Ask HN: Has HN been slow/spotty loading for you?

#1

Post by lukeqsee » Wed, Nov 17, 2010, 4:23 PM UTC

I love HN. I love it that PG built it himself. It's not easy. I applaud him for it. This isn't a complaint but an inquiry.

The last couple days (especially around peak times) HN seems to have slowed dramatically. Pages take multiple seconds (think, 10 to 20) to get served and even the up/down vote images fail to load.

Is it just me?

Re: Ask HN: Has HN been slow/spotty loading for you?

#2

Post by Scott_MacGregor » Wed, Nov 17, 2010, 4:36 PM UTC

Yes, I noticed it too.

I don't know what the backend is, but if it's on a single shared machine it might be too many inquires on the hardware at once. Maybe ask the hosting company to move it to a machine with a lower load.

Re: Ask HN: Has HN been slow/spotty loading for you?

#3

Post by lukeqsee » Wed, Nov 17, 2010, 4:40 PM UTC

Scott_MacGregor wrote: post #2

Yes, I noticed it too. I don't know what the backend is, but if it's on a single shared machine it might be too many inquires on the hardware at once. Maybe ask the hosting company to move it to a machine with a lower load.

It's an arc backend. (http://arclanguage.org/)

Re: Ask HN: Has HN been slow/spotty loading for you?

#4

Post by _b8r0 » Wed, Nov 17, 2010, 4:41 PM UTC

I can't find the HN story, but I seem to remember that PG was rebooting the server quite regularly. It must be pretty difficult when you're looking at having to toss up continuing to use the language with it's limitations or start looking at changes to Arc.

Maybe a front-end cache like nginx would help?

Re: Ask HN: Has HN been slow/spotty loading for you?

#5

Post by scdlbx » Wed, Nov 17, 2010, 5:09 PM UTC

I have not had any noticeable problems in the past week.

Re: Ask HN: Has HN been slow/spotty loading for you?

#6

Post by mrduncan » Wed, Nov 17, 2010, 5:22 PM UTC

Scott_MacGregor wrote: post #2

Yes, I noticed it too. I don't know what the backend is, but if it's on a single shared machine it might be too many inquires on the hardware at once. Maybe ask the hosting company to move it to a machine with a lower load.

As of 2 years ago, it was hosted on a "3.0 GHz Core whatever, 12 GB RAM, 64-bit FreeBSD 7.1" - it's certainly not a shared machine. (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=516122)

rtm is the sysadmin for HN (yes, that rtm: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Tappan_Morris).

Re: Ask HN: Has HN been slow/spotty loading for you?

#7

Post by kreek » Wed, Nov 17, 2010, 5:24 PM UTC

Pages load fine for me, however submitting a comment is taking longer than usual.

Re: Ask HN: Has HN been slow/spotty loading for you?

#8

Post by smackfu » Wed, Nov 17, 2010, 5:38 PM UTC

I've had the images fail to load, as well as the stylesheet (so all the text comes up as Times New Roman.)

Re: Ask HN: Has HN been slow/spotty loading for you?

#9

Post by yuvadm » Wed, Nov 17, 2010, 5:40 PM UTC

NO. This is not just you, at all.

HN has been slow as molasses lately.

Re: Ask HN: Has HN been slow/spotty loading for you?

#10

Post by SriniK » Wed, Nov 17, 2010, 5:40 PM UTC

Are you having issues with iphone/ipad? Sometimes I too have problem with HN site on my iphone.