Thread

Hi. I have a development site that was (is?) running painfully slow.

I started moving it to another server to see if I could rule out the current one (Aplus.net) and happened to notice that the $db[‘expressionengine’][‘cachedir’] setting in /system/expressionengine/config/database.php was incorrect. Upon fixing it, the site performs significantly better on the Aplus.net server.

Does that make sense? Is this cache directory setting so important that, if it’s wrong, the site suffers? Or am I grasping at a straw (e.g., too many other potential factors, like it being the weekend)?

Notably, I didn’t even have caching *on* (either template or DB).

Other factors: v2.1.3, build 20101220.

Hi Micahel,

To confirm. Do you have any caching related variables in your config.php file.
Can you replicate the opposite way if you offset the cachedir back to what it was does performance decrease again?

Hi John.

No other caching-related variables, other than:

$config['enable_sql_caching'] = "n";

Changing the cachedir back to the incorrect value doesn’t do anything. Probably just me grabbing at straws.

The site is working okay now, although I’ve started looking into moving it.

Hey Michael,

I suspect that incorrect path was a red herring, unless you can flip it back to being incorrect and you immediately notice it’s significantly, consistently slower. Have you looked into EngineHosting? They handle a lot of caching on the database side themselves and you wouldn’t need to worry about it at all.

I’ve got the client considering a move to a different web host. EH is always at the top of my recommendations, and it’s an easier sell since I don’t plan on moving their email. Thanks, Brandon and John.

Hi, Michael -

At this point, what can we do to help you make this a better experience?  It sounds like the site may be running well again now.  I just want to make sure that you get the assistance you need.

Thank you!

I appreciate that, Lisa.

The site isn’t much better (we’ve isolated the issue to the DB connection, which keeps dropping [access to phpMyAdmin is also flaky, so it’s likely not EE]), so we’ll be moving to Engine Hosting.

My first site on EH! :D

I’m sorry that you’re running into problems, but I did a happy dance about you moving to EH.  =)

I’m going to close this one out since you’re working on an alternate solution.  You know where we are, so shout if you need help, please!