Mailing List Archive

Upgrade questions
I'm in the process of trying to upgrade the scripts on my
Disinfopedia. Right now it's running the Wikipedia scripts which I
downloaded about three months ago. I'm having some trouble and would
appreciate answers to a few questions.

(1) My immediate *reason* for wanting to upgrade is that my web host
says the existing script "has driven the server load to unbearable
proportions and even caused the server to crash which required a
manual reboot." We got a significant upward spike in usage on Sunday,
which probably accounts for the problem. My first question is: Have
changes made during the past three months improved the efficiency of
the scripts in ways that might reduce the server load? If not, maybe
there's no need for me to upgrade the scripts at this time.

(2) I used CVS to install the new scripts at a temporary URL for
testing purposes, but I haven't been able to get them working. I
compared my current database schema to the schema in buildTables.sql,
and it looks like a number of changes have been made, including:

* In table "user," the field "user_newtalk" has been dropped.

* A table "user_newtalk" has been added.

* In table "cur," the fields "cur_ind_title" and "cur_ind_text" have
been dropped.

* In table "math," the field "math_html_conservative" has been
renamed to "math_html_conservativeness," and a new field
"math_mathml" has been added.

* A table "searchindex" has been added.

I'm assuming that these differences account for the failure of the
current scripts to run my existing database. I could use SQL queries
to add and delete the necessary fields, but I'm nervous about
screwing something up. What's the best way to proceed?

Mil gracias!
--
--------------------------------
| Sheldon Rampton
| Editor, PR Watch (www.prwatch.org)
| Author of books including:
| Friends In Deed: The Story of US-Nicaragua Sister Cities
| Toxic Sludge Is Good For You
| Mad Cow USA
| Trust Us, We're Experts
--------------------------------
Re: Upgrade questions [ In reply to ]
On Mon, 2003-03-17 at 08:06, Sheldon Rampton wrote:
> My first question is: Have
> changes made during the past three months improved the efficiency of
> the scripts in ways that might reduce the server load? If not, maybe
> there's no need for me to upgrade the scripts at this time.

Yes, in several ways:
* Limited client-side caching (enabled for IE) reduces the number of
pages requested.
* Inverse timestamp index makes history list, diff, and user contribs
_not_ exceedingly slow.
* Moving search index to separate table should reduce lock pressure on
'cur' table.

> (2) I used CVS to install the new scripts at a temporary URL for
> testing purposes, but I haven't been able to get them working. I
> compared my current database schema to the schema in buildTables.sql,
> and it looks like a number of changes have been made, including:

You didn't run the update scripts!

See maintenance/patch-list.txt, and double-check that none have been
left off the list by mistake. ;)

Oh, and BACK UP YOUR DATABASE BEFORE PROCEEDING. As I'm sure you already
have...

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)