Put vBulletin in HTML Instead of PHP?

[Daniel Thomas]

<i>(If they are needed, I don't have server specs at the moment, I'm waiting for the account holder to get me that information)</i>

Okay, we've been having some serious speed issues for over a year now and I apologize if I posted this in the wrong area.

Our forum, is going God awful slow. We're on a dedicated hosting plan from the Planet but here for the last year or more, the forum itself has been slow, and the server was optimized about a week ago by the Planets technical staff and it literally appears to be even worse now.

It's not like our forum is being overwhelmed though, about two years ago, and further back, we were a bustling quick loading forum, we had hundreds of users on the forum at one time, so I know we should be able to handle our current capacity relatively easily.

We've optimized vBulletin too, limited the search engine bots, and I disabled all the modifications to see if they were causing the slow loading times, no dice there either.

If anybody cares to check, you can go to pwmforums.com and see how slow it is, then go to pwmania.com (the main site) and see how relatively fast it is. We have about 5 sites hosted on the server, with the PWM site being by far the largest, but its been like that ever since we bought the server, probably 3-4 years ago.

----

Okay, I went through that long story to ask this question. I've seen other forums that have apparently turned their forum into .html format and doing away with the .php, which I feel may be why the forum, and not the sites, is slow. So...any advice on how I could turn our forum into the .html formats to see if it helps improve our loading times.

[TigerC10]

You won't be able to use HTML, the PHP is used to render dynamic content.

Have you checked the vB error logs? Sometimes they can clue you into some problem that is occurring frequently which slows down the site.

Also, have you optimized the database at all? The more activity on a board, the more overhead gets generated for the database tables - the more overhead, the longer it takes to query from a table. I try to optimize the tables at least once per week.

Finally, large user databases can slow down a lot of the CRON jobs that run every hour. Run a user search in your AdminCP and delete all of the people who have 0 posts, and it should clear things up.

[Daniel Thomas]

Originally Posted by TigerC10

You won't be able to use HTML, the PHP is used to render dynamic content.

Have you checked the vB error logs? Sometimes they can clue you into some problem that is occurring frequently which slows down the site.

Also, have you optimized the database at all? The more activity on a board, the more overhead gets generated for the database tables - the more overhead, the longer it takes to query from a table. I try to optimize the tables at least once per week.

Finally, large user databases can slow down a lot of the CRON jobs that run every hour. Run a user search in your AdminCP and delete all of the people who have 0 posts, and it should clear things up.

Hey, thanks for the response. You can go to wrestlingclique.com and see that their vBulletin board is using the .html formats. Not everything is in HTML format, but like the threads and member profiles, they are in HTML. Also, they have 10,000 users to our 11,000 and are still much faster.

I'll look into those errors logs and see if anything can be found.

Now when you say optimize the database, you mean optimizing the database through vBulletin with those Maintenance tools or actually optimizing it through the Server?

[Carnage]

that board probably has done one of two things; used mod_rewrite to change the path for the files OR setup apache to pass things with a html extension via php before outputting.

I see what you mean about it being slow; i'll take a browse around and see if there are any suggestions i have.

Also, theres an ad at the bottom of your page that advertises part time job at $50-$100 an hour - its a scam. You may want to remove those particular ads. (They link to sites such as Kevin gets green etc)

[TigerC10]

Originally Posted by Daniel Thomas

Hey, thanks for the response. You can go to wrestlingclique.com and see that their vBulletin board is using the .html formats. Not everything is in HTML format, but like the threads and member profiles, they are in HTML. Also, they have 10,000 users to our 11,000 and are still much faster.

It's easy to set up a web server to "fake out" like that. I have methods for both Apache and IIS to rename the .php to a .html, so just because you see the html extension doesn't mean it's actually straight html. If you have dynamic content on the page (like Welcome, whoever or you have 1 unread message - the page is being handled by some sort of server side scripting language (like php, asp, jsp, ruby on rails, or cgi). The thing is, the server side scripting language is used to generate an HTML page - that's why your browser doesn't care if it's .php; all the browser looks at is the html code that the php generates.

As for the users, I'm just saying that they could be bogging down your CRON jobs. If they are, then you might need to see if there's something wrong with the CRON jobs themselves - some modifications will add new CRON jobs, or even alter existing ones, so you've got to be careful.

Originally Posted by Daniel Thomas

Now when you say optimize the database, you mean optimizing the database through vBulletin with those Maintenance tools or actually optimizing it through the Server?

Well, doing it through either the maintenance tools or through the server is fine. I prefer to use phpmyadmin to do it, but it does pretty much the same thing - so it's no big deal to use the one in vB's adminCP.

[Carnage]

hrm, close your forum; put it in debug mode and have a look at where the time is being taken generating the pages. I suspect you may have a rogue sql query doing something bad...

[Daniel Thomas]

I installed KX Debug and heres what I got...I hope this stuff is safe to post here. If any of yall can actually dissect what this stuff means, it would be a great help.

Template Usage:

    * (1)FORUMHOME
    * (1)ad_footer_end
    * (1)ad_footer_start
    * (1)ad_forumhome_afterforums
    * (1)ad_header_end
    * (1)ad_header_logo
    * (1)ad_navbar_below
    * (1)cyb_lastxhoursvisitors
    * (1)footer
    * (1)forumhome_event
    * (8)forumhome_forumbit_level1_nopost
    * (1)forumhome_forumbit_level1_post
    * (27)forumhome_forumbit_level2_post
    * (28)forumhome_lastpostby
    * (14)forumhome_loggedinuser
    * (1)forumhome_markread_script
    * (46)forumhome_subforumbit_post
    * (1)forumhome_subforumseparator_post
    * (1)gobutton
    * (1)header
    * (1)headinclude
    * (1)navbar
    * (9)navbar_notifications_menubit
    * (6)option
    * (1)spacer_close
    * (1)spacer_open
    * (1)vbplaza_navbar_buttons_left
    * (1)vbplaza_usercp_navbar_bottom 

Phrase Groups Available:

    * global
    * holiday

	
Included Files:

    * ./index.php
    * ./global.php
    * ./includes/init.php
    * ./includes/class_core.php
    * ./includes/config.php
    * ./includes/functions.php
    * ./includes/class_datastore.php
    * ./includes/datastore/datastore_cache.php
    * ./includes/class_hook.php
    * ./plugins/credits_plugins.php
    * ./includes/functions_credits.php
    * ./vbplaza/includes/functions.php
    * ./vbplaza/includes/plugins_global.php
    * ./includes/functions_notice.php
    * ./includes/functions_bigthree.php
    * ./includes/functions_forumlist.php
    * ./includes/functions_calendar.php
    * ./includes/functions_user.php 

Hooks Called:

    * init_startup
    * fetch_userinfo_query
    * fetch_musername
    * vbplaza_build_username_style_complete
    * vbplaza_build_usertitle_style_complete
    * fetch_userinfo
    * cache_permissions
    * style_fetch
    * cache_templates
    * global_start
    * parse_templates
    * notices_check_start
    * notifications_list
    * global_setup_complete
    * forumhome_start
    * forumhome_event
    * forumhome_loggedinuser_query
    * forumhome_loggedinuser
    * cache_ordered_forums
    * forumbit_subforumbit
    * forumbit_subforumbit2
    * forumbit_display
    * forumhome_complete

In the Messages drop down I got:
like 30 returning default icon messages
at the end "php_sapi_name(): apache2handler

Queries Executed:

SQL Query

SELECT *
FROM datastore
WHERE title IN ('credits_central','credits_forum_overrides','credits_interest')

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	datastore	range	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	50	 	3	Using where

Time Before: 0.06076 seconds
Time After: 0.06087 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00012 seconds
Session Handling
SQL Query

SELECT *
FROM session
WHERE sessionhash = '1c5416e5093187ce37966a8d28de3c2f'
	AND lastactivity > 1239834778
	AND idhash = '57d8fa56204064a0f608d7c09072e6f6'

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	session	const	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	32	const	1	 

Time Before: 0.06225 seconds
Time After: 0.06242 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00016 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT 
	userfield.*, usertextfield.*, user.*, UNIX_TIMESTAMP(passworddate) AS passworddate, user.languageid AS saved_languageid,
	IF(displaygroupid=0, user.usergroupid, displaygroupid) AS displaygroupid,
	language.phrasegroup_global AS phrasegroup_global,
	language.phrasegroup_holiday AS phrasegroup_holiday,
	language.options AS lang_options,
	language.languagecode AS lang_code,
	language.charset AS lang_charset,
	language.locale AS lang_locale,
	language.imagesoverride AS lang_imagesoverride,
	language.dateoverride AS lang_dateoverride,
	language.timeoverride AS lang_timeoverride,
	language.registereddateoverride AS lang_registereddateoverride,
	language.calformat1override AS lang_calformat1override,
	language.calformat2override AS lang_calformat2override,
	language.logdateoverride AS lang_logdateoverride,
	language.decimalsep AS lang_decimalsep,
	language.thousandsep AS lang_thousandsep
	
FROM user AS user
LEFT JOIN userfield AS userfield ON (user.userid = userfield.userid)
LEFT JOIN usertextfield AS usertextfield ON (usertextfield.userid = user.userid) LEFT JOIN language AS language ON (language.languageid = IF(user.languageid = 0, 1, user.languageid)) 

WHERE user.userid = 1

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	user	const	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	4	const	1	 
1	SIMPLE	userfield	const	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	4	const	1	 
1	SIMPLE	usertextfield	const	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	4	const	1	 
1	SIMPLE	language	system	PRIMARY	 	 	 	1	 

Time Before: 0.06465 seconds
Time After: 0.06749 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00283 seconds

Time Before: 0.06144 seconds
Time After: 0.06865 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00721 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT access.*, forum.forumid,
	FIND_IN_SET(access.forumid, forum.parentlist) AS ordercontrol
FROM forum AS forum
INNER JOIN access AS access ON (access.userid = 1 AND FIND_IN_SET(access.forumid, forum.parentlist))
ORDER BY ordercontrol DESC

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	access	ref	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	4	const	1	Using where; Using temporary; Using filesort
1	SIMPLE	forum	ALL	 	 	 	 	90	Using where

Time Before: 0.07407 seconds
Time After: 0.07418 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00011 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT calendarpermission.usergroupid, calendarpermission.calendarpermissions,calendar.calendarid,calendar.title, displayorder
FROM calendar AS calendar
LEFT JOIN calendarpermission AS calendarpermission ON
	(calendarpermission.calendarid = calendar.calendarid AND usergroupid IN (6))
ORDER BY displayorder ASC

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	calendar	system	 	 	 	 	1	 
1	SIMPLE	calendarpermission	system	 	 	 	 	0	const row not found

Time Before: 0.07506 seconds
Time After: 0.07517 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00011 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT *
FROM style
WHERE (styleid = 25)
	OR styleid = 24
ORDER BY styleid DESC
LIMIT 1

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	style	range	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	2	 	2	Using where

Time Before: 0.07675 seconds
Time After: 0.07701 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00027 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT title, template
FROM template
WHERE templateid IN (17991,18083,18085,18086,18087,18088,18089,18090,18091,18093,18094,18095,18096,18097,18092,18084,0,15725,15647,18490,17993,17992,17994,16453,17988,18265,15617,15618,18218,18219,18485,18488,18497,18238,18239,18240,18241,18439,18502,18501,18503,18506,1354,1355,1356,14897,14894,14895,14882,14884,16435,16352,16337,16338,16339,16340,16342,16341,16343,16344,16345,16346,16347,17923,17924,17925,17926,18527,18554,18570)

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	template	range	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	4	 	70	Using where

Time Before: 0.08075 seconds
Time After: 0.08140 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00065 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT * FROM credits_bank WHERE userid = 1 AND status = 1

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	credits_bank	ALL	 	 	 	 	139	Using where

Time Before: 0.53086 seconds
Time After: 0.53099 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00014 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT COUNT(post.dateline) AS pcount 
FROM post AS post FORCE INDEX (dateline)
INNER JOIN thread AS thread USING (threadid)
WHERE post.dateline > 1239828223
AND thread.forumid IN (0196,3,155,197,4,208,216,1,2,28,9,168,169,170,183,211,212,214,171,172,173,198,210,215,5,6,156,157,158,159,213,12,14,130,21,153,95,32,31,94,34,111,107,207,40,113,29,30,160,194,75,176,35,190,191,199,200,201,202,203,164,177,178,195,179,180,181,182,152,166,167,175,154,205,161,162,163,165,192,186,204,209,187,188,189,193,131,132,127,129)

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	post	range	dateline	dateline	4	 	77	Using where
1	SIMPLE	thread	eq_ref	PRIMARY,forumid	PRIMARY	4	pwmania_forums.post.threadid	1	Using where

Time Before: 0.53372 seconds
Time After: 0.53381 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00010 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT COUNT(dateline) AS rcount 
FROM reputation 
WHERE userid = 1 
AND dateline > 1239742528

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	reputation	ref	userid,dateline	userid	4	const	63	Using where

Time Before: 0.53459 seconds
Time After: 0.53468 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00009 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT id
FROM cyb_chatbox AS cyb_chatbox
WHERE dateline > '1239828223'

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	cyb_chatbox	ALL	 	 	 	 	914	Using where

Time Before: 0.53570 seconds
Time After: 0.53579 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00009 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT noticeid
FROM noticedismissed AS noticedismissed
WHERE noticedismissed.userid = 1

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	noticedismissed	ref	userid	userid	4	const	1	Using where

Time Before: 0.54545 seconds
Time After: 0.54557 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00012 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT template
FROM template
WHERE templateid = 18478

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	template	const	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	4	const	1	 

Time Before: 0.55187 seconds
Time After: 0.55197 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00010 seconds
End call of global.php: 0.558423995972
SQL Query

SELECT
	user.username, (user.options & 512) AS invisible, user.usergroupid,
	session.userid, session.inforum, session.lastactivity, session.badlocation,
	IF(displaygroupid=0, user.usergroupid, displaygroupid) AS displaygroupid, infractiongroupid
	
FROM session AS session
LEFT JOIN user AS user ON(user.userid = session.userid)

WHERE session.lastactivity > 1239834778
	
ORDER BY username ASC

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	session	ALL	 	 	 	 	100	Using where; Using temporary; Using filesort
1	SIMPLE	user	eq_ref	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	4	pwmania_forums.session.userid	1	 

Time Before: 0.56257 seconds
Time After: 0.56403 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00146 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT forum.forumid, lastpost, lastposter, lastthread, lastthreadid, lasticonid, threadcount, replycount, lastpostid, lastprefixid
	
FROM forum AS forum

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	forum	ALL	 	 	 	 	90	 

Time Before: 0.57410 seconds
Time After: 0.57452 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00042 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT moderator.*, user.username,
IF(user.displaygroupid = 0, user.usergroupid, user.displaygroupid) AS displaygroupid, infractiongroupid
FROM moderator AS moderator
INNER JOIN user AS user USING(userid)
WHERE moderator.userid = 1

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	user	const	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	4	const	1	 
1	SIMPLE	moderator	ref	userid_forumid	userid_forumid	4	const	1	Using where

Time Before: 0.58117 seconds
Time After: 0.58150 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00033 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT user.avatarid, user.avatarrevision, avatarpath, NOT ISNULL(customavatar.userid) AS hascustom, customavatar.dateline,
	customavatar.width, customavatar.height, customavatar.width_thumb, customavatar.height_thumb
FROM user AS user
LEFT JOIN avatar AS avatar ON avatar.avatarid = user.avatarid
LEFT JOIN customavatar AS customavatar ON customavatar.userid = user.userid
WHERE user.userid = 1

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	user	const	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	4	const	1	 
1	SIMPLE	avatar	const	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	2	const	0	unique row not found
1	SIMPLE	customavatar	const	PRIMARY	PRIMARY	4	const	1	 

Time Before: 0.64494 seconds
Time After: 0.64535 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00041 seconds
SQL Query

select p.threadid, t.forumid from post p left join thread t on(t.threadid = p.threadid) where p.userid = 1

Time Before: 0.64580 seconds
Time After: 0.64848 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00268 seconds
SQL Query

select count(*) as newposts from post where dateline >= 1239828223 and visible = 1

Time Before: 0.67740 seconds
Time After: 0.67750 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00010 seconds
SQL Query

select count(*) as newthreads from thread where dateline >= 1239828223 and visible = 1 and sticky in(0,1)

Time Before: 0.67769 seconds
Time After: 0.67777 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00009 seconds
SQL Query

select count(*) as lastposts from post where visible = 1 and dateline >= 1239749278

Time Before: 0.67800 seconds
Time After: 0.68085 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00285 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT userid, username, usergroupid, displaygroupid, lastactivity, IF(user.options & 512, 1, 0) AS invisible
FROM user AS user
WHERE lastactivity > 1239749278
ORDER BY username ASC

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	user	range	lastactivity	lastactivity	4	 	422	Using where; Using filesort

Time Before: 0.68183 seconds
Time After: 0.68713 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00531 seconds
SQL Query

SELECT userip, dateline
FROM cybvilxh_guests AS cybvilxh_guests
WHERE dateline > 1239749278

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	cybvilxh_guests	ALL	 	 	 	 	1337	Using where

Time Before: 0.77844 seconds
Time After: 0.78353 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00509 seconds
SQL Query

UPDATE session
SET lastactivity = 1239835678, location = '/index.php?explain=1', inforum = 0, inthread = 0, incalendar = 0, badlocation = 0
WHERE sessionhash = '1c5416e5093187ce37966a8d28de3c2f'

Time Before: 0.79350 seconds
Time After: 0.79380 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00030 seconds
SQL Query

UPDATE user
SET lastactivity = 1239835678
WHERE userid = 1

Time Before: 0.79396 seconds
Time After: 0.79453 seconds
Time Taken: 0.00058 seconds
Page generated in 0.790579080582 seconds with 28 queries, spending 0.0247750282288 doing MySQL queries and 0.765804052353 doing PHP things. Shutdown Queries: DISABLED

[TigerC10]

One big red flag to me is the vbPlaza thing. That modification was removed from vbulletin.org for security exploits that the author refused to fix. He later on opened his own website for it and he claims that the exploits have been patched - but I'm still kinda hesitant.

Another thing, your guest views are taking the longest according to that read out. Do you have RSS enabled for your board? That's one way I can see guest views going up like that.

But all of those guest views might also be a person running a botscript to check for exploits in your vbPlaza...

[Daniel Thomas]

Originally Posted by TigerC10

One big red flag to me is the vbPlaza thing. That modification was removed from vbulletin.org for security exploits that the author refused to fix. He later on opened his own website for it and he claims that the exploits have been patched - but I'm still kinda hesitant.

Another thing, your guest views are taking the longest according to that read out. Do you have RSS enabled for your board? That's one way I can see guest views going up like that.



But all of those guest views might also be a person running a botscript to check for exploits in your vbPlaza...

Hey again. No we have no RSS feeds and I even disabled the RSS Feed in the schedule tasks. Yes, we purchased the new vbplaza a couple of months ago...but the forum has been running slow for over a year now, long before we ever got vBPlaza, but it is running unusually slower for the last week or two.

I'm tempted to install a 2nd copy of vbulletin on the server for testing purposes to see if it too runs slow...possibly indicating a server/mysql problem and not a vb problem.

[Dismounted]

How many modifications have you installed? (And which?)