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#328752 - 14/01/2010 23:48 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: tman]
tman
carpal tunnel

Registered: 24/12/2001
Posts: 5528
The alt text for your blog logo says Chris.

The blog layout and the rest of the site layout is slightly different. The edges of the boxes don't line up when you switch between them.

Its hard to tell what are actually links.

It is possible that now you're using more PHP that it would be slower. If their webserver is slow or busy from other sites then you'll get a delay. I've got spotty internet at the moment and there is a pause or two but that might be something my side.

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#328753 - 15/01/2010 00:05 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: tman]
hybrid8
carpal tunnel

Registered: 12/11/2001
Posts: 7738
Loc: Toronto, CANADA
The site still seems very fast to me. I've cleared out my cache and done a reload. Pretty fast from here.

I was going to suggest using PHP with either passed parameters on the URL or (/and) custom ID tags on specific pages to delineate which section you're in and then change the navigation appropriately. You should be able to keep your nav in its own file which will help additionally with load times - because that file will get cached.
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Bruno
Twisted Melon : Fine Mac OS Software

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#328754 - 15/01/2010 00:48 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: tman]
Cris
pooh-bah

Registered: 06/02/2002
Posts: 1904
Loc: Leeds, UK
Originally Posted By: tman
The alt text for your blog logo says Chris.


How the hell did you spot that? Now fixed smile

Originally Posted By: tman
The blog layout and the rest of the site layout is slightly different. The edges of the boxes don't line up when you switch between them.


You are not supposed to notice that. I got someone else to do the blog template and it isn't 100% right, it's on the to do list somewhere.

It has been a very productive day at the end of it all. I think I may have sorted out the speed issues with my shop system, there was a .htaccess file in the thumbnail directory that shouldn't have been there, removing that has improved the page load times considerably.

Also loads of little bugs sorted (cheers fellas) along with some cool php lessons learned. I am using this bit of code to help the menu system know what to highlight...

Quote:
$path = $_SERVER['PHP_SELF'];
$page = basename($path);
$page = basename($path, '.php');


Seems to work pretty well grabbing the file name, the rest is pretty crude but at least it works smile

Cheers

Cris.

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#328757 - 15/01/2010 02:06 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: Cris]
gbeer
carpal tunnel

Registered: 17/12/2000
Posts: 2665
Loc: Manteca, California
On snow leopard / FF 3.5.7

Here is a snap of what I'm seeing. This was loading/rendering slowly enough that some text was initially showing large and blue. I was able to hit <esc> and do a screen grab.

The blue text did not show with Safari


Attachments
websnap.tiff (254 downloads)

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Glenn

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#328760 - 15/01/2010 06:40 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: gbeer]
Cris
pooh-bah

Registered: 06/02/2002
Posts: 1904
Loc: Leeds, UK
Now that is very interesting, I've just cleared my FF cache and I get the same thing.

The text is the alt tag from the images not yet loaded, so I wonder if I some kind of formatting error. Now the page is cached again I'm not seeing the problem when I go back.

I can't remember the site doing this before I made all the changes yesterday, so I can only assume I've broken something, or the server is being a bit slow in presenting the images and FF initially thinks they are missing.

Hmmmm, wonder what to do?

Cheers

Cris.

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#328761 - 15/01/2010 06:46 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: Cris]
tfabris
carpal tunnel

Registered: 20/12/1999
Posts: 31597
Loc: Seattle, WA
By the way, at least on Windows machines, holding down the CTRL key while pressing the Refresh key (F5) will force-reload the page from scratch while bypassing the cache. So that's a quick way to check page loads without needing to do all the clicking to empty the cache. Macs have a similar feature I'm sure, but I don't know which keys to press.
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Tony Fabris

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#328762 - 15/01/2010 07:36 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: tfabris]
Cris
pooh-bah

Registered: 06/02/2002
Posts: 1904
Loc: Leeds, UK
Woo Hoo smile

I have removed the text from the alt tags that was causing the problem, according to the standards there was no need to duplicate the information as I was doing in the title tag.

What the hell is the point anyway of having "standards" if each browser has a different translation of the rule book? Corr Blimey Govnaa!

Cheers

Cris.

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#328763 - 15/01/2010 09:43 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: Cris]
g_attrill
old hand

Registered: 14/04/2002
Posts: 1172
Loc: Hants, UK
- "About" page produced an error when I first clicked - normal layout but it said something like "Sorry an error has occured", presumably a server error?

- Page vertical alignment now fine, but the main "/" front page is broken. I *think* you have an index.php and another older version of the front page (index.html?) which needs to be deleted to make the php version the default.

- On the packages page where it says "Mini Website - An exclusive website to share with your guests, example here" the "here" is the same colour as the background making it invisible.

- As mentioned make all the links a slightly different colour

- On the FAQ page(s) perhaps indent the FAQ/Contract links to make the more obvious too - I like to use a mini PDF icon like a bullet point to make it obvious that it's a separate document.

- Contact page - make your email address a mailto:link

- Overall perhaps slighly increase the leading (CSS line-height should do it), because the text is larger than normal it feels a bit "crowded".

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#328764 - 15/01/2010 11:00 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: g_attrill]
Dignan
carpal tunnel

Registered: 08/03/2000
Posts: 12338
Loc: Sterling, VA
Looks great Cris! Though I think the contrast change now highlights the need for a different font on those text-heavy pages even more. That text just doesn't seem as delicate as the feel of the rest of the site.

Hmm, I'm clicking around the site, and it does seem to take a while to load. Each time, it's not like it's taking a long time on each element, but like there's some initial hurdle it's trying to get over before the page loads, and then everything loads in an instant.
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Matt

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#328765 - 15/01/2010 11:18 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: Dignan]
msaeger
carpal tunnel

Registered: 23/09/2000
Posts: 3608
Loc: Minnetonka, MN
Clicking the logo brings up an error page. You said you are changing the logo anyway but I still had to point it out smile
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Matt

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#328766 - 15/01/2010 11:45 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: Cris]
tman
carpal tunnel

Registered: 24/12/2001
Posts: 5528
Originally Posted By: Cris
How the hell did you spot that? Now fixed smile

It was loading slowly and I saw the alt text before it changed into an image.

You've taken out the meta keyword, description and author lines from the HTML? The validator complained about some of those lines but that was because you had NAME= instead of name= and I think because you didn't have <meta blahblahblah /> in there but I can't remember...

You've got 2 CSS files and 1 piece of CSS inline?

WAI Accessibility test smile

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#328769 - 15/01/2010 13:10 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: tman]
frog51
pooh-bah

Registered: 09/08/2000
Posts: 2091
Loc: Edinburgh, Scotland
I like it - and I don't have any speed/performance comments. Just a wee grammar one. In this sentence on the About page, you should remove the first 'a':

My aim is simple, to produce a unique, creative and contemporary images of outstanding quality that will become a precious memory for many years to come.

Cheers

Rory
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Rory
MkIIa, blue lit buttons, memory upgrade, 1Tb in Subaru Forester STi
MkII, 240Gb in Mark Lord dock
MkII, 80Gb SSD in dock

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#328772 - 15/01/2010 15:37 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: frog51]
Cris
pooh-bah

Registered: 06/02/2002
Posts: 1904
Loc: Leeds, UK
Thanks again guys, I have corrected most of the mistakes pointed out I think.

It's even slower with the php, I got told "that's just the way it is". I guess when it's time I'll be moving hosts.

Next week I'll be adding a few extra options and stuff, hopefully then all that background work will pay off.

Cheers

Cris.

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#328773 - 15/01/2010 16:01 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: Cris]
hybrid8
carpal tunnel

Registered: 12/11/2001
Posts: 7738
Loc: Toronto, CANADA
PHP is interpreted on the server, so it's going to add a small penalty, depending on how much processing you do before you start to serve HTML. It's usually negligible however, and I would never think to myself or say to you "this site is slow."

You can affect the perceived speed by moving the logic around within the PHP as necessary/suitable and trying to output some HTML as early as possible.
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Bruno
Twisted Melon : Fine Mac OS Software

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#328779 - 15/01/2010 18:13 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: hybrid8]
Phoenix42
veteran

Registered: 21/03/2002
Posts: 1424
Loc: MA but Irish born
On the About page you have a hyperlink to your Contact page in the email. It links to contact.html which doesn't exist. I believe you want contact.php which can be reached from the menu.

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#328780 - 15/01/2010 18:16 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: tman]
andym
carpal tunnel

Registered: 17/01/2002
Posts: 3996
Loc: Manchester UK
Now my ADSL is shoddy at the best of times, but it took nearly 20 seconds to load your Blog page. I also can't read your contact details at the bottom of the site, they're too small and too pale against the background.

But other than that, it's great!
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Cheers,

Andy M

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#328782 - 15/01/2010 19:17 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: andym]
Dignan
carpal tunnel

Registered: 08/03/2000
Posts: 12338
Loc: Sterling, VA
Originally Posted By: andym
I also can't read your contact details at the bottom of the site, they're too small and too pale against the background.

Oh my god, if people in this thread hadn't pointed it out, I don't think I would have even noticed that your contact info was down there. That is really hard to see.

I wasn't going to mention it before, but this has happened to me twice now today. When I initially go to your site, the main content is way out of place. The two main boxes have ended up on the very top of the browser instead of in the middle, and this last time they were even moved to the left. When this happens I'm able to navigate, but the boxes never move. However, a simple page refresh fixes everything. Perhaps it's just my system/browser/add-ons, though.
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Matt

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#328784 - 15/01/2010 19:38 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: andym]
mlord
carpal tunnel

Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
Originally Posted By: andym
Now my ADSL is shoddy at the best of times, but it took nearly 20 seconds to load your Blog page

Yep, 22 seconds here, averaging around 448 KBytes/sec over our 5-6 mb/sec link.

BIG page. smile

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#328785 - 15/01/2010 19:42 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: mlord]
mlord
carpal tunnel

Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
And what's that very faint scribbling at the bottom of the pages??


Attachments
unknown.png

Description: Actual size .png image of the faint scribbling..



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#328786 - 15/01/2010 19:46 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: mlord]
mlord
carpal tunnel

Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
Originally Posted By: mlord
And what's that very faint scribbling at the bottom of the pages??


Oh.. that must be the contact info noted by others above.. sure enough, a little tweaking in an image editor, and there's definitely some micro-text there!


Attachments
unknown.png

Description: The hidden micro-text



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#328787 - 15/01/2010 19:51 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: mlord]
ricin
veteran

Registered: 19/06/2000
Posts: 1495
Loc: US: CA
A few Firefox tools that'll help you out:

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Donato
MkII/080000565
MkIIa/010101253
ricin.us

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#328789 - 16/01/2010 01:19 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: tfabris]
gbeer
carpal tunnel

Registered: 17/12/2000
Posts: 2665
Loc: Manteca, California
Originally Posted By: tfabris
By the way, at least on Windows machines, holding down the CTRL key while pressing the Refresh key (F5) will force-reload the page from scratch while bypassing the cache. So that's a quick way to check page loads without needing to do all the clicking to empty the cache. Macs have a similar feature I'm sure, but I don't know which keys to press.


Ctrl+Shift+R does it for FF in windows

Command+Shift+R for FF in Mac OSX
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Glenn

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#328794 - 16/01/2010 07:21 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: mlord]
Cris
pooh-bah

Registered: 06/02/2002
Posts: 1904
Loc: Leeds, UK
Originally Posted By: mlord
And what's that very faint scribbling at the bottom of the pages??


This is a design decision.

There has to be something there for the page to balance out, but if it's any heavier it becomes a distraction. We put in a contact page with all those details repeated for people to actually read.

I'm not very good at design and layout, so I asked someone to help me out. The greys are supposed to be low contrast to make sure that the focus is on the pictures, after all that is what is most important on the site.

Cheers

Cris.

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#328795 - 16/01/2010 07:37 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: ricin]
Cris
pooh-bah

Registered: 06/02/2002
Posts: 1904
Loc: Leeds, UK
Originally Posted By: ricin
A few Firefox tools that'll help you out:



Now that is really useful stuff. The Google one especially is making some really good suggestions. Thanks smile

Cheers

Cris.

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#328799 - 16/01/2010 11:22 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: Cris]
sein
old hand

Registered: 07/01/2005
Posts: 893
Loc: Sector ZZ9pZa
Not sure how it compares with Page Speed, but Google Speed Tracer looks to be a very powerful optimisation tool for Chrome.
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Hussein

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#328803 - 16/01/2010 12:31 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: Cris]
mlord
carpal tunnel

Registered: 29/08/2000
Posts: 14493
Loc: Canada
Originally Posted By: Cris
Originally Posted By: mlord
And what's that very faint scribbling at the bottom of the pages??


This is a design decision.

Needs fixing. Especially if you want your "hidden copyright notice" there to be legally valid.

Cheers

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#328804 - 16/01/2010 13:28 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: Cris]
hybrid8
carpal tunnel

Registered: 12/11/2001
Posts: 7738
Loc: Toronto, CANADA
Originally Posted By: Cris
I'm not very good at design and layout, so I asked someone to help me out. The greys are supposed to be low contrast to make sure that the focus is on the pictures, after all that is what is most important on the site.


If you're not supposed to be able to read it, it should be removed completely. If you are supposed to be able to read it, it needs to be higher contrast or it's working as the reverse of what you intended. It becomes distracting because you can see that there's something there but you don't know what it is exactly.

I'm not suggesting putting it in black, but you should definitely darken up the text so someone can easily grab your phone number from it.
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Bruno
Twisted Melon : Fine Mac OS Software

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#328808 - 16/01/2010 17:55 Re: Speeding Up My Website - Hints & Tips [Re: Cris]
gbeer
carpal tunnel

Registered: 17/12/2000
Posts: 2665
Loc: Manteca, California
Originally Posted By: Cris
Originally Posted By: mlord
And what's that very faint scribbling at the bottom of the pages??


This is a design decision.

There has to be something there for the page to balance out, but if it's any heavier it becomes a distraction. We put in a contact page with all those details repeated for people to actually read.


If it's not there to be read, but for stylistic balance, then how about replacing the text, with a flourish of some kind.
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Glenn

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