At SandCamp 2011, Brandon Lyon spoke about Performance & Scalability for Drupal websites. Unlike most Performance & Scalability talks he didn't just talk about the different resources available to enhance your site, but also gave instructions on how to identify the problem areas on your site as well. Brandon covered everything from the many layers of caching, to optimizing PHP, Apache, and MySQL and how to measure the performance of each in the following presentation.

1. PERFORMANCE & SCALABILITY
Where to Begin
Brandon Lyon

2. Performance & Scalability
 Define the Objective

3. Performance & Scalability
 Define the Objective
 Minimize HTTP
Requests

4. Performance & Scalability
 Define the Objective
 Minimize HTTP
Requests
 Minimize Server
Processing

5. Performance & Scalability
 Define the Objective
 Minimize HTTP
Requests
 Minimize Server
Processing
 Optimize Server
Processing

6. Performance & Scalability
 Define the Objective
 Minimize HTTP
Requests
 Minimize Server
Processing
 Optimize Server
Processing
 Optimize the
Database

7. Performance & Scalability
 Define the Objective
 Minimize HTTP
Requests
 Minimize Server
Processing
 Optimize Server
Processing
 Optimize the
Database

8. Minimizing HTTP Requests
 Aggregate &
Compress CSS Files

9. Minimizing HTTP Requests
 Aggregate &
Compress CSS Files
 Aggregate
JavaScript Files

10. Minimizing HTTP Requests
 Aggregate &
Compress CSS Files
 Aggregate
JavaScript Files
 Image Sprites

11. Performance & Scalability
 Define the Objective
 Minimize HTTP
Requests
 Minimize Server
Processing
 Optimize Server
Processing
 Optimize the
Database

12. Minimize Server Processing
 Alternative PHP
Cache (APC)
 Memcached
 Varnish Cache

13. Alternative PHP Cache (APC)
 Make sure you've allocated enough memory.
apc.shm_segments=1
apc.shm_size=32
 Check your script files on every request?
apc.stat=0
 Memory Fragmentation?
apc.ttl=0

14. Memcached
 Basic Implementation
# memcached -m 24 -p 11211 -d
$conf = array(
'memcache_servers' => array(
'localhost:11211' => 'default',
),
'memcache_bins' => array(
'cache' => 'default',
),

15. Memcached
 Server Cluster?
$conf = array(
'memcache_servers' => array(
host1:port => cluster,
hostN:port => cluster,
),
'memcache_bins' => array(
bin1 => cluster,
binN => cluster,
),

16. Varnish Cache
 Toss your cookies!  Define Exceptions
if (req.url !~ "^/blog/.*/") { if (req.url ~ "install.php|update.php") {
set req.http.Cookie = return(pass);
regsuball(req.http.Cookie, "comment_.*", ""); }
}

17. Performance & Scalability
 Define the Objective
 Minimize HTTP
Requests
 Minimize Server
Processing
 Optimize Server
Processing
 Optimize the
Database

18. Optimize Server Processing
 Identify the Problem

19. Optimize Server Processing
 Identify the Problem
FIX IT

20. Optimize Server Processing
 Identifying the Problem Areas
 Network
 Linux
 Apache
 MySQL
 PHP

21. Optimize Server Processing
 Identifying the Problem Areas
 Network
 Linux
 Apache
 MySQL
 PHP

22. Optimize Server Processing
 Performance Profiling
 Apache Benchmarking (ab)
 MySQL Slow Query Log & Profiling
 PHP Xdebug & KCachegrind

23. Apache Benchmarking (ab)
# ab -n 100 -c 10 http://d7.blyon.lan/
 10 Concurrent Requests
 100 Requests
 7.35 Requests/Second
 50% of Requests served in
under 1352ms

24. Apache Benchmarking (ab)
 Compress Cached Pages
 Aggregate and Compress CSS files
 Aggregate JavaScript files

25. Apache Benchmarking (ab)
# ab -n 100 -c 10 http://d7.blyon.lan/
 10 Concurrent Requests
 100 Requests
 46.32 Requests/Second
 50% of Requests served in
under 213ms

26. Apache Benchmarking (ab)
 Install APC
 Install APC Drupal Module

27. Apache Benchmarking (ab)
# ab -n 100 -c 10 http://d7.blyon.lan/
 10 Concurrent Requests
 100 Requests
 648.77 Requests/Second
 50% of Requests served in
under 12ms

28. Optimize Server Processing
 Performance Profiling
 Apache Benchmarking (ab)
 MySQL Slow Query Log & Profiling
 PHP Xdebug & KCachegrind

29. MySQL Slow Query Log
/etc/mysql/my.cnf
log_slow_queries = /var/log/mysql/mysql-slow.log
long_query_time = 1
# tail -f /var/log/mysql/mysql-slow.log
# User@Host: root[root] @ localhost []
# Query_time: 0.000427 Lock_time: 0.000037 Rows_sent: 50
Rows_examined: 50
SET timestamp=1294541182;
select * from node;

30. Optimize Server Processing
 Performance Profiling
 Apache Benchmarking (ab)
 MySQL Slow Query Log & Profiling
 PHP Xdebug & KCachegrind

31. PHP Xdebug & KCachegrind
 Xdebug Features
 Stack Traces & Function Traces in Error
Messages
 Memory Allocation
 Infinite Recursion Protection
 PHP Profiling
 Code Coverage Analysis
 Interactive Debugging support

32. PHP Xdebug & KCachegrind
 Xdebug Configuration
 zend_extension="/usr/local/php/modules/xdebug.so"
 xdebug.profiler_enable_trigger = 1
 Xdebug Usage
 Append ”?XDEBUG_PROFILE=1” to URL
 View cachegrind compatible profile log
/tmp/cachegrind.out.10362

33. PHP Xdebug & KCachegrind
 Kcachegrind
 Profile data Visualization tool
 Accepts ”Callgrind Profile” formatted data
 Requires KDE Libraries

34. PHP Xdebug & KCachegrind

35. Now FIX IT

36. Performance & Scalability
 Define the Objective
 Minimize HTTP
Requests
 Minimize Server
Processing
 Optimize Server
Processing
 Optimize the
Database

37. Optimizing the Database
http://day32.com/MySQL/tuning-primer.sh
 Analyzes current my.cnf
 Analyzes resource usage
 Analyzes Caching
 Analyzes Tables and Queries
 Generates recommended my.cnf

38. PERFORMANCE & SCALABILITY
Where to Begin
Brandon Lyon