Yes, my site was down for a day and a half.
That can happen when your webserver host Dotster catches fire and loses power and well let’s just say I have had better weeks.
Any-who it is nice to be back and online yet again. So who can I terrorize?
Andrew B. King ~ Website Optimization
From: O’Reilly
I have heard many murmurs lately about Ellora’s Cave and their persistent reintroduction of their new website http://www.jasminejade.com/ which people have complained is slower than molasses in winter. The Ellora’s Cave crew counters that that is a false perception and those web servers are faster, stronger, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. All to which I say… I don’t care if you have the best heavy metal on the planet if your web app is shit it will continue to run like shit. You cannot polish a turd by flinging it faster.
First off this issue is not about perceptions. Perceptions tend to be baseless or we would not have sayings like Don’t Judge A Book By It’s Cover and I would not constantly have to tell people to look up the Google start page to check and see if my websites really are that slow or if the customer has a slow connection or computer. This is about response times and download speeds and despite what you may have heard those events are fully measurable in the real world. If they can be measured then things can be proven so let me show you how.
I will randomly pick a site that measures these things for free that anyone can use…
Web Page Analyzer so there you go everyone can check my findings.
Now let’s take a site I believe we all think is pretty slick and quick for an ePublisher.
http://samhainpublishing.com/
Total size of the Samhain front page is 126291 bytes which means that is how much data has to be downloaded by your browser to see it. Notice how they are keeping close to 100K there? That is prudent, not as necessary these days as much but a good basic principal.
Those of us using a 128K broadband internet connection will see this site in 12.51 seconds which is cool because I have always been told 10 seconds for a web page is the sweet spot for doing business. While those poor folks stuck for whatever reason using 56K modems will see Samhain in 29.97 seconds. Luckily not many people use 56K anymore but it is good to keep in mind.
The total number of objects on this page is 24 with an optimum web page number of 20 recommended and of those objects the total number of images is 17. Good job guys not bad at all.
http://www.loose-id.com/
Total size of the Loose Id front page is 260259 bytes which means that is how much data has to be downloaded by your browser to see it.
Those of us using a 128K broadband internet connection will see this site in 19.69 seconds which is a little slow but not bad. While those poor folks stuck for whatever reason using 56K modems will see Loose Id in 55.67 seconds. So if you are stuck using 56K it will literally take a minute to get their web page. Not too bad.
The total number of objects on this page is 19 and 15 of those are images which is a smidgen better than Samhain even so while Loose Id’s timings are not spectacular they are still doable.
Just keep in mind all ePublishers are trying to show their covers so image use will be important to them. One suggestion I can make is try .png instead of .jpg although I like .jpg for quality purposes but this is just a try it in a dev environment and see if it helps type suggestion.
I know you are waiting for the old Ellora’s Cave website…
http://ellorascave.com/
Total size of the old Ellora’s Cave front page is 578979 bytes which is freaking double Loose Id’s size folks. Not good!
Those of us using a 128K broadband internet connection will see the old Ellora’s Cave web site in 44.47 seconds which is slow it just is. While those poor folks stuck for whatever reason using 56K modems get ready to settle in for a whole 122.55 seconds. So if you are stuck using 56K it will literally take around two minutes to get their web page!
The total number of objects on this page is 51 and 49 of those are images which is sad. Talk about trying to do too much!
So the new Ellora’s Cave web site has to be better than this right?
http://www.jasminejade.com/
Total size of the new Ellora’s Cave front page is 570757 bytes which is a slight bit less than the old site but not by that much.
Those of us using a 128K broadband internet connection will see the new Ellora’s Cave web site in 52.44 seconds… WTF! That’s close to a minute on broadband! While those poor folks stuck for whatever reason using 56K modems get ready to settle in for a whole 131.35 seconds. So if you are stuck using 56K it will literally now take over two minutes to get their web page!
The total number of objects on this page is 88 and 85 of those are images which is Craptastic! You FAIL!
So NO, Ellora’s Cave and their developers are NOT making things better, they are actually making things worse and it is fully provable so there is no room to argue. It is as bad as it is and it is too bad they can’t seem to check their own work.
Tags: ePublisher, Web DesignTags: ePublisher, Web Design
Jill N. Noble wrote,
Grrr. You just had to bring this up, huh? Here’s the message I get when I enter our URL:
The size of this web page (3039314 bytes) has exceeded the maximum size of 3000000 bytes.
I take it that’s *not* good. I’ve never had any complaints from customers, but maybe we should take a second look at our design?
Link | July 4th, 2009 at 10:40 am
K. Z. Snow wrote,
First, Teddy, thanks for explaining why you were inaccessible yesterday. (I never know if it’s my backwater server or IE or what.) And BIG thanks for the link to the Web Page Analyzer and your own analysis of the data. Very, very enlightening!
Link | July 4th, 2009 at 11:10 am
TeddyPig wrote,
Oh my Jill
Um no, not good.
OK web basics…
Always think about what you want to do on the front page and do only that.
Then think about the other pages you want and have them do only those tasks.
Keep it simple stupid.
For an ePublisher in my opinion that front page should be-
Simple and easily understood controls to access the major parts of the site on the left hand. Genres you are selling, your author list, defined pages on your site that do defined things,
Prominent and eye catching identification of the ePublisher at the top.
Important but informative and very brief news links for customers on the right.
Your latest offerings for sale smack dab in the middle.
At the bottom as long as the front page is small then have contact links and maybe search functions.
See where I am going? Move the higher amount of information off the page and sort it into it’s own pages. Each book should have it own page providing details and excerpts etc. Each author should have their own page listing their books and series etc. Each sub genre should have it’s own page listing the books that fit there. Each news item should have it’s own page providing details. Now find a simple way to present these links on the front page.
Now you have to take all that stuff and as simply as possible balance it by making it pretty and download ASAP and present it in as close to ten seconds as possible.
Perfect this and you will be rocking in the real world.
Link | July 4th, 2009 at 11:25 am
AnneD wrote,
Interesting website – especially the warnings/congratulations on the bottom that direct you to exact problem areas.
Looks like I need to go figure out what they mean by HTML/CSS/JAva compression.
Link | July 4th, 2009 at 2:26 pm
Teddypig wrote,
Well if you are using blog software it gets tricky to do all that.
My rules for that is to keep the number of posts showing on the front page down and get rid of too many of those stupid Twitter and visitor location toys to one or two.
Anything that uses scripts or dances around flashing book covers at you will mess things up for visitors even on broadband. Stop the madness and get back to blogging.
Link | July 4th, 2009 at 2:53 pm
Mike Feury wrote,
Good article Teddy.
FYI the fire that knocked you out also knocked out (one of?) the largest payment processors on the web, Authorize.net. Thousands of web merchants lost the ability to automatically take credit card orders. Some local Seattle TV and radio stations also got hit.
No consolation, I’m sure, but it was a freak event with much worse consequences than usual.
Link | July 4th, 2009 at 3:55 pm
Angelia Sparrow wrote,
I do not GET the Jasmine Jade change over.
You type in darkroastpress, you get Dark Roast. You type in ApexBookStore and you get Apex. You type in ellorascave.com and you get the website. This is logic.
Who is going to think “Ellora’s Cave, oh I’d better type in something COMPLETELY UNRELATED IN ANY WAY!” hm?
Link | July 4th, 2009 at 4:34 pm
TeddyPig wrote,
A major processor with only a localized network and no geographical BCP????
Good god I would never work for them that is insane!
Single point of FAIL!
I mean this is my blog! I don’t run a bank application from this server nor would I ever seeing how many random daytime outages I have had.
Link | July 4th, 2009 at 4:43 pm
TeddyPig wrote,
Angelia,
They could switch the url over to this new site and make it THE Ellora’s Cave website they have done this before. What I am showing is the slow speeds are real (There are detailed computer books I have read out there describing every problem they are having and the reasons for it.) and those slow speeds will still be a problem causing the same complaints from their customers unless they stop arguing and fix it.
Link | July 4th, 2009 at 5:27 pm
Treva Harte wrote,
Welcome back, Mr. Pig.
Link | July 4th, 2009 at 5:51 pm