I was particularly interested in attending the WordPress Optimization session presented by Ben Metcalfe of WP Engine during WordCamp Philly. Considering that most of our end-users are on shared hosting and not well-versed on technical jargon, it’s common to receive questions on the support forums related to slow sites / servers / and optimization tips.

Ben provided a list of to-dos for WordPress optimization. Some are a bit technical and you may need a server admin to perform them, however others are do-able right from within WordPress. If I find a link to Ben’s presentation online, I’ll be sure to link directly to it. For now, here’s the quick list to consider depending on your setup and circumstances:

For all users:

• Keep WP Updated – Always stay updated.
• Use a Cache Plugin – WP Super Cache or W3 Total Cache work for most users. Even WordPress.com uses a cache plugin.
• Deactivate Unused Plugins – If you have plugins you are not using, deactivate them. If you’re sure you do not need them, delete the plugins. Note that in some cases, even if a plugin is deactivated, it may still be loaded into memory. In short, be a neat-freak about your plugins.
• Avoid Bad Plugins – I provide a list of some of these on the support forums.
• Review Your Theme – roughly 1/3 of all optimization problems are due to theme code. Ensure it validates. When possible, place CSS at top and Javascript at bottom (not inline). If you see any weird code (i.e., making requests to other sites on the internet) then abandon that theme.
• Hosting – Check your hosting solution. Who is on your server? Use YouGetSignal’s Reverse IP Lookup if you wish to see other sites on your site. If you have non-kosher sites on the same server, ask your host to move you to another one. If you have a thousand other sites on your server, you have quite a packed server (or said differently, a terrible host).
• Offloading (poor-man’s CDN) – If you have the ability to offload your images or other large files (videos, etc.), do it. Flickr is a great solution for serving images.
• Feedburn your RSS Feed – Let Google’s FeedBurner handle your feed. Check your logs to see how many requests are made to your /feed url.
• Repair your MySQL Database – Be consistent in repairing your MySQL database. Once a month is fine for most users.
  • OptimizeDB plugin by Joost does this for you without any overhead
  • Use PHPMyAdmin – only if you are tech and db-savvy
  • Manually – only if you are tech and db-savvy
• Load from Multiple Sub-domains – To bypass limits on simultaneous processing, if you understand domain mapping and server administration, then look into using multiple sub-domains for serving files. Even better, try using different domains.

  good:

  foo1.yourdomain.com, foo2.yourdomain.com

  better:

  foo1.otherdomain.com, foo2.otherdomain2.com

• Browser Caching – W3 Total Cache will take care of this – HTTP cache-control, expires header, and entitry tags.

For Advanced Users and High Traffic Sites:

• Log Slow MySQL Queries – check your logs! What’s taking the most time? Dig into it.
• Good How To:
  Check Site with Profile Tools- use any of the tools below to dig into your site’s performance.
  • WP-Tuner
  • WPDB Profiling
  • WP Engine’s Speed Test
  • YSlow
• CDN – Use a CDN. It can be used all the time – OR – just in “emergencies.”
  • MaxCDN (used by WP Engine)
  • Amazon CloudFront
  • CloudFlare
• Smush Images – Let’s face it – you don’t sit there and optimize every image before uploading it to your site. The plugin below will do it for you.
  • WPSmush.it plugin
• APC / Opcode cache – PHP-APC + W3-Total-Cache
• Apache Optimization – your server admin should be able to optimize your Apache server. When possible, disable .htaccess and use httpd.conf instead (central library that Apache uses). Do NOT attempt this unless you know what you are doing! It is not for beginners.
• Dedicated MySQLDB Box – Consider moving your MySQLDB Box to another server in the same data center.
• Reverse-proxy with nginx – Run Apache on port 8080. Cache static pages.
• Varnish Cache – Ideally, do not run Varnish on port 80 (even though some tutorials tell you to do so on port 80). Varnish cache doesn’t like cookies. Send cookies to nginx.
  • Update (Jake’s Comment)
    Varnish VCL should be configured to destroy cookies when unnecessary (not logged) and to destroy cookie of static content.

    http://blog.brigato.fr/2011/12/24/wordpress-performance-guide-from-5-to-6100-requestssec-on-a-1vcpu1gb-ram-vps/

• Memcache – Ideally, run Memcache on a separate box in the same datacenter under the same subnet.
• HyperDB – multiple database servers – not intended for the standard user.
• Static Site on Amazon S3 – If you can generate your site as static pages, Amazon can host them. Do not do this if your site requires any dynamic widgets or data processing.

Finally, here’s something that should be reinforced by everyone, do not edit WordPress core files. It’s not good practice and will be overwritten when you upgrade your WP installation.

Now, go optimize your site!

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• Shared Hosting – We recommend HostGator to clients who are getting started or have growing sites.
• VPS / Cloud – We highly recommend VPS.NET, After all, Gabfire Themes runs on it.

So you acquired a domain name, and are now looking at web hosting providers for your WordPress sites. With all the different choices and providers out there, where should you start your search for the best web hosting? In this article, we explain the various types of hosting, features to consider, and provide a few recommendations.

Types of Web Hosting

Free Hosting

Many hosts will have promotions or specials for free hosting. As with most things free, there will be an up-sell at a future date. In our opinion, free hosting is fine if you plan on hosting a very simple, static site that requires little to no processing power from the server. However, if you are running WordPress, free hosting is not geared towards your site. Additionally, free hosting can have a negative perception and user experience for visitors to your site. However, if you just want a site online, there’s nothing wrong with free hosting as long as you are willing to accept the lack of performance and user experience.

Shared Hosting

Most online sites are hosted on Shared Hosting environments. This means that several accounts (i.e., other sites) are also being hosted on the same server and using the same resources (bandwidth, RAM, etc.) of that physical server. Shared hosting is more affordable and popular since all the users are sharing the costs. If you do not expect high amounts of traffic and have a standard website, shared hosting is a suitable hosting solution. There are many reputable hosts that offer this solution at very low prices. Therefore, when choosing between free hosting vs. shared hosting, opt for shared hosting as it will definitely give you more reliability and features. Most shared hosting accounts come with one-click installations of popular software – such as WordPress – as well as shopping carts and other add-ons. However, when several accounts are using the same fixed amount of resources on a server, there will be noticeable variations in performance and stability at times. Servers may go down due to scripts executed on other users’ sites, or a single site may use up more resources leaving less for the other sites on the server. These are the types of reasons that drive more popular blogs, and especially those who make money off their sites, to opt for cloud hosting (VPS) or Dedicated hosting.

VPS Hosting

VPS stands for Virtual Private Server. Unlike shared hosting where other websites are sharing the same fixed resources as your site, a VPS is a virtual instance of a server that can be used exclusively by an individual customer of the service. In short, it means the resources available all for your sites (not sharing). VPS hosting is becoming more and more affordable nowadays but is still more expensive than shared hosting.

Dedicated Hosting

Dedicated hosting means obtaining full access to a server, and all its available resources, exclusively for your site. If you have a popular site, get massive amounts of traffic, or just want the scalability of resources on a server, then dedicated hosting may be the right hosting solution. This is what the big boys online use. But having a dedicated server means you alone are responsible for all aspects of it including, in most cases, the server administration, upgrading, security, and uptime/downtime. Furthermore, this is the most expensive hosting solution. It can get even more expensive if you choose to have the hosting provider manage all the administration of the dedicated server.

Hosting Features

Hosting providers are great at marketing their offerings. When making a decision on which host to choose, you should carefully consider all the following factors:

• Reliability - Check hosting reviews for the provider and ensure they are reliable. Are their servers up all the time? Keep in mind that almost every hosting company claims their servers are up 99.99% of the time. Therefore, read recent reviews on their forums to see what types of issues and questions existing users are raising.
• Speed – Do site hosted by the host load quickly and correlate to the hosting package you plan on selecting?
• Support - Is the host available for technical support? How quickly do they respond if/when a site or server goes down?
• Limitations - Are there any special restrictions the host imposes on its users. If so, choose another host.
• Web Tools – These are important internet hosting tools to support blogging. Make sure your host provides these.
• Control Panel – You will definitely need access to a control panel. The most popular control panels are cPanel and Plesk. Does your host offer access to these so that you can make changes to your site?
• Cost – Does the cost of hosting meet your expectations of the service?
• Scalability – If your site grows, will it be easy to upgrade your account to a better server / package?
• Location – Does your hosting provider have servers in your country or in neighboring countries? It’s important that your server be geographically close to the majority of your visitors.
• Bandwidth and Storage – Does the package you selected allocate enough bandwidth and storage to accommodate the software and website you are running?

Web Hosting Recommendations

We work with hundreds of users who ask for our recommendation. Based on our past experience, the following hosting providers have consistently satisfied our web hosting needs:

• Shared Hosting – We recommend HostGator to clients who are getting started or have growing sites.
• VPS / Cloud – We highly recommend VPS.NET, After all, Gabfire Themes runs on it.

Once you have your hosting secured, you can move on to installing WordPress and getting your web site up and running.

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If you’re reading this then you want to know how to buy a domain name. Acquiring a great domain name is the first step in building a web site. It’s also one of the easiest things to do online – even for beginners with no technical knowledge.

Considerations

• Do Keyword Research. If you plan on building a web site related to horse riding, then you’ll want to research the keywords in Google and check out your competition. Based on your research, determine what keywords you plan on targeting for search results and choose the domain name that best reflects your topic. Tip: It’s a good idea to have your keyword in your domain name for ranking purposes. This is not absolutely necessary, but definitely helps.
• Choose the proper top-level domain or TLD. In other words, the suffix of your domain (i.e., .com, .net, .org, .info, etc). If your business is in the United States, then you should use .com as your domain. Most users assume domains end with a .com, so that should be your first preference. If .com is not available, only then would I recommend .net. The .org TLD is reserved for nonprofits. Stick to these TLDs and avoid the rest.
• Check the domain name history. Google for previously indexed pages or any negative backlinks. You want to start with a clean slate.

Common Misconceptions

• You do NOT have to purchase your domain name from the same company that you choose to host your website. A domain registrar can be different from the domain hosting provider. For example, you can purchase the domain name at GoDaddy, and then host it at HostGator.
• You do NOT need to have an established company to purchase a domain name. Anyone can acquire a name.

How To Register a Domain Name

To register your own domain name – such as gabfirethemes.com or yourdomain.com – for your web site, you can use a registrar such as GoDaddy.

1. Go to GoDaddy or any domain registrar
2. Search for your preferred domain name. If it is not available, continue searching in order of preference.
3. Purchase the domain name.
4. Ensure you setup auto-renewal of the domain name so that it does not slip away by mistake.
5. If hosting elsewhere, change the domain nameservers (DNS) to those provided by your hosting provider.

You are now the proud owner of online real estate. Your next step is to find a solid WordPress web hosting provider.

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One of the major change of WordPress 2.5 was to remove the IDs on all admin pages. The reason of removing ID’s from admin pages was probably due to the fact that the common user don’t need them but since our templates are magazine/news style where we do have multiple loops on main pages, we will need to check category ID’s in order to set our templates.

If your browser shows the URL in the status bar, you can see the ID number when you mouse over the category link. If the status bar is disabled, you can activate it by checking the Status bar choice under View on both Firefox and Internet Explorer.

Check Category ID

‘

Check Page ID

Use a Plugin to Check ID No’s

The other way of checking ID numbers is to download and install Reveal IDs for WP Admin. When you install that plugin, the ID numbers will be printed next to categories as in following screenshot.

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