BrakeBlog Oct 2011 – Jan 2012 (Godaddy)

BrakeBlog

Page loadtime High 1086ms – Average 639ms – Low 360ms

Christian Heights UMC (ditto)

CHUMC

High 1730ms – Average 1080ms – Low 379ms

The church website loads 440ms slower on average when it is running normally. It will be interesting to see how these numbers change since the BrakeBlog has transitioned to its new home.

Another thing which is much more surprising to me personally is the radical difference in traffic patterns between my personal blog and the church website. The BrakeBlog received 143 (non-unique) visits in December while transferring 709 megabytes of data during the same period. These numbers are reversed on the church though. CHUMC received only 64 (non-unique) visits while transferring 1,810 megabytes in December. 28 megabytes per CHUMC user versus only 5 megabytes per BrakeBlog user. I have to think that the sermons I post online are far more popular than I realized.

Thanks to Paul Lloyd

Doing this analysis I realize how large both websites are. The church website seems to hit a ceiling at 100 users. I have been disappointed that I haven’t been able to attract more than that. A CHUMC user, however, is much more involved and that counts as much or more than the simple visitor total. After I move both websites away from Godaddy those TX/RX lights on the server won’t be blinking quite as fast as they were.

To all my visitors on the BrakeBlog and Christian Heights, THANK YOU! Stay tuned for the follow-up post when we find out what were the results of this experiment.

Energynet Datacenter

I have been a GoDaddy customer since 2003. For the vast majority of that time the service from GoDaddy was acceptable though not excellent. I tolerated many of GoDaddy issues because none justified the time necessary to switch. The most recent example happened in September 2011. The website for Christian Heights began loading very slowly and throwing “500 Internal Server” errors. When I emailed Support about this, their best response was to paraphrase; “It’s not our fault! WordPress is slow, you need to optimize your database.”

Our administrators actively monitor the performance of our hosting and balance the load on the servers as needed. However, as your site is hosted within a shared environment, you may experience periods of reduced performance. This can generally be caused by the application interfacing with the database or just to the amount of content the site contains. You can improve performance by optimizing the fields and tables of your database.

They are full of —— er, baloney. I know this primarily because the problem stopped immediately after I contacted them even though Support never admitted to doing anything. I have shopped for alternatives before but never bothered to make a serious move because Godaddy was always the cheapest among the mid-tier registrars. Being cheap always trumped whatever service problems I experienced.

It became a matter of principle when I read that Godaddy was supporting SOPA/PIPA. This time I am strongly motivated to leave Godaddy. I picked Hopkinsville Electric’s Energynet service to be my new web host. Energynet being local is very important. It is the primary reason why I am willing to pay more. I have taken the first step by transferring ericbrake.com to Hover. I expect to move christianheightsumc.org and ericbrake.ws also though not immediately. ericbrake.com will operate as a test site while I learn how to migrate both blogs to new installations of WordPress.

Clunker Computer

Mom’s current computer is at least ten years old. Back in the day it probably ran Windows 98, then I put Linux on it. Now is the time for it to go to the scrap pile and be replaced by Mom’s New old computer. Dad made a comment that when the HP is setup for Mom’s use that it should have an anti-virus installed. So I remembered that Microsoft was now producing it’s own anti-virus free for everyone. It is my opinion that both McAfee and Norton should drop dead anyway. I considered Microsoft Security Essentials to be far better than any of my other options.

My original plan was to setup the laptop where the CRT monitor is sitting now. Mom would use a regular keyboard and mouse just like she is now. However, my plan changed when Mom said she wanted to use the keyboard and touchpad built in to the laptop. The touchpad is something new that she has never used before. She thinks using the touchpad is more advanced than a plain mouse. I’m not sure that the touchpad is the best thing for her but if she wants to try it, so be it. What this means for the moment is that the laptop can’t sit where I originally planned for it. I was disappointed because I was ready to tear into the old computer and start unhooking it but such was not meant to be.

Old vs New

The old laptop on the left is an HP Pavilion dv4000 and the new one on the right is a Dell Inspiron N5010. The HP has been through the battle and it came out only slightly dinged. A piece of molding on the left side is broke off and there is a wear mark on the right side of the touch pad where my hand always rested. The Intel graphics are old enough that they are no longer supported by the 2.6.38 Linux kernel. Finally, the main reason why I replaced the HP is that the cd burner started throwing errors when I was burning sermons on disk for church.

broken molding on laptop

Those are all of the things wrong with the laptop but that wouldn’t prevent it from being useful in retirement. Once I have the Dell setup and I’m at home using it. I will give the old laptop to my mom for her to use. The HP is still a fast machine good for web surfing and email.

Only mildly related is the fact that Bing search copied the same feature. What pops up in Bing has little to no importance but it is still amusing.

If you type in “Christian Heights” one of the suggestions is Christian Heights United Methodist Church. I am the maintainer of the CHUMC website and I like the way Bing search is thinking.

Bing recommends CHUMC

Archos 5 on the pulpit

Using the Archos 5 is simple but the device is limited. Sound quality is excellent if the person is standing nearby the microphone. I think I can do better.

Zoom H1 and mixer

The sound system at Christian Heights has three microphones, one for each podium and a wireless mic that the pastor wears. This adds up to much better coverage for everyone who might speak during the service.  Download both audio samples here: Archos Sample – Zoom Sample

Both files have been normalized and compressed in the same manner. When I listen to both files I notice that the Archos has more room noise. Mostly due to it sitting on the main podium while the man in the recording is standing at the other one. I am satisfied with how the Zoom H1 performed. Next week, I will make some adjustments and this will become the primary means of recording.

My first impressions based on examining the contents of the box are that ZOOM/Samson is playing a dirty trick on their customers. The box contains three items: the H1 recorder, one AA battery, and a 2 GB SD card. However, the package does not include a USB cable to transfer the audio files to a computer. The cable is included in an accessory package sold separately.

The missing cable is not a huge problem because I already had a USB cable that fit. Be warned!

The digital recorder I ordered should be here Monday or Tuesday.

Can’t wait to plug it in next Sunday.

Spam: Prisoner of the Mafia

Some spam comments are just gibberish, others attempt to flatter me with generic praise. On Sunday, I received a unique comment via the church blog begging me not to ignore it.

HELP! I’m currently being held prisoner by the Russian mafia xyzrxyz [deleted] enlargement xyzrxyz and being forced to post spam comments on blogs and forum! If you don’t approve this they will kill me. xyzrxyz [deleted] enlargement xyzrxyz They’re  coming back now. xyzrxyz [deleted] xyzrxyz Please send help!

Nice try. Still didn’t get past the spam filter though. When the Russians do show up this is the song you should sing as your being dragged away.