Version 0.5.1 of WP Super Cache is now available! This release of the plugin will be especially useful for Digg and Slashdot users who experience really huge traffic spikes.
This post has been dugg! Add your Digg here! I doubt it’ll get anywhere near the front page at this stage as it’s only collected 3 diggs in 7 hours. Once it hits 24 hours it disappears forever.
After submitting a site to Digg, some people do the following to get every last ounce of performance out of their WordPress blog, especially on an underpowered server:
- Clear the cookies from their browser so the comment form won’t be filled in. (or use a second browser).
- Visit the page they submitted to Digg and save it to their desktop.
- Open an ftp programme, and recreate the path to the page. Then upload the saved file as “index.html” to that directory.
- Finally, after the Digg subsides 24 hours later, remember to remove the directory structure and index.html.
The new version of WP Super Cache automates all the above. You do have to make your blog’s root directory writable by the webserver, but you’re warned continually that this is a major security risk and reminded to make it read-only again.
Download it here: wp-super-cache.0.5.1.zip
How does it perform versus the regular static files the plugin creates? In most situations you won’t notice any difference, but when there are tens of thousands of requests hitting your server for one particular page, I find that Apache has trouble keeping up.
In other developments, I added checks for PHP safe_mode. Unfortunately safe_mode stops WP Super Cache working properly. I’m glad to see Mark applied my patch for Subscribe to Comments! No more stray emails if you use the moderation queue to approve comments from many posts!
I’m still using WP-Cache 2 on both of my blogs. Do I need to completely remove the plugin in order to install this one? By the way, your “WP Super Cache” page returns this:
404 Not Found
The resource requested could not be found on this server!
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RT – yes. It’s quite simply to install if you’re used to WP-Cache. Thanks for the heads up on the 404, I was testing something and forgot to remove the directory. Oops 🙂
It’s still won’t work for me. Must be running PHP in safe mode or something.
Here’s the spec of my shared hosting server:
E
cPanel Build 18033
Theme x3
Apache version 2.0.61
PHP version 5.2.5
MySQL version 5.0.27-standard
Architecture i686
Operating system Linux
Path to sendmail /usr/sbin/sendmail
Path to PERL /usr/bin/perl
Kernel version 2.6.18-8.1.15.el5
cPanel Pro 1.0 (RC1)
anything there that stands out?
If not, then, I dunno…
-Chuck
So to make sure, if “Super Cache Compression” works on my hosting, will enabling this improve my blogs performance compared to just the standard enabling?
Also, why does wp-cache and wp-super-cache have different amounts of cached and expired pages in the cached contents section?
Hi Donncha,
I’ve been meaning to ask this since I first installed WP-SuperCache (the first beta). I have two special templates for mobile phone users. One is for the Apple iPhone called iWPhone (obviously for my blog) and the other one is for pda and mobile phone users called WordPress Mobile. Both plugins use browser sniffing to serve a special template. I just can’t get this to work with whatever caching plugin I use (and have used). Normal desktop users sometimes get the mobile optimized template (served from the cache), more often than not mobile users get the normal desktop template. WP-(Super)Cache kicks in way before these plugins are called and so I’m forced to turn these plugins off (and send the desktop version to mobile users, for which I’m getting alot of angry complaints).
My question: could you please find out a way to differentiate between ‘desktop’ and ‘mobile’ users and send mobile users to the proper plugin/theme instead of serving the desktop cache??? I’ve been searching for this solution ever since, but nobody seems to be willing to solve this dilemma once and for all.
I’ve read about the non-cache calls, but to be honest that’s way above my head 🙁 Any solution would be much much appreciated!
Kind regards,
-Jean-Paul
John-Paul … I already read a post about that problem, but forgot the url. If I find it again I will write it here. There is a possibility …
What’s really nice is that if you are running on a host that is using phpsuexec, there is no need to make the directory writeable by the world. php runs as your user and it can write your files without that security risk!
This might be especially useful for WordPress bloggers using grid-hosts like Mediatemple and others that charge for extra CPU cycles.
Just a note that in apache 2.2 if you have mod_deflate setup you are better to serve only .html and let apache take care of compression (that said, most hosts do this half assed), if you contact me via email i can explain it some more if you’d like more information about it. Real shame we have nothing like drupal’s aggregate css and js files in wordpress as yet! Combine this with aggregated css and js and a mod_deflate apache… would make for a fast wordpress setup!
Trophaeum – I tested mod_deflate but I wasn’t happy with the results. I don’t think mod_deflate caches the gzipped content like mod_gzip does. When under load Apache served .html.gz files much faster than with mod_deflate gzipping .html files.
AFAIR, there was no mention of caching on the mod_deflate page. I can only presume that gzipping was done on-the-fly unfortunately.
Marcel: I would be MUCH obliged if you could digg up that url (or if Donncha tackles the problem directly in WP-SuperCache)
Many of us find this plugin too difficult to install and configure. For very technically proficient users of WP, it is great. But for the vast majority of us it is beyond our capabilities. One person who I know and would consider quite advanced technically did install and configure it but claimed it took him 4 hours to get it correct and was the hardest install of a WP plugin he had ever done.
Maybe the intended user base for the plugin does not include non-tech types or it just may not be possible to simplify, but it would sure be great if there was an easier way to install and use it!
WT – sorry that you’re having problems installing it but why don’t you use the forums and ask for help?
It has got to the stage where if you’re using a fairly standard WP on Apache+mod_php install then the plugin will install and try to configure itself correctly to cope with local oddities. Unfortunately it’s nigh on impossible to forsee the problems everyone will have and it’s only through feedback that it can be improved.
There is a solution for anyone who doesn’t want to get their hands dirty with the nitty-gritty of running a webserver – hire someone to maintain it or set up a blog on wordpress.com and you’ll be able to cope with *any* level of traffic.
Cool! I used to disable wp-cache and running WP Super Cache now!
Vey Cool !
i need to get this plugin
Well Donncha, this is the real me, finally leaving a comment on the post 🙂