DC loads fast. What is the secret.

[alivingspirit]

As a religious reader of DC forums I can't help but notice how fast the pages load compared to other websites. On my computer it sometimes loads faster than the Google homepage so I use it regularly when I want to check my internet connection. What is the secret to this speed? Why don't other websites know about it? Or am I just imagining things?

[mouser]

The secret is a $279 a month dedicated server. 

And it needs to be pointed out that the only reason we can afford that is because of donations from ordinary people to support the site.

[CWuestefeld]

How does DC avoid spam users?

I have a SMF forum that's been under attack for the past week, getting numerous user registrations that are clearly bogus. I've responded in a completely reactive fashion. Since my forum is only of local interest, and the bad guys are using IP blocks that ARIN says are European, I just ban IP ranges as they hit me. But this means I'm always playing catch-up.

I don't want to switch to the model where I have to approve each registration -- I think that interferes with getting new users participating.

Has anyone else experienced this? How did you deal with it?

[f0dder]

As a religious reader of DC forums I can't help but notice how wonderful the people who participate are, compared to other websites. Why do we fail to attract nasty trolls and stupid idiots? Or am I just imagining things?

[mitzevo]

Get a grip f0dder

[mouser]

well we do get about 1 spam post per day i think, but because we have such nice readers they always spot it and report it -- and then we have great moderators like jgpaiva and carol haynes and others who quickly delete the spam posts and ban the user.

[mahesh2k]

BTW Which Company Hosts "DC" ? Is it possible to see the "Sever Pictures" of that Hosting company?

[mouser]

we use SoftLayer for the main server.. they are not cheap, but they are good: http://www.softlayer.com/

History of DC servers:

• DC started on a $10/month normal web hosting account in march 2005
• Upgraded to $60/month vps at some point
• Then upgraded to dedicated server after that (maybe in the $150 range?)
• Last year after much anguish decided to spend the big bucks and go for a high quality dedicated server ($280 a month)

[mitzevo]

yeah that's true, trolls wouldn't even last a week.. and maybe the fact that DC doesn't get much of them signing up is because the main thing new people see is the "donation" part of DC, then all the calls to actions about signing up to the forum, donating, etc. and by that time they are thinkg wtf and are usually out [therefor not bothering to sign up, and make a post or 10]

that would pretty much turn away most trolls/trouble makers..

Plus I think because the website design is sorta old school .. lol

People who are into their software and coding usually reside at DC longterm because they appreciate it.

[mahesh2k]

WOW  Look at their Dedicated Hosting custmization options,very few Hosts offer that. Ther datacenter must be most reputed in US,isnt it?

People who are into their software and coding usually reside at DC longterm because they appreciate it.

True

[a_lunatic]

Has anyone else experienced this? How did you deal with it?

-CWuestefeld (November 20, 2008, 08:44 AM)

Yes I have had the same & there is a post on the smf forums about it.
Tidal wave of spambots attacks SMF 1.1.x - How to protect your forum

[alivingspirit]

The secret is a $279 a month dedicated server. 
And it needs to be pointed out that the only reason we can afford that is because of donations from ordinary people to support the site.

-mouser (November 20, 2008, 08:26 AM)

WOW!

Plus I think because the website design is sorta old school .. lol

-mitzevo (November 20, 2008, 09:12 AM)

You gotta love the old school, distraction free, and add free look.

Why do we fail to attract nasty trolls and stupid idiots?

-f0dder (November 20, 2008, 08:54 AM)

Ha ha! Trolls.

[cranioscopical]

Why do we fail to attract nasty trolls and stupid idiots?

-f0dder (November 20, 2008, 08:54 AM)

So, you think you're free of stupid idiots, eh?

Time for another limerick, perhaps...

[Lashiec]

God, I swear I read "as a religious leader of DC forums" both in alivingspirit and f0dder's posts

Why do we fail to attract nasty trolls and stupid idiots?

-f0dder (November 20, 2008, 08:54 AM)

True. And this is an unacceptable situation. An Internet forum is not a true forum unless it has its share of trolls. Perhaps we should hire someone as the friendly resident troll?

[Deozaan]

Why do we fail to attract nasty trolls and stupid idiots?

-f0dder (November 20, 2008, 08:54 AM)

So, you think you're free of stupid idiots, eh?

Time for another limerick, perhaps...

-cranioscopical (November 20, 2008, 03:48 PM)

Hey! As someone who helped create that limerick, I resemble that remark!

[f0dder]

I hi-jacked the thread. I'm an idiot. Sorry

[Gothi[c]]

While the dc website may have an 'old school' look, I noticed that the average page size is not any smaller than your average website, if not bigger.

We average about 3 to 10 requests per second, depending on the time of the day.
Right now, with 10 requests/sec, load average is 0.26, 0.26, 0.2
... So yeah... fancy server
Beyond that it's just tweaking the apache Min/MaxSpareServers,ServerLimit,MaxClients and MaxRequestsPerChild values to match the capabilities of the server and reflected traffic. Though more tuning could be done there. We're just using the prefork MPM for now. But that probably will only affect anything under maximum load.
Other than that nothing special configuration wise, there's a lot more that could be done, and a lot more tweaking to do. But all that takes testing which we're not too keen on doing. ( prefer no downtime over 1ms faster loading page for now )

So it's probably mostly due to the server being a beast.
(dual quad core (so 8 cpu cores total), 4GB ram)

Like mouser said, we rely 100% on continuous donations to keep this place running, so keep donating whenever you can if you want to keep seeing fast loading pages

[f0dder]

Gothic: it's not only the server specs, I bet, but also has a lot to do with the hosting facility and the quality of it's peering. Here from Denmark, I have 21 hops/170ms to www.donationcoder.com - and the site absolutely flies

[Gothi[c]]

Yes, of course. the connectivity matters a great deal. Glad to hear all is working so smooth for everyone It's nice to hear the opposite of complaining for a change