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250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

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    250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

    It's never fast enough...

    http://www.slashgear.com/250ms-is-en...king-01216392/
    Peter
    AlphaBase Solutions, LLC

    [email protected]
    https://www.alphabasesolutions.com



    #2
    Re: 250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

    I read this article last evening as well--which made me reflect on my investigations into possibly using Alpha Five. How responsive do you find your A5 applications to be?

    Comment


      #3
      Re: 250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

      Originally posted by waldhorn View Post
      I read this article last evening as well--which made me reflect on my investigations into possibly using Alpha Five. How responsive do you find your A5 applications to be?
      Alpha is comparable to any data driven product out there, I think. My point was intended to be general in nature, as in you no matter how fast you are you can never be fast enough.
      Peter
      AlphaBase Solutions, LLC

      [email protected]
      https://www.alphabasesolutions.com


      Comment


        #4
        Re: 250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

        Thanks, Peter. That was an interesting read as I currently am wrestling with dealing with slow responses in my app. Almost makes me want to throw up my hands and surrender.
        Carol King
        Developer of Custom Homebuilders' Solutions (CHS)
        http://www.CHSBuilderSoftware.com

        Comment


          #5
          Re: 250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

          Performance is often a function of design and hardware. We have a commercial intranet application running that has a million records in the primary table, and over 4 million records in some support tables. The back end database is SQL Server 2008 R2 Enterprise, and it is currently running on A5V10. Most web pages open in a second or less, and finding a single record on an indexed key is well under a second. One complex query is slow, but it is being run against a complex SQL view with over 20 linked tables. The speed limitation is SQL Server, as a query against a non indexed field in the view can take up to 15 seconds. However, that is a rare case, and most row sorts and searches are under 1 second.

          We have tested the same application on Alpha Five V11, and in most cases, it is slightly faster. The application was built for speed, and uses a limited number of rows in grids (typically no more than 15), uses SQL Views wherever possible, and has offloaded some processing to SQL Server. While many tabbed forms and linked grids are used, the concepts open only one grid at a time and most grids are linked to a single table or a view.

          The hardware configuration has SQL Server on a dedicated box with considerable RAM, and four App servers running on virtual machines with load balancing. This supports over 120 users who use the system all day, every day.

          The idea of 250ms response is certainly possible in the Alpha App server. But like most servers, that kind of speed is only capable if the pages are static or the server side work is minimal.

          Here is a link to a commercial site running on Alpha Five. All of the pages are dynamic and pull data from a SQL Server database. Some of the pages are hand coded, and some use components. As you can see, the speed is quite good. It is currently running on V10, but testing in V11 shows improved speed as the V11 App Server is quite a bit faster than the V10 server.

          Comment


            #6
            Re: 250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

            Jerry - they are html pages - where's the data - Carol's issue is about real data.. not just a few char fields delivering web page content. Why not ask Carol about index's etc - help her.. as an Alpha employee this quote
            Almost makes me want to throw up my hands and surrender
            should have the entire business working on a solution - if she fails many will.. you don't want that.
            Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
            Albert Einstein, (attributed)
            US (German-born) physicist (1879 - 1955)

            Comment


              #7
              Re: 250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

              Revisiting this thread...

              Originally posted by kingcarol View Post
              I currently am wrestling with dealing with slow responses in my app. Almost makes me want to throw up my hands and surrender.
              Originally posted by peteconway View Post
              ...this quote should have the entire business [Alpha Sorworking on a solution - if she fails many will.. you don't want that.
              Carol: Have you resolved your issue with ongoing slow A5 app response?

              Did you receive any assistance from Alpha Software as prompted by Peter? Were you able to narrow the issue down to a component, e.g., choice of database back-end, hardware, etc.?

              Comment


                #8
                Re: 250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

                Mark, Alpha did help, and indicated that having group breaks, summary totals, links on the lines, too many records per page, using Access, etc., was going to slow it down. I did remove some of that stuff on a test grid and accomplished much better speed, but, trouble is... I need all the stuff I removed. They also, of course, said that Access as the back end database can slow it down, so I went and did comparitive testing using MySql and did not gain any significant speed. I have about decided that there is no way for me to migrate my entire Job costing and accounting database to the web.

                Besides there being too many possibilities of connection and browser issues, slowness, and other web issues, I realized this week that my multi-tenants have to wait in a print queue when producing a report.. ie, if 40 tenants had requested reports, all of them would have to wait for each previous tenant's report to be produced one at a time before theirs would be processed. This is absolutely a no-sell to my report-intensive home builders. Alpha has indicated that there is a way to do a 'work queue' and that I could use their consulting services to get that accomplished.

                But, I don't know... I'm getting pretty worn out and am starting to think that there are just too many issues with web to risk putting my customers' whole back office accounting system onto it. They depend on the CHS Access app every day all day to run their businesses. Right now I have a few hundred home builders using the CHS Access app for heavy accounting, budgeting, job costing, check printing, etc., etc. via Remote Desktop to our servers, and I basically get ZERO tech support calls for any failure of the system. It behaves very bug-freely for my customers. Calls I get at all are usually for some accounting advice... so..... hmmmm... 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it' may apply?

                So.... I will offer some 'cool' web tools to my customers via an Alpha web app that is integrated with the CHS Access backend data, but will most likely decide not to migrate the entire job cost and accounting app to the web. Maybe I can get my life back after 2 years of trying? :)

                P.S. I don't think this is an issue with Alpha. I think it's an excellent product. I just think that the web isn't quite ready to handle what I was attempting to do.
                Carol King
                Developer of Custom Homebuilders' Solutions (CHS)
                http://www.CHSBuilderSoftware.com

                Comment


                  #9
                  Re: 250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

                  If you remember Carol - I was happy to take a look at it - the offer stands.
                  Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
                  Albert Einstein, (attributed)
                  US (German-born) physicist (1879 - 1955)

                  Comment


                    #10
                    Re: 250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

                    Originally posted by kingcarol View Post
                    ...They also, of course, said that Access as the back end database can slow it down, so I went and did comparitive testing using MySql and did not gain any significant speed...
                    Carol, I know you probably read this thread:
                    http://msgboard.alphasoftware.com/al...1777-SQL-Speed

                    Originally posted by kingcarol View Post
                    ...I just think that the web isn't quite ready to handle what I was attempting to do.
                    Nah. I don't believe that. Easy for me to say, of course, but somehow I can't think the couple of roadblocks you hit are completely insurmountable.
                    Peter
                    AlphaBase Solutions, LLC

                    [email protected]
                    https://www.alphabasesolutions.com


                    Comment


                      #11
                      Re: 250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

                      I'm probably not the most knowledgeable about development but just a thought. What if you split your reporting to a reports database that is a mirror of your production dB. Then you can tune the "REPS" db for reporting purposes only. I've worked on quite a few Crystal Reports projects where the backend was Oracle and to help ease performance issues they ran reports off of a "REPS" (reports) dB and day to day functions off of "PROD".

                      The reports dB I remember containing a lot of views for common reports.
                      Never take a ride to the edge of your mind unless you've got a ticket back - Jon Oliva - Savatage.

                      Comment


                        #12
                        Re: 250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

                        Did you see this thread: http://msgboard.alphasoftware.com/al...1777-SQL-Speed
                        Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
                        Albert Einstein, (attributed)
                        US (German-born) physicist (1879 - 1955)

                        Comment


                          #13
                          Re: 250ms is enough wait to send web users packing

                          Yep, I did read Steve's article. I think I've already got his info about indexes covered.
                          ANYWAY, I am probably just needing a little 'step-away' time and then will be a re-evalutaion of my structure and contracting an IT consultant that is familiar with MS Access, hosting servers, and Alpha, etc., etc.. Thanks for various offers and I will make it known when I'm ready to really step back in.
                          Carol King
                          Developer of Custom Homebuilders' Solutions (CHS)
                          http://www.CHSBuilderSoftware.com

                          Comment

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