Chris

Got a big problem with the way N13 is reading and writing to mySQL.
Sometimes it seems to navigate ok. Other times it just hangs.

We dont know what the problem is.


I also never solved the problem of RSS feeds that take ages to load.

Server has been checked uot and found to be ok.
Can you advise what i should look for...

There have been multiple threads about the script being slow for some people so when I get the time I'll look into it and possibly re-write the SQL interface and see if it can be sped up. One thing that may be worth trying is if you edit db.php, change



to



This will use the standard MySQL interface which should be less cpu intensive.

been loading and reloading your N13 news on to different servers.



On my main site, I decided to make a new database and import mysql backup of all my latest news stories.

The site then worked like lightning. both navigation in the pages and in the admin panel was fast. After a period of time still no slow down.

I decided to click my main RSS feed button to load into browser. Still slow and would have timed out with out loading - but, thereafter on click back to home page, the sql requests have reverted to hanging. Pages dont load and the website is effectively down again.

now reverted back to my original mySQL database [by changing only the username and password in db.php]
site was again working lightning fast for a short time.


I suspect that as soon as an external site called my RSS feed. {newsnow call it every three minutes]. It caused the recurring problem again in N13/mysql .

I believe the problems is to do with slow loading RSS feeds ...

I set up N13 on a different server and made an RSS feed. The feed loads perfectly. I therefore advised the host / server engineer of the slowness associated with one server and not the other.

This was the hosts response....



Thanks for the email. Unfortunately the steps taken do not appear to indicate a server issue, but a coding problem with your script and data base configuration.

If in each scenario of your test things start fast and then slow down a server issue would be indicated if things were continually slow. It appears the more your database is used the slower it gets. This could indicate additional data being written which is subsequently being analysed and as it grows slows everything down if it is not suitably optimised. Also, are all database connections closed as soon as they have been used.

There are only so many simultaneous database connections allowable at any one time. This is generally not an issue as a connection should be opened, used and closed immediately in a split second.

I dont necessarily agree with the hosts comments.

He operates two servers. N13 works perfectly on one and has problems on the other. These can be seen below.

http://www.rebayte.co.uk/news2/rss.php?feed=rebayte_test
http://www.ukcitymedia.co.uk/news/rss.php?feed=New_News

There must be some fundemental differences in the setups but I have so far not asked for a detailed breakdown of each spec.

further info will be posted but meantime, any observations appreciated.

It doesnt sound right...

It is pretty unreasonable of a host of two unix machines to blame scripts if a software runs on one machine and not the other.

Ill challenge them again....

Running 3.5. If I install rss.php from version 3.3, the system works fast.
The rss feed wont work but at least the page loading and system navigation works ok.


According to the host, the rss.php coding is not compatable across all servers.
It is selective in that will only work on some.



The solution could just be to install the script on to servers on which it will work although its a horrible restriction.


I could supply both ini files for each server if required.

Chris

Basically, in my case, if I delete all the RSS feeds. The system works fine. However as soon as a feed is created the system is runined.

We placed some microtime sections all the way through config.php. This what we get

STEP1 0.0001370906829834
STEP2 0.016007900238037
STEP3 0.0065910816192627
STEP4 3.6001205444336E-5
STEP5 0.00035190582275391
STEP6 0.00026512145996094
STEP7 22.844742059708

The last step is around the archive conponents at the end of config.php

If the RSS feeds are then entirely deleted, then the speed around Step7 reverts to miliseconds.


***********


This can seemingly only be cured by changing the database completed. There is a fix for this but since it means there is some form of corruption the database, the fix is to make a new empty database and re-enter all the articles. [not a big deal just needs a few hours].


Any comments appreciated before we execute fix.

Fix did not work.

I installed the script on further domains and carried on some more tests.

I decided to post up to one hundred posts of around 140 to 180 words. Each post had an average length title and a category selected. I then timed the loading of rss feed getting the following result.

45 1.50
61 2.40
67 3.10
72 3.50
79 4.60
87 5.80
93 7.10
100 8.60

Things start to slow after post 40. By post 100 loading of the feed takes about 8.5 seconds. Within the feed setup, feed is set to contain all posts, I therefore selected only 10 posts to display in feed at post 100 and the loading improves to take about 5.5 seconds.

At one hundred posts the feed still validates.
We thought it was either the database or possibly the server.



*******************




At 400 posts, my LIVE database fails validation - times out.
So, I took a copy of the database and in order to see whether the database itself is corrupt, deleted rows until only 90 are left.

Tried to load RSS feed. [edit - set for 'all' in admin rss setup] Takes 4 mins plus to load. Once up on the screen continues loading for 10 mins plus. Validator fails. 500 server error.


Restricted number of article in feed to 10. [edit - in admin rss setup] Retested. takes 1.0 min to load. Validator passes. with following warnings - [1] Your feed appears to be encoded as "UTF-8", but your server is reporting "US-ASCII"

[2] Self reference doesn't match document location ... rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" />


********************


Deleted more rows to leave 45 rows. articles on average about 300 words each.

32 seconds to load.



We still dont know what the problem is but now im thinking the database is OK.