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Hi all, please see this major site announcement: https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058427594/boards-ie-2026

Please Dump All Old/Closed Threads From The BOARDS . . .

  • 16-04-2007 01:41PM
    #1
    tak
    Closed Accounts Posts: 394 ✭✭


    Folks,

    Holding old and closed threads is only slowing down the rate of access to the existing posts.

    So why not have a procedure to dump the old or closed threads ?

    Getting to my PM page today was hell - and I use Mozilla too . . .

    I see nor reason to store this junk, no reason to buy surplus capacity BUT every reason to speed up users' access to their pages of interest . . .

    That's how I view things anyway.

    Regards,

    Tak.
    Post edited by Shield on


Comments

  • #2
    Boston
    Closed Accounts Posts: 17,163 ✭✭✭✭Boston


    Your view is wrong. The storage of old posts does not have an adverse effect on overall performance.


  • #3
    seamus
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 68,173 ✭✭✭✭seamus


    The problem is with one of the ad servers. Old posts and threads are not causing any problems.


  • #4
    irlrobins
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,541 ✭✭✭irlrobins


    Pft! Noobs.:rolleyes:


  • #5
    aidan_walsh
    Closed Accounts Posts: 17,208 ✭✭✭✭aidan_walsh


    tak wrote:
    Holding old and closed threads is only slowing down the rate of access to the existing posts.
    What makes you come to this conclusion? Which is utterly wrong, but it would be nice to hear your logic anyway.


  • #6
    FX Meister
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,215 ✭✭✭FX Meister


    Get rid of the ads so. Simple


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  • #7
    MarkR
    Moderators, Regional Midwest Moderators, Paid Member Posts: 11,390 Mod ✭✭✭✭MarkR


    Revenue. Who needs it? :rolleyes:


  • #8
    RuggieBear
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 17,958 ✭✭✭✭RuggieBear


    :d


  • #9
    DeVore
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 32,387 ✭✭✭✭DeVore


    Yeah and burn all those books too!! History? Who needs it! :)

    As a genuine answer... imagine you had the index of a library and that library had a 10 million books. Now that list (index) is sorted by the Most Recent Book Taken Out. So, the list starts with the book most recently taken out. Then the next most recently taken out etc etc.

    Suppose that 20 books are listed per page... this list is then 500,000 pages long. However if I asked you for the last 40 books that were taken out... you'd rip the top two pages off and hand them to me. It wouldnt make it faster if that list was 10 pages long or 500,000 pages long.

    Thats database indexing 101 basically.

    DeV.


  • #10
    tak
    Closed Accounts Posts: 394 ✭✭tak


    What makes you come to this conclusion? Which is utterly wrong, but it would be nice to hear your logic anyway.


    Well Aidan,

    My reasoning was that all the old posts - since they are data and hence part of the base that has to be lifted each time one goes to a page where one can select either old or new posts - would slow down the rate of access to that page.

    Surely a database having a bigger bulk (not all text data either) will be slower to handle ?

    I was also awful vexed at the time it took me yesterday to get to one single PM.
    Each time it tried to open the message it conked out.
    "Done" was on the bottom of the screen but that screen was blank . . .

    Okay, all my programming has been on things that have nothing to do with text data.
    I do not know anything much about DBs. Just use Excel/Access as handy tools to make own customer databases, etc.
    But whatever it is it was a real b***s yesterday, not the first time either.

    Over to you.

    Tak.


  • #11
    Boston
    Closed Accounts Posts: 17,163 ✭✭✭✭Boston


    You should look up how cache's work also. A properly designed cache of recently accessed data greatly improves performance. Infact you'd be looking at 90% + data accesses being serviced via the cache.


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  • #12
    oscarBravo
    Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 28,865 Mod ✭✭✭✭oscarBravo


    tak wrote:
    My reasoning was that all the old posts - since they are data and hence part of the base that has to be lifted each time one goes to a page where one can select either old or new posts - would slow down the rate of access to that page.

    Surely a database having a bigger bulk (not all text data either) will be slower to handle ?
    I'd politely suggest doing some reading on why DBMS exist, never mind how they work, before making further suggestions. I've worked in the past on relational databases with several million rows per table, where it was necessary to access almost any arbitrary subset of data, on demand, with sub-second response times. The whole point of how a database works is to make its size pretty much irrelevant.


  • #13
    Sleepy
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2, Paid Member Posts: 24,843 ✭✭✭✭Sleepy


    DeVore wrote:
    Yeah and burn all those books too!! History? Who needs it! :)

    As a genuine answer... imagine you had the index of a library and that library had a 10 million books. Now that list (index) is sorted by the Most Recent Book Taken Out. So, the list starts with the book most recently taken out. Then the next most recently taken out etc etc.

    Suppose that 20 books are listed per page... this list is then 500,000 pages long. However if I asked you for the last 40 books that were taken out... you'd rip the top two pages off and hand them to me. It wouldnt make it faster if that list was 10 pages long or 500,000 pages long.

    Thats database indexing 101 basically.

    DeV.
    Nice analogy, I may just use that next time a customer asks why I'm telling them to get their DBA team to run stats on their system database :)

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  • #14
    tak
    Closed Accounts Posts: 394 ✭✭tak


    Thank ya boys.

    Regards,

    Tak.


  • #15
    gandalf
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 26,457 ✭✭✭✭gandalf


    You just got served :p


  • #16
    homah_7ft
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,137 ✭✭✭homah_7ft


    So the solution is get rid of new threads :D


  • #17
    Seth Brundle
    Moderators, Politics Moderators, Paid Member Posts: 45,375 Mod ✭✭✭✭Seth Brundle


    Im confused.
    What has all this database stuff got to do with the monkeys that type out the page each time a user requests it?

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  • #18
    The Muppet
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 14,009 ✭✭✭✭The Muppet


    Good idea and just in case they are needed in the future we could ask redspider to store them in his file. Space may be a bit tight though


  • #19
    Sparky
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 22,227 ✭✭✭✭Sparky


    Tak I hope you weren't involved in the persecution of innocent adverts in computer hardware FS on adverts.ie


    May the boards database crimes tribunal hear a good deal about this if you were.

    *shakes fist*


  • #20
    Stabshauptmann
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,885 ✭✭✭Stabshauptmann


    while we're at it can we delete the inactive users too


  • #21
    irlrobins
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,541 ✭✭✭irlrobins


    ^ Now while this might not affect performance it might free up some desired usernames....


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  • #22
    DeVore
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 32,387 ✭✭✭✭DeVore


    Has it been a year already? It seems like only last month I was answering this suggestion... :)


    DeV


  • #23
    fade2black
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,936 ✭✭✭fade2black


    Ah yes. Fadetoblack you thieving non posting bastard!


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