Newsletter improvement IMMEDIATE: up the delivery rates

[ed]

newsletter editor is unhappy with simplenews delivery rates - we need to get it out much much faster - starting thursday 27/05/10

[jim]

Cron is still only getting called once an hour - this is the first port of call in speeding up SimpleNews?.

Secondly, the server is too slow to send out more than about 100 newsletters per cron run - upping the PHP max timeout would extend this

Thirdly, SimpleNews?'s effectiveness is in doubt! Please see: #58 'Simple news: add tracking and bounce handling facilities'

[chris]

Things that have been changed:

• The cron job now runs every 5mins this is the cron job: */5 * * * * /usr/local/sbin/ab -v 4 -n 1 http://www.transitionnetwork.org/cron.php
• Access to ​http://www.transitionnetwork.org/cron.php is restricted to access from the server itself, this is the URL that the cron job uses
• Access to ​https://www.transitionnetwork.org/cron.php is restricted via HTAuthentication, using the same username and password as the uploads on Atrium, email me if you need it -- this can be used to run the cron jobs manually

[chris]

Oh also in /web/system.phpini/transitionnetwork.org/php.ini I have changed this: default_socket_timeout = 360

It was set to 60 seconds.

Is this OK?

[jim]

Thanks Chris... Confirmed: cron is now running every 5 minutes.

I've upped SimpleNews?' throttle to 200/cron run so (can be made higher if needed later now the max execution time is higher):

• 7,000 newsletters/200 per cron = 35 crons
• 35 crons / 12 per hour (60/5) = 2 hours 55 to send all newsletters...

Ed: is all newsletters being sent in under 3 hours ok??

Chris: can you confirm max_execution_time in php.ini is also 360?

[chris]

max_execution_time in php.ini is also now set to 360

[ed]

just to double check - no-one is going to have to press a button a lot are they?

[jim]

No, that's the point of cron - we're using its finger...

[ed]

damn fine work chaps. tally ho.