Wordpress crashes my server - any advice?
 

It seems a lot of people here are running adult blogs with Wordpress installations. I tried to switch my site to Wordpress as well but it seems my server can't handle the traffic. First the database connection dropped, so I installed WP Cache. That worked for a few hours but now my server is completely dead. Don't tell me I need a bigger machine - the one I'm running should be fine. Is there any general advice on Wordpress installations?
Thanks.

this could be any number of things

does your server actually crash or does apache crash or what exactly is dying...assuming its a UNIX/Linux server this can tell you everything you need to know

my guess is it isnt actually crashing the server but crashing your process.

In general make sure you have up to date versions of PHP and MySQL and make sure that you have any updates/patches for your OS installed.

Thanks, Mike. Will ask my server admin. Yes, it's Linux. First only my Wordpress built site went down because the database connection got killed while static pages that are sitting in another location on the server still worked. Now it seems the whole server is down. Guess I'm not very lucky with this Wordpress thing...

In general wordpress isnt that demanding even on a very high traffic system, is your server shared or dedicated?

regardless your server admin can run any number of unix diagnostics that will indicate what the problem is but it could be anything from kernel parameters to needing an update for PHP or MySql

exactly your server admin should be able to help you with this if he can't contact me ill get you a tech to have a look at it

It's a dedicated server. Will check for the PHP/MySql update.

optimize MySQL

Are you running one of those "show the recent referrers" scripts? In years of using WordPress the only thing I've done that killed it was install a referral plugin that managed to thrash mySQL so hard it brought my box to a screeching halt.

I'm sure that was poor plugin design, but still.

Both php and sql versions 4 something.

Forkbeard, I do run a plugin that is called UserOnline, from http://lesterchan.net/wordpress/read...seronline.html. Maybe that's the problem?

disable your plugins then re-enable them one at a time...that would narrow that down but take webair up on the offer to have an admin do the diags on it...that will tell you REAL quick...unlike windows, when anything in UNIX dies Unix has knowledge of what it was and why it died, all you gotta do is know how to ask it.

Thanks, Mike, will do. I'm pretty sure now it's the plugin but I'll happily accept your offer if I still can't solve the problem. What server details would your tech guy need?

the current php version is 5.2.5

mysql 5.0

make sure that the version of WP you are using is compatible with your 4.x versions

that wasnt my offer...it was webair's

let their guy do it...Im guessing they are your hosting company...

No, actually they aren't ;-) But maybe they want to become it?? :1orglaugh

But actually I'm wondering. The latest Wordpress release only requires this:
PHP version 4.2 or greater
MySQL version 4.0 or greater
So do I really need the 5 versions?

ssh to login and see what you have going on should be fine

http://ocaoimh.ie/2007/11/05/wordpress-super-cache-01/

install wp-super-cache and you won't have any problems

Thats not necessarily so that would only be true if he was in fact bound somehow by his load, which I seriously doubt. While that may improve his performance in some instances it wont stop crashes.

sounds like your versions are OK and if webair is willing to take a look for ya..let em...and remember that next time you need a hosting company because by God THATS service!

Hm, that seemed to be a bit trickier to set up, or am I wrong?

Yes, that's true...

no youd just ask your admin to give webair a shell login and the login info they may need an admin password but webair can be trusted.

if disabling the plug in didnt work Id let webair take a look at it...hell Im fine giving advice here but I wouldnt do a forensic on it for free

and BTW if your server admin cant use the UNIX utilities to determine the problem you may be in need of a new server admin....Just a thought ;)

top in ssh would give an idea of the problem:

CPU , memory or the most likely culprit .
Config of apache ( how many allowed connections ) could also be the problem.

Personnally, I have quite a few clients running some WP sites, with substantial traffic... This requires at least a Core2 Duo CPU and lots of memory...

I know you don't want people to say " it is the server ", but giving the specs of the box would help.:2 cents:

CentOS 4.1
Dell SC1425 Dual Xeon 2.8Ghz
1GB DDR Memory
2x 80 GB Harddisk (RAID1)

Not the one that gave me fits, but it could be similar. As somebody else pointed out, with plugins the trick is to disable them one by one until the problem goes away. Or, faster, turn them all off to see if the problem goes away, then turn them back on one by one until it comes back.

a dual xeon with only 1 gig ram ?

LOL

So what would be normal?

2 gigs would be normal

under normal uses you will run out of ram before you run out of cpu power

plus ram is pretty cheap nowdays.

all of my dual xeons have at least 2 gigs ram :)

I'm going with those who say the plugin is the culprit...

Testing...will post it here as soon as I know.

You are running way to short on Ram ... Now, you have to go to the swap folder to create virtual memory ( BTW, your swap should be twice the actual memory ).
Go with an extra gig, but if you want it to purrrrr, make it an extra 2 gig..

CPU are fine, and probably running at 0.20 , while the memory is probably maxed out at 95% ....

Thanks, one more thing to do.

are you running wp-cache as a wordpress plugin....ive had problems with it before

Yes but I installed it because I had the same problem before. Without wp-cache the database connection crashed after 20 minutes, after I installed it all was fine for a few hours.

as an example of a heavy WP usage on a dual Xeon 3.0 Ghz:

top - 18:36:03 up 42 days, 8:02, 1 user, load average: 0.13, 0.16, 0.24
Tasks: 262 total, 1 running, 261 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
Cpu(s): 7.0% us, 2.1% sy, 0.0% ni, 89.7% id, 0.9% wa, 0.1% hi, 0.2% si
Mem: 3090296k total, 2716696k used, 373600k free, 82456k buffers
Swap: 4096532k total, 213776k used, 3882756k free, 378908k cached

The mem is practically all used on this box, and it has 3 Gigs of DDR2 ...
So your one gig must be gone in seconds, causing the bottleneck, then freezing of the box.

I see. However, I have been running this server since two years without a single problem. The problem only started with the Wordpress installation.

ouch i have a simliar prob

How similar? :winkwink:

you are giving the answer ...WP is a heavy user of memory by it's numerous MySql requests.
How many uniques on that site ?

About 15,000/day

you still shouldnt be having issues UNIX can tell you what the problem is. as someone noted you could run top or memstat or netstat or several others that would tell you why its dying

till then you are simply shotgunning the problem.

well, that is much less then my client :


VISITS:
Average Per Day 89,772
Average Visit Length 0:29
Last Hour 4,270
Today 4,438
This Week 628,404

PAGE VIEWS

Average Per Day 118,646
Average Per Visit 1.3
Last Hour 5,626
Today 5,862
This Week 830,521


If your box is a colo, add the memory... If a rented box, well maybe check the top command to see ( that is hat I ran a few post avbove ).

Ok, sounds good. Pageviews is actually pretty much the same as for your client. Will check the top command and then decide. Thanks.

Removed the plugin, running fine since 2 hours now.

Yes, it looks like it was the UserOnline plugin. Site is running since 12 houus without a problem after I removed it.

sandman!, what would be reasonable for an additional Giga? My hosting company gave me this which sounds pretty steep to me:

- 1GB RAM: Eur 19,00/month.
- Install fee: Eur 99,00.

that is a lot... find a new host... paying per month on ram is stupid.

I can't praise the guys from Webair enough, they are just great. Remember, I'm not even a Webair customer (yet!) but they had one of their tech guys take a look at my server and I got some very helpful input from it. And then they put me together with another of their stuff who is a Wordpress expert and who took almost 2 hours of his time to help me.
Without being one of their customers Webair gave me better service than any hosting company that I've ever been a customer of! :thumbsup

Plugins will kill you.