Ugh, I still don’t see the sidebar after, um, 2 minutes? It might be that your shared host is on a slow box as well. I’m using WebHostingBuzz.com and they have been good so far; paying less than 4 USD a month.
I agree on the BlogCatalog and MyBlogLog issue though; I just put their buttons up so stats are still collected.
Quote
Well I downloaded and accessed the site via Chrome, and it loaded just fine. I’m guessing there’s an issue between your connection and the ad code I’m using. Maybe they’re having latency issues, so if you can’t load the ad, you won’t be able to load the rest of my site either.
Hopefully this will clear up eventually on its own.
Quote
Hey Linc
Dedicated hosting doesn’t have to cost *that* much. I’m using MediaTemple dedicated virtual (dv) Base plan, which means I have a vps to myself and my clients. It’s $50 per month, which is still pretty high if you are used to paying for shared hosting, but it’s not $200/mo. like the ones you may have heard about.
I used to use Dreamhost for years, and around the last year or so of my history with them, I had a number of my client sites reporting downtimes of up to an hour, several times a day, almost every day. Since the move to MediaTemple, so far, not one complaint! That was in March of ‘07. Don’t let anyone else using MediaTemple tell you that they suck…those are the dolts using the Grid Server (gs) service, which frankly, does…suck!
Quote
I’ve been reading about VPS and some argue that it’s nothing more than a glorified shared account. All things considered I’d probably would prefer a server to myself, if only to see how the speed compares. I can always go back to shared or VPS if it doesn’t meet expectations.
Quote
Hi Lincoln,
I guess i didn’t mention that I put a link to your site on my website.
I was checking out e-how the other day, and thought of you. I thought that you would write some great articles there, and they say that you will get paid. Well anyway, it is an opportunity to link up and get noticed!!!!!
faithful reader
Janay
Quote
Thanks Janet, that’s much appreciated!
I guess I could write for eHow, if I actually knew how to do anything that is.
Coincidentally enough I actually did apply with a news site to do freelance writing for them but I’m pretty sure I’ll get blown off. :cry:
Quote
Re: The myth about VPS’s being just glorified shared server hosting is b.s….
See, I have my own proprietary IP address - most websites on shared hosting share an IP, you will have an IP for just your website or group of websites. This will ensure that your site is never sharing an IP with a website that might be in a “bad neighborhood”.
Most Web Hosting companies offer “virtual” or “shared” hosting. This means you literally share your resources, applications and environment with potentially hundreds of other users in the same directory. This configuration can allow any compromises to a single site to affect the performance and security of everyone else on the same server.
With Virtual Private Server (VPS Hosting) Technology, also known as Virtual Dedicated Server (VDS Hosting) technology, a web server is divided into multiple isolated environments. Each environment has its own server software providing independence for that website. Any compromise to a site would only affect that VPS and could not affect any other site on the same server. As with a dedicated server, each VPS has its own independent web server, mail server and independent software instances. A crashed application (Apache, Sendmail, MySQL etc.) in another client’s VPS has no effect on your VPS.
What may be even more appealing is that with VPS web hosting, you have nearly full control over the most common areas of a website/server.
Quote
Did you jump straight from a shared to a VPS before, and if so did you notice an improved difference in performance? I’d be curious to see if such a hosting upgrade would dramatically improve performance for my site as well.
How’s my blog running by the way?
Quote
Lincoln,
Trust me you know HOW to write for ehow. Just read some of what other people write, geesh! even I could write stuff like that. Maybe I should start writing, after all I did raise three sons, and believe me, you learn a few things along the way.
I guess this is one of those days that I feel compelled to put in my 2 cents worth.
Actually, the more I think of it, perhaps I would write about my pet peeves. I could probably make a living on them alone
have a great day
Quote
@Janet: I guess I have little enthusiasm for writing of a more technical nature, unless it allowed me to inject a lot of sarcasm and witticism into it. Something like “How to be a Schmucky Ducky Moron in Five Easy Steps” I could totally go for.
Quicktags: