Hi Leo, I have a very similar app running in mod_perl with about 1/2 mio hits a day. I need to do some optimisation, so I'm just interessted what optimisations that you are using brought you the best improvements. Was it preloading modules in the startup.pl or caching the 1x1 gif image, or maybe optimising the database cache ( I'm using mysql ). I'm sure you are also having usage peaks, so it would be interessting how many hits(inserts)/hour can a single server machine handle approx.
Thanks Denis -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht----- Von: Leo Lapworth [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Gesendet: Freitag, 4. Februar 2005 10:37 An: ben syverson Cc: modperl@perl.apache.org Betreff: Re: Logging user's movements H On 4 Feb 2005, at 08:13, ben syverson wrote: > Hello, > > I'm curious how the "pros" would approach an interesting system design > problem I'm facing. I'm building a system which keeps track of user's > movements through a collection of information (for the sake of > argument, a Wiki). For example, if John moves from the "dinosaur" page > to the "bird" page, the system logs it -- but only once a day per > connection between nodes per user. That is, if Jane then travels from > "dinosaur" to "bird," it will log it, but if "John" travels moves back > to "dinosaur" from "bird," it won't be logged. The result is a log of > every unique connection made by every user that day. > > The question is, how would you do this with the least amount of strain > on the server? > I think the standard approach for user tracking is a 1x1 gif, there are lots of ways of doing it, here are 2: Javascript + Logs - update tracking when logs are processed ------------------------------------------------------------------------ --------- Use javascript to set a cookie (session or 24 hours) - if there isn't already one. Then use javascript to do a document write to the gif. so /tracker/c.gif?c=<user_session_id>&page=dinosaur It should then be fast (no live processing) and fairly easy to extract this information from the logs and into a db. Mod_perl - live db updates ------------------------------------- Alternatively if you need live updates create a mod_perl handle that sits at /tracker/c.gif, processes the parameters and puts them into a database, then returns a gif (I do this, read the gif in and store it as a global when the module starts so it just stays in memory). It's fast and means you can still get the benefits of caching with squid or what ever. I get about half a million hits a day to my gif. I think the main point is you should separate it from your main content handler if you want it to be flexible and still allow other levels of caching. Cheers Leo ____________ Virus checked by G DATA AntiVirusKit Version: AVK 15.0.2702 from 26.01.2005 Virus news: www.antiviruslab.com
