Comments for Drew Gillson http://www.drewgillson.com/blog e-commerce with Magento | LiveOutThere.com startup life Tue, 17 Jan 2012 06:23:53 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Comment on Customize TinyBrick’s LightSpeed for use with Redis by MageAustralia http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/customize-tinybricks-lightspeed-for-use-with-redis/#comment-16 MageAustralia Tue, 17 Jan 2012 06:23:53 +0000 http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/?p=11#comment-16 Hi Drew. I remembered you leveraged Redis pretty heavily for liveoutthere.com - I thought this may interest you if you're not already familiar with it. https://github.com/steelThread/redmon#readme Hi Drew. I remembered you leveraged Redis pretty heavily for liveoutthere.com – I thought this may interest you if you’re not already familiar with it.

https://github.com/steelThread/redmon#readme

]]> Comment on Customer service or inside sales? by MageMojo http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/customer-service-sales/#comment-14 MageMojo Fri, 06 Jan 2012 21:48:54 +0000 http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/?p=127#comment-14 You should check out StoreMail as this exactly that type of service they offer for Magento! http://www.storemail.com/Screencast/?vid=a8 You should check out StoreMail as this exactly that type of service they offer for Magento!
http://www.storemail.com/Screencast/?vid=a8

]]> Comment on Putting Magento to the test on Boxing Day by MageMojo http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/putting-magento-to-the-test-on-boxing-day/#comment-11 MageMojo Tue, 03 Jan 2012 07:26:09 +0000 http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/?p=37#comment-11 Sorry to hear that Drew. I recently did an article for thewhir.com discussing how, as a dedicated Magento host, we prepare for Black Friday and Cyber Monday (ie. Boxing Day): http://www.thewhir.com/web-hosting-news/112511_QA_Eric_Hileman_of_Magento_Web_Host_MageMogo_on_Surviving_Black_Friday_and_Cyber_Monday We had a few clients do this type of "door buster" promotion and overwhelm their servers here. Fortunately for them we're always available and monitoring all servers and were immediately available to upgrade their server to a higher level of resources within minutes. Throwing hardware at the problem, when you can quickly do it in a viritualized infrastructure, is a good way to solve an immediate problem like this. We do some siege testing and a quick and dirty way is using Ashley Shroder's speed test site: http://www.magespeedtest.com/ ...but like you said it's not real accurate when it comes to traffic patterns, especially the checkout process. Still it gives us a good feel if a client can survive their anticipated traffic. I bet had you done that you would have caught your xml config issue right away :) You sound like the perfect client to host here and make the most of our performance optimization services which we provide at no cost with all our plans. Check us out because we'd love to work with you. Anyway, great article. Thanks for sharing. Sorry to hear that Drew. I recently did an article for thewhir.com discussing how, as a dedicated Magento host, we prepare for Black Friday and Cyber Monday (ie. Boxing Day):

http://www.thewhir.com/web-hosting-news/112511_QA_Eric_Hileman_of_Magento_Web_Host_MageMogo_on_Surviving_Black_Friday_and_Cyber_Monday

We had a few clients do this type of “door buster” promotion and overwhelm their servers here. Fortunately for them we’re always available and monitoring all servers and were immediately available to upgrade their server to a higher level of resources within minutes. Throwing hardware at the problem, when you can quickly do it in a viritualized infrastructure, is a good way to solve an immediate problem like this.

We do some siege testing and a quick and dirty way is using Ashley Shroder’s speed test site:
http://www.magespeedtest.com/

…but like you said it’s not real accurate when it comes to traffic patterns, especially the checkout process. Still it gives us a good feel if a client can survive their anticipated traffic. I bet had you done that you would have caught your xml config issue right away :)

You sound like the perfect client to host here and make the most of our performance optimization services which we provide at no cost with all our plans. Check us out because we’d love to work with you.

Anyway, great article. Thanks for sharing.

]]> Comment on Putting Magento to the test on Boxing Day by drew.gillson http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/putting-magento-to-the-test-on-boxing-day/#comment-9 drew.gillson Fri, 30 Dec 2011 18:42:42 +0000 http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/?p=37#comment-9 Thanks for that link~ fascinating stuff. I'm always less than enthusiastic about Siege testing because it's just so damn hard to accurately reproduce realistic traffic load patterns. Doing log reconstruction makes a lot of sense to me. Thanks for that link~ fascinating stuff. I’m always less than enthusiastic about Siege testing because it’s just so damn hard to accurately reproduce realistic traffic load patterns. Doing log reconstruction makes a lot of sense to me.

]]> Comment on Putting Magento to the test on Boxing Day by MageAustralia http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/putting-magento-to-the-test-on-boxing-day/#comment-8 MageAustralia Fri, 30 Dec 2011 06:21:08 +0000 http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/?p=37#comment-8 As a Systems Admin / Magento Dev who's gone through a similar albeit smaller ride than yourself, there's nothing like the anxiety of watching those load averages climb, especially when that floodgate opens at sale time. At least in a physical sale, people can 'see' others and understand the situation if they have to wait in line. You may find this interesting. The ability to replay your logs for load testing http://www.igvita.com/2008/09/30/load-testing-with-log-replay/ As a Systems Admin / Magento Dev who’s gone through a similar albeit smaller ride than yourself, there’s nothing like the anxiety of watching those load averages climb, especially when that floodgate opens at sale time. At least in a physical sale, people can ‘see’ others and understand the situation if they have to wait in line.

You may find this interesting. The ability to replay your logs for load testing
http://www.igvita.com/2008/09/30/load-testing-with-log-replay/

]]> Comment on Putting Magento to the test on Boxing Day by Matthew Bertulli http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/putting-magento-to-the-test-on-boxing-day/#comment-7 Matthew Bertulli Fri, 30 Dec 2011 01:00:09 +0000 http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/?p=37#comment-7 Thanks for this post Drew. We also run a few eCommerce shops with Magento at our core and boxing day/week has been a wild ride (we'll be posting our notes next week). I love the approach you took with Facebook and one on one service. Bloody brilliant! Thanks for this post Drew. We also run a few eCommerce shops with Magento at our core and boxing day/week has been a wild ride (we’ll be posting our notes next week). I love the approach you took with Facebook and one on one service. Bloody brilliant!

]]> Comment on Understand your visitors’ behaviour by plugging into the matrix by Putting Magento to the test on Boxing Day | Drew Gillson http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/understand-your-visitors-by-plugging-into-the-matrix/#comment-5 Putting Magento to the test on Boxing Day | Drew Gillson Thu, 29 Dec 2011 23:57:51 +0000 http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/?p=32#comment-5 [...] had between 100 and 200 active shoppers, and dozens of people checking out simultaneously. We use Dg_Matrix to watch shopper behaviour, and the screen was flying. Alex and I stayed on live chat until [...] [...] had between 100 and 200 active shoppers, and dozens of people checking out simultaneously. We use Dg_Matrix to watch shopper behaviour, and the screen was flying. Alex and I stayed on live chat until [...]

]]> Comment on Customize TinyBrick’s LightSpeed for use with Redis by Putting Magento to the test on Boxing Day | Drew Gillson http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/customize-tinybricks-lightspeed-for-use-with-redis/#comment-4 Putting Magento to the test on Boxing Day | Drew Gillson Thu, 29 Dec 2011 23:32:10 +0000 http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/?p=11#comment-4 [...] of the traffic increase, I had recently switched to Redis for our Magento cache backend. We use Redis in combination with TinyBrick’s LightSpeed extension to store the full HTML of our pages, which will theoretically reduce the database traffic to near [...] [...] of the traffic increase, I had recently switched to Redis for our Magento cache backend. We use Redis in combination with TinyBrick’s LightSpeed extension to store the full HTML of our pages, which will theoretically reduce the database traffic to near [...]

]]> Comment on Using Redis as Magento’s cache backend by Putting Magento to the test on Boxing Day | Drew Gillson http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/using-redis-as-magentos-cache-backend/#comment-3 Putting Magento to the test on Boxing Day | Drew Gillson Thu, 29 Dec 2011 23:31:47 +0000 http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/?p=5#comment-3 [...] that this was not a front-end problem. In anticipation of the traffic increase, I had recently switched to Redis for our Magento cache backend. We use Redis in combination with TinyBrick’s LightSpeed [...] [...] that this was not a front-end problem. In anticipation of the traffic increase, I had recently switched to Redis for our Magento cache backend. We use Redis in combination with TinyBrick’s LightSpeed [...]

]]> Comment on Customize TinyBrick’s LightSpeed for use with Redis by Using Redis as Magento’s cache backend | Drew Gillson http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/customize-tinybricks-lightspeed-for-use-with-redis/#comment-2 Using Redis as Magento’s cache backend | Drew Gillson Sun, 25 Dec 2011 00:43:22 +0000 http://www.drewgillson.com/blog/?p=11#comment-2 [...] Redis as Magento’s cache backend « Previous / Next » By drew.gillson / December 25, 2011 / Magento / No [...] [...] Redis as Magento’s cache backend « Previous / Next » By drew.gillson / December 25, 2011 / Magento / No [...]

]]>