Mitchel, you might want to point out, that disabling "Auto-Sync File System" does not improve view performance. Enabling this option, will resync file entries for the currently selected directory, when creating a file link in URLControl and should be enabled, if the user uploads files using ftp etc.

Mitchel,
Thanks for putting together such a great list of things to do to speed up a DNN site. As always your efforts are appreciated.
Thanks,
Tom

18 months ago I was doing demos of my site www.AgingSafely.com at trade shows and couldn’t count on having internet access. This meant that I needed “Snappy” performance running as localhost with EVERTHING being done on my laptop. I looked thru dozens of DotNetNuke performance forum posts. I took a list of the dozen or so most common and tried them one or two at a time. Most were the same as your list. There may have had significant performance gains if you are running a site the size of DotNetNuke, but had not observable gains on my site with a few hundred pages and 50 portals. Since much of my setup comes from Lee Sykes DNN Creative videos, I already had event logs that self-pruned, the scheduler limited, etc.

As I worked downs the list I was getting dejected.

When I got to the final item Snapsis PageBlaster, I finally saw “Snappy” performance. I have been a user for 18 months and now am using V3.* and most of its features.

This item should not be last on the list, but should be first on everyone’s list. I also use it for xhtml fix-ups, moving content from one page/site to another, and many other non-performance issues.

Regards - DaveS

Sebastian,

Yes you are correct, when the scheduler is in timer mode. There is a slight gain, at least I have noticed with disabling it when in Request mode, most likely just due to the task starting.

Dave,

Personally I notice the DNN configuration changes helping on the smaller sites, single portal a few hundred pages, and PageBlaster really starts to shine on the Medium to larger sites. For example a site such as DotNetNuke could REALLY benefit from something like PageBlaster.

What do you think of the PowerDNN database tune-up? They run a process every night that improves the performance dramatically. I am not sure what they do but I can tell the difference each morning.

I will refrain from much discussion about the PowerDNN optimizations.

THey are cleaning the EventLog that is one of the biggest items that they are doing.

I like your guides and tips. Thanks!

Hi Mitch,

This is a great summary thanks. I was wondering about the menu changes you discuss. One site I manage www.mofga.org uses the solpart menu. How could I change that? Is there a tutorial, guide, etc.? Do you I need to have the skin 'rewritten'? If so, whom might you recommend?

I noticed a big speed up of my sites when I went from shared hosting to dedicated server.

thanks,

Will

Will,

Modifications to the skin will be needed. Drop me an e-mail at msellers@iowacomputergurus.com and I'll get you in contact with someone.

Super - thanks for posting these - it's good to have a checklist like this to go through.

One question - is pageblaster still worthwhile on a dnn5 site? I remember using it on an early 4.0 site and it made a huge difference, but I got the impression that dnn itself was a lot faster now.

Thanks again - super post

Stuart

yes, with 4.4.1 and later releases performance improvements were done, but PageBlaster still gives a lot of benefits

Just Super ! I experienced a drop in performance when I use my multiple site hosting for a couple of hours. Your article gave me some consideration about host settings. The performance improvement is easily reached, thanks again.

Hi Mitch,

I do not use the DNN search on my biggest site - it just not get the job done for me so I use google (http://www.mofga.org/Search/tabid/192/Default.aspx). So I should just disable the DNN search from the scheduler altogether, right? - thanks.

Will,

You are 100% correct, if you are not using the DNN search, disable the task. It is a BIG performance hit, especially on large sites.

Mitchel, auto file sync in Host Settings has nothing to do with the file sync scheduled task. In fact: the file sync scheduled task should NEVER be activated since it contains serious bugs (it is deactivated when upgrading to dnn 4.9.0 even). Like Sebastian says, the auto file sync sincs the filesystem on a "need to know" basis, ie. when the dnn url control is displayed, or when the core filemanager is displayed. I would not recommend turning it of

Erik,

In some ways I agree, but I have seen it cause errors, and with MOST people that I talk to NOT FTPing files to the site, it is not needed, and is an added performance hit. I should put a bigger note there about its purpose though.

In general, any scheduled task shall only be enabled, if needed. unfortunately, this requires understanding of the various tasks, its purpose and effects. Search is in most cases the most "expensive" tasks any it should be considered carefully, whether it is needed and how often it shall run.
Scheduled FileSync will be eliminated in next DNN version (5.0.1/4.9.2). I have never experienced issues with AutoFileSync, neither myself nor from forum users. I can imagine issues only, when files are locked by other processes of missing folder permissions.

I agree 100% with that Sebastian in regards to the enable/disabling of scheduled tasks. It isn't something that you should leave at default, and it takes careful consideration.

It is good to know that the File Sync task is getting removed.

My only complaint about Auto-Sync is that since it syncs every time that a URL control is displayed, or in file manager, in sites with a lot of files, and NO FTP uploads, there is a performance hit on the load of those controls. But it is less of an issue than some of the other items, because it is an admin-only visible issue.

I would also recommend a pinging/keep alive service or application. smarterping is a good free tool if you have a server or pc that's always on & connected.

I also wanted to bring up another point since you host at 3essentials too:

http://knowledge.3essentials.com/web-hosting/article/344/Performance-problems-and-tuning-for-ASP.net-based-sites-including-DNN.html

Yes, that is a good point as well.

I'm also going to be launching my own KeepAlive service in the next 1-2 weeks as well.

I just went thru your checklist on my developing site. The site goes TOO FAST now lol

Great article. Thank you!

Comments from the following blog entry: How I Get My DotNetNuke Sites to Load So Fast, located at: http://www.dotnetkicks.com/opensource/How_I_Get_My_DotNetNuke_Sites_to_Load_So_Fast

Very nice document!!, someone have any other document to recomend the best setting for the IIS to use with a big DNN portal? we have al most 200.000 users and 16.000 articles in our portal.

Comments from the following blog entry: Beef up your performance with DNN (DotNetNuke), located at: http://www.mytechthoughts.com/post/2009/01/27/Beef-up-your-performance-with-DNN-(DotNetNuke).aspx

Comments from the following blog entry: Beef up your performance with DNN (DotNetNuke), located at: http://www.mytechthoughts.com/post/2009/01/13/Beef-up-your-performance-with-DNN-(DotNetNuke).aspx

Comments from the following blog entry: Beef up your performance with DNN (DotNetNuke), located at: http://www.mytechthoughts.com/post/2009/01/13/Beef-up-your-performance-with-DNN-(DotNetNuke).aspx

Thanks for all your help, I was able to speed up my site considerably: www.shutdownfriday.com

Comments from the following blog entry: A useful article for DNN optimization, located at: http://www.fooloo.net/Home/tabid/126/EntryId/3/A-useful-article-for-DNN-optimization.aspx

Comments from the following blog entry: A useful article for DNN optimization, located at: http://www.fooloo.net/Home/tabid/126/EntryId/3/A-useful-article-for-DNN-optimization.aspx

Comments from the following blog entry: A useful article for DNN optimization, located at: http://www.fooloo.net/Home/tabid/126/EntryId/3/A-useful-article-for-DNN-optimization.aspx

Thank you, thank you, thank you. The speed of my site has been very frustrating. These changes made all the difference in the world. What a difference!!! Thank you!

Jeremy,

I'm glad that this has helped you! Spread the word!

Comments from the following blog entry: 优化DotNetNuke网站性能的10个技巧, located at: http://www.cnblogs.com/dnnmix/archive/2009/04/16/1437208.html

Comments from the following blog entry: 优化DotNetNuke网站性能的10个技巧, located at: http://www.cnblogs.com/qing123/archive/2009/04/22/1441064.html

Mitchel - This information was unbelievable... I implemented your suggestions and what used to be a somewhat slow loading site... my site now screams (http://www.FroTime.com). Awesome - thanks a ton!

Comments from the following blog entry: Beef up your performance with DNN (DotNetNuke), located at: http://www.mytechthoughts.com/post/2009/01/13/Beef-up-your-performance-with-DNN-(DotNetNuke).aspx

On the topic of PageBlaster. I tried it for 3-4 days on DNN5.1.4, but eventually unistalled it. Yes, there is an performace increase (a lot).
I use a lot of Ventrian Property Agent modules and they have a lot of dynamic content, which does not work with PB.

I had to do exclusion for captcha and also I use freindly urls, human readable which cause issues because now it is difficult to exclude pages which are in admin edit mode.
The I also have some AJAX issues, so I had to exclude ajax (issues like the fist time I click, nothing happens, but on second click it post)
I also had to disable the move of js files to the header...had some serious js errors doing this.
Taking into accaount all the stuff I had to disable, I've remove it from my host.

A lot of this exclusions was done because there is multiple portals on one DNN host and some settings are global, so you have to disable features to get all you hosts working.

If you have one site, one DNN instance, then it is a different ballgame because you will need less tweaks to get everything running smooth with PB.

Take note, this is not a negative review on PB, it does have a huge improvment on Performance, but be warned...your time could get blogged down in tweaking and exclusion regular expressions!

excellent, thanks a lot for this. I've put this to work with good results. In adition to the setup I found that database maintenance can be crucial as well, depending on the size and activity of the project.

hey Mitch,

This may be a stupid question - but can you use the core compression (Host Settings) AND PageBlaster or do you have to disable the former if using PB?

Thanks

Rodney,

If I recall correctly you would NOT want to use core compression if you are using PageBlaster, you would essentially be doing compression twice which will NOT continue to have benefit.

Thanks Mitchel,

That's a very helpful summary.

Regards,

Paul Taylor

And by the way, your Scheduled SQL Jobs module has proved invaluable help in improving site performance.

Thanks for great article. I cannot find Advanced -> Authentication Settings ... under Host settings. Am I missing something?

Jakeman,

They moved it in 5.x in some places. "Admin" -> "Extensions", then click edit next to the one that you want.

Mitchel,

Thanks for your article. Just wondered what you thought about this one on the same subject. Lots of duplicates, but some different suggestions as well, would you agree with them all?

http://dotnetnuke-solutions.blogspot.com/2009/02/dnn-optimization-steps.html

Rob,

I agree with some, but not all.

Thanks, but i was sort of hoping you could be more specific about which ones you don't agree with.

Principally 1, 14 and 16 (understand if you wouldnt like to comment on all).

Rob,

I'd rather not post publicly about this, drop me an e-mail at msellers@iowacomputergurus.com and we can discuss.

Thanks for the useful article. One comment on the caching settings however: I found that on shared hosting where you have no control of the process memory allocation, the Memory cache setting tends to produce Out of Memory exceptions. Setting the cache setting to File in these circumstances reduces or eliminates exceptions and is advisable.