Lambda the Ultimate

inactiveTopic Site speed
started 5/23/2003; 6:30:14 AM - last post 5/25/2003; 2:15:09 PM
andrew cooke - Site speed  blueArrow
5/23/2003; 6:30:14 AM (reads: 473, responses: 11)
Is anyone else frustrated with the site speed? I, for one, would be willing to pony up some cash to help Ehud buy a copy of whatever is needed to move this onto someone's machine (I'm guessing that amongst you freeloading academics(*) someone can get space on a server with "free" bandwidth, but that we'd need to buy a copy of Newsland or Frontier or whatever it's called).

(Only a suggestion!)

(*) I was one once (you can draw a parallel with giving up smoking, I suspect)

Kimberley Burchett - Re: Site speed  blueArrow
5/23/2003; 9:04:33 AM (reads: 482, responses: 1)
I find it annoying too. Frankly I'm surprised the site has as many comments as it has, given how tedious it can be to read and post. I'd kick in $10 if it'd help.

Josh Dybnis - Re: Site speed  blueArrow
5/23/2003; 11:31:45 PM (reads: 484, responses: 0)
I'm just a lurker. But count me in for $10 too. That's well worth it if it makes the site fast enough for me to browse through the old posts, which I find just too frustrating now.

Robert Holwerda - Re: Site speed  blueArrow
5/25/2003; 5:51:45 AM (reads: 444, responses: 2)
I'll chip in $10 too.

Ehud Lamm - Re: Site speed  blueArrow
5/25/2003; 5:58:34 AM (reads: 463, responses: 1)
Since the site speed is really getting worse, I'll try to see what can be done. I am a bit busy until the end of June, so I will not be able to provide any solution until then. I hope Userland takes a look at those servers, since this wasn't such a problem only weeks ago.

andrew cooke - Re: Site speed  blueArrow
5/25/2003; 7:43:15 AM (reads: 480, responses: 0)
thanks!

Marius Amado Alves - Re: Site speed  blueArrow
5/25/2003; 8:00:30 AM (reads: 434, responses: 3)
Plus 10$ here.

But I wonder: why isn't LtU just a mailist? That way we could really host it on an academic server (I can do it here, but I guess it's better that Ehud do it on his Univ.) And I'm sure there is free weblog software. The only added functionality the LtU weblog has w.r.t a mailist is post editing, and we all can live without that I guess. Or else we install a wiki. Sorry, this is surely ignorance exposing, but between wikis and mailists I fail to see what weblogs bring new. My ideal discussion tool is a mailist with queryable archives, like SourceForge's. More (pseudo)funcionality is only getting in the way--of use and of installation. (Note given uptodate queryable archives weblog-like pages can easily be produced on the fly.)

andrew cooke - Re: Site speed  blueArrow
5/25/2003; 10:12:32 AM (reads: 457, responses: 2)
My ideal discussion tool is a mailist

mine too, but then i'm an email junkie (run a local imap server, where i can filter, archive, and search, then read technical lists via imap-to-nnttp).

however, i can see the advantages of the weblog format. for new users it has an immediacy that mailing list archives lack - i can't imagine it would have survived the first few years as a mailing list. and i seem to have some personal inability to master wikis (i have no idea why - in theory they seem like a good idea).

also, since this hosting has been free, it seems a little mean-spirited not to keep to the same system (moving to a different system might imply work converting between formats too), but if there is a simple way to have an email gateway to the site then it seems like a Good Idea to me. i did look for some kind of screen-scraper that would check the site now and then and convert it to email for my own use, but didn't find anything suitable (there are a couple of projects on freshmeat, but they appeared either dead or poorly supported).

more importantly than all that, though, is that it's whatever fits with ehud - he made this place and i feel bad turning up and suggesting changes (ie starting this thread) when it's very much his place (has it been more than a few weeks since his last plea for more editors? if we can't produce editors what right do we have to change the hosting details?).

[final comment - maybe the weblog format is the happy compromise that hits the sweet spot between wiki and mailing list? it's not that it adds anything new to the two, but how it combines them...]

Ehud Lamm - Re: Site speed  blueArrow
5/25/2003; 11:36:20 AM (reads: 470, responses: 1)
Andrew, I prefer a news aggregator (which reads the RSS feed). There are aggregators that work inside Outlook, if that'w what people want. Alternatively, we can use bloglet, so that you could subscribe via email.

Martijn Vermaat - Re: Site speed  blueArrow
5/25/2003; 2:05:57 PM (reads: 423, responses: 1)
You can read the RSS feed in your newsclient by using "nntp//rss" (http://www.methodize.org/nntprss/), a NNTP server that presents RSS feeds as newsgroups (written in Java), if you like.

But more on-topic, isn't the speed of the server Userland's issue? Or are Manilla sites hosted free of charge?

[On a side note: this is my first post here after a year or so of lurking. So this is also my first opportunity to let you know I find LtU among the best programming related resources on the web. Great work editors!]

Ehud Lamm - Re: Site speed  blueArrow
5/25/2003; 2:15:09 PM (reads: 434, responses: 0)
LtU uses free hosting, something Userland wants to get out of (according the Dave Winer's weblog at least). There are companies offerring commercial Manila hosting. I guess this would be the easiest approach (but it looks expensive).

By the way, I think the speed is improving. But maybe that's just wishful thinking...

andrew cooke - Re: Site speed  blueArrow
5/25/2003; 2:33:27 PM (reads: 475, responses: 0)
oh dear - i suddenly feel old! i never even thought about this newfangled rss technology... looks like this is what i need. i'll give it a go.