Official Luthiers Forum!

Lance, I think this has been brought up before but I don't recall if there was any resolution.

I would participate more often in the Forum but for it's extreme slow resoponse in displaying. When I connect, either with the latest greates of Firefox or Internet Exploder, it takes about 20-30 seconds to display the forum page. After I log in, about the same time to re-display the main page. If I go to a thread, it is dependent on how many posts in the thread but typically 10-30 seconds to display. Then the 20-30 seconds to return to the main page. To top it all off, it always returns me to the top of the main page. I have to scroll down the list again to try to find where I was before I went to a thread. AFAI can tell, all this is the same whether I am logged in or not.

I know, I'm whining about an otherwise great place but if there is some way around all this slowness I'd appreciate knowing about it. I usually only last about 10 minutes before I give it up for the day.

TIA,
Alan D.

I've been having the same problem. I thought it was my old computer, but it's the same on the new one.

Al

Alan, do you have a dial-up connection?

Try using the "Active Topics" feature. It should help quite a bit.

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"I want to know what kind of pickups Vince Gill uses in his Tele, because if I had those, as good of a player as I am, I'm sure I could make it sound like that.
Only badly."

I'm on wireless DSL. I'm running at 48Mbps right now.

AlA Peebels38979.7078703704

Alan,

As Don said, Active Topics is the way to go. It only displays one line for each topic. Main Discussion Forum displays one line for each post, which could mean 40 or 50 lines for just one topic. Plus, using Active Topics drastically cuts down the load on the OLF server.

Hope this helps.burbank38979.7156365741

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now known around here as Pat Foster
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http://www.patfosterguitars.com

I'll try that.

Al

I've long complained of the speed here....

The 'active topics' page is a terrible way to go, since my second biggest complaint is that folks around here don't put up good titles to their threads, and Lance and Brock don't have time to re-name them. So, if we head to active topics, we see titles that don't make much sense. Seeing a title like; "would it make sense to..." doesn't make me want to go read it. On the other hand, staying at the forum main page, we can see how the thread develops, and who's posting. So, even if the title makes no sense or tells us nothing, if after 2 days, the thread has attracted a lot of activity from those who post good post(not just "me too" posts), then it's time to take a look.

Sorry, but there's so much traffic here, it's impossible for some of us to follow all the fluff.

All that to say, this place loads awful slow.... <bg>

I have no problem with the site loading slow.

Maybe you just have a crummy host/computer (all you whiner's)

I run on cable internet (100mbps) so that could be my advantage, although this is not extremly fast by any means....

That's enough from me......nothing better to say.Rod True38979.7476388889

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My Facebook Guitar Page

"There's really no wrong way, as long as the results are what's desired." Charles Fox

"We have to constantly remind ourselves what we're doing....No Luthier is putting a man on the moon!" Harry Fleishman

"Generosity is always different in the eye of the person who didn't receive anything, but who wanted some." Waddy Thomson

I'm running on cable internet also ...
But, I have the same problem. It is very slow.

That said ... YOU GOTTA LOVE THIS FORUM .

Mike

Yup, high speed connection here, too. This isn't the only forum that is slow, but there are fast ones out there, with more traffic than here, so that tells us it can be done.

Not really complaining, I guess, as I have got used to it, but it really does limit how much I participate here, and how many threads I'll actually read.

When it was last brought up, I commented that I thought it was the
software interacted with the databases. Brock responded that the slow
speed is because the software uses access for it's DB's. That would be
the problem. Access bogs down with lots of queries and child DB's.
Brock said the next release would be using SQL, which should clean it all
up.

I have the same problem as above. Sometimes it is downright painful to make your way through all the threads.

[QUOTE=James Orr] Access bogs down with lots of queries and child DB's.
Brock said the next release would be using SQL, which should clean it all
up.[/QUOTE]

Anyone have any idea when the next release will take place?

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Dave Rector
Rector Guitars

I agree with others... I have a DSL line and the speed is ok but seems a little slugish. In general my access speed to most internet sites is good.

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Brad
Avon, OH

I have cable as well, and the OLF is slow, but I'm willing to put up with it.

As I recall from the last thread on this subject, Brock mentioned that it is the database behind the scenes (Access?) that accounts for the slow load times. As I also recall, Brock said that they were working on something new to replace Access to improve the speed here. I'm patient. I'll wait.

I agree with Mario about the Active Topics selection. If nothing gets posted in a thread for a day or two, it gets dropped from the active topics screen, thus fading into oblivion unless somebody loads the Main Forum screen, and decides to post in the thread.

Best,

Michael

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Live to Play, Play to Live

Same problem here. I too, am on high-speed DSL and this site is particularly slow. I suppose the 'active topics' is somewhat remedial, but ordinarly, that's not how I would view what's going on. I have found that if I open-up a thread in a 'new window', from the Main Page, I can access the different threads much quicker, rather that waiting for it all...to reload again.

I have to agree. The forum is very slow, it's not my pc or ISP it's something to do with this site. It typically takes me 5 seconds or more to go to a different page.

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David White, Toronto

"All my favourite singers can't sing."

I think this forum is well worth the extra 30 sec.

[QUOTE=James Orr] When it was last brought up, I commented that I thought it was the
software interacted with the databases. Brock responded that the slow
speed is because the software uses access for it's DB's. That would be
the problem. Access bogs down with lots of queries and child DB's.
Brock said the next release would be using SQL, which should clean it all
up.[/QUOTE]

Yes, we know it is slow, I suffer from it too, on fast connections at work and at home, and with decent machines in both places.

When we originally got this software we wanted to maintain the cascading threads that the previous version of the OLF had, it made the community feel like a friendly place, and as Mario said, let you identify which were the hot discussions (even if they were about fluff).      However.... the sofware we bought wasn't capable of doing this so we brought in a programmer who pimped out the environment for us and made it run the cascading threads, and he added a few other goodies that were not native to the software enviornment.

We knew the cascading threads were going to be a HUGE drain on the server.. (the growth is not linear, it is exponential. Anyone remember big O theory?) ... but... at that time we "maybe" had 100 members. An Access db was a good way to go, the cascading threads were not a big drain on the server and life was good.

Now as we set at nearly 1000 members this isn't working anymore. Lance and I both know we need to shed our skin and adopt something new. But... (isn't there always a but?) we pimped out the system so much that it is not a simple thing for us to move to the latest version of the software and shift to Microsoft SQL Server in the process. It is about more than just plugging in new software, we have to maintain all the old messages, the database of user info, etc. The problem has gotten more complex.

It is a project we need to tackle though, and we are gearing up for a solution -- I just don't know what it is going to be yet.

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Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

I am on Cox Cable link and my service actually runs pretty fast. When I hit the OLF button it appears in less than a second. After I hit enter it takes about 3-5 seconds to get to the menu page. I hit Main Forum and the longest it has taken is around 10 seconds. I get a few delays of between 10-15 seconds posting and returning to the thread menu sometimes but that is not really to bad. My system is pretty powerful but I don't know if that has anything to do with things.

Mike

Alan, I use Firefox, and yes, the pages load slow for me as well. So, I right click on a link and select the option to open it in a new tab. That way as I scroll down the list, selecting topics I want to read, the first one is opening. By the time I get to the bottom and open the last one I'm interested in, pages have loaded and I can start viewing them. Its the best work around that I can come up with. Hope it helps.

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Aoibeann

I run Core Duo 2.0 Ghz, Windows Vista RC1, 1GB ram, cable internet. Bandwidth test ran 2357 Kbps and I still have problems loading up pretty slow.

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Peter M.
Cornerstone Guitars
http://www.cornerstoneukes.com

You guys are whiners.

I have dial up and normally connect around 36 Kbytes!!!!!
I play solitaire between threads.    True, but I wouldn't want to be anywhere else. I love this place.

Ron

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OLD MAN formerly (and formally) known as:

Ron Wisdom

Somewhere in the middle of Arkansas......

I love it too! But sure would be nice if it was a bit faster!!

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Peter M.
Cornerstone Guitars
http://www.cornerstoneukes.com

[QUOTE=old man] You guys are whiners.

I have dial up and normally connect around 36 Kbytes!!!!!
I play solitaire between threads.    True, but I wouldn't want to be anywhere else. I love this place.

Ron[/QUOTE]

Ron, just what i was gonna write, it is slow for me too but heck, i ain't goin' anywhere else!

This forum is really slow to load when I am in Windows mode and using Explorer. When I'm running Mac and browsing in Safari though it's only the initial opening of the page that's slow. After that it's just fine, and even the first slow page is not half as slow as in Explorer.

As with any dedicated Mac user, I put all the blame on Windows.

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