# Has the bottleneck in board performance been identified?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337
**Category:** About This Message Board
**Created:** [August 30, 2002, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337 "2002-08-30T17:59:45Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@Coldfire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Coldfire)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/21 "2002-09-02T12:10:07Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Musicat \*
> \*\*But just a few minutes ago, about 11:00PM (+/-5 mins) Chicago time, everything sped up to (tolerably) normal. Suddenly. All threads, all windows, all functions.
>
> Now I am intimately sensitive to my computer’s, brower’s, and ISP’s needs and performances, and I am 95% sure the speedup was on or near SDMB’s end. (Other simultaneous windows showing non-SDMB URLs were fast-normal.) Does this observation help in any way to trace the problem to origin? For example, was there a heavy process running that stopped around 11PM tonight?\*\*
My guess in such cases is that someone’s doing an extensive search, and as soon as it ends, all the waiting threads/replies/refreshes go through. They actually already went through, but the feedback to your end was halted because the server was working on a search.
Sometimes, I wonder if we should shut down search altogether. Maybe it’s worth an experiment. We’ll get tons of duplicate threads, of course, but they can be moderated to an extent. Ah well, we’ll see, there may be a reason why this is a worse idea than I think right now.
---
### Author:  [@femtosecond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/femtosecond)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 12:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/22 "2002-09-02T12:45:34Z")
> [@](#):
>
> _Originally posted by clayton\_e_
> **I was wondering… What type of connection connects the server to the outside world?**
[http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?postid=1439956#post1439956](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?postid=1439956#post1439956)
> [@](#):
>
> _Originally posted by jdavis_
> Two T-1s configured to look like a single communication channel from the LAN side our network. 384 Kbytes/sec upload/download shared capacity. The SDMB probably consumes 40% of this bandwidth at peak capacity with the remainder being utilized by our other web sites, corporate usage, etc.
(Note that some other specs from that thread are known to be outdated.)
Exa is 10[sup]18[/sup] [http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/prefixes.html](http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/prefixes.html)
To give you an idea, one terabyte could hold about 500 times our message board database.
From the Hacker Jargon File: [http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/jargon/html/entry/quantifiers.html](http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/jargon/html/entry/quantifiers.html)
> [@](#):
>
> [1993 update: hacker Morgan Burke has proposed, to general approval on Usenet, the following additional prefixes: groucho 10^(-30) harpo 10^(-27) harpi 10^(27) grouchi 10^(30)
>
> We observe that this would leave the prefixes zeppo-, gummo-, and chico- available for future expansion. Sadly, there is little immediate prospect that Mr. Burke’s eminently sensible proposal will be ratified.]
Nothing official yet. And always forgetting Manfred.
---
### Author:  [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/23 "2002-09-02T13:17:59Z")
If I am really reading it correctly Why not just turn off the search function when capacity hits a certain level or just somehow limit the amount of resorces a search can have?
---
### Author:  [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/24 "2002-09-02T13:32:14Z")
If I am really reading it correctly Why not just turn off the search function when capacity hits a certain level or just somehow limit the amount of resorces a search can have?
---
### Author:  [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/25 "2002-09-02T14:21:02Z")
> [@](#):
>
> _Originally posted by Duck Duck Goose
> Yah, every time Jerry the Tech God waves his thunderbolts and upgrades the server, the demand just keeps pace with it._
> [@](#):
>
> _Originally posted by Savaka:_
> \*\*Y’know, I’ve heard this a couple of times now from different people and I don’t understand it. Are you saying that people are refusing to sign up because our boards are occasionally slow? Or that members would post more if the boards were faster?
\*\*
Yeah, that’s what I’m saying–well, not that people refuse to sign up because the MB is slow, but that people post more when the boards are faster. I speak from personal experience–during fast times, like Saturday mornings, when nobody is here, I can get through all the forums, but on slow weekday afternoons, I’m lucky if I can get through a few threads in GQ (my favorite place).
And, of course, I usually have something to say in all the forums I can get through. 😃
See, you are obviously not an SDMB addict yet, Savaka. You, fortunate soul, are still able to pick and choose which of the forums you browse, but the rest of us, poor miserable hag-ridden souls, with the Straight Dope Monkey riding our backs mercilessly, will work our way through as many of the forums, and threads, as God and the hamsters will permit us.
And if Jerry the Tech God happens to have thrown a couple of thunderbolts at the server, causing it to speed up even the tiniest microsecond, we whoop with joy and open even more threads.
And, of course, we think of something to say in most of them. 😃
---
### Author:  [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/26 "2002-09-02T14:44:49Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Coldfire \*
> \*\*Sometimes, I wonder if we should shut down search altogether. Maybe it’s worth an experiment. We’ll get tons of duplicate threads, of course, but they can be moderated to an extent. Ah well, we’ll see, there may be a reason why this is a worse idea than I think right now. \*\*
It might be interesting to do for a day (week?) as an experiment, but the search function is so useful, I’d rather put up with the slowness to preserve the search ability.
I realize this might require a hack, but it’s too bad there can’t be _some_ restrictions on searching. Maybe limits on one or more of these – how many searches that can be done at once, how much time between searches for one user, etc.
If searches are indeed the system hog, I suspect part of the problem is in the underlying VB script/code/SQL. It may not be as efficient as possible for quantity searching. Has VBulletin been queried to tackle this? Any improvement in this area would probably benefit other VB sites even more than SDMB – we can’t be the biggest one in their territory.
And what would **DDG** do without search? 🙂
---
### Author:  [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/27 "2002-09-02T14:50:18Z")
I just thought of something else. If the search function is turned off, wouldn’t that render the “View New Posts” button inoperative? It seems to work thru a specialized search script. Or am I the only one that uses that button?
---
### Author:  [@Savaka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Savaka)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/28 "2002-09-02T18:07:38Z")
OK. Thanks for the explanation **Duck Duck Goose**. I guess I’d expect some reduction in posting frequency during slow server times, but I still have a hard time accepting that any upgrade would immediately be met with an equivalent demand, thus nullifying the upgrade.
And I’m sure this has been thought of before, but…
If the Chicago Reader won’t accept monetary donations, would they accept a donation of equipment? If the SDMB regulars organized a collection and, with the help of Administrators, figured out the appropriate hardware upgrades and made the purchases, would the Chicago Reader really refuse delivery if said hardware turned up on their doorstep?
---
### Author:  [@Jenner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jenner)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/29 "2002-09-02T19:14:59Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by k2dave \*
> \*\*If I am really reading it correctly Why not just turn off the search function when capacity hits a certain level or just somehow limit the amount of resorces a search can have? \*\*
Well, the mods could always post a sticky asking people not to search during peak hours. I’m sure most of us would be happy to oblige.
---
### Author:  [@White\_Lightning](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/White_Lightning)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/30 "2002-09-02T20:16:38Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by **Musicat** \*
> …but the search function is so useful, I’d rather put up with the slowness to preserve the search ability.
Me too… fwiw.
---
### Author:  [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/31 "2002-09-02T20:39:59Z")
> [@](#):
>
> the mods could always post a sticky asking people not to search during peak hours. I’m sure most of us would be happy to oblige.
It’s a good idea to let the SD’ers know the search function cause so much slowness and perhaps to limit or pospone searches during peak times. At the very least narow the search to the forumn and date range. Perhaps a icon can appear during peak capacity stating ‘please narrow search fields as much as possible or search later’
---
### Author:  [@White\_Lightning](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/White_Lightning)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/32 "2002-09-02T21:10:28Z")
Are there seriously people using this board regularly that aren’t aware of the problems with searches putting added strain on the server?
---
### Author:  [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)
#### Post date: [September 2, 2002, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/33 "2002-09-02T21:58:49Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by k2dave \*
> \*\*…s. At the very least narow the search to the forumn and date range. Perhaps a icon can appear during peak capacity stating ‘please narrow search fields as much as possible or search later’ \*\*
This may or may not help; it depends on how well-designed the SQL implementation is.
In highly optimized and smartly implemented database languages, it would be possible to search a single forum without touching other forum records (if they’re not in the “index” they will be invisible). But a less efficient design may still have to page thru ALL records, matching each to the filter before deciding to include/discard.
Someone more familiar than I with the SDMB SQL implementation is going to have to step in here to tell us which is the case here.
---
### Author:  [@minty\_green](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minty_green)
#### Post date: [September 3, 2002, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/34 "2002-09-03T02:18:01Z")
As long as we have so many concerned Dopers in here, I figured this might be a good time to show off my sig again. I hardly ever search via hamster any more. Just be sure to include the word “straightdope” so you get hits off the right board.
---
### Author:  [@Savaka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Savaka)
#### Post date: [September 3, 2002, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/35 "2002-09-03T03:39:21Z")
Wow! Thanks, **minty**! I’d never heard of this before. Henceforth I shall use Boardreader exclusively.
---
### Author:  [@minty\_green](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minty_green)
#### Post date: [September 3, 2002, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/36 "2002-09-03T12:05:40Z")
You’re welcome, **Savaka**. The other nice advantage to Boardreader is that it still retains the threads that were lost from January to March of last winter when the board got hacked. You just have to click on the “cached” link at the end of the thread title that pops up from the search. Cached versions don’t put any strain on the SDMB server either, so I usually click on those rather than the SDMB link in the thread title to identify the thread(s) I’m searchin for.
Only disadvantage is I’m not sure how often they update their archives, so searching for something from yesterday is probably not going to happen. Other than that, it’s the best hamster-saver ever.
---
### Author:  [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)
#### Post date: [September 3, 2002, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/37 "2002-09-03T12:44:35Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Musicat \*
> **And what would DDG do without search?**
Er, well, actually, I rarely, if ever, search the _thread archives_ for what I need. Most of the question-answering and looking-for-links that I do, I do with Google and Alltheweb, not in amongst the old SDMB threads.
So it ain’t me. 😉
I do Search in the Column Archives, but I believe that Jerry told us some time ago that they’re on a completely separate server, along with the Home Page.
---
### Author:  [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)
#### Post date: [September 3, 2002, 12:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/38 "2002-09-03T12:46:48Z")
So, why isn’t the existence, and URL, for Boardreader posted prominently somewhere around here, in the FAQ maybe? I didn’t even know it existed, either. Is it legal, to have all that presumably copyrighted Straight Dope stuff on somebody else’s website? 😕
And, is somebody somewhere harvesting e-mail addresses from it?
---
### Author:  [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)
#### Post date: [September 3, 2002, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/39 "2002-09-03T13:55:57Z")
**DDG,** we talked about this not long ago, and even got a response from the boardreader tech god:
[http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=109034](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=109034)
---
### Author:  [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)
#### Post date: [September 3, 2002, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337/40 "2002-09-03T22:21:04Z")
Yeah, I saw that thread, and I read it again just now, and I don’t see where Tuba has ever come back with any information on whether boardreader has permission from the _Reader_ to do what it’s doing.
So my question still stands.
[Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337.md?page=1)
[Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-the-bottleneck-in-board-performance-been-identified/126337.md?page=3)