[chrishajer]

I think it’s cool that the index and the mini-plugin can improve on bbPress, but “severe performance issues” to me is not going from 0.0920 to 0.0005 seconds. That’s from 1/10 of a second to nearly nothing. But 1/10 second was “severe performance issues”?

Or, does this query from _ck_ just show a way to measure the improvement, where in actual usage, someone with 10K topics or 42K topics would see a performance hit (delay) much different than the test query that _ck_ posted. I’m all for improving what can be improved, but there are much larger issues to worry about than something that is taking 1/10th of a second. With bandwidth and browsers being what they are, the page isn’t going to load that quickly anyway, and adding 1/10 of a second to the processing time is not going to be noticeable to me.

[_ck_]

Very nice. So it’s definitely proven to be way faster.

But another question is, how much space does a non-unique index on 42,000 rows take?

[Sam Bauers]

Here’s the result on WordPress.com’s English support forum:

41,990 total rows



Showing rows 0 - 24 (25 total, Query took 0.0024 sec)

Showing rows 0 - 24 (25 total, Query took 0.0024 sec)

Showing rows 0 - 24 (25 total, Query took 0.0024 sec)

Showing rows 0 - 24 (25 total, Query took 0.0024 sec)

Showing rows 0 - 24 (25 total, Query took 0.0024 sec)



Showing rows 0 - 24 (25 total, Query took 0.2102 sec)

Showing rows 0 - 24 (25 total, Query took 0.2062 sec)

Showing rows 0 - 24 (25 total, Query took 0.2037 sec)

Showing rows 0 - 24 (25 total, Query took 0.2031 sec)

Showing rows 0 - 24 (25 total, Query took 0.2060 sec)

[_ck_]

I bet it only doubles the performance when it can sort in memory. Once it spills into a temporary disk sort, then you start seeing a more radical increase in performance between the forced index and not.

I should also point out the mini-plugin (and index) will also help on any forum/sub-forum page in addition to the front-page. So all that extra index storage is at least multi-purpose.

One way to boost this even further would be to ORDER BY the topic_last_post_id and then use the last_post_id as a UNIQUE index (key) since no two posts can have the same post_id (and no two topics can have the same last post_id). topic_time is not unique at all so it takes a tad longer for mysql to sort/larger index.

[chrishajer]

With 615 topics, .0095 vs .0044 (~twice as fast). This is MySQL 4.0.27.

[_ck_]

Wow that is very significant, thanks for sharing that!

[johnhiler]

I added the index and installed the plugin (my bb_topics has 11,826 records).

The first query took 0.0005 sec. The second one took 0.0920 sec. That’s 184 times faster!

[_ck_]

One possible way to benchmark the performance is to run these two queries in phpmyadmin (via SQL tab)

SELECT SQL_NO_CACHE t.* FROM bb_topics AS t   USE INDEX(topic_time)  WHERE t.topic_status = '0' AND t.topic_sticky != '2'   ORDER BY t.topic_time DESC LIMIT 25

vs.

SELECT SQL_NO_CACHE t.* FROM bb_topics AS t  WHERE t.topic_status = '0' AND t.topic_sticky != '2'   ORDER BY t.topic_time DESC LIMIT 25

On my setup the one with the forced index takes half the time of the one without, however we are talking 0.0026 sec vs 0.0013 sec so that is almost meaningless. What we need is someone with 10,000 topics and then you’ll know for certain.

[chrishajer]

So long as it doesn’t kill anything (error out), I’m fine with installing it. I can wait for the performance improvements (if there will be any.) My forum has only 600 or so topics right now.

[_ck_]

Should work on both 0.9 and trunk.

Seems fine on my 0.9 and trunk.

Unfortunately I have too few topics to benchmark any significant performance increase since this is only helpful to more active forums (ie. > 1000 topics)

[chrishajer]

What versions will that work on, _ck_?

[_ck_]

Not extensively tested but this will do it without a core hack

(once ALTER TABLE bb_topics ADD INDEX (topic_time) is done)

<?php

/*

Plugin Name: Topic Time Index

*/

add_filter('get_latest_topics_join','topic_time_index',99999);

function topic_time_index($join) {return " $join USE INDEX(topic_time) ";}

?>

[John James Jacoby]

Seems maybe the core should be updated to work around this eh?

[_ck_]

This is the SQL query to use if others want to add such an index:

ALTER TABLE bb_topics ADD INDEX (topic_time)

But that in itself is not enough, bbPress has to be forced to use the index.

I am trying to figure out a way to do this without hacking the core, via a mini-plugin instead.

[_ck_]

That’s funny I was just about to make a TRAC ticket pointing out there is no index on topic_time for the latest view.

Strange you have to force the index though, what is the default ORDER BY, let me go look…

yup, they order by topic_time, with no index, that’s just crazy, even for just 1000 topics, because it would have to do a full column scan. Ordering by topic_last_post_id would be even faster with an index too though I guess in a very strange circumstance the last post might not be the last time.

Still, you should not have to force the index.

Oh wait, I see why – it’s because mysql decides to use the stickies key instead, ugh.

Yeah I can see why that would bring a large forum to a crawl.

I think whomever designed the bbPress database tables had a misunderstanding how mysql indexes work because they are using multiple field indexes that are not the primary key. Or a key at all. Which is useless because mysql will only use one index per query regardless of it’s complexity (or lack of). An index on multiple fields is useless unless it’s used as a key. MySQL 5 can use different indexes for the query vs ORDER BY or GROUP BY but bbPress doesn’t take advantage of that at all.

[anotherdan]

I have just re-launched a site containing about 43000 topics and over 300000 posts…

I had severe performance issues on all sites using the get_latest_topics functionality (the frontpage was severe because it is using more than once in my custom theme).

Because of the “index” design it file-sorting because it’s sorting on topic_time and is mysql is hitting the stickies index.

The solution was to create a new index only with the topic_time field in it. However I was unable to force this index in the query without touching the core files.

This is what i did:

Could there be a filter there so I could move this out into a plugin?

BB_Query::generate_topic_sql function:

$index_append = '';

switch ($this->query_id) {

case 'get_latest_topics':

$index_append = ' FORCE INDEX (topics_time_order) ';

break;

}



$this->request = $this->_filter_sql( $bits, "$bbdb->topics AS t $index_append" );

I guess I will find more places where I could do some index optimization that fit’s my install… I can’t be the first running into this issue?

[grassrootspa]

Been really excited about BBpress 1 and was planning on incorporating it into my WordPress site when it finished Alpha testing.

Anyone have any clue how IntenseDebate (via WordPress plugin) interacts with BBpress 1? Anyone have problems?

Obviously with Automatic behind both I’m sure its only a matter of time before BBpress, IntenseDebate and WordPress go together like Peanut butter, Jelly, and bread.

[sbouazza]

Hello,

I’ve finished the front-page styling for my future French SEO forum, here’s a screenshot ( the forum itself is not yet online, so I can show you only a screenshot sorry ) : http://img55.imageshack.us/img55/7527/forumscreenshotyb4.png .

And here’s the same design rendered using Lynx ( I use it to test accessibility, even if it isn’t the “perfect” accessibility checker ) : http://img98.imageshack.us/img98/3513/forumscreenshotlynxzc6.png .

What do you think ? It is good or bad ?

[JesperA]

Hi!

I want to use a couple of WordPress function so i tried to include wp_blog_header in bb_config like this:

“require_once(‘../wp-blog-header.php’);”

This works well if i am in the forum section but as soon as i go into bb-admin i get the terrible feared:

Warning: require_once(/wp-blog-header.php) [function.require-once]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in C:wampspeedrevisionforumbb-config.php on line 49

Fatal error: require_once() [function.require]: Failed opening required ‘/wp-blog-header.php’ (include_path=’.;C:php5pear’) in C:wampspeedrevisionforumbb-config.php on line 49

This worked great in 0.9.0.3 but in the latest unstable version 1 A4 it does this, why?

And why does it say that a forum is locked when i am trying to make a post?

Would really appreciate some help

[chrishajer]

I just watched the basic integration screencast and tried integration again. I ran into some of the same problems mentioned above so I did a little testing.

1. Sam, thanks for the screencast.

2. Using a subdirectory of forums, and then making a WordPress Page called “Forums” with a slug of “forums” works just fine. The page will show up in your WordPress page menu like any other Page, but the real ‘forums’ subdirectory you installed bbPress into is what is displayed to visitors, NOT the content of the WordPress Page called “Forums.” I used to install a redirect plugin at WordPress to redirect the “Forums” Page to the http://example.com/forums/ real subdirectory, but I guess this works just fine like this. Good to know.

3. When using PHP4 (4.4.9) I encountered the “Forum could not be created!” error mentioned above. I thought it was possibly the MySQL version (which was 4.0.27 I believe) but it turned out that by using PHP5 (5.2.6) it installed fine, into the same database. I added this to my .htaccess file in the site root (for WordPress and bbPress):

AddType x-mapp-php5 .php

That forced .php files to be processed as PHP5. I did that before installing WordPress. I confirmed with phpinfo that PHP5 was being used for both the blog and the forum. The 2nd time through (actually, the 3rd time, but that’s a different story), using PHP5, the forum was created properly.

After that, following the screencast pretty closely resulted in an installation where I can log in as Admin (key master) at either bbPress or WordPress, and I am logged in on the other side, as expected. Logging out of one logs me out of both. It’s what I expect user integration to be.

Waiting for the next screencast, Sam. Thanks.

p.s. Did I miss it, or is the NONCE key for bbPress never set in the video? I have one in wp-config.php, since the keys were generated by the WordPress.org API, but did I miss setting that in bbPress? Should I just make it the same as it is in bbPress? Will not having it prevent me from administering the forum or something? I didn’t test any functionality of the forum, just the logins.

[Ganzuelo]

I had the stable version 9.03? And I thought it was integrated with my word press. I then went to do the upgrade to the latest version and the Admin area was all screwy. I have the day off so I decided uh I can just start over, deleted word press, deleted bbpress I got wordpress back and now I cant get bbpress going.. i use vista Firefox and I am getting a loop redirect error and I cant get by it

[Malice]

Yea I have a similar problem. A sticky in a subforum (not sticky to front) makes the topic disappear from the subforum. It does still show up in the latest discussion on the frontpage. Can’t sticky posts in individual subforums though.

Forum

I use several plugins, all activated:

BBcode Buttons Toolbar 0.0.8

BBcode Lite 1.0.3

BBPress Private Messaging 0.80

bbPress signatures 0.1.9

bbPress Smilies 0.0.5

bb Topic Views 1.6.3

Bozo Users 1.0

Google Analitycs 0.1

Human Test for bbPress 0.8.2

Instant Password 0.0.4

New User Notification Email 0.0.2

Post Count Plus – Dynamic.Titles & More! 1.1.6

Quote 0.2

Subscribe to Topic 0.0.1

Unread Posts 0.9.3

[walkerevans]

I was just thinking the same thing. I’ve run a few tests and it doesn’t appear to search tags or headlines.

If anyone knows a fix it would be great to hear one!

[_ck_]

Untested. Actually the forum is deleting some of the code so use it from here:

http://pastebin.com/f54a958de

<?php

/*

Plugin Name: Wiki Link

*/

add_action('post_text','wiki_link',200);

function wiki_link($text) {

$url="http://example.com/path_to_wiki?terms=";

$text=preg_replace("/([[(.+?)]])/si","<a class='wiki_link' href='$url$2'>$2</a>",$text);

return $text;

}

?>

the above is missing two $2, should look like

<a class='wiki_link' href='$url$2'>$2</a>

[chrishajer]

You could switch the display to list the forums up top and the latest posts on bottom. Just edit your front-page.php template file and move things around where it’s best for your users.