Forum Moderators: phranque
DSZ
mySQL is extremely fast - you won't notice a decrease in speed if you switch from individual html files to mySQL-driven pages. In fact, it may even be faster, as your server won't have to wade through the 1000's of html files to locate the one you need.
If you're on a windows server you could use ASP in place of PHP. I would recommend you stick with mySQL regardless of platform, however, as it is capable of holding millions of records per database without performance hits like MS Access would. MS Access also has a limit of concurrent users before it starts throwing up. mySQL is also free, unlike some other comparable databases such as MSSQL or Oracle.
Other reasons to use a scripting language like php or asp:
You can use includes on your pages. If all your pages share a similar header, imagine what would happen if you had to make a change to all of them. You'd have to edit each html file separately. But if you're using PHP you can just include a header file; all you'll have to do is edit that one file and all the pages will change.
You can use mod_rewrite [on apache webserver] to dynamically create filenames. What this means is you can make it appear as if you have 1000's of html files, when in fact the server is just renaming something like:
widget.com/webpage.php?databasequery=135
to:
widget.com/title_taken_from_database.html
I'm not an expert by any means - in fact, I was asking the same question as you about 6 months ago. I figured out the basics of php and mySQL within a few days, despite not really even knowing what mySQL was or how to use it.
So the moral of the story is that you should switch to a scripting language and database, and that it won't be hard :) The people around here are very helpful, and you can find answers to most scripting/database questions in Google.
That is really a great point and I am putting couple of big ++ for using database.
But let mi get back to my original question. Can anybody positively confirm and hopefully explain why the following (1) is faster then (2):
(1)
1.Open page1.php 1.1. page1.php is found almost instantly as the search is within few pages 2.Open PHP 3.Open mySQL 4.Find where is record XYZ in the database 5.Get record XYZ from that location 6. Include the XYZ in the data to be send. 7.Send Data
(2)
1.Open page1000.html 1.1 Find where is file page1000.html in the file system 2. Get File 3. Send Data
As I see it point 4. from variant (1) must be significantly faster than point 1.1 of variant (2) (i.e. designed to work with substantial amounts of data, or the file system to be unable to handle well more then couple of hundred files) to overcompensate the additional steps required in var. (1)
Is this the case or am I missing something?
DSZ
Databases, however, are also very fast, and the difference in speed is likely to be minimal if you use a fast script that doesn't hit your database too hard, and you aren't on a server that's bogged down with too much traffic or other sites that do use processor-intensive scripts.
The database would help you a great deal in adding lots of information to your site fast. If you don't use any database-like features and it's just for page fetching, you'll have one very, very fast site indeed. Maintenance will be much easier - you won't have to run a search/replace on your template for changes, but just add the stuff you need to one file and it'll be there on all your pages. When you add or delete a page, links will be updated without you having to do anything. You'll have to think about your cache policy, though - if you don't, just try to mimic a caching scenario similar to what your server is already running. A good caching script will allow you to do this if it supports E-tags and other cache-relevant headers.
You may lose time with a database(maybe, I don't know), but if you write a good script to access your database and time it against your current structure, I bet there is only a microsecond of a difference. Too small of a difference to even notice.
Hope that helps
